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CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
This application is a Continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/572,592, filed Aug. 10, 2012, which are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety.
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to integrated circuits, more particularly integrated circuits comprising multiple processing cores.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Integrated circuits (IC) typically include numerous passive and active components manufactured on a substrate material. Conventional ICs may include hundreds, thousands, millions or more semiconductor devices. As semiconductor technology has progressed, ICs have provided ever increasing performance. Furthermore, as semiconductor technology has progressed, it has generally been possible to decrease power consumption for the same level of performance. However, the increase in performance generally causes the power consumption in the IC to increase faster than technological improvements in decreasing power consumption. In addition, ICs may only operate at maximum performance a fraction of the time.
A number of techniques have been developed to increase performance and reduce power consumption. For example, sleep and standby modes, multithreading, multi-core and other techniques are currently employed to increase performance and/or decrease power consumption. Generally, techniques for reducing power or increasing performance are particularly suited for a given processing task. Therefore, one of the biggest challenges in designing high performance IC, such as microprocessors, is trading off high performance and low power operations required for different tasks. Low power consumption can be partially important in the case of portable devices with a finite amount of power provided by its battery. By reducing the power consumption of such devices, it is possible to extend the battery lifetime of the device.
Accordingly, there is a need to improve the trade off between high performance and low power operations of ICs.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
According to a first aspect of the disclosure there is provided an integrated circuit comprising: a first core circuit configured to operate at a first clock rate for carrying out a first range of tasks; and a second core circuit configured to operate in a first mode and a second mode, the second core circuit being configured to operate at a second clock rate for carrying out a second range of tasks in the second mode and being configured to operate in the second mode when the first core circuit carries out the first range of tasks, the second clock rate being greater than the first clock rate.
Suitably, the second core being idle or off in the first mode.
Suitably, the second core operating in the first mode when the integrated circuit carries out a task in the first range of tasks and the second core operating in the second mode when the integrated circuit carries out a task in the first range of tasks and, in parallel, a task in the second range of tasks.
Suitably, when the second core operates in the second mode, the integrated circuit being capable of carrying out a task in the first range of tasks and a task in the second range of tasks at the same time.
Suitably, the first range of tasks having a first range of performance parameters and the second range of tasks having a second range of performance parameters, the performance parameter being a workload, the workloads of the second range of tasks being greater than the workloads of the first range of tasks.
Suitably, the mode of operation of the second core being dependent on instructions sent by the first core.
Suitably, the clock rate of the first core being between 32 kHz and 16 MHz.
Suitably, the clock rate of the second core being between 8 MHz and 64 MHz.
Suitably, the first clock rate being variable between a first range of clock rates.
Suitably, the first clock rate being selected from the first range of clock rates in dependence on a performance parameter of a task, the task being comprised in the first range of tasks.
Suitably, the first range of tasks having a first range of performance parameters and the second range of tasks having a second range of performance parameters, the first core being capable of carrying out a task in the first range of tasks and, at the same time, the second core being capable of carrying out a task in the second range of tasks, the first clock rate being dependent on the performance parameter of the said task being carried out.
Suitably, the clock rate of the first core being variable between 32 kHz and 16 MHz.
Suitably, the clock rate of the second core being between 8 MHz and 64 MHz.
Suitably, the IC further comprises a core controller for controlling the mode of the second core, the core controller determining a performance parameter and causing the second core to operate in the first mode when the performance parameter is in a first performance range and causing the second core to operate in the second mode when the performance parameter is in a second range.
Suitably, the second core having a third clock rate in the first mode, the third clock rate being less than or equal to the first clock rate.
According to a second aspect of the disclosure there is provided a device comprising the integrated circuit described above, the first range of tasks including scanning for a user input at said device and scanning for data sent to said device.
According to a third aspect of the disclosure there is provided a Bluetooth Low energy chip comprising the integrated circuit described above.
According to a fourth aspect of the disclosure there is provided a method for processing at an integrated circuit, the integrated circuit comprising a first core circuit and a second core circuit, the second core circuit being configured to operate in a first mode and a second mode, the method comprising: at the first core circuit, operating at a first clock rate for carrying out a first range of tasks; and at the second core circuit, operating at a second clock rate for carrying out a second range of tasks in the second mode when the first core circuit carries out the first range of tasks, the second clock rate being greater than the first clock rate.
Suitably, the method further comprises: determining a performance parameter for a first task of the first range of tasks and a performance parameter for a second task of the second range of tasks; if the performance parameter of the first task is below a performance threshold and the performance parameter of the second task is above the performance threshold, then: at the first core circuit, carrying out the first task; and at the second core circuit, carrying out the second task, the first and second cores carrying out their respective tasks at the same time.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The following disclosure will now be described by way of example with reference to the accompanying drawings. In the drawings:
FIG. 1 illustrates an IC; and
FIG. 2 shows an example of a process carried out by the IC.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
Examples of the type of devices that require low power consumption may be wireless keyboards and mice, wireless microphones, and other wireless devices. Such devices may wirelessly communicate with other devices using a communications protocol. An example of a suitable communications protocol that provides for low power consumption may be Bluetooth Low Energy (BLE), which is defined in the Bluetooth Specification v4.0. These devices may be operable using a chip that comprises BLE circuitry (that enables BLE communication) and an IC, for example, a processor that enables the chip to carry out certain tasks. In some situations, the resulting output from processing these tasks may be communicated wirelessly via the BLE circuitry. In some other situations, the processor may perform certain tasks that do not require the resulting data to be communicated via the BLE circuitry.
FIG. 1 shows an IC 10 that includes a first core 11 and a second core 12 . The IC 10 may comprise a memory block 13 that can be shared between the first core 11 and the second core 12 . The cores 11 and 12 may be independently and dynamically operable and asymmetric. The cores 11 and 12 can process data to carry out tasks or execute instructions. For example, one such task may be a background task such as scanning for an input (e.g. for a keyboard, scanning for a key to be pressed by a user). Another task may be an active task such as acquiring data to be sent via BLE (e.g. for a keyboard, acquiring and encoding the data resulting from keys being pressed by a user). The tasks required to be performed by the IC may vary in the amount of processing power required to execute each task. For example, the scanning for an input may require less processing power than the encoding of data to be sent via BLE.
The first core 11 may have less processing power than the second core 12 . For example, the clock rate of the first core 11 may be less than the clock rate of the second core 12 . This allows the first core 11 to operate with a lower power consumption than the second core 12 . For tasks that require low processing power, the first core 11 may be utilised, while the second core 12 is idled by turning it off. The second core 12 may be idled by turning off the power rail of the core, internally gating the power rail, back biasing the substrate of the core, gating the clock of the core, or the like. The second core 12 may have a separate power and clock domain, so that it is independently controllable from the first core 11 . This allows the second core 12 to be completely powered off when it is not in use, which helps to save power. This provides a power saving as the higher power second core 12 is not constantly running and only running when required. A power saving can be achieved as the second core 12 may not process tasks that require low processing power. These low processing power tasks are processed by the first core 11 , which uses less power than the second core 12 .
While a chip or device comprising the IC is switched on, the first core 11 may constantly be on and running. The IC may be required to perform certain tasks, and each task may require a different amount of processing power. The first core 11 may be capable of providing processing power up to a certain performance threshold. Any tasks received by the IC below the performance threshold may be carried out by the first core 11 alone, allowing the second core 12 to be idled. If the IC receives a task above the performance threshold, the second core 12 is turned on and the task is carried out by the second core 12 . Once that task is complete, the second core 12 may be idled again. The first core 11 may have its own memory space and it thus not reliant on the second core 12 being powered for it to run.
Irrespective of the status of the second core 12 (either switched on or switched off), the first core 11 remains on. This provides a number of advantages, such as:
Parallel processing. By having both cores 11 and 12 operating at the same time, two processing tasks can be carried out at the same time. The first core 11 is able to carry out any task below the performance threshold while the second core 12 is able to carry out tasks above the performance threshold. This provides the IC with a greater total processing capability and allows different types of tasks of different workloads to be carried out in parallel. Shorter switching delay. The first core 11 is not turned off when the second core 12 is active, thus when the second core 12 is turned off, there is no need to turn on the first core 11 as it is already on. Powering up takes time as voltage rails and clocks of a core that is being switched on takes some time to stabilise. Thus by leaving the first core 11 on, the delay in switching processing from the second core to the first core is reduced. Power saving. If the first core 11 was switched off when the second core 12 is on and the workload of some tasks vary slightly above and below the performance threshold, then this would result in poor performance and increased power consumption due to the frequent switching between the cores. By allowing the first core 11 to remain on, the first core 11 is not frequently switched on and off, thereby reducing the effects of poor performance and increased power consumption.
The IC may determine the workload associated with each task and if that workload is above a certain performance threshold, the IC can cause the second core 12 to be switched on. For example, the first core 11 can collate data (such a task having a low workload) and when that data is required to be processed and sent via BLE (such a task having a high workload), the first core 11 can wake up the second core 12 . The first core 11 can continue to collate the data for processing at the second core 12 (i.e. the first core 11 and the second core 12 can carry out their respective tasks at the same time). The first and second cores 11 and 12 can have a section of shared memory 13 to enable data to be transferred between the cores. One way the workload can be defined is by the amount of data that is required to be processed by a certain amount of time.
The IC may cause the second core to be turned on depending on an operating mode of a device comprising the IC. For example, the device may be in a “sleep” or “background” mode in which there is a low workload. When the device changes to an “active” mode in which there is a higher workload, the second core 12 may be “woken up” to process the higher workload. In an example, a wireless keyboard in a sleep mode (i.e. not being used) waits for a user to press a key by scanning the keys in the background. This key scanning requires a low workload and can be carried out by the first core 11 . The key scanning processed by the first core 11 can detect when a user presses a key. This can then cause the keyboard to change to an “active” mode and cause the second core 12 to be turned on. The second core 12 can then acquire and process the data arising from the keyboard being used (which has a higher workload than key scanning) Thus, the turning on of the second core 12 can be dependent on the processing carried out by the first core 11 .
The first core 11 may have a low clock rate. The clock rate of the first core 11 may be a rate between 32 kHz and 16 MHz. Preferably, the rate is 32 kHz. This allows the first core to be very power efficient and provides enough processing power for certain low workload tasks (for example, such as, scanning for data input).
The clock rate of the first core 11 may be fixed (i.e. non-adjustable) or variable (i.e. adjustable). The first core 11 can be run at different clock speeds to enable it to be at its lowest power for the task in hand. Switching the clock speed of the first core 11 can be done on the fly and does not corrupt the clock of the IC. A first core 11 with a variable clock rate may be capable of adjusting its clock rate between 32 kHz and 16 MHz. By providing an adjustable clock rate, the first core 11 is capable of processing tasks with a greater range of workloads. For example, if a task with a workload just above the performance threshold is to be processed in an IC with a non-adjustable clock rate, the second core 12 would need to be switched on. However, if the clock rate is adjustable, then the clock rate of the first core 11 may be adjusted such that the first core is capable of processing that workload without having to turn on the second core 12 . This can help negate the frequent switching problems mentioned above. Furthermore, the variable rate clock rate of the first core 11 allows the IC to select a clock rate that enables the processing to be done on the first core at its lowest power.
The second core 12 may have a high clock rate. This clock rate may be a rate between 8 MHz and 64 MHz. This higher clock rate allows the IC to process data more quickly.
The IC may comprise a controller which determines when to turn the second core 12 on and off. The controller can determine the workload of the IC and if that workload is above a certain performance threshold, then it can turn the second core 12 on. If that workload falls below the performance threshold, the controller can turn the second core off.
Rather than idling the second core 12 when there are no high workload tasks (i.e. tasks above the performance threshold), the clock rate of the second core 12 may be lowered. This can help save power and partially negate some of the abovementioned issues regarding frequently turning the core on and off. The clock rate may be lowered to the same rate as the first core 11 . This can allow parallel processing of low workload tasks, which can be useful in dual functionality devices (e.g. scanning for inputs from a keyboard with an integrated mouse). The clock rate of the second core may be lowered to be less than that of the first core, thus bringing added power saving benefits.
FIG. 2 diagrammatically shows an exemplary process that can be carried out by the IC for processing a task.
At step 21 , a task is received. At step 22 , it is determined if that task is above a performance threshold. If the task is not above the performance threshold, the process moves on to step 23 . If the task is above the performance threshold, the process moves on to step 24 . At step 23 , the first core processes the task and then the process ends. At step 24 , the second core is turned on. At step 25 , the second core processes the task. At step 26 , when the processing of the task has been completed, the second core is turned off and then the process ends. During steps 24 to 26 , the IC may receive another task that is not above the performance threshold and performs steps 21 to 23 for the other task at the same time as steps 24 to 27 .
The applicant draws attention to the fact that the present invention may include any feature or combination of features disclosed herein either implicitly or explicitly or any generalisation thereof, without limitation to the scope of any of the present claims. In view of the foregoing description it will be evident to a person skilled in the art that various modifications may be made within the spirit and scope of the invention.
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An integrated circuit comprising: a first core circuit configured to operate at a first clock rate for carrying out a first range of tasks; and a second core circuit configured to operate in a first mode and a second mode, the second core circuit being configured to operate at a second clock rate for carrying out a second range of tasks in the second mode and being configured to operate in the second mode when the first core circuit carries out the first range of tasks, the second clock rate being greater than the first clock rate.
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CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION
[0001] The present application claims priority to, and incorporates by reference, U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 60/987,802 filed Nov. 14, 2008 entitled SOCCER TRAINING AND MOTIVATIONAL PROGRAM.
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
[0002] The present invention relates to a method for use in improving the technical skills and motivation of sports participants, and in particular those participating in the sport of soccer.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0003] In soccer, as in most sports, a great deal of attention is paid to the development and motivation of the athletes playing the sport. This is especially true at early stages of development. All sports take time to learn and this is clearly true for children. While children can discover the natural fan in nearly any sport, they also are quickly frustrated when they are unable to advance at a sufficient pace and/or play the game at the level of their sport heroes and idols. When children first begin to learn a sport, they simply do not understand, and are generally not ready for, the level of commitment and practice required to reach their maximum potential in a sport.
[0004] Thus, a problem exists in bridging the gap between a child's natural enthusiasm and the time it takes to develop the necessary skills to engage in sport at a high level.
[0005] Many devices exist to bridge this gap, which are generally designed to make the sport fun as well as teaching the skills necessary to excel. Primarily, in this regard, there exists many skill training devices which are designed to develop the ability and skills of the participants, and particularly the skills of younger participants. These devices tend to isolate a particular skill used in a sport for focused development. Hopefully, especially in the case of younger participants, these devices are fun which helps keep the interest level high.
[0006] Another important aspect of successful development of athletes is motivation. It is not enough to merely develop skills. There must be a certain level of focused drive and inspiration for an athlete to truly exceed at the highest possible level. Thus, a successful program for the development of sport participants should not ignore the importance of motivation in the success of athletes.
[0007] Typically, there is little attention paid to both aspects of development, more commonly the focus is on one aspect or the other. Thus, a need exists for a total system for the development of both the skill and the motivation of athletes and especially of younger athletes.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0008] An object of the present invention is to provide a program for skills develop and motivation.
[0009] These and other objects of the present invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon reference to the following specification, drawings, and claims.
[0010] The present invention intends to overcome the difficulties encountered heretofore. To that end, a method of promoting development and motivation in a field of achievement is provided, comprising isolating a task for development, prescribing a level of achievement related to the task, measuring the level of achievement, and awarding the achievement of the task with a tangible indicia of achievement.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0011] FIG. 1 depicts a character based skillzy.
[0012] FIG. 2 depicts a task based skillzy.
[0013] FIG. 3 depicts a team based skillzy.
[0014] FIG. 4 depicts a skills based skillzy.
[0015] FIG. 5 depicts a skills based skillzy.
[0016] FIG. 6 depicts a skills based skillzy.
[0017] FIG. 7 depicts a skills based skillzy.
[0018] FIG. 8 depicts a skills based skillzy.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
[0019] The present invention relates to skill development and the motivational aspects of a sport, and in particular the sport of Soccer. As mentioned above, it is not enough to simply develop skills in order to maximize the effectiveness of a player in a sport. A certain amount of motivation or encouragement needs to be imparted as well. This can be accomplished through the use of a one or more skillzys. A skillzy is a task, responsibility, undertaking, trait, or characteristic which is designed and developed to award, and therefore motivate, particular achievement in a sport or activity. In particular, the task can be broken down into a series of steps toward accomplishing the specific goal, with a separate skillzy awarded for each step toward the overall goal to be accomplished. In this regard, the skillzy represents a progressive system of achievement and motivation, and the depiction of each of the individual skillzys below is an example of one skillzy in the series wherein each skillzy breaks the task down into parts and awards the accomplishment of each step as motivation to accomplish the final goal.
[0020] As shown in FIG. 1 , the skillzys can be physically represented with a generally credit card sized PVC cards that will be used as incentives/rewards to help motivate young athletes. Each skillzy will depict (graphically illustrate) a specific sports technique and skillzys will be earned by the kids upon demonstration of proficiency of that skill in competitive environments.
[0021] The skillzys will have a hole punched in the top left corner so that they can be strung on an over-sized, lockable key ring in order to be displayed on a sports bag or backpack.
[0022] As the players develop, the skillzys can be used not only as a reward for accomplishment, but also as a form of healthy intra-team competition. As players develop and earn awards their teammates will be similarly motivated to achieve similar awards. Furthermore, the skillzys can award team accomplishments as well, in which case they are earned by all members of the team. The display of the awards on the player's sport bag is a constant reminder of the achievements that the player has earned along the way, and an incentive to earn additional awards.
[0023] In particular, the skillzys depicted in FIG. 1 is designed to promote and reward the character traits of sportsmanship, effort and energy, and attitude, which are important traits in sports as well as other activities. This set of skillzys can be referred to with the acronym SEAS. Coaches, trainers, parents, or other authority figures can use the SEAS skillzys to focus the player toward development of these traits. When the player has developed sufficient skills, as determined based on a predefined criteria, one or more of the SEAS skillzys are awarded to the player. The player will be evaluated based on performance on and off the field, and can be taught to focus on the SEAS traits rather than things that they cannot control such as weather, field conditions, officials, the other team, performance of teammates, and the like.
[0024] FIG. 2 depicts a specific skill orientated skillzy, which is designed to motivate and teach the Pull Back Turn skill common to the sport of soccer. This is a soccer ball control skill where foot and ball movement are coordinated with a pivot turn. The skill can be taught through drills, as well as executed in a game environment, with the skillzy awarded in response thereto. The skillzy also provides a reminder of the breakdown of the elements of the skill.
[0025] The Pull Back Turn skillzy is of a type that are designed to encourage individual technical skills development by rewarding athletes when they properly execute an individual move, or combination of moves, or when they obtain a certain measurable skill level using the specific skill involved.
[0026] FIG. 3 depicts one of a series of combination play skillzys used to develop tactical ideas and group play on a sport team. The example shown in FIG. 3 is the Give & Go skillzy. In this skill, a first player passes the ball to a second player and the first player immediately breaks away and receives the ball back from the second player.
[0027] This is a multiple player task and is designed to promote and motivate not only particular skills, but the execution of skills in a cooperative team environment—which is an important aspect of success in team sports and activities.
[0028] FIG. 4 depicts another example of a series skillzy focusing on the skill of juggling in soccer. The Blue Level Juggler skillzy, shown in FIG. 4 , is awarded to players that demonstrate the ability to keep a soccer ball in the air through the use of their feet, head, and body. The skill level can be measured and awarded based on the number of touches and rewarded with a skillzy for that level. FIG. 4 shows a blue skillzy for 10 touches, other skillzys are awarded for more touches with different colors as a means to motivate performance. Athletes work to develop their joggling sill with the soccer ball, attaining higher and higher levels as they improve. Series like this help to motivate while allowing coaches and trainers to encourage goal setting and work ethic needed to reach set goals.
[0029] FIG. 5 depicts another example of a series skillzy associated with the sport of soccer. The Crack the Crossbar skillzy relates to the ability to strike a soccer ball and hit the soccer goal crossbar from certain distances. This skill is designed to develop power and accuracy in kicking skills. The number on the skillzy denotes the distance from the crossbar, and additional skillzys can be used to award progressive achievement relating to this task, for example hitting the crossbar from further distances.
[0030] In this regard, the progressive element of awarding skillzys for accomplishing a task in steps is an important motivational factor. It serves the purpose of setting realistic incremental goals, especially for younger athletes, and provides continuous positive feedback that keeps interest high. Further, the collection of the series of skillzys provides a constant tangible reminder of achievement, and the display of the skillzys is a source of pride to the athlete, and motivation to others.
[0031] While the invention has been described in terms of soccer, those of ordinary skill in the art will understand that the invention is not necessarily limited thereto. While the initial embodiment of the skillzys programs is for soccer, and most preferably youth soccer, the program is applicable to other traditional team sports, such as hockey, football, basketball, baseball, as well as individual sports such as golf, tennis, track, and the like. Moreover, the concept can be used with non-athletic endeavors such as any aspect of education.
[0032] For example, FIGS. 6 , 7 , and 8 depict skills based skillzys in sports other than soccer. FIG. 6 shows a basketball skillzy designed to develop and motivate dribbling skills. FIG. 7 shows a baseball skillzy that is designed to develop and motivate hitting skills. FIG. 8 shows a football skillzy that is designed to develop and motivate kicking skills. The skillzys show in FIGS. 6-8 are awarded in the same manner as described hereinabove.
[0033] Unless otherwise defined, all technical and scientific terms used herein have the same meaning as commonly understood by one of ordinary skill in the art to which this invention belongs. Although methods and materials similar to or equivalent to those described herein can be used in the practice or testing of the present invention, suitable methods, and materials are described below. All publications, patent applications, patents, and other references mentioned herein are incorporated by reference in their entirety to the extent allowed by applicable law and regulations. In case of conflict, the present specification, including definitions, will control.
[0034] The present invention may be embodied in other specific forms without departing from the spirit or essential attributes thereof, and it is therefore desired that the present embodiment be considered in all respects as illustrative and not restrictive, reference being made to the appended claims rather than to the foregoing description to indicate the scope of the invention. Those of ordinary skill in the art that have the disclosure before them will be able to make modifications and variations therein without departing from the scope of the invention.
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A method of promoting development and motivation in a field of achievement is provided, comprising isolating a task for development, prescribing a level of achievement related to the task, measuring the level of achievement, and awarding the achievement of the task with a tangible indicia of achievement. The invention in its preferred embodiment relates to the sport of soccer.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The invention concern a jet regulator and aerator for attachment he sanitary fittings or the like, with a jet dispersion arrangement including a perforated plate that contains a number of flow holes, which produce individual jets.
A jet regulator of the above described type is already known from DE-PS 30 00 799, which has a perforated plate with a number of flow holes, produce individual jets. The perforated plate of this know jet regulator contains air intake device as well as several jet radiating strainers, which are located downstream in the flow direction. However, the arrangement of a large number of jet regulating strainers is expensive. Good jet regulator are also required to keep any calcification, particularly of the sensitive jet regulating strainers, moderately low. The perforated plate of the jet regulator known from DE-PS 30 00 799 is therefore designed to favor good jet dispersion, and the regulating strainers can be constructed with a correspondingly large mesh. Large mesh regulating strainer keep the danger of clogging and calcification comparatively low.
Another jet regulator has also been created, which contains a first and an immediately following second perforated plate (see DE-OS 34 04 662). The first and the separate second perforated plate contain flow holes, which are staggered with respect to each other. While the first perforated plate is designed to produce individual jets, the second perforated plate produces turbulence in these individual jets, creating the partial vacuum needed to mix in air and slow the individual jets down. Instead of the usual jet regulating strainers, the second perforated plate contains several ring walls placed downstream in the flow direction, which have circular steps or gradations on the inside and outside of the wall sections facing the perforated plates. These steps, which protrude into the paths of the individual jets produced by the perforated plates, are designed to properly disperse the water jets by mixing air into them. Since this known jet regulator does not require any jet regulating strainer, the danger of calcification is eliminated.
However, the jet regulator known from DE-OS 34 04 662 is comparatively large in height, requiring a special housing which can also limit the use of this jet regulator. Furthermore the production and assembly of the two perforated plates requires high accuracy, especially if they have several flow holes that are staggered with respect to each other, which involves considerable expense. To develop low noise in these perforated plates, the flow holes of the first perforated plate must have very sharp edges on their inflow side for example. Such edges, at least such edges of durable nature, are difficult to achieve with injection molded products.
The task therefore exists to create a jet regulator of the above described kind that is not prone to calcification, which can be manufactured at comparatively lost cost, which makes possible the production of a uniform full stream with the lowest possible noise, and still does not exceed the usual height of such jet regulators.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
With the jet regulator of the above-mentioned kind, the fulfillment of this task by the invention consists particularly in that at least some of the flow holes contain a deflection slope at a distance from their outflow side, which is placed at an angle to the flow direction, at least in the area of one of the individual jets, and that this deflection slope or these deflection slopes are followed by flow obstacles in the form of pins and/or ribs located at a distance from each other in the outflow direction.
The jet regulator of the invention also produces individual jets with only one perforated plate. Instead of the usual jet regulating strainers, which are prone to calcification and clogging, the jet regulator of the invention has pins and/or ribs located at a distance from each other, approximately oriented in the longitudinal direction of the jet regulator. These flow obstacles, toward which the individual jets are aimed via deflection slopes, disperse the individual jets well and can also mix them with air. In addition, the high flow velocity of the individual jets is first slowed down in the desired manner by the intercepting deflection slopes, and then also by the pins and/or ribs, without creating any significant noise. Since, as a rule, the jet regulator of the invention has only one perforated plate, the high cost involved with the staggered use of two perforated plates is avoided, and the jet regulator of the invention can be produced with an unusual compactness of height.
A preferred configuration of the invention provides that the distal or free ends of the pins point towards the perforated plate, and that at least the upper or distal ends of the pins located in the outflow area, or in the outflow direction of the flow holes, embody a deflection slope. In this particularly compact and simple configuration, at least the distal ends of the pins located in the outflow area of the flow holes are shaped as deflection slopes. For example, these deflection slopes on the ends of the pins may be formed so that the distal end areas of all the pins taper towards the perforated plate, and that these open end areas are preferably conical. A pyramid-shaped or hemispherical bevel is possible, for example, instead of a conical pin end.
It is useful if at least some of the pins located in the outflow area, or in the outflow direction of the flow holes, are staggered with respect to the flow holes, preferably they are arranged in a radial stagger towards the inside. The inward staggered arrangement of the pins located in the outflow area of the flow holes deflects the individual jets toward the outside, where they impact against other pins and/or ribs. The pins and ribs can be properly placed in this outer ring-shaped area, at a sufficient distance from each other. In this instance it is useful if the pins downstream of the deflection slope or bevels are placed at different distances from each other, at least in a partial area of the jet regulator, and preferably are staggered with respect to each other along the longitudinal axis of the jet regulator. In this way, the pins practically form labyrinth-shaped flow obstacles which disperse and slow down the individual jets particularly well, so that they can be mixed with incoming air.
If the flow holes, or at least a portion of the flow holes, are arranged in a small circle on the perforated plate, it is useful if they are assigned a common deflection slope, which preferably is the front of a round and/or concentric ring wall that faces the perforated plate.
It is generally advantageous if the perforated plate is followed by at least one ring wall in the flow direction, which tapers in the direction of the perforated plate, at least in the area that faces the perforated plate. The tapered area of this ring wall guides the individual jets and also slows them down. In this instance it is useful if pins are located in the tapered area on the outside of at least one ring wall, and a circular channel is located between the ring wall and an adjacent ring wall, on the inside wall of the jet regulator and/or a central body coaxially located along the longitudinal axis of the jet regulator.
The desired slowdown or dispersion and mixing effect in the individual jets flowing past the ring wall can be enhanced if at least one ring wall has steps or cascade-shaped gradations on the outside and/or inside wall, at least in the area that faces the perforated plate.
A preferred configuration of the invention provides that ribs are located on the inside wall of the jet regulator and/or on the inside of at least one ring wall, and preferably extend in the radial direction. The individual jets flowing towards the inside of this ring wall are caught in this rib area, are again slowed down, possibly are also mixed with air, and continue in the flow direction. It can be advantageous if the inwardly facing ends of at least a portion of the ribs which are oriented in the flow direction is located at a distance from a neighboring ring wall or from the central body. The thickness of the ribs can be made comparable to the diameter of the pins located on the neighboring ring wall. Also, thicknesses of the ribs may be similarly sealed.
In the design of a mold to produce the product it may help if all wall surfaces are slightly tapered to facilitate removal from the mold.
To be able to join the outer jacket of the jet regulator to the inside ring walls in a simple single-piece manner, it is useful and preferred if at least some of the ribs are radially attached to cross pieces, which connect the inside of the jet regulator wall, or a ring wall, to an opposing ring wall, or to the central body.
The production of a homogeneous full stream after flowing through the jet regulator is benefitted if the edges of the ribs or cross pieces are rounded on the small side that faces away from the flow direction. For the same reason, it can be useful if the perforated plate contains a central flow hole, around which other flow holes are arranged in circular and especially concentric form.
To keep the noise derived from the production of the individual jets through the perforated plate as low as possible, it is useful if the flow holes in the perforated plate are rounded on the inflow side and/or are given a funnel-shaped taper in the flow direction. A rounding radius of at least 0.2 mm, preferably at least 0.6 to 0.8 mm, proved to be particularly advantageous. This rounding of the flow hole edge area on the inflow side achieves a laminar stream in the individual jets, which permits the flow holes in the perforated plate also to have a rounded edge area on the outflow side. This rounding on both sides of the flow holes prevents a production cost that would otherwise only occur with the comparatively short service life of the sharp edges that can be achieved with injection molding forms.
The thinnest possible wall configuration of the perforated plate also achieves good stream dispersion in the individual jets. Under the pressure of the water stream impacting on the perforated plate, particularly at high water temperatures, a thin-walled perforated plate can vibrate, thereby producing undesirable noise. Therefore, a further development of the invention provides for the perforated plate to have radially oriented reinforcing ribs on the flat outflow side.
The air mixing zone, which is adjacent to the perforated plate in the flow direction, can be particularly large if the perforated plate contains a dish-shaped longitudinal section, with the bottom of the dish located on the inflow side of the perforated plate.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
Other features of the invention can be found in the following description of a configuration example according to the invention, in conjunction with the claims and the drawings. The individual features can be used by themselves, or several can be joined into a configuration according to the invention. In the drawings:
FIG. 1 is a partial longitudinal section through a jet regulator with only one perforated plate, which is followed by a number of pins and ribs arranged as flow obstacles in the flow direction, where the ribs under the jet regulator are depicted again in a longitudinal section displaced by 90° ;
FIG. 2 is a top view of the jet regulator section in FIG. 1 arranged in the flow direction under the perforated plate;
FIG. 3 is a bottom view of the jet regulator in FIGS. 1 and 2;
FIG. 4 is a top view of the perforated plate;
FIG. 5 is a longitudinal section of the perforated plate through plane V--V in FIG. 4;
FIG. 6 is a longitudinal section of the perforated plate through plane VI--VI in FIG. 4;
FIG. 7 is a bottom view of the perforated plate in FIGS. 4 to 6, which clearly shows the flow holes arranged in two perforate circles;
FIG. 8 is an enlarged fragmentary partial longitudinal section of the area of one of the flow holes in the perforated plate of FIGS. 4 to 7;
FIG. 9 is a partial longitudinal section similar to FIG. 1 of a modified jet regulator embodying the invention wherein the ribs and cross pieces of the taper conically in the flow direction along their full length; and
FIG. 10 is a bottom plan view of the jet regulator of FIG. 9.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
FIG. 1 depicts a partial longitudinal section of a jet regulator 1 for attachment to sanitary fittings or the like. The jet regulator 1 accommodates only one perforated plate 2 (not shown in FIG. 1; see FIGS. 4 to 8), which serves as a stream dispersion device. The perforated plate 2 (FIG. 4), which may be preceded in the flow direction by a strainer (not illustrated) contains a number of flow holes 3 arranged in two separate concentric hole circles 4, 5 around a central axial flow hole 3'. In this instance, the flow holes exhibit a round open cross section, but could also have square, hexagonal or similar multiple corner cross sections, at least in some areas.
The flow holes arranged in the two hole circles 4, 5 are equipped with deflection slopes 6, 7 (FIG. 1) at a distance from their outflow side. These are arranged at an angle to the flow direction Pf1, at least in the partial area to which the individual jets flow, and laterally deflect the individual jets impinging on them.
These deflection slopes 6, 7 cause a first slow-down of the water streams, which mix with the air that flows into the open area remaining between the deflection slopes 6, 7 and the perforated plate 2, and serves as an air mixing zone. This air is drawn in by the liquid streams through the air intake openings 8, provided as lateral openings on the outer jacket 9 of the jet regulator 1.
The perforated plate 2 illustrated in FIGS. 4 to 8 is placed perpendicular to the flow direction Pf1 in area 10 of jet regulator 1, in its outer jacket 9.
The deflection slopes 6, 7, which point sideways, are followed by pins 11 and ribs 12 approximately oriented in the lengthwise direction of the jet regulator 1, and serve as obstacles to the flow, causing additional slowing and splitting of the water streams, while mixing air into them. The free ends of these pins 11 point toward the perforated plate 2. All pin ends are approximately cone-shaped. It could also be possible to give the pin ends spherical shapes or similar, tapering toward the perforated plate 2.
As shown in FIG. 1, the cone-shaped ends of the pins placed in the outer hole circle 5 in perforated plate 2 in the outflow direction of flow holes 3 serve as deflection slopes 6, which divert the impacting individual jets produced by hole circle 5 towards the neighboring outer pins 11. In order to be able to divert the respective individual jets towards the outside, the pins 11, which are placed in the outer hole circle 5 and in the outflow direction, can be radially offset inward in relation to the passage axis of the flow holes 3. In this way the individual jets do not impact on the points of these pins 11, but on the outward facing surfaces of the respective conical pin ends.
The pins placed in the outer hole circle 5 of perforated plate 2 are arranged in three pin circles, where the inner pin circle is located in the outflow area of the corresponding flow holes 3 of hole circle 5. The pins 11 located in the two neighboring outer pin circles are staggered with respect to each other, so that the individual jets pass through a practical labyrinth formed by the rows of pins, where they are dispersed, significantly slowed down and mixed with air.
The common deflection slope 7 is assigned to the flow holes 3 located in the inner hole circle 4, where this slope is formed by the outward inclined front of a circular concentric inner ring wall 13, which faces perforated plate 2. An outside ring wall 14 is located between this inner ring wall 13 and the outer jacket 9 of jet regulator 1. Pins 11 outward the deflection slope 7, which are arranged in only one pin circle, located between the inner ring wall 13 and the outer ring wall 14. Pins 11 that are allocated to the outer hole circle 5 are located between the outer ring wall 14 and the neighboring outer jacket 9 of jet regulator 1. Ring channels 15, 16 and 17 through which water flows, are located between the outer jacket 9 and the outer ring wall 14; between the outer and the inner ring wall 14, 13 and also between the inner ring wall 13 and a central body 20 respectively. They are coaxially disposed with respect to the longitudinal axis of the jet regulator.
Similar to the conical ends of all pins 11 of jet regulator 1, the deflection slope 7 also has an inclination angle of about 40° with respect to the longitudinal axis of the jet regulator. As a consequence, the individual jets, which are produced by the inner hole circle 4, are deflected to the next outward pin circle, where they are slowed down and mixed with air.
To favor the slow-down of the individual jets and achieve a good mixture of these liquid streams with the drawn-in air, the ring walls 13, 14 are constructed in step or cascade form (as a circular tiered wedding cake) in the area facing the perforated plate 2 where the concentric "treads" of these steps are located respectively in planes that are approximately transverse to the flow direction, and the concentric "risers" of these steps are approximately located in the flow direction. The edges of the steps protruding into ring channels 15, 16 between surfaces of the steps on the outside of ring walls 13, 14 have sharp edges, to improve dispersion and air mixing of the individual jets. As shown in FIG. 2, the pins 11 are placed on the steps, the "treads" of which are shorter in dimension than the adjacent "risers".
The lengthwise-oriented ribs 12, which extend approximately in the radial direction and like pins 11 also serve as flow obstacles. Ribs 12 are located on the inside walls of the outer jacket 9 and on the inside of the two ring walls 13, 14. At least the small side or the front 18 of the ribs 12 ends spaced from the next inward ring wall 13, 14. As shown in FIG. 1, the thickness of the ribs 12 is approximately equal to the diameter of the pins 11 located on the adjacent inside ring wall 13, 14. For example, the thickness of the ribs 12 protruding into ring channel 16 corresponds approximately to the diameter of the pins 11 located in this ring channel 16. It may be an advantage for production reasons if the ribs 12 and cross pieces 19 are conically tapered toward the outflow side along their full length, regardless of the pin diameter, as illustrated in FIG. 9.
All ribs 12 are joined by radial connection pieces 19, which connect the inner wall of the regulator's outer jacket 9 with ring wall 14, or this ring wall 14 with the neighboring ring wall 13, and this ring wall 13 with the central body 20. The edges of these connection pieces 19 are rounded on the small side that faces away from the flow direction, which favors joining the individual jets and gives a harmonic aspect to the full stream flowing from the jet regulator. As shown in FIG. 9, partial other ribs 12' can be placed between ribs 12 and connection pieces 19 on the inside of ring walls 13, 14, and/or on the outer jacket 9, to additionally slow down the individual jets, where these additional ribs end at a distance spaced from the next inward ring wall and possibly from the central body.
FIG. 3 makes clear that the ribs 12 and connection pieces 19, located between the individual walls, are evenly staggered and distributed around the circumference of ring channels 15, 16 and 17. It can be seen in FIG. 3 that the ring walls 13, 14 also have step or cascade-shaped gradations on the inside of their ring walls. The gradations inside the ring walls which expand in the flow direction, are designed to prevent an unfavorable backflow by any individual liquid stream against the flow direction Pf1.
As is clear from FIGS. 1 and 2, a pin 11 is located on the central body 20, coaxially with the central flow hole 3' of perforated plate 2. The free end of this pin which faces the perforated plate 2 and is also cone-shaped and acts as the deflection slope. Three other pins 11, which also serve as flow obstacles, are located at a small distance from this central pin 11. These three outer pins extend beyond the central pin 11, in order to catch the central divided individual jet.
Instead of the pins 11, the central body 20 may be formed with an outer surface which tapers on toward the perforated plate 2, at least in the area that faces the perforated plate 2. To provide the central individual jet with a high flow velocity as well, it can be useful if the central body 20 is cone-shaped, at least in the area that faces perforated plate 2, or if it has step or cascade-shaped gradations, similar to ring walls 13, 14. In turn, the central body can also have several flow holes to additionally divide the central individual jet.
The longitudinal sections in FIGS. 5 and 6 make clear that the perforated plate is dish-shaped, where the bottom of the dish opposes the flow direction Pf1. The perforated plate 2 has radially oriented reinforcing ribs 21 on the flat outflow side, which permit the perforated plate 2 to have thin walls, without incurring excess vibrations under the pressure of the water jet.
To maintain the noise produced by the individual jets as low as possible, the flow holes 3, 3' of perforated plate 2 are rounded on the inflow side and have a funnel-shaped taper in the flow direction Pf1. A rounding radius of about 0.6 to 0.8 mm has proved to be useful for the edges on the inflow side of the flow holes 3, 3'. The rounded edges of the flow holes 3, 3' guide the individual jets in a laminar stream without heavy turbulence. This laminar stream also permits a slight rounding of the edges on the outflow side of the flow holes 3. The rounded edges of flow holes 3 facilitate production of the jet regulator 1 and its perforated plate 2, as well as improve long service life of the injection molds being used to make it.
Several catch hooks 22 are provided on the top front surface of perforated plate 2, which serve to affix a strainer attachment, not illustrated here. The spacing of the pins 11 assigned to hole circles 4, 5 is influenced by the diameter of the flow holes of the strainer attachment, as well as to the perforated plate 2 located downstream in the flow direction. The spacing of these pins 11 from each other corresponds to, or is larger than, the open diameter of these flow holes. In this way dirt particles, which have reached the inside of the jet regulator 1 through the strainer attachment (not shown) and the perforated plate 2, are also able to pass between pins 11.
The pins 11 exhibit a round cross section in FIGS. 1 and 2. In order to possibly achieve an additional slow-down by means of the pins 11, these could also have a hexagonal, octagonal or similar non-circular cross section. As is clear from FIGS. 1 and 2, all pins 11 have a cone-shaped or similarly tapered end, to prevent excessive splitting of the individual jets they catch.
As shown in FIG. 1, the outflow edges of ring walls 13, 14 are rounded on the outside wall, while the opposing inside wall has sharp edges. The rounded edges on the outside wall of ring walls 13, 14 combine the individual jets well, and provide a homogeneous aspect to the full stream. FIGS. 6 and 7 depict four cutouts 23 on the underside of perforated plate 2, which are evenly spaced around the plate circumference and serve to position the perforated plate 2 in the jet regulator 1. The cutouts 23 coincide with the positioning noses 24 placed on four of the ribs 12 that protrude inward with the outer jacket 9 of jet regulator 1. These four ribs 12 serve to support perforated plate 2.
The perforated plate 2 illustrated in FIGS. 4 to 8 locks onto the sleeve-shaped part of jet regulator 1 illustrated in FIGS. 1 to 3, or is attached in similar removable form. The sleeve-shaped part of jet regulator 1 illustrated in FIG. 1, which is a plastic injection molded part like the perforated plate 2, has four equally spaced centering or positioning projections 26 on its outer jacket 9, which facilitate the precise reception and positioning of these sleeve-shaped parts in the machines used to produce the jet regulator 1.
FIGS. 9 and 10 illustrate a jet regulator 1, which coincides mostly with the jet regulator illustrated in FIGS. 1 to 8. The jet regulator 1 in FIGS. 9 and 10 has ribs 12, which are conically tapered toward the outflow side, together with their one-piece connection pieces 19. Between these ribs 12, which blend into the connection pieces 19, additional ribs 12' are provided in at least one of the ring channels, in this instance ring channel 16, where these ribs 12' end spaced from the next inward ring wall 13 and approximately extend to the outflow side of ring walls 13, 14. All the ribs 12, 12' are rounded on their small outflow side, to favor the harmonic concentration of the individual jets into a full aerated stream.
The configuration with its conical ribs 12 and connection pieces 19, depicted in FIGS. 9 and 10, is particularly easy to remove from a corresponding injection mold.
The jet regulator 1, consisting of the sleeve-shaped part and perforated plate 2, is located in a jet regulator housing that is not illustrated here, which can be attached by means of an internal or external thread to the external or internal thread of a water fitting. Because of the low height of the jet regulator of the invention, other conventional jet regulator housings can also be used, therefore the jet regulator of the invention has multiple applications.
Thus, while the invention has been shown in only one embodiment, it is not so limited but is of a scope defined by the following claim language which may be broadened by an extension of the right to exclude others from making, using or selling the invention as is appropriate under the doctrine of equivalents.
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Jet regulator and aerator for attachment to a faucet contains a circular perforated plate for producing individual jets, and a coaxial sleeve downstream. The sleeve supports--deflection slopes which are inclined at an angle to the flow direction. The deflection slopes may be in the form of conical-pointed pins aimed at the plate. The pins are mounted on a tiered-wedding-cake shaped wall. An axial cone in the sleeve may also comprise a deflection slope. Additional obstacles consist of pins and/or ribs located at intervals from each other.
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[0001] The invention for which the patent application is being made is an autonomous electrogravitational energy alternator, whose main characteristic lies in its totally autonomous functioning, without the need to be driven by other auxiliary means, such as (as an indication rather than in quantitative terms) internal combustion engines driven by petrol, diesel or producer gas, hydraulic turbines driven by steam produced from gas or coal, nuclear power plants, or any method that provides motive force, such as solar energy, etc.
[0002] There is a patent claim for the upper and lower electromagnetic coils, as well as the circular magnetic rings with variable polarity in the upper and lower chassis, with an upper axle-housing chassis, upper fixing, dynamotor, principal alternator and intermediate loose pinions, with upper and lower stabilisers, as well as lateral inertia stabilisers and induction field.
[0003] The alternator herein described does not produce any pollution.
DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
[0004] The autonomous electrogravitational energy alternator proposed by this invention is based on the combination of mechanical and electromotive forces from magnetic fields and the levitation of rotors in a horizontal position. This means that the rotors, being above the chassis itself, avoid any rubbing or angular movements; this provides homogeneous operation and gathers the maximum amount of mechanical force from the principal rotors, thereby obtaining electrical energy.
[0005] To be more specific, the autonomous electrogravitational energy alternator of this invention is based on a principal axle, with a fixing nut and a support bearing, and high and low lateral inertia stabilisers and induction fields.
[0006] The invention incorporates electromagnetic coils, as well as magnetic circular rings with variable polarity in the upper and lower chassis, with an axle-housing chassis and an upper fixing, principal alternator and dynamotor pinions, and loose intermediate pinions; this provides a loose-pinion axle chassis and a dynamotor with a dynamotor pinion and intermediate loose pinions.
[0007] The invention has a principal alternator with its corresponding axle, as well as some levitation base plates, which pertain to the aforementioned principal alternator, with variable-field magnetic rings within the alternator base plates and dynamotor, as well as intermediate axle-housing chassis plates and fixings for all the elements.
[0008] Finally, it should be mentioned that the invention is fitted with a low inertia rotor, a threaded closure ring from the principal axle to the chassis, a fixing nut, a bearing-hosing separator in the principal rotor and several bearings in the principal axle, two central axle pinions in the upper section, the axles of the upper and lower loose intermediate pinions, emergency lateral bearings and bearings for the needles for guiding the principal axle.
DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0009] To complement this description, and with the aim of helping towards a better understanding of the characteristics of the invention, attached with this report are some diagrams which illustrate the following:
[0010] [0010]FIG. 1.—This corresponds to a view of a lateral elevation of the invention (autonomous electrogravitational energy alternator).
SET-UP OF THE INVENTION
[0011] From FIG. 1 it is possible to see how the proposed autonomous electrogravitational energy alternator is made up around a dynamotor ( 12 ) which is responsible for bringing the whole unit into operation. This is outlined below:
[0012] The dynamotor ( 12 ) is fitted with two traction pinions ( 9 ) and ( 13 ) at its outlet which are responsible for moving the intermediate pinions ( 10 ) and ( 14 ), which in turn are responsible for moving the pinions ( 25 ) and ( 26 ) of the principal axle ( 1 ), bringing about movement in the high ( 2 ) and low ( 22 ) rotors.
[0013] When the principal axle ( 1 ) receives this movement from the dynamotor ( 12 ), it transmits movement to the pinions ( 10 ) and ( 14 ), which are configured as intermediate loose pinions located on the side of the alternator, engaging with the outlet pinions ( 9 ) and ( 19 ) the pinions of the principal alternator ( 15 ).
[0014] With the turning of the rotors ( 2 ) and ( 20 ) set to the rate of revolutions required by the coils ( 6 ) and ( 6 ′), the dynamotor switches off. The dynamotor ( 12 ) then changes function and begins to operate as an electric generator, together with the principal alternator ( 15 ), thus creating energy that is free to be used.
[0015] To prevent rubbing, in the principal rotors ( 2 ) and ( 20 ) there are electromagnets ( 7 ) and ( 7 ′) fitted in the upper section, configured as two pairs, with two more pairs ( 37 ) and ( 37 ′) in the lower section; these are responsible for levitating the whole central unit.
[0016] The spherical units ( 5 ) and ( 5 ′) located on the periphery of the rotors ( 2 ) and ( 20 ) are responsible for entering the magnetic fields produced by the coils ( 6 ) and ( 6 ′) in order to move the rotors ( 2 ) and ( 20 ), with these movements being in a pentagonal form of units with 90° angles and cosines of pi of 40°, creating a perfect turn and fully exploiting the inertia.
[0017] Both the dynamotor ( 12 ) and the alternator ( 15 ) have two fixing and inertia plates ( 16 ) for the installation of two electromagnets ( 17 ) and ( 17 ′), which work against the two electromagnets ( 18 ) and ( 18 ), which in turn are responsible for levitating the alternator ( 15 ) and the dynamotor ( 12 ).
[0018] As a consequence, both in the rotors ( 2 ) and ( 0 ) and the lower fixing plates ( 16 ) and ( 16 ′), the installation of the electromagnets ( 17 ) and ( 17 ′), as well as the electromagnets ( 18 ) and ( 18 ′), means that there are forces of repulsion present, which results in the levitation of the rotors ( 2 ) and ( 20 ), the dynamotor ( 12 ) and the alternator ( 15 ), all governed by the law of gravity.
[0019] In summary, the movement of the principal rotors ( 2 ) and ( 20 ), which are responsible for producing a sufficient level of inertia over the alternators ( 15 ) and the dynamotor ( 12 ), generates a movement that can be harnessed and transformed into electrical energy.
[0020] The invention allows for the possibility of adding elements to the machine or removing them, depending on the energy calculation that is carried out.
[0021] The following elements make up the machine:
[0022] Principal axle ( 1 ),
[0023] High inertia rotor ( 2 ),
[0024] Fixing nut ( 3 ),
[0025] Support bearing ( 4 ),
[0026] High lateral inertia stabilisers and induction fields ( 5 ),
[0027] Low lateral inertia stabilisers and induction fields ( 5 ′)
[0028] Upper electromagnetic coils ( 6 ),
[0029] Lower electromagnetic coils ( 6 ′),
[0030] Circular magnetic ring with variable polarity in the upper and lower chassis ( 7 ), ( 7 ′), ( 37 ) and ( 37 ′),
[0031] Axle-housing chassis and upper fixing ( 8 ),
[0032] Dynamotor and principal alternator pinions ( 9 ),
[0033] Intermediate loose pinions ( 10 ),
[0034] Loose pinion axle-housing chassis ( 11 ),
[0035] Dynamotor ( 12 ),
[0036] Dynamotor pinion ( 13 ),
[0037] Intermediate loose pinions ( 14 ),
[0038] Principal alternator ( 15 ),
[0039] Principal axle alternator ( 15 ′),
[0040] Levitation base plates ( 16 ) of the principal alternator ( 15 ),
[0041] Variable-field magnetic rings ( 17 ′) of the base plates ( 16 ) of the alternator ( 15 ) and dynamotor ( 12 ),
[0042] Magnetic rings ( 18 ) and ( 18 ′) of the base plates ( 16 ) and ( 16 ′) in the chassis of the alternator ( 15 ) and dynamotor ( 12 ),
[0043] Intermediate chassis plates ( 19 ) and ( 19 ′) between the axle-housing and the fixings of all elements,
[0044] Low inertia rotor ( 20 ),
[0045] Threaded closure ring ( 21 ) from the principal axle ( 1 ) to the chassis,
[0046] Fixing nut ( 22 ),
[0047] Separator ( 23 ) of the bearing housing of the low rotor,
[0048] Bearings ( 24 ) of the principal axle ( 1 ),
[0049] Central pinion ( 25 ) and ( 26 ) of the axle in the upper and lower parts respectively,
[0050] Axles ( 27 ) and ( 27 ′) of the upper and lower intermediate loose pinions,
[0051] Lateral bearings ( 28 ), ( 28 ′), ( 28 ″) and ( 28 ′″), as well as bearings ( 29 ) and needles for guiding the principal axle ( 1 ).
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SUBJECT OF THE INVENTION: This descriptive report refers to an invention patent application. The invention is an autonomous electrogravitational energy alternator, whose purpose is to function as a totally autonomous alternator, without the need to be used or driven by other auxiliary means, such as petrol or diesel internal combustion engines, gas or coal-fired turbines, nuclear power plants, etc.
Being completely autonomous, the invention doesn't require any fossil fuels and it doesn't pollute or produce waste of any kind.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates to disintegrating apparatuses, and more particularly relates to an apparatus which is especially (but not exclusively) adapted for the disintegration of bale-like masses of waste textile strand material that includes polyester, nylon and/or other synthetic textile strands which have tensile strength of large magnitude and which frequently also are of considerable length.
As employed herein, the appellation "textile strand material" is meant to encompass all manner of natural or synthetic fibers, filaments, slivers, rovings and yarns, as well as all combinations of any of the foregoing, such as "composite" or "core" yarns incorporating both filamentary strands and spun-staple fibers, tow, smaller "bundles" of texturized or untexturized filaments, etc.
Prior patents of possible relevance to the present invention, or to its background, include the following: U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,941,530, 3,900,920, 3,886,629, 3,797,073, 3,736,624, 3,676,991, 3,663,993, 3,653,094, 3,443,285, 3,099,047, 3,040,387, 2,241,151, 2,205,666, 1,340,201, 188,928 and 20,677; French Pat. No. 814,365 and German Pat. No. 325,207.
Numerous so-called "bale pluckers" or other apparatuses have heretofore been devised for the purpose of disintegrating bales, cheeses or similar masses of natural textile fibers, such as cotton or wool, or of synthetic textile fibers comprised of "staplized" synthetic filaments. Fibers of the aforesaid type are relatively short, their maximum length usually being no more than four to five inches and frequently much less, and the tensile strength, both of the individual fibers and of the nonintegrated groupings or "tufts" of adjacent ones of them, is relatively small. Additionally, the bales comprised of such fibers usually possess approximately equal characteristics of density, composition and the like throughout either their entire extent or, if such bales are of "layered" construction, throughout at least each of their individual layers. Bales of the foregoing composition and construction may be and are readily disintegrated by known "bale plucking" apparatuses, many of which employ at least one rapidly-rotating "plucker roll" having peripheral teeth or pins which engage a surface of the bale and readily withdrawn discrete "tufts" of fiber therefrom.
Quite different considerations are presented by bales or similar masses of waste textile strand material of the type inadvertently but regularly produced, as a waste by-product of their normal operations, by manufacturers of synthetic filaments and by throwsters, textile mills and similar organizations which process and/or use such filaments in the manufacture of yarns or other products. Waste material of the aforesaid type may include at least some amount of relatively short strands, consisting of "staplized" filament or of natural fibers or of a combination of the foregoing, either in discrete form or in the form of roving, sliver or the like of low tensile strength. However, a significant portion and usually the vast majority of the waste strand material will consist of such things as single or multiple-ply yarn spun in whole or in part from "staplized" synthetic filaments; filamentary, and/or "core" yarns formed in whole or in part from continuous filaments; and other continuous-filament "bundles", such as tow, whose dimensions may approach those possessed by ropes and cables. Such strand material has a tensile strength of large magnitude: Some of it will withstand an applied tensile force of thousands of pounds, and may also undergo great elongation, before breaking. Apart from the possibility of its further elongation by stretching, at least some of the waste strand material also will usually be of considerable length in its unstretched form: i.e., its length will be many feet, or even hundreds of yards, as opposed to the much smaller length of natural fibers and of "staplized" filaments. Additionally, when waste strand material is set aside for eventual reclamation, it normally is not arranged in any type of orderly fashion, but rather is merely tossed or otherwise casually deposited into a container or upon a pile until a mass of the desired quantity has been accumulated. Such mass may then be formed into a bale to facilitate its transport to a reclaimer of waste material, or may be delivered to a reclaimer in unbaled form. In either case the mass of strand material received by the waste-reclaimer will be of heterogeneous density and composition, and will include randomly-extending and intertangled textile strands of large-magnitude tensile strength and, in many cases, of considerable length.
Masses of strand material of the aforesaid type cannot be satisfactorily disintegrated by conventional "bale pluckers", including particularly those employing a rotatable "plucking roll" or similar instrumentality, such as an endless toothed apron driven in one direction along a closed loop-like path of travel, as the disintegrating instrumentality. Attempted use of conventional "bale pluckers" and similar apparatuses for the aforesaid purpose results not in disintegration of the mass of strand material, but rather in disintegration of the apparatuses themselves unless the latter are equipped with suitable stop-motion devices effective to halt their operation in response to the over-load stresses which are placed upon their components by strand material of the described type. In recognition of the foregoing fact, the now prevalant industry practice is for strand-masses of the type in question to be manually disintegrated or "picked-apart", by a person withdrawing successive hand-fulls and lengths of strand material from the mass and depositing the same in a strand-cutting device or other processing instrumentality, or upon a conveyor leading to such a device or other instrumentality. This approach is highly dangerous, inefficient and uneconomical, and significantly increases the cost of reclamation of the waste material. An alternative industry-approach problem has been to employ disintegrating apparatuses, for instance hammer-mills, which do not preserve the quality and character of the strand material and which so pulverize, heat and/or otherwise deteriorate the same as to render it suitable only for re-melting and re-extrusion, or for other limited and commercially less-valuable uses. This approach is also highly uneconomical since it results in complete loss of that portion of the value of the strand material attributable to the prior processing (e.g., extruding, drawing, texturizing, etc.) which it has undergone. Additionally, unless the supply hopper or the like of the hammer mill or other apparatus in question is of considerable size, some manual "picking-apart" of the mass of strand material is still necessary for introduction of the material into the apparatus.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention provides a highly reliable and durable apparatus which is particularly adapted for and capable of automatically and efficiently disintegrating bale-like masses of textile strand material, of the previously-described type including synthetic textile strands of large-magnitude tensile strength and frequently also of considerable length, while at the same time so preserving the material's quality and properties as to permit any desired type of further reclamation-processing and end-use thereof. By way of example in the latter regard, strand material withdrawn from a bale-like mass of the type in question by the present apparatus is in suitable condition for direct delivery by the apparatus to a suitable rotary cutting device, wherein the strands are formed into shorter segments of desired lengths and may also be "opened" to a considerable extent, to produce fluffy fibrous output admirably suited (usually after further processing, such as garnetting) for use as padding and/or insulating material in mattresses, pillows, cushions and the like, or for use as raw material in a yarn-spinning operation.
The apparatus of the present invention is of massive high-strength construction and has an elongate passageway extending throughout its entire length. Communicating with respective rearward and forward end portions of such passageway are a receiving station which is adapted to receive a bale or other mass of the strand material to be disintegrated, and outlet means which is adapted to receive strand material withdrawn from such mass. Strand entraining means, which includes a carriage-like component mounting a large number of extendable and retractable tooth-like components, is reciprocatorily movable forwardly and rearwardly along a linear path of travel closely adjacent and generally parallel to the aforesaid passageway throughout substantially its entire length. During at least part of each stroke of forward movement of the carriage component of the entraining means, its tooth-like components are extended into the passageway so as to then withdraw strand material from the mass thereof at the receiving station and transport the withdrawn strand material forwardly through the passageway. The quantity of strand material so withdrawn by the entraining means during each of its forward-movement strokes may be and preferably is controlled, to minimize possible overloading or "choking" of the apparatus, by maintaining a predetermined compressive force upon the bale or mass of strand material within the receiving station, and by varying the point in time during each forward-movement stroke of the entraining means at which its tooth-like components are extended into the passageway and thus into engagement with the bale of strand material. The strand material withdrawn from the bale or mass by the entraining means is advanced by it, during the same or a subsequent one of its forward-movement strokes, forwardly through the passageway to, and preferably beyond in the case of at least some of the strand material, the passageway's outlet means. During each stroke of rearward movement of the entraining means its hook-like components are retracted so as to reduce the possibility of any previously withdrawn strand material not fully introduced into the outlet means, and thus remaining in the passageway, being returned to the receiving station under the impetus of rearward movement of the entraining means. To further guard against if not altogether obviate the foregoing undesirable result, extendable and retractable strand restraining means are projected, during each rearward movement stroke of the entraining means, from a retracted position outside of the passageway to an extended position within that portion of the passageway intermediate the receiving station and the outlet means.
During the terminal portion of each rearward stroke of movement of the strand entraining means, withdrawn strand material previously deposited by the entraining means within that portion of the passageway projecting forwardly of the outlet means, as previously described, is moved rearwardly through such projecting passageway portion back to the outlet means. This is preferably accomplished by a blade or rake-like pusher member disposed within the projecting passageway portion and movable longitudinally thereof under the impetus of a lost-motion innerconnection with the entraining means. In addition to other benefits, the above described mechanism helps insure the presence of a desired quantity of withdrawn strand material within, or at least in the immediate vicinity of, the outlet means at substantially all times during operation of the apparatus. This in turn permits the output of the apparatus, and therefore the output of the device or mechanism which receives the strand material from the apparatus's outlet means, to be of a substantially continuous nature, rather than intermittent.
Some of the strand material transported to out outlet means, by the entraining means and/or the pusher member, will freely enter the outlet on its own initiative. But some long segments, large "clumps" and/or other portions of the strand material will frequently not do so, and will instead tend to "bridge" the outlet. To overcome this problem, and also to further contribute to realization of the previously-discussed uniformity of output, the apparatus additionally includes extendable and retractable stuffer means which extends into the passageway and assists in introducing into the outlet "bridging" or other strand material then immediately adjacent thereto.
The apparatus further includes control means which reliably causes the above-described and other components of the apparatus to automatically perform their respective functions at desired times and in proper sequence. The control means is also effective to temporarily halt operation of certain components of the apparatus upon the occurrence and during the pendency of an undesirable operating condition within either the apparatus itself or within the device which receives strand material from the apparatus's outlet.
DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
Other features and benefits of the invention will be apparent from the following description of an illustrative embodiment thereof, which should be read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which:
FIG. 1 is a partially-schematic side elevational view of a disintegrating apparatus in accordance with the present invention, some components of the apparatus being broken away to better disclose interior details;
FIG. 2 is a partially-schematic elevational view of a portion of the opposite side of the apparatus shown in FIG. 1;
FIG. 3 is an enlarged fragmentary perspective view of a vertically movable platform, and some adjacent components, associated with the bale receiving station of the apparatus;
FIG. 4 is a partially-schematic, enlarged top-plan view of a portion of the strand entraining means, and some adjacent components, of the apparatus;
FIG. 5 is a fragmentary view taken approximately along the line 5--5 of FIG. 4, showing some components of the entraining means in side elevation and others in vertical section;
FIG. 6 is an enlarged fragmentary view taken approximately along the line 6--6 of FIG. 1, and showing some components of the apparatus in elevation and others in vertical section;
FIG. 7 is a view taken substantially along the lines 7--7 of FIG. 6, showing some components of the apparatus in top plan and others in horizontal section;
FIG. 8 is an enlarged, fragmentary, foreshortened top-plan view of the pusher means and some associated components of the apparatus, the pusher means also being shown in FIGS. 1 and 6;
FIG. 9 is a schematic representation of some of the control components of the apparatus; and
FIG. 10 is a block diagram of the control means of the apparatus.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
The disintegrating apparatus identified in its entirety in FIG. 1 by the numeral 10 includes frame means 12 having an elongate passageway 14 extending generally horizontally throughout its entire length and substantially its entire width. Underlying and communicating freely with a rearward (leftward, as viewed in FIG. 1) end portion of passageway 14 is a station or compartment 16 which receives a bale or other mass of strand material to be disintegrated. An outlet 20, which is adapted to receive strand material withdrawn from mass 18 and conducted to the outlet through passageway 14, is provided in communication with a forward (rightward, as viewed in FIG. 1) end portion of passageway 14. Strand entraining means 22 is reciprocatorily movable forwardly and rearwardly along a linear path of travel extending in closely adjacent and parallel relationship to passageway 14 throughout substantially its entire length. During its strokes of forward (rightward, as viewed in FIG. 1) movement, entraining means 22 is adapted to withdraw strand material from mass 18 and to transport withdrawn strand material forwardly through passageway 14 to locations therewithin adjacent outlet 20. Entraining means 22 and the subsequently-described drive mechanisms associated therewith are so constructed as to impose forces in excess of 200,000 pounds magnitude upon the strand material if, as is sometimes the case, forces of such magnitude should be required to effect the aforesaid withdrawal and/or transportation of the strand material. During each stroke of rearward (leftward, as viewed in FIG. 1) movement of entraining means 22, strand restraining means 24 projects into that portion of passageway 14 intermediate compartment 16 and outlet 20 to assist in preventing previously-withdrawn strand material within such passageway portion from being then carried rearwardly back to compartment 16 under the impetus of return movement of entraining means 22. Pusher means 26 is provided within with that portion of passageway 14 projecting forwardly of outlet 20 for the purpose of rearwardly returning withdrawn strand material, previously deposited by strand entraining means 22 in such forwardly-projecting portion of passageway 14, to a location adjacent outlet 20. To further assist and/or control the discharge through outlet 20 of withdrawn strand material conducted by strand entraining means 22 and/or pusher means 26 to a location within passageway 14 adjacent outlet 20, apparatus 10 further includes stuffer means 28 and gate means 30 associated with such outlet. Still other components of apparatus 10 will be pointed out during the following more-detailed description of those components generally identified above.
Referring now to other figures of the drawings in addition to FIG. 1, the upper extremity or top of passageway 14 is defined by a plurality of laterally-spaced grid bars 32 (FIGS. 1, 4-6, and 8) extending horizontally in parallel relationship to each other throughout substantially the entire length of apparatus 10. The section of passageway 14 overlying compartment 16 of apparatus 10 is bottomless, thereby permitting the projection into such passageway section of the upper portion of the mass 18 of strand material within compartment 16. Elsewhere along its length the lower extremity or bottom of passageway 14 is defined by rigid plate means 34 (FIGS. 1, 6 and 9) which extends in vertically-spaced underlying and parallel relationship to grid bars 32. Outlet 20 of apparatus 10 comprises, as shown in FIGS. 1, 6 and 9, an opening provided through and across substantially the entire width of passageway bottom plate 34, and communicating with duct means 36 (FIGS. 1, 6 and 7) extending downwardly from such plate. Along most of its length the opposite lateral extremities of passageway 14 may be and illustratively are overlaid by sections of vertical frame panels 38,38' respectively disposed at opposite sides of apparatus 10. Openings 40,40' (FIG. 6) are provided through the respective passageway panel sections 38,38' immediately adjacent outlet 20, for a purpose to be subsequently described.
Access to bale compartment 16 is provided on the FIG. 1 side of apparatus 10 by pivotally-mounted door members 42. The opposite wall of compartment 16 is defined by one of the frame panels 38' (FIGS. 1 and 2) upon the other side of apparatus 10. Compartment 16 also has respective forward and rearward walls 44,46 (FIG. 1) which span the width of apparatus 10 and which extend vertically from the base of the apparatus to the undersurface of bottom plate 34 of passageway 14. As is best shown in FIG. 2, the wall of compartment 16 defined by one of side panels 38' has a pair of longitudinally-spaced slots 48,48' extending therethrough. A pair of elongate track members 50,50', each of which has a generally U-shaped cross-section configuration indicated in FIG. 3, overlie the exterior surface of panel 38' and extend in adjacent parallel relationship to slots 48,48', respectively. A frame assembly 52 (FIGS. 2 and 3) extends between and is mounted for vertical movement by track members 50,50'. Assembly 52 includes generally L-shaped end plates 54,54' upon the respective vertical legs of which are mounted rollers 56,56' which are received within respective ones of the track members 50,50'. The generally horizontally extending legs of plates 54,54' project through slots 48,48' into the interior of bale compartment 16. Mounted upon the legs of plates 54,54' within compartment 16 is a platform 58 having width and length dimensions only slightly less than the corresponding interior dimensions of compartment 16. Platform 58 supports the mass 18 of strand material within compartment 16. To assist in keeping the space beneath compartment 16 free from strand material, strips of resilient material 60,60' are preferably and illustratively secured to the forward and rearward edges of platform 58 so as to project therefrom into engagement with the adjacent compartment walls 44,46 (FIG. 1).
Vertical movement is imparted at desired times to frame assembly 52, and thus to the platform 58 and the strand mass 18 within compartment 16, by drive means best shown in FIG. 2 and including a reversible motor-transmission-brake unit 61, which is mounted along with an associated control unit 62 atop frame 12 of apparatus 10. Unit 61 is effective to at desired times impart selective rotation in either direction to a worm member 66 extending therefrom, and to at all other times apply a braking force prohibiting the worm's rotation. Worm 66 meshes with a worm gear 68 secured to a shaft 70 mounted by suitable bearings in spaced parallel relationship to the side of apparatus 10 shown in FIG. 2. Sprockets 72,72' affixed to opposite end portions of shaft 70 have chain members 74,74' respectively entrained about and depending downwardly therefrom. One end of each chain 74,74' is secured to frame assembly 52. Weight members 75,75' are respectively secured to the other ends of chains 74,74', so as to at least partially counterbalance the weight of assembly 52 and the platform 58 (FIGS. 1 and 3) carried by it. By reason of the foregoing innerconnection, assembly 52 and platform 58 move upwardly when unit 61 rotates worm 66 in a first direction (e.g., clockwise) and move downwardly when worm 66 is rotated in the opposite direction (e.g., counterclockwise). The range of the aforesaid vertical movement of platform 58 is between a lowermost position wherein the platform is adjacent the bottom of compartment 16, and an uppermost position wherein platform 58 is closely adjacent the horizontal plane of the upper surface of bottom plate 34 of passageway 14.
Prior to commencement of the operation of machine 10, doors 42 of compartment 16 are opened and the strand-material bale or mass 18 to be disintegrated is placed upon platform 58, which at such time occupies its lowermost position of FIGS. 1 and 2. Doors 42 are then closed and platform 58 and the strand mass 18 thereon are moved upwardly by unit 61 and the previously-described components connecting the same with platform 58. Control unit 62 interrupts the aforesaid operation of unit 61, and therefore halts the upward movement of platform 58 and strand mass 18, when the upper surface of the latter has been subjected to a compressive force of predetermined desired magnitude by reason of its engagement with the undersurface of the passageway grid bars 32 overlying compartment 16. The optimum value of the aforesaid preselected force will be within the range of from 10 to 200 pounds per square foot, depending upon the character of the particular mass 18 of strand material to be disintegrated: For most types of strand material a preselected compressive force of approximately 50 pounds per square foot has been found to be preferable. During subsequently-ensuing operation of machine 10 the strand material is progressively removed in a manner to be subsequently described from the upper portion of the mass 18 within compartment 16, and unit 61 is periodically actuated to cause platform 18 to move further upwardly to bring the successive new upper surface portions of the strand mass 18 upon the platform into compressive engagement with the undersurfaces of the overlying grid bars 32. On each such occasion the driving operation of unit 61 is again halted, with ensuing cessation of the upward movement of platform 58 and the thereon-supported strand mass 18, by control unit 62 when the compressive force upon the upper surface of the strand mass reaches a desired preselected magnitude. The aforesaid action of the control unit 62 is achieved, in the illustrative embodiment of such unit, by a switch component 63 (schematically shown in FIG. 9) which automatically interrupts the "platform-up" driving action of the motor component of unit 61 when the torque-load upon such motor reaches a value corresponding to the adjustably-variable setting of switch 63. In addition to being manually adjustable (by means not shown in the drawings) prior to the commencement of a bale-disintegrating operation, the torque-load setting at which actuation of switch 63 occurs is adjusted automatically each time platform 58 moves upwardly to compensate for the diminishing weight of the strand mass 18 upon the platform. This is done by a gear 64 (FIG. 2) which forms part of unit 61 and which is driveably engaged by a rack bar 65 (FIGS. 2 and 3) carried by and movable vertically with platform frame assembly 52. The automatic adjustment by gear 64 and rack bar 65 of the setting of switch 63 is such as to make the latter's actuation dependent at all times upon the compressive force imposed by the undersurface of grid bars 32 upon the top surface of the strand mass 18, notwithstanding the progressively-diminishing weight of the strand mass. In lieu of the aforesaid arrangement, it will of course be appreciated that the desired result could be achieved by other mechanisms, as for instance by the use in control unit 61 of a pressure-responsive switch mounted in association with the grid bars 32 overlying compartment 16.
Referring now primarily to FIGS. 1,2,4 and 6, strand entraining means 22 of apparatus 10 includes a carriage member 76 having a horizontally extending base plate 78 and upstanding side walls 80,80' and end walls 82,82'. Base plate 78 closely overlies, and spans substantially the entire width of, the array of laterally-spaced grid bars 32 defining the upper extremity of passageway 14. Carriage 76 is mounted for reciprocatory forward and rearward movement longitudinally of apparatus 10 by means of wheels 84,84', which are respectively carried by opposite carriage side walls 80,80' and are received within guide tracks 86,86', each of generally U-shaped cross-sectional configuration, disposed on opposite sides of apparatus 10 and extending substantially the full length thereof. In FIG. 1 carriage 76 is shown by solid lines in its rearmost position, and its forwardmost position is fragmentarily indicated by phantom lines. Carriage 76 is moved during operation of apparatus 10 between its aforesaid positions by drive means which includes a reversible motor-transmission-brake unit 88 mounted in any suitable manner atop frame 18 of apparatus 10. Unit is effective to at desired times impart selective rotation in either direction to a worm member 90 extending therefrom, and to at all other times apply a braking force to such worm member. Worm 90 meshes with a worm gear 92 affixed to the central portion of a shaft 94 extending substantially the full width of apparatus 10 and having chain sprockets 96,96' secured to its opposite end portions. An elongate chain member 98 (FIG. 1) is entrained about sprocket 96, and about idler sprockets 100 mounted in any suitable manner upon frame 12 beneath drive sprocket 96, and has its opposite ends respectively secured to opposite end portions of side wall 80 of carriage 76. At the other side of apparatus 10 (see FIG. 2), a second chain 98' similarly is entrained about drive sprocket 96' and idler sprockets 100', and has its opposite ends secured to side wall 80' of carriage 76. When worm 90 is rotated in a "forward" direction by drive unit 88, chains 100,100' moves carriage 76 forwardly from its rearmost position, shown in solid lines in FIG. 1, to its forwardmost position indicated by phantom lines. Upon reversal of the direction of rotation imparted to worm 90 by drive unit 88, carriage 76 moves rearwardly back to its illustrated solid-line position.
A plurality of elongate slots 102 (FIGS. 4 and 5) extend through base plate 78 of carriage 76. Slots 102 are arranged in a plurality of longitudinally-spaced parallel rows, there preferably being eight such rows, each of which spans substantially the full width of carriage base plate 78. One complete row and parts of two others are shown in FIG. 4. The number of slots 102 in each row, illustratively nine, corresponds to the number of spaces between adjacent ones of the parallel grid bars 32 defining the upper extremity of passageway 14. The slots 102 of each row directly overlie respective ones of such grid-bar spaces, and have widths approximately 70% of the widths of the spaces. Parallel shafts 104, mounted by bar-like bearing members 106 which are secured upon and also serve to further strengthen carriage base plate 78, overlie respective ones of the eight rows of slots 102. Nine strand entraining members 108 are fixedly secured to each shaft 104, at spaced locations along its length, and extend through respective ones of the nine slots 102 therebelow. Each entraining member 108 is of generally L-shaped configuration and includes a medial portion 110, through a rearward part of which shaft 104 projects, which innerconnects an upper shank-like portion 112 and a lower tooth-like portion 114. A stud-like abutment or stop member 116 projects laterally through and outwardly from opposite sides of medial portion 110 of each entraining member 108 at a location adjacent the junction of the forward and upper edges of portion 110. Portion 112 projects upwardly from medial portion 110 and shaft 104, while tooth-like portion 114 extends forward from medial portion 110 and underlies base plate 78 of carriage 76.
Each entraining member 108 is pivotally movable about the axis of its supporting pivot shaft 104, in unison with such shaft and the other members 108 thereon, between extended and retracted positions respectively shown in solid and phantom lines in FIG. 5. In the extended position of each entraining member 108, its lower tooth-like portion 114 projects angularly forwardly and downwardly into passageway 14 and the narrow leading end of such portion 114 is disposed in closely-spaced overlying relationship to the horizontal plane of passageway bottom plate 34 (FIGS. 1 and 6). When an entraining member 108 occupies its aforesaid extended position, further clockwise (as viewed in FIG. 5) pivotal movement thereof about the axis of its supporting shaft 104 is prohibited by then-occurring abutting engagement of its stop members 116 with those upper surfaces of carriage base plate 78 immediately adjacent the slot 102 through which such entraining member 108 extends. In the retracted (FIG. 5 phantom-line) position of each entraining member 108, no portion of it projects into passageway 14. At such time the upper surface of hook-like portion 114 of each member 108 abuts the undersurface of carriage base plate 78, and the lower surface of hook-like portion 114 is disposed at the elevation of the plane of the undersurface of the spaced grid bars 32 defining the upper extremity of passageway 14.
In addition to the previously-discussed shafts 104, eight shafts 118 are provided in association with respective ones of the eight rows of entraining members 108. Each shaft 118 extends freely through bores within the shank-like upper portions 112 of the members 108 of a corresponding one of the rows, and also extends freely through bores within two innerconnecting members 120 which extend longitudinally of carriage 76 between the rearmost and forwardmost ones of shafts 118. As is shown in FIG. 4, the rear ends of members 120 are pivotally connected to the rod component 122 of a fluid-operated piston and cylinder assembly 124 mounted upon carriage 76. Pressurized fluid is supplied to the forward end of the cylinder component of assembly 124 during commencement of each stroke of rearward movement of carriage 76: Rearward movement of carriage 76 tends to cause portions 114 of members 108 to become disengaged from, and to ride upwardly upon, strand material within passageway 14. During rearward movement of carriage 76, and as a result both of such movement and of the pressurized fluid then present within the forward end portion of the cylinder component of assembly 124, members 108 therefore assume their retracted (phantom-line) positions of FIG. 5. When pressurized fluid is introduced into the rearward end of assembly 124, as occurs at preselected times during forward-movement strokes of carriage 76, assembly 124 and the effect of gravity of course then bias members 108 toward their extended (solid-line) positions of FIGS. 1 and 5.
The section of passageway bottom plate 34 intermediate compartment 16 and outlet 20 is provided with a plurality of spaced openings 126 (FIGS. 1,6 and 9) therethrough. Illustratively there are three longitudinally-spaced rows of such openings 126, each row extending across substantially the full width dimension of passageway base plate 34 and being comprised of ten of the openings 126. All of the openings 126 are in vertical alignment with overlying ones of the spaced grid bars 32 defining the upper extremity of passageway 14. Strand restraining means 24 of apparatus 10 (FIGS. 1 and 6) comprises three rows of vertically-extending, spike-like members 128, the longitudinal axes of which are in a vertical alignment with respective ones of the openings 126 within passageway bottom plate 34. Spike members 128 are rigidly supported at their lower ends by a base member 130, which in turn is supported upon the vertically-extending rod component 132 of a fluid-operated piston and cylinder assembly 134. The array of spike members 128 normally occupies a retrated position, such as shown in FIGS. 1 and 6, wherein the free upper ends of members 128 underlie passageway plate 34 and do not project into passageway 14. The introduction of pressurized fluid into the lower end of the cylinder component of assembly 134 causes spike members 128 to be moved upwardly to an extended position (indicated by phantom lines in FIG. 1) wherein they project into passageway 14 through respective ones of the openings 126 within passageway bottom plate 34. When in their extended position, the upper ends of members 128 are disposed in closely-spaced relationship to overlying ones of the grid bars 32 defining the upper extremity of passageway 14, and the side surfaces of members 128 are disposed closely adjacent the vertical planes containing the opposite side surfaces of overlying ones of the grid bars 32. When pressurized fluid is introduced into the upper end of the cylinder component of assembly 134, base member 130 and spike members 128 of course return to the retracted positions illustrated in solid lines in FIGS. 1 and 6. As is indicated in FIG. 1, the rearward face of base member 130 abuts and is movable vertically along an adjacent upright portion of frame 12 of apparatus 10. The rearwardly-directed forces imposed upon restraining means 24, during use thereof, are prevented by the aforesaid abutment from being transmitted to assembly 134.
Referring now primarily to FIGS. 1,6 and 8, pusher means 26 of apparatus 10 includes a base member 136 which is supported upon the forward (rightward, as viewed in FIG. 1) expanse of grid bars 32, as by suitable bearings 138 (FIG. 6), for movement longitudinally thereof between rearwardmost and forwardmost positions respectively indicated by solid and phantom lines in FIG. 1. Support arms 140 (FIG. 6) depending downwardly from base member 136 through the spaces between adjacent ones of grid bars 32 support a blade or rake-like member 142, which is disposed within passageway 14, for movement in unison with base member 136. Blade 142 spans substantially the entire width and heigth of the interior of passageway 14. A pair of tubular abutment members 144,144' are fixedly mounted in any suitable manner upon the upper surface of base member 136. Elongate shafts 146,146' extend freely through respective ones of members 144,144', and at their rearmost ends are fixedly secured to front wall 82 of carriage member 76 (FIGS. 1 and 8) for movement with such carriage member longitudinally of apparatus 10. Collars 148,148' (FIG. 8) upon the forward end portions of the respective shafts 146,146' have an enlarged diameter which prevents their passage through tubular members 144,144'. As carriage member 76 moves forwardly from its solid-line and toward its phantom-line position shown in FIG. 1, pusher means 26 remains stationary in its rearmost (FIG. 1 solid-line) position until such time as carriage 76 abuts the rear ends of tubular abutment members 144,144'. Prior to such abutment, the forward movement of carriage 76 merely advances shafts 146,146' longitudinally through the bores of members 144,144'. Following and in response to the aforesaid abutment, pusher means 26 is moved forwardly by and in unison with carriage 76 until such components reach their forwardmost positions indicated by phantom lines in FIG. 1. Shafts 146,146' then project through and outwardly from the forwardmost end of apparatus 10. During the initial phase of thereafter-ensuing rearward movement of carriage 76 back toward its solid-line position of FIG. 1, pusher means 26 remains stationary since at such time shafts 146,146' slide freely through tubular members 144,144'. However, when the collars 148,148' (FIG. 8) upon the forward end portions of shafts 146,146' abut the forward ends of members 144,144', such abutment then causes pusher means 26 to move rearwardly in unison with carriage 76 until such members reach their rearmost positions indicated in solid lines in FIG. 1. During the aforesaid movement of pusher means 26 its blade member 142 engages any strand material previously withdrawn by entraining means 22 and present within that portion of passageway 14 projecting forwardly of outlet 20, and moves such strand material rearwardly through the passageway back to outlet 20. Blade member 142 overlies the forward edge portion of outlet 20 when pusher means 26 occupies its rearmost position. A shaft 150 (FIGS. 1 and 8) is fixedly connected at its rearward end to base member 136 of pusher means 26, for movement in unison therewith. Shaft 150 extends freely through a tubular abutment member (not shown in the drawings) fixedly mounted upon the forwardmost (rightmost, as viewed in FIG. 1) end portion of frame 12 of apparatus 10, and at its free end mounts a collar 151 which abuts the aforesaid abutment member when pusher means 26 reaches its rearmost position. This prohibits pusher means 26 from overtraveling its rearmost position, as might otherwise result if a binding condition should occur between either of the shafts 146,146' and the tubular member 144,144' through which it extends during that portion of the rearward movement of carriage 76 which precedes abutment of collars 148,148' with members 144,144'. Additionally, the shaft 150 assists in stabilizing both the forward and rearward movement of pusher means 26.
Referring now particularly to FIGS. 1 and 6, stuffer means 28 of apparatus 10 includes a plurality (illustratively three) of elongate, vertically-extending stuffer members 152. Members 152 are preferably formed from rigid steel bars, the lower ends of which have a smooth concave configuration. Members 152 are vertically movable between extended and retracted positions by a fluid-operated piston and cylinder assembly 154 (FIG. 1) which is fixedly mounted atop frame 12 of apparatus 10 by a frame extension 156. A slide-block 158, which is mounted within frame extension 156 and whose vertical movement is guided thereby, innerconnects the lower end of the rod component of assembly 154 and the upper ends of members 152. When occupying their illustrated retracted positions (FIGS. 1 and 6), as they normally do due to the presence of pressurized fluids within the lower portion of the cylinder component of assembly 154, members 152 are disposed directly above that portion of passageway 14 containing outlet 20 of apparatus 10. The introduction of pressurized fluid into the upper end portion of the cylinder component of assembly 154 causes members 152 to be moved rapidly downwardly to their extended positions, wherein they project through the vertical dimension of passageway 14 and through the approximate center (in the longitudinal direction of apparatus 10) of outlet 20, and into the duct 36 communicating with such outlet. To permit free passage of members 152 through the array of grid bars 32 defining the upper extremity of passageway 14, those bars 32 immediately adjacent the path of vertical travel of bars 152 have lengthwise sections (not shown in the drawings) of reduced widths. During movement thereof from their retracted and to their extended positions, members 152 engage any strand material then disposed within passageway 14 and within the path of travel of such members, and force such material downwardly through outlet 20 and into duct 36. It has been found that realization of this desired result is facilitated if, during each usage thereof, members 152 are rapidly reciprocated a plurality of times (e.g., three times) between their extended and retracted positions.
To further improve the effectiveness of its aforesaid operation, stuffer means 28 preferably and illustratively also includes a pair of auxiliary stuffer members 160,160' (FIG. 6) which are horizontally movable in unison with one another between extended and retracted positions by fluid-operated piston and cylinder assemblies 162,162' respectively mounted upon opposite sides of apparatus 10 adjacent the openings 40,40' provided within frame panels 38,38'. Members 160,160' are respectively mounted upon the rod components of assemblies 162,162', and in their illustrated retracted positions are disposed exteriorally of passageway 14. Assemblies 162,162' operate in unison with the previously-discussed assembly 154 which controls the movement of vertical stuffer members 152. Therefore, when pressurized fluid is introduced into the upper end of assembly 154, it is also simultaneously introduced into the outer ends of assemblies 162,162', causing movement of auxiliary stuffer members 160,160' through frame openings 40,40' and into passageway 14. During such movement of members 160,160', any strand material within the paths of travel thereof is displaced a sufficient distance toward the longitudinal center of apparatus 10 as to be within the paths of vertical travel of the laterally-outermost ones of the vertical stuffer members 152. The length of the strokes of members 160,160' is sufficiently small that neither of such members, when in its fully extended position, extends into the path of travel of any of the vertical stuffer members 152. The relatively short strokes of movement of members 160,160' also insures that, during each usage of stuffer means 28, members 160,160' will reach their fully-extended positions while vertical members 152 are still descending to the elevation of members 160,160', notwithstanding the fact that assemblies 154 and 162,162' are actuated substantially simultaneously.
The duct 36 (FIGS. 1,6,7 and 9) underlying passageway outlet 20 may extend to any of various types of known apparatuses suitable for the further processing in a desired manner of the strand material discharged through outlet 20. Illustratively and preferably however, duct 36 communicates via a connecting duct 164 (see particularly FIGS. 1 and 6) with the inlet of a rotary cutting device 166 which is powered by suitable drive means including a drive motor 168. Device 166 simultaneously reduces the length of the strand material received therein and "opens" such strand material, thereby converting the same to a fibrous product which is admirably suited, following its discharge through an outlet duct 170 (FIG. 1) and its possible further processing, for various end uses. It is desirable, from the viewpoint of achieving maximum production, that device 166 receive strand material through ducts 36,164 on a substantially continuous basis during its operation. On the other hand, overloading of device 166 might well damage such device and/or impair the quality of its fibrous output. Apart from other possible causes, overloading of device 166 could at times result from excessive quantities of strand material being pulled into the device by a "self-feeding" action. However overloading of device 166 might be caused, gate means 30 of apparatus 10 minimizes the possibility of ensuring detrimental consequences, by impeding the passage of strand material through ducts 36,164 to device 166 when the device is overloaded. As shown in FIGS. 1,6 and 7, the adjacent ends of ducts 36,164 are spaced vertically from each other and are innerconnected adjacent their opposite side by horizontally extending channel-like members 170,170', respectively. Gate means 30 includes plate-like gate members 172,172' which extend between channel members 170,170' and are mounted thereby for horizontal reciprocatory movement toward and away from each other between retracted and extended positions respectively indicated by solid and phantom lines in FIG. 7. The aforesaid movement is simultaneously imparted to members 172,172' by fluid-operated piston and cylinder assemblies 174,174'. The cylinder components of assemblies 174,174' are fixedly connected to frame 12 of apparatus 10, and the outer ends of the respective rod components of the assemblies are respectively connected to associated ones of the gate members 172,172'. When occupying their retracted (solid-line) positions, members 172,172' do not project into ducts 36,164 and their confronting edges are disposed between suitable horizontally-extending flanges provided upon the confronting ends of such ducts. The introduction of pressurized fluid into the outer end portions of the cylinder components of assemblies 174,174' moves members 172,172' from their retracted positions to their extended positions shown in phantom lines in FIG. 7, wherein members 172,172' abut one another and block the passage of material from duct 36 to duct 164. The provision of generally U-shaped openings 176,176' within the confronting edge portion of members 172,172' , as is also shown in FIG. 7, permits rapid movement of members 172,172' to their extended positions when required, even if at such time vertical stuffer members 152 (FIGS. 1 and 6) should occupy their downwardly-extended positions.
Apparatus 10 further includes suitable electrical control means, shown in block-diagram form in its entirety in FIG. 10, for causing the previously-described components of the apparatus to perform their respective functions at desired times in proper sequence and in non-interfering relationship to each other. As indicated by block 178 of FIG. 10 the control means includes a plurality of detector devices which detect the positions or other conditions of various components of apparatus 10. Data from the detector components is transmitted to an automatic/manual controller 180 incorporating suitable logic circuitry or the like, which correlates such data and in turn transmits control signals to the drive units of the various driven components of apparatus 10, indicated in block 182 of FIG. 10. During operation of apparatus 10 controller 180 would normally perform its signal-transmitting functions, at proper times and in proper correlated sequence, in automatic fashion. While controller 180 is also adapted for alternative manual operation, such would not be used during normal operation of apparatus 10 and, even when employed, would not be effective to transmit to the drive components (block 182 of FIG. 10) of apparatus 10 any operating signals whose transmission would be detrimental to the apparatus or the operation thereof.
Illustrative embodiments of the detector devices indicated by block 178 of FIG. 10 are schematically shown, along with certain additional components of apparatus 10, in FIG. 9 of the drawings. As is indicated in FIG. 9, the open and closed positions of doors 42 (FIG. 1) of bale compartment 16 is detected by limit switch 184,184' suitably mounted in association with such doors: For safety reasons, controller 180 (FIG. 10) will not permit operation of apparatus 10 except while both doors 42 are closed. Limit switches 186,186' respectively detect the extreme upward and downward positions of the platform 58 (FIGS. 1 and 3) within compartment 16: Controller 180 (FIG. 10) will not permit movement of platform 58 beyond the aforesaid extreme positions thereof, and will automatically stop operation of apparatus 10 when switch 186 is actuated. Switch 63 is the previously-discussed one forming part of the unit 62 (FIG. 2) associated with platform drive unit 61 (FIG. 2): Controller 180 (FIG. 10) halts upward movement of platform 18 when switch 63 signals that the compressive force upon the strand mass 18 supported by the platform is of the desired magnitude. Switch 188 is a torque-responsive one, operatively associated with the motor 168 (FIG. 1) which drives cutting device 166, for performing the previously-described function of detecting an overload condition within cutting device 166: Controller 180 (FIG. 10) actuates gate means 30 (FIGS. 1,6 and 7) and halts the operation of entraining means 22 (FIG. 1) and stuffer means 28 (FIGS. 1 and 6) when and while switch 188 signals that cutting device 166 is overloaded. Limit switches 190,190' respectively detect the arrival of carriage 76 (FIG. 1) at its forwardmost and rearwardmost positions: In response to the actuation of switch 190 controller 180 (FIG. 10) causes reversal of the theretofore rearward direction of movement of carriage 76, and also causes retraction of strand restraining means 24 (FIGS. 1 and 6). In response to the actuation of switch 190', controller 180 (FIG. 10) causes reversal of the theretofore forward movement of carriage 76, and causes movement of restraining means 24 to its extended position, and causes the introduction of pressurized fluid into the forward end of the assembly 124 associated with strand entraining members 108 (FIGS. 1,5 and 6). Members 108 therefore return to their retracted positions (FIG. 5, phantomlines) during rearward movement of carriage 76, as a result both of such rearward carriage movement and the action of assembly 124. In addition to the switches 190,190', the carriage-position detecting means indicated in block 178 of FIG. 10 also includes a photoelectric lamp-receiver unit designated by the numeral 192 in FIG. 9. Unit 192 detects whether carriage 76 occupies a position obstructing the path of travel of stuffer means 28 (FIGS. 1 and 6): Controller 180 (FIG. 10) prohibits actuation of stuffer means 28 until carriage 76 occupies a non-obstructing rearward position relative thereto. The other photoelectric unit 194 shown in FIG. 9 detects the presence of "bridging" or other accumulated strand material in that portion of passageway 14 immediately above outlet 20: Controller 180 (FIG. 10) actuates stuffer means 28 (FIGS. 1 and 6) when the presence of such strand material is detected by unit 192 and when unit 190 indicates that carriage 76 is in a non-obstructive position relative to the stuffer means. During each period of actuation of stuffer means 28, controller 180 (FIG. 10) preferably causes the stuffer members 152,160,160' to undergo a plurality (e.g., three) of reciprocatory strokes between their retracted and extended positions. If the presence of strand material is then still detected by unit 192, controller 180 will initiate another similar cycle of operation of stuffer means 28, and so on until unit 192 detects no longer detects the presence of strand material within its field of vision (or until, as previously noted, overloading of cutting device 166 is detected by switch 188). Also during each period of actuation of stuffer means 28, controller 180 causes movement of carriage 76 to be halted, so that no additional strand material will then be transported to outlet 20 by either strand entraining members 108 (FIGS. 1,4 and 5) or pusher means 26 (FIGS. 1,6 and 8). Limit switches 196,196' of FIG. 9 respectively detect the retracted and extended positions of stuffer means 28: The signals transmitted by such switches to controller 180 (FIG. 10) are there correlated to determine whether blockage of the field of vision of photoelectric unit 194 is caused by strand material or by the vertical stuffer members 152 (FIGS. 1 and 6), and also is employed when the controller causes the stuffer members to undergo, as previously described, a plurality of reciprocatory strokes between their extended and retracted positions. Further, and as a safety feature backing-up the operation of photoelectric unit 192, controller 180 will not permit carriage 76 to be driven forwardly except when switch 194 indicates that stuffer means 28 is fully retracted. A similar back-up safety function is performed by the limit switch 197 of FIG. 9, which switch verifies full retraction of strand restraining means 24 (FIGS. 1 and 6): Controller 180 (FIG. 10) prohibits carriage 76 from being driven forwardly except when switch 198 indicates that restraining means 24 is fully retracted.
Among the other drive members indicated in block 182 of FIG. 10 is a "traveling limit switch drive." As is shown in FIG. 9, this consists of a reversible motor 198 driveably connected to the rearward end of an elongate threaded shaft 200 mounted for rotation about its axis in spaced parallel reationship to the rearward portion of the path of travel of the carriage 76. A limit switch 202, designated as a "traveling" limit switch in block 178 of FIG. 10, is mounted upon threaded shaft 200 for movement forwardly or rearwardly therealong in response to rotation of the shaft by motor 198 in a "forward" or "rearward" rotative direction respectively. Controller 180 (FIG. 10) causes motor 198 to move switch 202 rearwardly a preselected distance each time carriage 76 reaches its forwardmost position and actuates limit switch 190. The magnitude of the rearward strokes of movement of switch 202, which movement-strokes are indicated by the arrows adjacent switch 202 in FIG. 9, is preselected by adjustment of a suitable timer or similar component (not shown) of controller 180. A limit switch 204 (FIG. 9, and also indicated in block 178 of FIG. 10) detects arrival of the traveling limit switch 202 at its rearmost position along shaft 200. In response to actuation of switch 204, controller 180 (FIG. 10) causes motor 198 to return traveling limit switch forwardly a preselected and adjustably variable distance along shaft 200, and also causes bale platform drive unit 61 to move bale platform 58 upwardly until compressive-force detecting switch 63 is again actuated. Controller 180 (FIG. 10) insures that the foregoing sequence of events always occurs during one of the time periods between successive forward-movement strokes of carriage 76: The entraining members 108 (FIGS. 1,4 and 5) carried by carriage 76 then occupy, as previously described, their retracted positions. Controller 180 causes movement of entraining members 108 to their extended positions in response to the actuation, during forward (only) movement of carriage 76, of traveling limit switch 202 by an actuator 206 (FIG. 9) upon carriage 76. The point along any one of the forward-movement strokes of carriage 76 at which entraining members move to their extended positions therefore is dependent upon the particular longitudinal position then occupied by traveling limit switch 202 along shaft 200. This in turn is dependent upon the preselected distances which controller 180 (FIG. 10) causes motor 198 to move switch 202 during each of the latter's strokes of forward and rearward movement.
In one extreme mode of operation, controller 180 might be preadjusted so as to cause limit switch 202 to move only a slight distance away from switch 204 during each of its forward-movement strokes, and to return to actuating engagement with switch 204 during the first one of its thereafter-ensuing rearward-movement strokes. Such mode of operation would result in strand entraining members 108 being extended substantially simultaneously with the commencement of each forward stroke of movement of carriage 76, and would also result in upward movement of bale platform 58 after each forward-movement stroke of carriage 76. This mode of operation would produce very rapid withdrawal of large quantities of the strand material 18 from compartment 16 (FIG. 1), but with most types of strand material could probably not be satisfactorily empolyed as it would likely cause overloading or "choking" of that portion of passageway 14 (FIG. 1) forwardly of compartment 16. In another extreme mode of operation of apparatus 10, controller 180 (FIG. 10) might be preadjusted to cause limit switch 202 (FIG. 9) to be moved a maximum distance from switch 202 during each of its forward-movement strokes, to a position such as is illustrated in FIG. 9; and to cause each rearward-movement stroke of switch 202 to be only a small fractional part of such distance. In accordance with this mode of operation strand entraining members 108 would be extended at a relatively late point in time during the first of the forward-movement strokes of carriage 76, and would thereafter be extended at slightly and progressively earlier points in time during each of the subsequently ensuing forward-movement strokes of carriage 76. Upward movement of platform 58 (caused as previously described by controller 180 upon actuation of switch 204 by traveling limit switch 202) would occur only after completion of a large number (e.g., one hundred) of forward-rearward movement strokes of carriage 76 and rearward-movement strokes of switch 202. This mode of operation would therefore produce a more gradual and progressive withdrawal and advancement of the strand material from the mass 18 thereof within compartment 16, and is therefore unlikely to produce any undesireable "choking" or overloading of passageway 14. By appropriate preselection of the distances through which controller 180 (FIG. 10) causes switch 202 to travel during its forward and/or rearward strokes, the rate of withdrawal of strand material from any particular mass 18 thereof within compartment 16 may be so adjusted as to achieve an optimum rate at which apparatus 10 performs with a high degree of efficiency without "choking" or overloading of that portion of passageway 14 forwardly of compartment 16.
Irrespective of the foregoing adjustive mode of operation of apparatus 10, controller 180 (FIG. 10) of course still functions as previously described to temporarily halt movement of carriage 76 and actuate stuffer means 28 whenever such carriage is in a non-interfering position and an accumulation of strand material is present within that portion of passageway 14 above outlet 20; and to temporarily halt operation of all of the foregoing components and actuate gate means 30 (FIGS. 1,6 and 7) if cutting device 166 should become overloaded.
It will be appreciated in the latter connection that the strand material discharged through outlet 20 of apparatus 10 could be received by some suitable structure or device other than or in addition to the cutting device 166 specifically shown. For example, the material discharged from outlet 20 and/or from device 166 might be received by a suitable hopper having associated therewith a level-responsive switch or the like effective, in a manner similar to that of the load-responsive switch 188 associated with device 166, to regulate the operation of apparatus 10.
While a preferred embodiment of the invention has been specifically shown and described, it is to be understood that this was for purposes of illustration only, and not for purposes of limitation, the scope of the invention being in accordance with the following claims.
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The apparatus is particularly adapted for disintegrating bale-like masses of waste textile strand material that includes synthetic (e.g., polyester, nylon, etc.) textile strands of large-magnitude tensile strength and frequently of considerable length. The length and strength of such strands, in conjunction with their normally quite-random and entangled array within the bale-like masses received by a reclaimer of waste strand material, has heretofore necessitated the manual disintegration of such masses. The apparatus of the present invention automatically and efficiently disintegrates bale-like masses of waste textile strand material of the above-described type, as well as of other types, and does so in a manner which does not so impair desirable physical properties of the strand material as to restrict its various end-uses.
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PRIORITY CLAIM
This application claims the benefit of provisional application Ser. No. 61/105,681, filed Oct. 15, 2008, which is relied upon and incorporated herein by reference.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates generally to tire changers.
Tire changers are utilized by employees of a vehicle service center when it is necessary to remove a tire from its rim and replace it with a new one. After the tire is replaced, the wheel is inflated by the operator. Some manufacturers of tire changers have devised various means to restrain the tire during inflation.
For example, some rim holding tire changers include swing over arm devices to help in restraining the tire/rim assembly. In other cases, a separate mechanical device has been utilized that the user inserts through the center hole of the wheel and locks into a mechanical system on the tire changer machine. Other manufacturers have provided systems in which the operator is located behind bars for the inflation stage of tire service. This system has had limited success as the operators do not want to move to a different location for tire inflation. Also, during a tire explosion, a tire and rim can be propelled upward and can do other damage.
A different way to handle tire inflation and provide more positive protection to the user is to have a 4-Bar cage or similar device. Such an arrangement will contain a tire failure or explosion. These devices, however, have drawbacks in that many times the cage devices are not firmly and structurally attached to the floor. As a result, they may become a flying object in the event of a tire explosion. Another drawback is the productivity lost when the operator moves from the tire changing machine to place the tire to be inflated in the 4-Bar cage arrangement.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention recognizes and addresses the foregoing disadvantages, and others, of prior art constructions and methods.
In accordance with one aspect, the present invention provides a tire changing machine comprising a chassis base and a rotatable wheel holder (e.g., turntable) configured to retain a wheel rim. A tower carrying a mount/demount head movable toward and away from the wheel rim, extends upward from the chassis base. An inflation cage is fixed with respect to the chassis base. The inflation cage defines an interior accessible through a first opening for ingress and egress of a vehicle wheel.
Preferably, the inflation cage may be located at a back of the tire changer to rest on a common floor surface with the chassis base. For example, the inflation cage may be attached to the tower such as by a plurality of U-bolts extending around the tower.
In some exemplary embodiments, the inflation cage may have first and second openings at opposite ends thereof for ingress and egress of the vehicle wheel. Such embodiments may utilize first and second wheel ramps at the first and second openings, respectively. The first and second wheel ramps may be in alignment but have a gap defined therebetween to provide a rest position for the wheel.
It will often be desirable to form the inflation cage by a plurality (e.g., four) of vertical bars spaced apart from one another. Such vertical bars, for example, may have a generally rectangular C-shaped configuration and may be attached to a back panel to define the cage interior.
Embodiments are contemplated in which the tire changing machine further comprises an automatic inflation device. For example, the automatic inflation device may be attached to the inflation cage.
In accordance with another aspect, the present invention provides a tire inflation cage comprising a cage structure defining an interior in which a vehicle wheel is located during inflation. The interior is accessible through a first opening for ingress and egress of the vehicle wheel. An attachment mechanism by which the cage structure is attached to the tire changer is also provided.
Other objects, features and aspects of the present invention are provided by various combinations and subcombinations of the disclosed elements, as well as methods of utilizing same, which are discussed in greater detail below.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
A full and enabling disclosure of the present invention, including the best mode thereof to one skilled in the art, is set forth more particularly in the remainder of the specification, including reference to the accompanying figures, in which:
FIG. 1 is a left side perspective view of a tire changer with attached inflation cage in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention;
FIG. 2 is a rear perspective view of the tire changer of FIG. 1 ;
FIG. 3 is a front perspective view of the tire changer of FIG. 1 ;
FIG. 4 is a right side perspective view of the inflation cage showing a shelf arrangement in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention;
FIG. 5 is an enlarged perspective view showing the manner in which a wheel can be inserted into the interior of the inflation cage;
FIG. 6 is an enlarged front view of an automatic inflation device that may be used with the tire changer; and
FIG. 7 is an enlarged back view of the automatic inflation device of FIG. 6 .
Repeat use of reference characters in the present specification and drawings is intended to represent same or analogous features or elements of the invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
It is to be understood by one of ordinary skill in the art that the present discussion is a description of exemplary embodiments only, and is not intended as limiting the broader aspects of the present invention, which broader aspects are included in the exemplary embodiments.
The preferred embodiment will be described in relation to a rim holding style tire changer. In this regard, the structure and operation of a rim holding style tire changer device is described in detail in U.S. Pat. No. 6,182,736 to Cunningham et al., incorporated herein by reference in its entirety for all purposes. One skilled in the art will appreciate, however, that aspects of the present invention may be applicable to various other types of tire changers as well.
Referring now to FIGS. 1-3 , a rim holding style tire changer 10 including an attached inflation cage 12 in accordance with the present invention is illustrated. Tire changer 10 includes a base 14 in which a variety of internal mechanisms are located. A rotatable wheel holder, here in the form of a turntable 16 , is located above the top of base 14 for supporting a vehicle wheel in a horizontal position for the tire changing operation. In this case, a pneumatic motor located inside of base 14 functions to rotate turntable 16 .
Turntable 16 includes a plurality of jaws 18 that move radially into and out of engagement with the wheel rim. A series of foot pedals 20 a - c ( FIG. 3 ) are provided at the front of base 14 for use by the operator. Foot pedals 20 a - c perform various functions, such as controlling rotation of turntable 16 and movement of jaws 18 .
A vertical tower 22 extends up from the back of base 14 . As shown, a mount/demount assembly 24 is located at the upper end of tower 22 . Assembly 24 includes a pivotal swing arm 26 carrying a vertically movable toolhead 28 at its distal end. As a result, toolhead 28 may be moved from a position away from the wheel rim to a position adjacent to the wheel rim.
Referring now also to FIGS. 4-6 , inflation cage 12 is mechanically attached to, and maintained in position by, tire changer 10 . In this case, a plurality of U-bolts 30 are used to connect cage 12 to tower 22 ( FIG. 5 ). As one skilled in the art will appreciate, attaching cage 12 to tire changer 10 precludes the need to bolt the cage to a floor. This is because the weight of tire changer 10 prevents cage 12 from moving in the event of a tire explosion. Advantageously, inflation cage 12 can be attached to machines already in service as a retrofit.
As can be seen in FIG. 2 , cage 12 in this embodiment includes a back panel (wall) 32 located adjacent to tower 22 . A pair of spaced-apart rail structures 34 extend horizontally along back panel 32 as shown. Rail structures 34 assist in guiding a wheel 36 into the interior of cage 12 and also provides clearance for the ends of U-bolts 30 . In this regard, apertures (not shown) may be defined in rail structures 34 to provide clearance for tightening U-bolts 30 .
As shown, a plurality of bars 38 having a generally rectangular C-shape (i.e., the shape of a rectangle without one of the long sides) are attached to back panel 32 in a vertical orientation. In this embodiment, four such bars 38 are situated in a spaced apart arrangement to define the cage interior. Bars 38 may be attached to back panel 32 by welding or any other suitable technique. One or more spacer elements 40 may be attached across bars 38 in a horizontal orientation. A corner piece 42 may be attached at the outside bottom corner of cage 12 to provide a planar surface adjacent to the floor on which cage 12 rests. As one skilled in the art will appreciate, more or fewer vertical bars may be provided as necessary or desired. In addition, other suitable box-like structures may be used. All of these arrangements would be considered “cages” as that term is used in the present application.
Each open end of cage 12 is equipped with a ramp 44 to facilitate ingress and egress of wheel 36 . Preferably, a gap 46 ( FIG. 1 ) will be provided between ramps 44 in the middle of the cage interior to assure wheel 36 stays in this position when not being moved by the operator. Gap 46 will thus provide a detent between the ramps.
In the illustrated embodiment, an automatic inflation device 48 is also provided. As shown, the inflation device may be mounted to one of the bars 38 in a location convenient to the operator. Inflation device 48 , which includes an inflation hose 50 , automatically inflates wheel 36 to a pressure selectable by the operator.
As shown, a shelf arrangement 52 may be incorporated into cage 12 to provide additional storage for the operator. In this case, for example, a plurality of shelves are located on the side of back panel 32 opposite bars 38 .
Because the inflation cage 12 is adjacent the tire changer, the operator can seal the tire on the machine using the bead sealing feature of the tire changer machine. Then, the tire can be placed in the inflation cage whereupon the automatic inflation device is attached to the tire valve for bead seating and final inflation. While the tire in the cage is being inflated, the operator has the opportunity to service a second tire. This flow of processes facilitates improved operator productivity.
Because the bars in the disclosed cage are vertical whereas inflation cages of the prior art had horizontal bars, it is assured that the tire will be at rest in the middle of the cage for inflation. This feature negates the need for other systems that require the operator to roll the tire up a ram system when near the middle of the cage. In addition, the described device is more economical than many of the existing products available to the trade.
It can be seen that the present invention provides a tire changer having an attached inflation cage. While preferred embodiments of the invention have been shown and described, modifications and variations may be made thereto by those of ordinary skill in the art without departing from the spirit and scope of the present invention, which is more particularly set forth in the appended claims. In addition, it should be understood that aspects of the various embodiments may be interchanged both in whole or in part. Furthermore, those of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that the foregoing description is by way of example only, and is not intended to limit the present invention. Therefore, it is contemplated that any and all such modifications are included in the present invention as may fall within the literal and equivalent scope of the appended claims.
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A tire changing machine comprises a chassis base and a rotatable wheel holder configured to retain a wheel rim. A tower, carrying a mount/demount head movable toward and away from the wheel rim, extends upward from the chassis base. An inflation cage is fixed with respect to the chassis base. The inflation cage defines an interior accessible through a first opening for ingress and egress of a vehicle wheel. Preferably, the inflation cage may be located at a back of the tire changer to rest on a common floor surface with the chassis base.
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CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] The present patent application claims the benefits of priority of U.S. Patent Application No. 62/141,457, entitled “Self-detaching support frame system for an implement and method for using the same”, and filed at the US Patent Office on Apr. 1, 2015, the content of which is incorporated herein by reference.
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
[0002] The present invention generally relates to frames and frame assemblies for supporting implements on vehicles and more particularly relates to frames and frame assemblies for supporting implements on small vehicles such as, but not limited to, all-terrain vehicles (“ATV” or “ATVs”) and utility-terrain vehicle (“UTV” or “UTVs”).
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0003] Since a couple of years, the All-terrain vehicles (“ATV” or “ATVs”), utility-terrain vehicle (“UTV” or “UTVs”) or other recreational off highway vehicles (“ROV”) (hereinafter, ATV should be understood to refer as comprising ATV, UTV, ROV and other similar vehicles) market has been growing steadily. Moreover, ATV users have been using their vehicles for new tasks such as snow removal, load transport, etc. To help ATV users make the fullest use of their vehicles, numerous accessories have been put on the market. ATV and other similar vehicles are often equipped with implements such as plows to allow the vehicles to displace snow, dirt, soil, gravel, etc. Such implements are typically removably mounted to the vehicles via appropriate supporting frames or supporting frame assemblies.
[0004] However, in order for the ATV user to use an accessory to its full capacity, the accessory must be easy to use and more importantly, easy to install. In the field of support frame assemblies for snow plows and other front-mounted implements, this is even more important since these assemblies are generally relatively heavy and thus difficult to manipulate and install.
[0005] Support frame assemblies currently on the market are not easy and/or are time consuming to install. In the vast majority of cases, when the user is alone, he or she (hereinafter, for the sake of simplicity, only the masculine form will be used) must use brute force to install the frame assembly on his ATV. This comes from the fact that all the weight of the plow assembly rests on the ground. Thus, the user must overcome the friction force between the ground and the plow. Moreover, since snow plows are generally made of metal, they can be relatively heavy and the friction force between the ground and the plow can be relatively large.
[0006] Thus, in general, most frame assemblies currently on the market are more easily installed when two or more individuals are present.
[0007] As a result, in current frame assemblies, the majority of the systems on the market offer the possibility of a quick attach, which allows the user minimal handling to mount the plow system on the ATV. Unfortunately, these systems require the user to get out of the vehicle to detach the plow system from the ATV. Some plow systems comprise quick release mechanisms which allow removing the plow system from the vehicle without undue labor. However, even these quick release mechanisms require the user to get out of the vehicle. There are even some plow systems that are not equipped with quick release mechanisms and imply that the users should lie down under the vehicle to install or detach the plow push frame from the ATV.
[0008] In view of the foregoing, there is indeed a need for a new and improved support frame assembly for a plow or other implement which mitigates at least some of the shortcoming of prior art support frame assemblies.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0009] The shortcomings of the prior art are generally mitigated by providing a self-detaching support frame system for an assembly.
[0010] Since the self-detaching support frame system for an implement in accordance with the present invention can be used with implements and accessories other than plows, hereinafter, the term “plow” shall be construed broadly and shall therefore relate to any front-mounted accessories such as plow, blade and other similarly mounted implements.
[0011] The self-detaching support frame system for an implement is designed to fill a need on the market for mechanical self-detach system that can at least partially, preferably totally disconnect the push frame from the vehicle by pulling on a release handle while remaining seated on the vehicle.
[0012] Hence, the self-detaching support frame system for an implement allows the user to at least partially, preferably entirely, disengage the support frame assembly by activating a control, preferably a single control such as a handle located near the vehicle steering. Understandably, the handle could be located at various locations on the vehicle as long as the user may access the handle without requiring him to go off the vehicle.
[0013] According to one aspect of the present invention, once disengaged, the vehicle is preferably ready to drive without the plow system and without the user having to get off the vehicle. This system has a pull cable with a handle located near the ATV steering, which is connected to the mount plate latching system.
[0014] According to one aspect of the present invention, the self-detaching support frame system for an assembly does not require the user to get off the vehicle or lay down on the floor to disengage the plow system.
[0015] According to one aspect of the invention, the self-detaching support frame system for an assembly may additionally release the winch hook automatically without further user manipulation.
[0016] According to one aspect of the present invention, the self-detaching support frame system for an assembly preferably requires no engine or electric system, only mechanical components to detach the plow system. The absence of an engine or electric actuated system generally implies a low-cost mechanism.
[0017] According to one aspect of the present invention, a method for removing a support frame system for an assembly is disclosed. The method comprises the step of:
a. pulling a handle on the vehicle to activate the mechanism.
[0019] According to one aspect of the present invention, the trigger handle is preferably connected to the activation cable. This cable is then connected to a mount plate that is fastened under the vehicle. Pulling on the trigger handle rotates the lock system and releases the hook of the latching system. The latching mechanism is held to the mount plate by the hook and by two brackets (parts are attached on the ATV). By releasing the hook, the latching system falls on the ground by gravity, then releasing the front brackets in the same movement. The system is now completely disengaged. Once disengaged, the tube or lever arm retained under the vehicle moves. As such, upon falling of the latch system on the ground, a lever arm is released thus disengaging a rod operatively connected to a rotated lock plate previously engaging a winch hook. By this movement, the rod pulls the pivot link and ejects the winch hook. As a result, the winch hook is now completely disengaged. The system is totally free to be moved and the vehicle ready to ride without the plow system.
[0020] Hence, a self-detaching support frame system for an assembly, in accordance with the principles of the present invention, generally extends longitudinally and generally comprises, at its rear end, a rear attachment mechanism for removably mounting the rear end of the support frame to the underside of the vehicle, and at its front end, an implement attachment assembly for supporting the implement.
[0021] The rear attachment mechanism typically allows the support frame to pivot with respect to the vehicle, thereby allowing the support frame to be raised and lowered as needed, typically by the winch of the vehicle. In typical though non-limitative embodiments of the support frame, the rear attachment mechanism is a latching mechanism that comprises one or more latches.
[0022] In typical though non-limitative embodiments of a support frame, the support frame is configured to support a plow.
[0023] The support frame assembly in accordance with the principles of the present invention also generally simplifies the installation and removal of the support frame assembly to and from a vehicle.
[0024] According to one aspect of the present invention, a self-detaching support frame for an implement for a vehicle is disclosed. The support frame comprises a first portion, a second portion and a lever arm. The first portion comprises a first end adapted to receive an implement and a second end adapted to receive a lifting system. The second portion being pivotally mounted to the first portion and comprises a first end comprising a first securing member adapted to engage with a retaining member mounted to the vehicle and a second end comprising a second securing member adapted to engage with a receiving member mounted to the vehicle. The lever arm is pivotally mounted to the second portion, the lever arm being adapted to engage the lifting system. The disengagement of the retaining member from the first securing member allows the second portion to move downwardly, the downward movement allowing the lever arm to move and to release the lifting system.
[0025] According to one aspect of the present invention, the second portion has a D-shape made from tubular members and comprises side arms mounted to the tubular members adapted to be pivotally mounted to the first portion.
[0026] According to one aspect of the present invention the axis of rotation of the lever arm with regards to the second portion and the axis of rotation of the second portion with regards to the first portion are substantially parallel.
[0027] According to one aspect of the present invention the axis of rotation of the second portion with regards to the first portion is substantially perpendicular to the length of the support frame. The lever arm may be mounted between the end of the second portion and the opposite end of the first portion.
[0028] According to one aspect of the present invention the first end is a latch hook adapted to be engaged by the retaining member. The receiving member may be a rod substantially perpendicular to the length of the support frame. The lever arm may be mechanically connected to the attachment system.
[0029] According to one aspect of the present invention the mechanical connection is a rod.
[0030] According to one aspect of the present invention, the attachment system comprises a hook mounted to the first portion, a supporting member mounted to the hook, and a lock plate pivotally mounted to the supporting member and connected to the rod. The rotation of the lock plates closes the hook in an engaged position or opens the hook in a disengaged position.
[0031] According to one aspect of the present invention, the retaining member is pivotally mounted to the vehicle and mechanically connected to a mechanical connection adapted to move the retaining member to release the first end.
[0032] According to one aspect of the present invention, the mechanical connection is engaged by a release controller. The release controller is located within arm's reach of the vehicle user when located in the driving position.
[0033] According to one aspect of the present invention a vehicle mounting assembly for mounting a support frame to a vehicle is disclosed. The mounting assembly comprises a mounting plate being configured to be mounted to an underside of the vehicle; a retaining element supported by the mounting plate, the retaining element being adapted to retain the support frame to the vehicle in a first position and to release the support frame in a second position; and an actuator operatively connected to retaining element to move the retaining element between the first and second position, the actuator being located on the vehicle in a location allowing a user to reach the actuator while the user is in the driving position. The actuator may be mechanically connected to the retaining element and the retaining element may either be a latch or a hook.
[0034] According to one aspect of the present invention, the self-detach support frame comprises a rear end configured to be removably mounted to the mounting plate and engaged by the retaining element, and a front end operatively mounted to an implement, the support frame comprising a rear section and a front section pivotally connected thereto.
[0035] Other and further aspects and advantages of the present invention will be obvious upon an understanding of the illustrative embodiments about to be described or will be indicated in the appended claims, and various advantages not referred to herein will occur to one skilled in the art upon employment of the invention in practice.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0036] The above and other aspects, features and advantages of the invention will become more readily apparent from the following description, reference being made to the accompanying drawings in which:
[0037] FIG. 1 is a user view of an ATV exposing a control for the self-detaching support frame system for an assembly
[0038] FIG. 2 is a close up view of the control of FIG. 1 .
[0039] FIG. 3 is a side view of an ATV exposing the self-detaching mechanism of the self-detaching support frame system for an assembly mounted thereto.
[0040] FIG. 4 is a close up view of the self-detaching mechanism of FIG. 3 .
[0041] FIG. 5 is a close up view of the self-detaching mechanism of FIG. 3 upon actuation of the self-release control.
[0042] FIG. 6 is a perspective view of an ATV exposing the self-detaching mechanism of the self-detaching support frame system for an assembly partially mounted thereto.
[0043] FIG. 7 is a close up view of the self-detaching mechanism of FIG. 6 .
[0044] FIG. 8 is a side elevation view of a self-detaching support frame system for an assembly mounted to an ATV.
[0045] FIG. 9 is a side elevation view of a self-detaching support frame system for an assembly partially mounted to an ATV.
[0046] FIG. 10 is a side perspective view of a self-detaching support frame system for an assembly.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
[0047] A novel self-detaching support frame system for an implement and method for using the same will be described hereinafter. Although the invention is described in terms of specific illustrative embodiments, it is to be understood that the embodiments described herein are by way of example only and that the scope of the invention is not intended to be limited thereby.
[0048] Referring first to FIGS. 1-6 , an embodiment of a self-detaching support frame system for an implement 220 , in accordance with the principles of the present invention, is depicted mounted to a vehicle 100 . In FIG. 1 , the vehicle 100 is an ATV. However, the vehicle 100 could be a UTV, ROV or any other similar small vehicles.
[0049] Now referring to FIGS. 1-6 , in the present embodiment, the self-detaching support frame system for an implement 220 comprises a vehicle plate 120 mounted on the underside of the vehicle 100 , a release control 130 in distance reach of the vehicle user, a mechanical connection 240 between the release control 130 and the vehicle plate 120 and a support frame structure for implement 300 . The in distance reach release control 130 , once disengaged, preferably renders the vehicle 100 ready to drive without the plow system and without the user having to get off the vehicle 100 .
[0050] In the present embodiment, the self-detaching support frame system for an implement 220 comprises a support frame structure for implement 300 releasably mounted to a mounting rod 116 located on the front side 118 of the frame of the vehicle 100 and a releasable attachment mechanism 320 located on a vehicle plate mounted to the underside of the vehicle. The mounting rod 116 can be either mounted to the underside of the frame 112 or integral therewith.
[0051] The system preferably has a pull cable with a handle located near the vehicle 100 steering, which is connected to the vehicle plate latching system 170 . As it will be best understood below, the connection between the support frame 300 and the frame 112 allows the implement 220 mounted to the support frame 300 to self-detach upon the actuation of a release control 130 by the user (see FIG. 2 ).
[0052] In other embodiments, the support frame 300 could be mounted to the underside of the vehicle 100 via different attachment mechanisms. However, these other attachment mechanisms must still allow the support frame 300 to pivot with respect to the frame 112 of the vehicle 100 . One of such other attachment mechanism is the use of a clevis pin. The clevis pin in another embodiment preferably acts as the pivot from which the frame may pivot with regard to the frame of the vehicle. In such an embodiment where the self-detach mechanism is combined with a clevis pin, the mechanical connection between the release control and the release mechanism could be via the clevis pin. As such, upon actuation of the release control, the clevis pin or pins would be removed, thus releasing the support frame.
Support Frame
[0053] As seen generally in the figures and more particularly in FIGS. 6-10 , the support frame 300 comprises the frame 340 and attachment means 315 for supporting the implement. The frame 340 generally extends longitudinally and comprises a front or forward end portion 342 and a rear or rearward end portion 344 . In the present embodiment, the front portion 342 is substantially H-shaped and comprises two longitudinal members 350 and 352 reinforced by a middle support member 354 . The front portion 342 comprises a first end 336 for mounting the implement 220 and a second end 338 pivotally connected to the rear portion 344 . The front portion 342 further comprises a winch hook attachment system 370 .
[0054] Referring to FIGS. 6-10 and particularly to FIG. 6 , the forward end portion 342 of the support frame 300 , and of the members 350 and 352 , are hingedly connected to the rear end portion 344 as to permit the implement 220 to pivot with respect to the vehicle 100 . The rear portion comprises front brackets 362 for mounting the support frame 300 to the vehicle 100 , a D-shape body 382 comprising right and left side arms 368 for pivotally connecting the rear portion 344 to the front portion 342 and a rear latch hook 388 for securing the support frame 300 to the vehicle 100 . The rear portion 344 further comprises a reinforcing arm 390 abutting on the right and left side arms 368 . The reinforcing arm 390 , also referred to as the middle arm 390 comprises a lever arm 364 mounted thereto. The lever arm 364 is used to pull the rod 394 actuating winch hook attachment system 370 in a closed position, securing the winch hook 160 to the support frame 300 upon mounting of the support frame 300 to the vehicle 100 . The movement of the lever arm 364 is initiated when the lever arm 364 is pressed against the skid plate (not shown) of the vehicle 100 when mounting the support frame 300 to the vehicle 100 . The middle arm 390 also comprises a finger 366 connected to an elongated member 394 operatively mounted to the winch hook attachment system 370 release mechanism.
[0055] Referring back to FIGS. 6-10 , winch hook attachment system 370 comprises a winch cable supporting member 374 connected to and extending between the members 350 and 352 . In the present embodiment, the winch cable supporting member 374 has a generally inverted ‘U’ shape and a rotated lock plate 372 adjacent thereto for retaining the winch hook 160 . The winch cable (not shown) and winch hook 160 referred to herein are the winch and winch hook 160 of the vehicle 100 . The rotated lock plate 372 is preferably operatively mounted to the winch cable supporting member 374 via a pair of supporting members 376 . Although preferred, any other suitable means of releasably securing the winch hook to the winch hook attachment system 370 would be suitable provided the winch hook 160 is easily releasable. The rotated lock plate 372 is also operatively connected to a spring loaded end 393 of the elongated member 394 for interlinking the rear portion 344 and winch hook attachment system 370 . Accordingly, though not shown, the position of the winch cable supporting member 374 could be adjustable in order to accommodate different configurations of winch positions and mounting plate positions.
[0056] As it will also be best understood below, having the rotated lock plate 372 adjacent to the winch cable supporting member 374 allows the retention of the winch hook 160 during use of the self-detaching support frame system for an implement 200 . The rotated lock plate 372 also allows the release of the winch hook 160 upon actuation of the release control 130 which provides significant benefits such as making the self-detaching mechanism complete and not requiring the user to get off the vehicle 100 even after detaching off the support frame 300 from the vehicle plate 120 .
[0057] According to one embodiment of the present invention, now referring to FIGS. 6-10 the right and left side arms 368 comprise indentations 367 for receiving the side walls of stoppers 365 installed on the front portion 342 of the support frame 300 . The stoppers 365 may be installed at various positions to allow adjustment of the height of the front brackets 362 when the support frame 300 rests on the ground. The adjustment of the stoppers 365 thus modulates the height of the support frame 300 as a function of the height of the vehicle 100 . As such, the stoppers 365 are positioned to ensure that the brackets 362 are at least as high as the front mounting rod 116 to ensure proper mounting of the support frame 300 to the vehicle 100 .
Locking System
[0058] As seen generally in the figures and more particularly in FIGS. 5 and 6 , the locking system comprises front and rear vehicle attachment 396 , 398 and a locking mechanism 170 . The rearward end portion 344 of the frame 300 comprises the rear vehicle attachment 396 configured to be releasably engaged to a mounting plate (also referred to as vehicle plate) 120 (see FIG. 5 ) secured to the underside of the vehicle 100 .
[0059] In the present embodiment, the rear vehicle attachment 396 comprises a latch hook 388 operatively connected to the rearward end portion 344 . The front vehicle attachment 398 comprises a pair of front hooks 362 which are respectively mounted to a matching rod 116 installed on the vehicle 100 or integrated in the frame of the vehicle 100 . The locking mechanism 170 , generally located on the mounting plate 120 comprises a spring-loaded retaining member 146 actively locking the latch hook 388 . The spring loaded locking mechanism 170 comprises a retaining member 146 operatively biased in an operative position, a position in which the retaining member 146 would retain the latch hook 388 to secure the front and rear vehicle attachments 396 , 398 of support frame 300 to the vehicle 100 . In the present embodiment, the operational bias is applied to the retaining member 146 by a resilient member 148 operatively connected to the retaining member 146 and to the vehicle plate 120 via a plate support member 150 .
[0060] The main use of the latch hook 388 , in cooperation with the front hooks 362 , is to securely attach the rear portion 344 of the support frame 300 to the mounting plate 120 connected to the vehicle 100 , and more particularly to the front mounting rod 116 and spring loaded locking mechanism 170 also referred to as a latch mechanism 170 (see FIG. 5 ).
Vehicle Plate Latching System
[0061] Referring now to FIGS. 3-5 , in the present embodiment, the vehicle plate 120 comprises attachment means, typically apertures (not shown), for mounting the vehicle plate 120 to the vehicle 100 . According to one embodiment, the vehicle plate could be fastened to the underside of the vehicle using fasteners 154 . According to another embodiment, the vehicle plate could be integrated to the vehicle frame 112 . The vehicle plate 120 generally comprises a latch mechanism 170 for receiving the latch hook 388 of the rear portion 344 of the support frame 300 . The latch mechanism 170 comprises a retaining member 146 configured to insert in the latch hook 388 thus releasably securing the support frame 300 to the vehicle 100 . The retaining member or rod 146 is controlled by a retention control 130 . From the retaining member 146 , a spring 148 extends which is preferably configured to maintain the retaining member 146 in a locked position. The retaining member 146 is preferably mounted on side support arms 142 , 152 pivotally connected to attachment plates 140 , 144 mounted to the vehicle plate 120 . As such, the vehicle plate 120 comprises a plate opening 174 for receiving the latch hook 388 . Understandably, the opening 174 is properly sized to receive the latch hook 388 . The plate opening 174 is preferably larger than the latch hook 388 to allow for ease of securing the latch hook 388 to the retaining member 146 . At least one of the side support arms 142 , 152 is biased in the operative position by a resilient member, preferably a spring, 148 operatively mounted to the support plate, preferably via a plate support member 150 . Understandably, any suitable biasing mechanism for biasing the retaining member 146 in its operative position, the position where the latch hook 388 is retained and where the support frame is mounted to the vehicle, would allow the latch mechanism 170 to retain the latch hook 388 .
[0062] As best shown in FIGS. 3 and 4 , the recess 198 cooperates with the similarly curved surface of the retaining member 146 of the vehicle plate 120 to form a secure attachment when in the locked position.
[0063] In accordance with the principles of the present invention, now referring to FIGS. 3-6 , the rear vehicle attachment 396 work in cooperation with the balancing effect of the hooks 362 and front supporting rod 116 . More particularly upon advancing of the vehicle 100 , the vehicle skid plate (not shown) interacts with the lever arm 364 to actuate the winch hook attachment system 370 securing the winch hook 160 to the support frame 300 . The vehicle front supporting rod 116 is then received in the support frame front hooks 362 , which upon further advancement of the vehicle 100 directs the latch hook 388 in the opening 174 to engage the retaining member 146 and secure the support frame 300 to the vehicle 100 .
Release Mechanism
[0064] In embodiment shown in FIGS. 4 and 5 , the self-detaching support frame system for an implement 300 comprises a release control 130 for releasing the latch hook 388 from the vehicle plate 120 . The release mechanism also referred as latch mechanism 170 releases the latch hook 388 by actuation of the release control 130 mechanically connected to the vehicle plate through a mechanical connection 240 . The mechanical connection 240 pulls the retaining member 146 in its inoperative position, the position where the latch hook 388 is released or unrestrained by the retaining member 146 . As such, the actuation of the release control rotates the lock system (the latch 170 ) and releases the hook 388 of the latching system 170 . The latching mechanism holds to the mount plate by the hook 388 and by two brackets 362 (parts are attached on the ATV). By releasing the hook 388 , the support frame 300 falls on the ground by gravity, then releasing the front brackets 362 in the same movement. The system is now completely disengaged. Once disengaged, the tube or lever arm 364 retained under the vehicle moves. As such, upon falling of the latch system on the ground, a lever arm 364 is released thus disengaging a rod 394 operatively connected to a rotated lock plate 372 previously engaging a winch hook 160 . As such, movement of the rod 394 pull the rotated plate or pivot link 372 and eject the winch hook 160 . As a result, the winch hook 160 is now completely disengaged. The system is totally free to be move and the vehicle ready to ride without the plow system 300 .
Description of the Method
[0065] In the present embodiment, the method of mounting the plow system comprises the steps of: moving the vehicle forward while substantially aligned with the support frame 300 , to engage the front brackets 362 with the mounting rod 116 located on the front side 118 of the frame of the vehicle 100 , the vehicle moving forward until the latch hook 388 is securely mounted to the retaining member 146 . The winch hook 160 is then manually attached to the hook receiving portion of the support frame 300 .
[0066] Conversely, the method for self-detaching the self-detach support frame system for an implement comprises the step of:
a. pulling a handle on the vehicle to activate the release mechanism.
[0068] Understandably, prior to disengaging the support frame 300 from the vehicle 100 , the implement 220 should be lowered and in contact with the ground thus releasing any tension in the winch cable (not shown).
[0069] While illustrative and presently preferred embodiments of the invention have been described in detail hereinabove, it is to be understood that the inventive concepts may be otherwise variously embodied and employed and that the appended claims are intended to be construed to include such variations except insofar as limited by the prior art.
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A self-detaching support frame system for an implement designed to self-detach from a vehicle by actuation of a release handle located within arm reach of the driver is disclosed. The self-detaching support frame system for an implement allow the user to at least partially, preferably entirely, disengages the support frame assembly by activating a control, preferably a single control such as a handle located near the vehicle steering.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0001] 1. Field of the Invention
[0002] The present invention relates to a pedal-driven vehicle, in particular an electric bicycle, and to a method for operating a pedal-driven vehicle.
[0003] 2. Description of the Related Art
[0004] In recent years, bicycles having a conventional pedal drive are increasingly equipped with an electric drive in addition. There are different options for placing the electric drive; the “center motor placement”, in which the electric drive is situated at the crankshaft assembly, offering conceptional advantages, in particular. In addition, a semiautomatic gear shift system is known from the bicycle sector, in which a gear shift operation is able to be triggered by pressing a button or the like, and the gear shift operation is executed by an electric actuator on the gear shift mechanism. These gear shift mechanisms are very comfortable, in particular. One set of problems with the known gear shift mechanisms, which affects both derailleur gears and hub gears, is that the gearshift mechanisms are unable to be operated in standstill mode. After travel using a high gear, it may therefore happen that the high gear is still engaged when the bicycle is at standstill, so that the drive-away is difficult because the engaged gear is too high.
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0005] In contrast, the pedal-driven or muscle-powered vehicle according to the present invention has the advantage that a gear shift operation is possible even when the rider is not pedaling. In the present invention, an electric drive is used to move a chain, so that an unproblematic gearshift operation is possible. To do so, a gearshift mechanism and an electric actuator for operating the gearshift mechanism are provided in addition to the electric drive and a power supply, especially a battery. A control unit controls the electric drive and the electric actuator, the control unit being configured in such a way that the electric drive is actuated in response to a gearshift command, so that the chain is moved so as to enable the gearshift change with the aid of the electric actuator. The present invention therefore allows a gearshift operation to take place without a rider having the operate the pedals for this purpose.
[0006] In an especially preferred manner, the control unit is set up in such a way that the chain can be moved out of a standstill state. In other words, the chain is preferably moved by the electric drive when the bicycle is coasting to a stop, for instance. Especially preferably, the gearshift mechanism is shifted to a lower gear from a standstill state, so that an easier initial acceleration is possible after the vehicle has stopped. To avoid incorrect shifting, the gearshift command is carried out from a standstill of the chain exclusively.
[0007] Moreover, the vehicle preferably includes a crank assembly sensor which is configured to detect a rider-triggered movement of a crank assembly. The control device is set up to control the electric actuator of the gearshift mechanism in such a way that when no crank movement is detected, the gearshift mechanism switches to a lower gear than the gear currently engaged. Especially preferably, the electric actuator shifts the gearshift mechanism into first gear. In other words, as soon as the crank assembly sensor detects no movement of the crank assembly, i.e., when the rider is not pedaling, the gearshift mechanism is shifted back into a lower gear. This provides the rider with the advantage that a lower gear is already engaged in the gearshift mechanism as soon as the rider starts pedaling again, so that the pedaling can be resumed without any problems. In particular after the vehicle has come to a stop, an initial acceleration is able to be made much easier by the already engaged lower gear.
[0008] Moreover, the vehicle according to the present invention preferably includes at least one torque sensor which is configured to detect a torque at the crank assembly applied by a rider. The control device is set up to control the electric actuator of the gearshift mechanism in such a way that if no torque is detected, the gearshift mechanism is shifted into a lower gear than the gear currently engaged. Especially preferably, the torque detection takes place simultaneously with the movement detection of the crank assembly, so that pedaling of the rider or stopping of the rider movement is possible in a redundant manner. The detection of a torque applied by the rider is advantageous in particular insofar as, for example, the rider may still pedal lightly when the vehicle is rolling to a stop without an additional torque being applied in this way. Nevertheless, the speed of the vehicle drops in such a case, so that it would be useful to shift into a lower gear.
[0009] According to another preferred development of the present invention, the vehicle moreover includes a semiautomatic shifting device, via which a rider inputs a gearshift command. In addition or as an alternative, the control device is configured to determine an efficiency of the electric drive and to output a gearshift command based on the ascertained efficiency of the electric drive. For example, the efficiency of the electric drive may be recorded as a function of detected parameters, such as the rate of rotation, the output torque of the electric drive, etc.
[0010] Moreover, the vehicle preferably includes a velocity sensor for detecting a vehicle velocity, the control unit being set up to select a gear as a function of the vehicle velocity in response to a gearshift command. The control unit, for example, includes a memory in which predefined velocity ranges are stored that are allocated to a predefined gear. At a velocity of zero, i.e., a standing vehicle, for example, the lowest gear may be engaged.
[0011] The pedal-driven vehicle is preferably an electric bicycle. Moreover, the electric drive of the electric bicycle is preferably installed as a center drive, i.e., the electric drive is situated in the region of the crank assembly.
[0012] It is moreover preferred that the gearshift mechanism of the pedal-driven vehicle is a derailleur gear or a hub gear.
[0013] In addition, the present invention relates to a method for operating a pedal-driven vehicle, in which a gearshift command is detected by a control unit in a first step. The electric drive then is powered in order to move the chain, so that a gearshift change may take place. At the same time, a gearshift change is carried out by an electric actuator at the gearshift mechanism. In the method of the present invention, a gearshift operation is therefore able to be realized with the aid of an automatic or semiautomatic gearshift mechanism, although the rider is not pedaling and the chain is actually not moving. The present invention overcomes this by controlling the electric drive, which then moves the chain, so that shifting of the gearshift mechanism, in particular into a lower gear, is possible.
[0014] Especially preferably, the chain is moved out of the standstill state by the electric drive. It is furthermore preferred that the electric drive shifts the gearshift mechanism into a lower gear than a gear engaged during the gearshift command. More specifically, if a velocity of the vehicle equals zero, the electric actuator shifts the gearshift mechanism into the lowest gear.
[0015] In addition, the gear to be engaged by the gearshift mechanism preferably is engaged as a function of a velocity of the vehicle. In the process, a control unit ascertains a vehicle velocity and compares the detected vehicle velocity to stored vehicle velocities, a predefined gear having been allocated to the stored vehicle velocities in each case. The method according to the present invention is used especially in conjunction with an electric bicycle, in particular a bicycle having a center motor.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING
[0016] FIG. 1 a schematic representation of a vehicle according to a preferred specific embodiment of the present invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
[0017] FIG. 1 shows an electric bicycle 1 according to a preferred exemplary embodiment of the present invention.
[0018] Electric bicycle 1 according to the invention includes an electric drive 2 , which is connected via connecting lines 12 , 13 to a control unit 5 and a battery 6 as electrical energy supply. Electric bicycle 1 furthermore includes a gearshift mechanism 4 , which is a derailleur gear in this exemplary embodiment. An electric actuator 3 is situated on gearshift mechanism 4 which is connected to control unit 5 via a connecting line 11 . Electric actuator 3 switches gearshift mechanism 4 in response to a command from a switch 9 , which is disposed on the steering mechanism and connected via a connecting line 10 to electric actuator 3 and control unit 5 .
[0019] Electric bicycle 1 of this exemplary embodiment thus includes a central control unit 5 , which controls all electrically operable devices, i.e., electric actuator 3 and electric drive 2 . As an alternative, it would also be possible to provide individual control units for the respective electrically drivable devices.
[0020] As can furthermore be gathered from FIG. 1 , in this exemplary embodiment electric drive 2 is situated directly on a crankshaft assembly 8 , so that a so-called ‘center motor’ is provided in this case.
[0021] In addition, electric bicycle 1 includes a multitude of sensors. A crankshaft assembly sensor bearing reference numeral 15 is provided in FIG. 1 , which is disposed on crankshaft assembly 8 and records a movement of the crankshaft assembly triggered by a rider via pedals. Crankshaft assembly sensor 15 , for example, is able to detect a rotation of a crankshaft. In addition, a torque sensor 16 is provided at crankshaft assembly 8 , which records a torque applied by the rider. Torque sensor 16 , for example, may include strain gauges or the like. In addition, a velocity sensor 17 is provided, which detects a rotation of a wheel of electric bicycle 1 . Based on the rotational speed of the wheel, control unit 5 can then calculate a velocity of the electric bicycle. All sensors are connected to central control unit 5 again.
[0022] According to the present invention, control unit 5 is now set up in such a way that electric drive 2 moves chain 7 in response to a gearshift command, so that a gearshift change is possible with the aid of electric actuator 3 .
[0023] According to the present invention, a gear shift change may occur despite the fact that chain 7 is standing still.
[0024] The gear shift command may be input by a rider via switch 9 , or control unit 5 may automatically output a gear shift command based on the driving states detected by the sensors. In an especially preferred manner, control unit 5 checks an efficiency of electric drive 2 in the process, so that a shift command is possible based on efficiency aspects. As an alternative, an automatic shift command may be output by control unit 5 also as a function of a pedaling frequency of the rider.
[0025] The present invention enables a gear shift operation in a stationary electric bicycle, in particular for the first time. Control unit 5 may be programmed in such a way, for example, that while electric bicycle 1 is coasting to a stop, during which the rider is no longer operating the pedals and chain 7 is standing still, a shift command for down-shifting the gears is able to be output by control unit 5 , so that a lower gear is engaged as a function of the driving speed. When electric bicycle 1 then has finally come to a stop, control unit 5 engages the lowest gear, so that the lowest gear is already engaged when the electric bicycle picks up speed again and support via electric drive 2 at an optimal efficiency is able to be provided in the event the rider wishes this. When the bicycle is rolling to a stop without any pedal operation by the rider, control unit 5 may engage an appropriate gear as a function of a speed of the electric bicycle, so that the optimal gear is immediately engaged when the rider resumes pedaling again (even without stopping). An adjustment of gearshift mechanism 4 takes place with the aid of electric actuator 3 .
[0026] Electric actuator 3 may be supplied with energy via battery 6 , or a hub generator is provided in addition, which supplies electric actuator 3 with energy.
[0027] The present invention therefore makes it possible to increase the driving comfort considerably, and a shift operation is able to be carried out without assistance by the rider, i.e., without selective pedaling. The shifting operation is performed more rapidly and safely at coordinated speeds, so that an efficiency increase is obtained in shifting. In addition, the stress on the toothed wheel works of the gearshift mechanism and, if provided, a gearing on electric drive 2 is reduced. This also results in less wear of the components of the gearshift mechanism and electric drive 2 as well as the gearing.
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An electric bicycle includes: an electric drive; a power supply; a chain; a gearshift mechanism; an electric actuator for actuating the gearshift mechanism; and a control unit for controlling the electric drive and the electric actuator. The control unit is configured to drive the electric drive in response to a gear shift command in order to move the chain so that a gear shift operation with the aid of the electric actuator is possible.
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FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to method and apparatus for producing carbon black by pyrolysis of a carbonaceous feed. In another aspect, the invention relates to method and apparatus for removing carbon black deposits from indirect heat exchange means associated with the production of carbon black.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PRIOR ART
In a typical furnace black process, a carbonaceous feed is introduced into a reactor and contacted with preheated air or hot combustion gases which elevate the temperature of the feed to a temperature sufficiently high to decompose the feed to form combustion products containing particulate carbon black. Such combustion products are typically at a temperature in the range of about 2400° F. to about 2900° F. The combustion products are cooled, usually by introducing a quench fluid into the combustion products to form an effluent, sometimes referred to as "smoke", containing particulate carbon black. The effluent is subsequently separated into a gas phase and a particulate carbon black phase by separating means such as a cyclone separator, bag filters, or the like. However, before such filtering or separating step, the effluent must be cooled to a temperature sufficiently low to prevent damage to the separating means.
It is common practice to initially cool or quench the carbon black reactor effluent by injecting directly thereinto quench fluid at one or more points in a quench chamber portion of a reactor. Typical quench fluids include water, cooled effluent or smoke, and/or off-gas, i.e., a portion of the gas phase separated from the effluent. Such a first cooling step normally lowers the temperature of the combustion products to a temperature of about 2000° F. or less, preferably between about 1500° F. and 2000° F. The first cooling is effected to lower the temperature of the carbon black reactor effluent to a temperature which can be safely accommodated in a subsequent indirect heat exchange means and to a temperature below which no further production of carbon black occurs.
A second step of cooling involves the use, for example, of a first indirect heat exchange means such as a shell-tube heat exchanger which further lowers the temperature of the effluent to a temperature of about 1200° F. or less, preferably between 800° F. and 1200° F. The thus cooled effluent can then be passed to one or more economizers, for example, indirect heat exchangers which are operable for heating air and/or feed to be introduced into the reactor. It is also common practice in the art to finally cool the effluent by injecting a trim quench fluid, for example, water, off-gas, and the like into the effluent before passing the effluent to the separating means. The final cooling lowers the temperature of the effluent to a temperature which can be safely accommmodated by the separating means. Typically, this temperature would be below about 600° F. for separating means such as bag filters. However, this temperature is dependent upon the type of bag filters used or, in general, the type of separating means used.
However, one problem encountered with the use of such apparatus is that carbon black deposits tend to build up in the heat exchangers, especially in the first indirect heat exchanger. Since carbon black is a good insulator, a thin layer of the carbon black will substantially lower the heat transfer rate in the indirect heat exchanger. It is therefore necessary to clean the indirect heat exchanger from time to time in order to maintain a high heat transfer rate and adequate operating efficiency. One method of accomplishing the cleaning is shutting down the reactor and allowing the indirect heat exchanger to cool to a temperature at which the indirect heat exchanger can be partially disassembled for cleaning by methods well known in the art to remove carbon black deposits. However, such a method is wasteful in several respects in that the total apparatus must be shut down to effect cleaning and after cleaning a stabilization period of several hours is required before production of carbon black is recommenced. Another method of cleaning comprises intervallically introducing additional carbon black, in various forms, into the effluent inlet to the indirect heat exchanger for a short period of time in a quantity sufficient to remove the deposited carbon black. A particularly advantageous method of cleaning the indirect heat exchangers when a carbon black pelleter is connected downstream of the heat exchanger is to return a portion of the wet pellets and/or dried pellets, preferably such pellets which are off-size specification, as additional cleaning carbon black to the inlet portion of the tube side of the shell-tube heat exchanger. Other forms of carbon black can also be effectively used as the additional cleaning carbon black. The cleaning carbon black can be, for example, flocculent carbon black, wet flocculent carbon black, partially agglomerated carbon black, dry carbon black pellets, wet carbon black pellets, and the like.
Such injection of additional cleaning carbon black into a shell-tube type heat exchanger is an effective way of cleaning the tubes to restore heat transfer efficiency. In such a heat exchanger, carbon black reactor effluent which has been quenched with quench fluid, preferably by adding directly to the effluent cooled recycled smoke, to a temperature of about 2000° F., and preferably between 1500° F. and 2000° F. is charged to the tube side of a shell-tube boiler, wherein on the shell side, high pressure hot water, for example, 600 psia, 485° F., is converted to steam, for example 600 psia, 485° F., and the carbon black containing gaseous effluent exits the tubes at about 1200° F. or preferably lower. When carbon black deposits accumulate on the inner peripheries of the tube walls of such a shell-tube heat exchanger, heat transfer efficiency is decreased and the temperature of the effluent from the tubes of the heat exchanger increases. By adding additional cleaning carbon black to the inlets of the tubes or plenum, continuously, cyclically, or intervallically as required by decrease of heat transfer efficiency as indicated by too high tube side gas outlet temperature, cleaning of the inner peripheries of the tube walls can be effected and heat transfer efficiency can be restored. There are, however, two problems. The first problem is that because of the rapid redeposition of the carbon black on the inner peripheries of the tube walls, the heat transfer rate and the steam generation rate vary in a broad range if the intervals between cleaning carbon black injection are of great duration. The second problem is that because of the number of tubes in a typical shell-tube heat exchanger as is used in the carbon black art, it is difficult to distribute additional cleaning carbon black uniformly to all tubes thereby to effect uniform removal of deposits from the inner peripheries thereof.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a method and an apparatus of producing carbon black which can be operated substantially continuously without need of completely terminating operation for cleaning of an indirect heat exchanger to maintain the heat exchange transfer rate in a desired range. It is a further object of this invention to provide a method and an apparatus whereby additional cleaning carbon black, in pellets or other suitable form, can be distributed to the tubes of a heat exchanger at different loci adjacent the upstream or inlet end of the heat exchanger so that additional cleaning carbon black is continuously, cyclically, or intervallically introduced into the tubes of a shell-tube or other appropriate heat exchanger to assure continuous, cyclic, or intervallic distribution of the carbon black among the various tubes for the cleaning of deposits accumulated in such tubes.
Other objects and advantages of the present invention will become apparent from the following description taken in connection with the accompanying drawings wherein are set forth by way of illustration and example certain embodiments of this invention.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Briefly, the invention comprises, in a method for producing carbon black wherein a gas stream containing carbon black is passed through means defining a flow path of an indirect heat exchanger laying down carbon black deposits thereon, means and method for removing at least a portion of the carbon black deposits comprising selectively introducing additional cleaning carbon black in an amount effective to remove at least a portion of the carbon black deposits into at least one portion of the means defining a flow path and flowing said additional cleaning carbon black along with said gas stream through the means defining a flow path to remove at least a portion of the carbon black deposits therefrom; and selectively introducing additional cleaning carbon black into at least one remaining portion of the means defining a flow path and flowing said additional cleaning carbon black along with said gas stream through the means defining a flow path to remove at least a portion of the carbon black deposits therefrom.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating the invention.
FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of carbon black producing apparatus showing one embodiment of the invention.
FIGS. 3 and 4 show an embodiment of a carbon black dispensing means suitable for use in the invention.
FIG. 5 shows an embodiment of the invention connecting a carbon black dispensing means to heat exchange means.
FIG. 6 is an embodiment showing a further modification of the embodiment of FIG. 5 by the addition of control means.
FIG. 7 shows an alternative embodiment of the control means.
FIG. 8 is an embodiment of the invention in which carbon black distributing means has an input connected to a screener output stream of a carbon black process stream.
FIG. 9 is an embodiment as in FIG. 8 but employing alternative control means.
FIG. 10 is an alternative embodiment of a portion of the carbon black process stream.
DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
In a preferred embodiment the invention comprises, in a method for producing carbon black wherein carbon black deposits are laid down on an indirect heat exchanger, method for selectively distributing additional cleaning carbon black in pellets or other suitable form as herein described to a number of inlet loci of a shell tube heat exchanger for example, to a number of loci circumferentially spaced in the plenum, and thence to respective portions of the tubes of the shell-tube heat exchanger, selectively effecting removal of at least a portion of the carbon black deposits in the respective portion of the tubes, thereby restoring heat transfer to the desired level in that portion, e.g., 1200° F. or lower for the tube side heat exchanger effluent temperature. Preferably the method comprises selectively, intervallically, or cyclically distributing the additional cleaning carbon black to the different loci to effect cleaning, although simultaneous and/or continuous distribution of the additional cleaning carbon black to the different loci is also consistent with the inventive concept. The pellets added during the cleaning of the tubes break up and the fines produced are carried by the gas containing produced carbon black ultimately to the pelleting-drying operation from which, preferably, the cleaning carbon black pellets were derived. The apparatus comprises, in accordance with the present invention, means whereby the cleaning carbon black pellets are distributed to the heat exchanger at more than one location, for example, through a rotary valve or other means as hereinafter described, having at least one and more preferably more than one outlet, which is rotating according to a desired cycle time either continuously or intervallically, to supply pellets to different input loci of the heat exchanger simultaneously or at different times.
Referring now to the drawings in detail and specifically to FIG. 1, the reference numeral 1 designates generally a carbon black production means operable for producing a hot gaseous carbon black containing effluent stream 2 which is cooled in heat exchange means 3 to provide a cooled carbon black containing stream 4 which is further processed as a process stream 5 to produce a product carbon black stream. As shown, a portion of the carbon black is diverted from the process stream and used as a cleaning carbon black stream 7. Alternatively, the additional cleaning carbon black can be obtained via a stream 6 from another source. Cleaning carbon black dispensing and/or distributing means 8 are provided whereby a cleaning carbon black stream 9 is used to selectively clean at least selective portions of heat exchange means 3.
Referring now to FIG. 2, the reference numeral 14 designates generally a carbon black reactor of any suitable type. Air is introduced into the reactor 14 via an inlet 3 and fuel is introduced into the reactor 14 via an inlet 12. A carbonaceous feed is introduced into the reactor via an inlet 10. Cooling air 11 is added around inlet 10. Air and fuel introduced via the inlets 13 and 12, respectively, can be combusted before introduction into the reactor or combusted within a combustion chamber 9 of the reactor 14. The combustion gases contact the feed from the inlet 10 and pyrolyze the feed to produce combustion products including particulate carbon black. The reactor 14 has an outlet thereof connected in flow communication via conduit means 17 with an indirect heat exchanger 16 such as a shell-tube heat exchanger. A heat exchange fluid such as water is introduced into, for example, the shell side of the heat exchanger 16 via an inlet and is generally discharged as stream as shown in FIGS. 2 and 6. The inlet to the tube side of the heat exchanger 16 receives effluent from the reactor 14 via conduit means 17 with the effluent flowing through the heat exchanger for discharge from an outlet thereof to conduit means 18. The conduit means 18 as illustrated includes one or more heat exchangers 61 connected in flow communication in the conduit means 18 for receiving effluent which can be used as the heat exchanger medium for heating such fluids as air, carbonaceous feed, and/or water, for example, air to be charged at inlet 13, for use in the carbon black producing process as in known in the art. A portion of heat exchanger outlet can be returned to the reactor 14 as a quench fluid, for example, via conduit 15 and blower 62.
Cleaning carbon black dispensing means 33 is connected in flow communication with cleaning carbon black distribution means comprising, for example, one or more conduit means 34a, 34b, 34c, and 34d, in flow communication with one or more loci, for example, inlets 36a, 36b, 36c, 36d, to the plenum 35 of the upstream or inlet end of heat exchanger 16 whereby cleaning carbon black may be selectively, if desired, introduced into the different inlets of the said heat exchanger continuously, intervallically, or cyclically to remove accumulated carbon black deposits from the walls thereof. Although my invention is illustrated by a preferred embodiment in which carbon black is introduced into plenum 35 via four conduits and inlets, it is apparent that the number of conduits and/or inlets can be varied in accordance with the principle of this invention so long as the cleaning carbon black is selectively distributed to at least two different portions of the heat exchanger means 16. As shown in FIG. 2, the cleaning carbon black dispensing means 33 preferably comprises a bin 37, for storage of the cleaning carbon black, adapted with a rotary valve portion 38, having one or preferably more than one outlet 43a, 43b, 43c and 43d (see also FIG. 4) and capable of continuous, cyclic, or intervallic operation so as to continuously, cyclically or intervallically dispense cleaning carbon black into said cleaning carbon black distributing means, for example, into one or more of the conduit means 34a, b, c, and d (see also FIGS. 2 and 5) for distribution to said one or more loci, for example, inlets 36a, b, c, d of plenum 35 of the heat exchanger 16 whereby the cleaning carbon black is introduced into different portions of the heat exchanger each portion comprising one or more of, for example, the tubes of an indirect heat exchanger to facilitate selective distribution of the cleaning carbon black among the various portions and hence among the various tubes of the heat exchanger to promote more uniform cleaning.
Cleaning carbon black dispensing means 33 further comprises an outlet portion, seen in FIG. 3 and FIG. 4, comprising generally cyclindrical external housing 48, having at least two and preferably four or more through openings 43a, b, c, d therethrough in flow communication with conduit means 34a, b, c, d respectively which are in turn in flow communication with through openings functioning as inlets 36a, b, c, d of the plenum 35 of heat exchanger 16 (see also FIG. 2) as described above.
The cleaning carbon black dispensing means 33 further comprises (see also FIG. 3) a rotary valve comprising in a preferred embodiment a drive motor 39 controlled by control means 40, drive shaft 41, and a rotary valve member 42 rotatably mounted within housing 48. Control means 40 may be any suitable control means known in the art whereby motor 39 is controlled by a control signal, for example, a signal at timed intervals from a time control means or a signal responsive to sensed temperature conditions from temperature control means. Member 42 preferably comprises support means, for example, one or more disks 49 and 52, said disk 52 having spaced apart openings 51 therein, rotatably mounted on shaft 41, and at least one and preferably four or more carbon black delivery means, preferably comprising a generally cylindrical internal housing 32 having opposite ends attached circumferentially to disks 49 and 52 and having at least one and preferably 4 or more circumferentially spaced through openings 47 serving as carbon black gates. Upper disk 52 has a through opening 51, for example, a generally rectangular opening, adjacent each gate 47. Openings 51 and 47 are in flow communication whereby carbon black received from bin 37 through opening 51 is delivered to gate 47 and is further preferably adapted with guide means, for example side walls 45 and 46 and chute 44 whereby carbon black from bin 37 is channeled from opening 51 to gate 47. The internal housing 32 is in narrow clearance adjacent spaced apart rotatable relationship to external housing 48 whereby at least one and preferably four or more gates 47 are aligned in feed through relationship to openings 43a, b, c, d during rotation of the rotary valve whereby cleaning carbon black is dispensed from bin 37 into respective conduits 34a, b, c, d. In a preferred embodiment the valve can be rotated through a cleaning cycle with at least a portion of each carbon black dispensing gate 47 adjacent each outlet 43a, 43b, 43c, 43d of the external housing 48 for one or more predetermined durations, known as distribution periods, in which positions cleaning carbon black is dispensed into the outlet for distribution to a corresponding inlet 36a, 36b, 36c, 36d of the heat exchanger plenum 35, and otherwise being in a neutral or blind position for an elapsed time period during which the gate 47 is not adjacent an outlet 43 and cleaning carbon black is not dispensed into the conduits 34a, b, c, d for transfer to the heat exchanger 16. The period of time comprising the distribution periods and elapsed time periods of a single 360° rotation of the rotary valve constitutes a single cleaning cycle. For example, a single 360° rotation of the rotary valve may occur in 150 seconds with each gate 47 remaining at each outlet for a distribution period of 2.5 seconds and during the remaining duration of the rotation cycle, constituting the sum of the elapsed time periods, being in neutral or blind position.
By introducing the cleaning carbon black selectively into different portions of the heat exchanger 16 for example, at a plurality of loci, represented in a preferred embodiment by distribution loci, such as inlets 36a, b, c, d to the plenum 35 of the heat exchanger 16, selective distribution of the cleaning carbon black throughout the cross-sectional area of a selected portion of the tubes is achieved for effectively uniform cleaning of the carbon black deposits from the inner peripheries of all the tubes in each such portion of the heat exchanger. Distribution of carbon black for a distribution period to each of said portions occur at least once and preferably 4 or more times during each cleaning cycle.
Another embodiment of the invention is illustrated in FIG. 5 wherein bin 37' is connected in flow communication with two or more, preferably four or more conduits, for example, conduits 34a', b', c', d' which are in flow communication with inlets 36a, b, c, d respectively of heat exchanger means 16 whereby cleaning carbon black is continuously introduced into said heat exchanger adjacent respective portions of the tubes thereof to effect cleaning thereof.
Another embodiment of the present invention is illustrated in FIG. 6. In FIG. 6 time controlled valves, for example, solenoid actuated valves 50a, b, c, d, are connected in series with each conduit means 34a, b, c, d, in flow communication with the outlets 43a', b', c', d' of the cleaning carbon black storage means 37'. Each of the conduit means 34a, b, c, d can have eductor means illustrated, for example, as 34E in line 34d to provide a carrier fluid to carry the cleaning carbon black into plenum 35. Preferably, the carrier fluid has a pressure in the range 5 to 10 psia. The cleaning carbon black may be gravity fed or in a preferred embodiment the storage means 37' may be pressurized, for example, at 5 psig or less. Valves 50a, b, c, d, can be controlled as is known in the art so as to effect continuous or time selective introduction of cleaning carbon black selectively into inlets 36a, b, c, d of heat exchange means 16 thereby to effect continuous, cyclic, or intervallic cleaning of respective portions therof. Alternatively to the solenoid valve control means shown in FIG. 6 any control means adapted to control the introduction of cleaning carbon black sequentially and/or with respect to duration into the plenum 35 of the heat exchanger 16 at different loci 36a, b, c, d may be employed in accordance with the present invention. For example, star valves 81a, b, c, d can be used as shown in FIG. 7 and can be controlled by control means 82 to effect selective distribution as desired of cleaning carbon black to heat exchange means 16.
Another embodiment of the invention is shown in FIG. 8 wherein cleaning carbon black, for example, off-size specification carbon black pellets from screener 29 in process stream 5 are controlled via valve 71 in conduit 77 for distribution to conduits 34a', b', c', d' to inlets 36a, b, c, d of heat exchange means 16. A carrier fluid, for example, off-gas, or nitrogen, is supplied via a conduit 73 and blower 72. Valve 71 can be operated manually or by control means 76 to effect admission of cleaning carbon black into conduits 34 and operation of blower 72 simultaneously.
Another embodiment is illustrated in FIG. 9 wherein the embodiment of FIG. 8 is equipped with valves, preferably ganged valves 74a, b, c, d in conduits 34a', b', c', d' respectively, connected to control means 75 whereby valves 74a, b, c, d are controlled as is known in the art to effect continuous, sequential, and/or time selective introduction of cleaning carbon black, for example, off-size specification pellets from screener 29 to heat exchanger inlet means 36a, b, c, d. Valves 74a, b, c, d can be further controlled as is known in the art to effect cyclic, continuous, or intervallic introduction of cleaning carbon black into the various inlet loci 36a, b, c, d of heat exchanger means 16 to effect cleaning of respective portions thereof.
As further illustrated in FIG. 2, separating means 20 such as a bag filter is connected in flow communication with the conduit means 18 and 19 for receiving effluent therefrom. The separating means 20 is operable for separating the effluent into an off-gas phase portion for discharge via an outlet (not shown) and a flocculent carbon black phase portion which is discharged via an outlet conduit means 21. The outlet conduit means 21 connects the separating means 20 in flow communication with a pelleter 27 as is known in the art. Generally a pelleting fluid, e.g., water with or without added pelleting aids sch as calcium lignosulfonate and the like, is added via conduit 22. The pelleter 27 is operable for forming the flocculent carbon black from the separator means into wet pellets. A discharge conduit 23 connects the pelleter 27 in flow communication with a dryer 28 for subsequent drying as is known in the art. Dried pellets are discharged from the dryer 28 via a discharge conduit means 25. The discharge conduit means 25 connects the dryer 28 in flow communication with a screener 29 which is operable for receiving the pellets from the dryer and separating the pellets according to their size. Pellets of the desired size are discharged via a discharge conduit means 26 for further processing as is known in the art. Off-size pellets are discharged via a second discharge conduit means 30. The off-size pellet discharge conduit means is connected to recycle conduit means 24 and/or to conduit means 60. Recycle conduit means 24 is in flow communication with conduit means 21 which is in flow communication with the pelleter 27. Conduit means 24 is operable to recycle off-size specification carbon black pellets from the screener 29 to the pelleter, usually by way of a pulverizer (not shown) and thence to subsequent processes as described above. Conduit means 60 provides flow communication between off-size specification conduit means 30 from the screener 29 and the cleaning carbon black storage means 33 and is operable to deliver the off-size specification carbon black pellets from the screener 29 to the storage means 33. In the embodiment illustrated in FIGS. 8 and 9, off-size specification carbon black is connected via conduit means 77 and valve means 71 to inlets 36a, b, c, d of the heat exchange means 16.
As shown in the preferred embodiments, off-size specification carbon black pellets are used as the cleaning carbon black, however the principle of the present invention is not limited thereto. Thus, any of the forms of carbon black which can be introduced in sufficient amount to effect cleaning of the heat exchanger means, e.g., flocculent carbon black, wet pelleted carbon black, dry pelleted carbon black, off-size specification dry pelleted carbon black, or any mixture of these or other forms of carbon black may be used as cleaning black in accordance with the present invention. In the event that it is desired to use flocculent carbon black for cleaning black, for example, conduit means (not shown) may be connected in flow communication between separator means 20, outlet conduit 21 and storage means 33. Further, as an optional mode of operation, water can be introduced into the flocculent carbon black in the conduit means, for example, in an outlet conduit means in a suitable mixer (not shown) in the event it is desired to use wet flocculent carbon black as the cleaning black.
As an example, FIG. 10 illustrates an arrangement of pelleting, screening, and drying wherefrom off-specification wet pellets are removed via conduits 30 and used to clean exchanger 16. Such wet pellets can have from about 40 to about 60 weight percent water.
To effect conveying of the cleaning carbon black to the storage means 33 or to effect conveying of the carbon black from the storage means 33 to the heat exchanger 16, a fluid carrier can be used in an effective manner. Any suitable source of fluid carrier can be provided as is known in the art, for example, cooled smoke from 15, off-gas from 20, nitrogen, and the like. Alternatively, the cleaning carbon black can be conveyed from the storage means 33 to the heat exchanger 16 by gravity feed or by pressurizing the storage means or by any other suitable method.
The cleaning carbon black is continuously, intervallically, or cyclically introduced into the heat exchanger 16 either periodically or at random intervals as determined by the particular carbon black producing process and either simultaneously to all of the inlets 36a, b, c, d or selectively to each as desired. In a preferred embodiment, the cleaning carbon black is selectively distributed to each of the inlets in turn. The rotary valve 38 or its equivalent may be controlled by suitable control means which would effect operation of the rotary valve 38 to dispense cleaning carbon black into conduit means 34a, b, c, d for introduction into the heat exchanger 16 in the event the effluent exiting the tubes of the heat exchanger 16 is at too high a temperature indicating a relatively low heat transfer rate. The valve 38 can also be connected to timer means (not shown) which would actuate or inactivate the valve 38 at regularly spaced intervals or random intervals or continuously to permit the introduction of cleaning carbon black into the heat exchanger 16 to effect the cleaning of carbon black deposits from the inside walls thereof. The valve 38 is maintained with gate 47 adjacent each outlet 43a, b, c, d for a sufficient time to permit a sufficient quantity of carbon black to be introduced into the heat exchanger at each of the plurality of inlet loci 36 to effect the cleaning. Preferably, the valve is rotated continuously in 150-second cycles with discharge gate 47 remaining adjacent each outlet 43a, b, c, d for 2.5 seconds and during the remaining time of the cycle being in the neutral or blind position.
The carbon black added is in an amount sufficient to remove at least a portion of the carbon black deposits from the heat exchanger. Also, it is preferred that the carbon black be added in a sufficiently short time distribution period or interval that the concentration of the total carbon black passing through the heat exchanger will be high enough to effect removal of at least a portion of the carbon black deposits. In operation, the cleaning carbon black is added in an amount to achieve an increase of concentration of carbon black by an amount in the range of between about 0.2 lbs/1000 SCF to about 35 lbs/1000 SCF of effluent flowing through the tubes of heat exchanger 16. The amount of carbon black introduced is an amount effective to clean at least a portion of the deposited black from the heat exchanger, i.e., at least above about 1 percent of the amount of black passing through per unit time. More preferably the additional amount of cleaning carbon black is added in an amount sufficient to increase the total amount of carbon black flowing through the selected portion of the heat exchanger to an amount at least above about 6 pounds per 1000 SCF, more preferably an amount in the range of about 6 pounds per 1000 SCF to about 35 pounds per 1000 SCF, and most preferably to an amount in the range of about 7.5 pounds per 1000 SCF to about 35 pounds per 1000 SCF. There is no true upper limit to the amount of additional cleaning carbon black which can be added except as limited by the amount which can be physically flowed through the heat exchanger consistently with good heat exchange capacity. For most any carbon black producing system in which carbon black deposits are laid down in the indirect heat exchanger, the preferred ranges are effective to reduce carbon black deposits and improve heat transfer efficiency, and particularly effective results are expected when the additional cleaning carbon black increases the total carbon black to an amount in the range of about 7.5 to about 35 pounds per 1000 SCF.
In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, additional cleaning carbon black is added to the different inlet loci 36, at least once during a unit period of time in an amount in the range of between about 1 percent and about 10 percent of the carbon black passing through the heat exchanger 16 during that period of time. Preferably, the amount of carbon black is in the range of about 2 percent to about 4 percent of the carbon black passing through per unit time. Preferably the unit time is a period of about 1 hour. Cleaning carbon black cycles occur at intervals effective to prevent excessive temperature fluctuation at the heat exchanger effluent outlet, at least 2 times per unit time. It is preferred that cleaning carbon interval or cycle occur in the range of between about 2 times to about 60 times per hour and more preferably in the range of about 4 to about 24 times per hour. The distribution period is a duration effective to remove at least a portion of the deposited black from the heat exchanger, for example, 1/4-second or greater. Further, the distribution interval of each introduction of cleaning carbon black to each inlet locus of the heat exchanger is in the range of between about 1/4-second to about 10 seconds and preferably in the range of about 1/2 to 3 seconds. However, cleaning carbon black may if desired be introduced continuously in accordance with the principle of this invention. It is preferred that the effluent flow through the effluent flow path at a speed of at least about 180 ft/sec and more preferably at least about 200 ft/sec. to effectively entrain the cleaning carbon black for cleaning respective portions of the heat exchanger.
As is known in the art of carbon black making, the temperature variation at the effluent outlet of the heat exchanger can vary from 1200° F. up to as much as 1600° F. However, such wide temperature fluctuation can cause temperature fatigue of the apparatus itself and undesirable downstream temperature variation. Clearly, the cleaning cycle could be controlled so as to occur only relatively infrequently when the heat exchanger effluent outlet temperature reached an upper limit, for example, 1600° F. However, when such long intervals elapse between cleaning cycles, more carbon black is deposited, and larger amounts of cleaning carbon black must be used concomitantly tending to require longer distribution times and higher rates of effluent fluid flow to entrain the cleaning carbon black. According to a preferred embodiment of the invention, cleaning carbon black cycles occur relatively frequently or the cleaning carbon black is introduced continuously. Under these conditions, introduction of a smaller quantity of cleaning carbon black is required during each distribution period, the distribution period can be brief, temperature fluctuation is minimized, and lower rates of effluent fluid flow can be utilized to entrain the cleaning carbon black. It is to be noted that for each introduction of carbon black during the unit time period, the amount of cleaning carbon black introduced can be equal amounts of cleaning carbon black for each period of introduction or can be unequal amounts. However, it is preferred that the amounts be generally equal.
In order to illustrate the present invention, the following calculated example is provided, calculated for a large scale vortex flow oil furnace reactor producing N220 black.
EXAMPLE
FLOW RATES AND CONDITIONS (CALCULATED-DURING CLEANING CYCLE)
The following numbers in parentheses refer to the drawings.
______________________________________(10) Oil Feed, gal/hr 400API @ 60° F. 0.4BMCI 125Mid Boiling Point, °F. 600-1200(11) Oil Tube and Nozzle Cooling Air, SCF/hr 6,000Temperature, °F. 100(12) Tangential Fuel (Gas, 940 Btu/SCF):SCF/hr 12,600Temperature, °F. 60(13) Tangential Air, SCF/hr 234,000Temperature, °F. 1,000(14) Reactor Effluent Before Quench:SCF/hr 332,000Temperature, °F. 2,600Pressure, psig 4Lbs carbon black/1000 SCF, (N220 type) 5.4(15) Cooled Recycle Smoke Quench:SCF/hr 135,000Temperature, °F. 500Lbs carbon black/1000 SCF, (N220 type) 5.55(60) Recycle Dry Pellets for Cleaning:Lb/hr 50Temperature of Mass, °F. 250Pellet Sieve Size, (U.S. Standard)mesh <120 to >10(36) Cleaning Carbon Black to Heat Exchanger:via 36a, lbs/hr 12.5time of flow, sec 10lbs/10 sec 0.52via 36b, lbs/hr 12.5time of flow, sec 10lbs/10 sec 0.52via 36c, lbs/hr 12.5time of flow, sec 10lbs/10 sec 0.52via 36d, lbs/hr 12.5time of flow, sec 10lbs/10 sec 0.52______________________________________
The cleaning carbon black pellets are assumed added with 4 tubes spaced at 90 degree loci around the plenum of the inlet tube end of a shell tube heat exchanger. The valve 38, FIGS. 2 and 3, is rotated to positions 43a, b, c, d continuously at 150 seconds per revolution, remaining at each position for 10 seconds. The remaining time is spent in neutral or blind position. This effects selective distribution of the pellets throughout the cross-sectional area of the tubes for effectively cleaning the carbon black deposits from the inner peripheries of all the tubes. Chamber pressure at pellet reservoir is 5 psig.
______________________________________(18) Effluent from Exchanger 16 Tubes:______________________________________SCF/hr 467,000Lbs carbon black/1000 SCF 5.97Temperature, °F. 1,200 ± 15______________________________________
Calculated temperature fluctuation at the heat exchanger is about 30° F. compared to about 100° to 120° F. where pellets are injected into the heat exchanger for cleaning without distribution at different loci.
______________________________________(19) Feed to Filter (20):SCF/hr 332,000Temperature, °F. 500Lbs carbon black/1000 SCF 5.55(24) Recycled Pellets to Pelleter (21):Lbs/hr (0.5% water) 90(21) Black from Exchanger (16) PlusRecycled Pellets (24) from Dryer (28)Lbs/hr 1,933Water, lbs/hr, (22) 1,933(Containing 0.4 Wt. % calciumlignin sulfate)(23) Wet Pellets to Dryer (28) Including BlackProduced, Black Recycled to Exchanger, andBlack Recycled to Wet Pelleter):Lbs/hr (50% carbon black by weight) 3,866(25) Dried Pellets to Screener (29) (IncludingBlack Produced, Black Recycled to HeatExchanger, and Off-Specification Pelletsto Pelleter):Lbs/hr (0.5 wt. % water) 1,943(26) Dried Carbon Black Pellets (NET):Lbs/hr (0.5 wt. % water) 1,802______________________________________
It can be appreciated from these data that addition of 0.15 lb cleaning carbon black/1000 SCF , based on unquenched reactor effluent, can reduce the temperature fluctuation of the output of the heat exchanger to about 30° F. when the cleaning carbon black is distributed to portions of the heat exchanger tubes according to the principle of the invention.
Although the invention has been described and illustrated by reference to a preferred embodiment thereof and its operation exemplified by a calculated example, the invention is not limited thereby but by the inventive concept as set forth in the claims appended hereto.
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Combustion gases containing free oxygen and a carbonaceous feed are introduced into a carbon black reactor, with the combustion gases being at a temperature sufficient to pyrolyze the feed hydrocarbon to produce combustion products containing particulate carbon black. The combustion products are cooled by quenching to form a gaseous effluent containing particulate carbon black. The effluent is discharged from the reactor to an indirect heat exchange means for further cooling the effluent. Carbon black pellets are introduced into the effluent inlet of the indirect heat exchange means for removing carbon black which has become deposited on surfaces defining the flow path or flow paths for the effluent flowing through the heat exchange means. The effluent after cooling in the indirect heat exchange means is passed to separating means for separating the effluent into a gaseous portion and a particulate carbon black portion. Thereafter, the particulate carbon black portion can be pelleted.
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PRIORITY
[0001] This invention claims priority of United States Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 60/244,292 filed Oct. 30, 2000.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0002] 1. Field of the Invention
[0003] The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for preparing variable density drilling muds and completion fluids. The present invention particularly relates to a method and apparatus for preparing variable density drilling muds for use on offshore drilling rigs.
[0004] 2. Background of the Art
[0005] Drilling for oil and gas in very deep water presents problems not found in terrestrial or shallow water oil and gas exploration. One problem encountered in deep water is drilling fluid management. A drilling fluid is a fluid specially designed to be circulated through a wellbore as the wellbore is being drilled to facilitate the drilling operation. The circulation path of the drilling fluid typically extends from the drilling rig down through the drill pipe string to the bit face and back up through the annular space between the drill pipe string and wellbore face to the wellhead and/or riser, returning to the rig. The drilling fluid performs a number of functions as it circulates through the wellbore including cooling and lubricating the drill bit, removing drill cuttings from the wellbore, aiding in support of the drill pipe and drill bit, and providing a hydrostatic head to maintain the integrity of the wellbore walls and prevent well blowouts. The drilling fluid also desirably prevents sloughing and wellbore cave-ins when drilling through water sensitive formations.
[0006] There are a number of different types of conventional drilling fluids including compositions termed “drilling muds.” Drilling muds comprise high-density dispersions of fine solids in an aqueous liquid, which is usually brine, or a hydrocarbon liquid. An exemplary drilling mud is a dispersion of clay and/or gypsum in water. The solid component of such a dispersion is termed a “weighting agent” and is designed to enhance the functional performance of the drilling fluid.
[0007] For the purposes of the present invention, a brine is an aqueous solution of sodium chloride or calcium chloride. Preferable, the brine is near saturation, but the term brines also include more dilute solutions, including but not limited to seawater.
[0008] In shallow water drilling, a riser system, that is a separate casing rising from the sea floor to the base of a drilling ship or drilling rig, can be used to return drilling mud to a drilling ship or platform for reuse. The use of a riser is not without problems, and these problems can be exaggerated in deep water drilling projects. One such problem is weight. A 6,000-foot riser 21 inches in diameter holding drilling mud has been estimated to weigh from about 1,000 to 1,500 tons. It is for this reason that riserless drilling methods have beer..disclosed, particularly for deep water drilling, in patents such as U.S. Pat. No. 6,102,673 to Mott, et al., and U.S. Pat. No. 4,149,603 to Arnold.
[0009] Another problem encountered in offshore drilling is space. On either a drilling ship or a drilling platform, the tools essential to drilling a well require a lot of space. For example, to drill a well requires a drilling apparatus that includes motors and hoists and the like. Also needed for drilling a well are pumps, pipe, drilling fluids, casings, fuel, and living space for a crew. As with any construction project involving a ship or drilling platform, it generally costs more to build larger. It is for this reason that drilling ships and platforms are built no larger than necessary and any new process for such a venue is desirably not space intensive. It is also desirable in the art of drilling oil and gas wells using drilling ships and platforms to improve existing processes to require less space.
[0010] Yet another problem with offshore drilling is logistics. Since there are no roads or rail service to offshore installations, pipe, drilling mud, drill bits, personnel, fuel, and the like must all be delivered by means of boats or helicopters. While there is a service industry that provides such services, the modes of transportation are more expensive than truck or rail transportation and more difficult schedule. Therefore, it would be desirable in the art of drilling offshore oil wells to reduce volume of consumable supplies needed to drill an oil well.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0011] In one aspect, the present invention is an apparatus for preparing variable density drilling muds comprising a mixing chamber, a first and a second feed line serving the mixing chamber, the first feed line having a first flow meter and a first control valve therein, and the second feed line having a second flow meter and a second control valve therein, wherein at least one of the flow meters is responsive to a nonintrusive sensory mechanism.
[0012] In another aspect, the present invention is a method of preparing variable density drilling muds comprising feeding water and a high-density base fluid to an apparatus for preparing variable density drilling muds, the apparatus comprising a mixing chamber, a first and a second feed line serving the mixing chamber, the first feed line having a first flow meter and a first control valve therein, and the second feed line having a second flow meter and a second control valve therein, wherein at least one of the flow meters is responsive to a nonintrusive sensory mechanism.
[0013] In still another aspect, the present invention is a portable apparatus for preparing variable density drilling mud comprising an apparatus for preparing variable density drilling muds, the apparatus comprising a mixing chamber, a first and a second feed line serving the mixing chamber, the first feed line having a first flow meter and a first control valve therein, and the second feed line having a second flow meter and a second control valve therein, wherein at least one of the flow meters is responsive to a nonintrusive sensory mechanism, wherein the mixing chamber and other elements are sized to fit into a rectangular form having dimensions of about 4 feet by 4 feet by 2 feet and further comprising a frame to hold apparatus elements, a means for attaching the frame to the deck of a ship or drilling rig, and quick couplings for attaching the feed lines to hoses having compatible couplings.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0014] For a detailed understanding of the present invention, reference should be made to the following detailed description of the preferred embodiments, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which like elements have been given like numerals, wherein:
[0015] [0015]FIG. 1A is a schematic illustration of the basic apparatus of the present invention.
[0016] [0016]FIG. 1B is a schematic illustration of an alternative embodiment of the basic apparatus of the present invention.
[0017] [0017]FIG. 2 is a schematic illustration of one section of the apparatus in FIG. 1 showing details from one feed line.
[0018] [0018]FIG. 3 is a cut-away illustration of a mixing chamber useful with the present invention.
[0019] [0019]FIG. 4 is a schematic illustration of the method of the present invention.
[0020] It will be appreciated that the figures are not necessarily to scale and the proportions of certain features are exaggerated to show detail.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
[0021] One embodiment of the present invention is an apparatus for preparing variable density drilling muds. For purposes of the present invention, a drilling mud is any drilling fluid, including completion fluids, which can be prepared using a high-density base fluid and water. Exemplary of such fluids is the clay and gypsum dispersions disclosed hereinabove.
[0022] The muds prepared using the apparatus of the present invention can be prepared with varying densities. One advantage of the present invention is the ability to take a high density base fluid and admix it with varying amounts of water to produce muds having a density intermediate between the density of the water and the base fluid. This ability provides a logistical advantage to those who drill oil wells where space for having multiple mud pits is not available, for example those who drill wells from floating vessels i.e., ships, semi-submersibles, and the like, and offshore platforms. Having one pit filled with mud having a high density both saves space and reduces transportation costs. Shipping muds at lower densities means, in effect, shipping water, and water in the form of seawater is a commodity commonly available to both floating drilling vessels and offshore drilling platforms.
[0023] The need for multiple density muds is evident in drilling processes. For example, when starting an offshore well, it is common to drill the first part of the well using seawater alone. As the well progresses, the pressures of any flow from the well, be it water, gas or oil, and the lateral pressures on the sides of the holes increase. As already stated, during the first phase of drilling the well, the pressures are minimal which allows for the use of seawater, which has a typical density of approximately 8.55 pounds per gallon, as a drilling fluid. As the well progresses, the density of the fluid used is increased such that the weight of the mud column creates a hydrostatic pressure sufficient to prevent the escape of high-pressure material likely to be encountered. The process of varying the density of muds used while drilling is sometimes referred to in the art as Dynamic Kill Drilling or DKD.
[0024] In one preferred embodiment, the present invention is an apparatus for preparing variable density drilling muds comprising a mixing chamber, first and second feed line serving the mixing chamber, the first feed line having a first flow meter and first control valve therein, and the second feed line having a second flow meter and second control valve therein, wherein at least one of the flow meters is responsive to a nonintrusive sensory mechanism. For purposes of the present invention, a flow meter is a device for measuring the flow of a material in a feed line of the apparatus of the present invention and includes the sensory mechanism; transmitter, for sending a signal from the sensory mechanism, if any; interpretive mechanism, for converting the signal into a flow measurement, if any; local display or read out, if any; and any other mechanism needed to perform the function of measuring the rate of flow of a fluid in the feed line and providing an output of same.
[0025] The flow meters useful with the present invention are flow meters that have a sensory mechanism that is nonintrusive. In the practice of the present invention, a feed stream of base fluid is fed through a feed line into the mixing chamber of the apparatus of the present invention. In actual practice, any feed stream, but particularly the base fluid feed stream may contain agglomerations and debris that can render inaccurate or even inoperative conventional flow meters having rotors or turbines in the path of flow as sensory mechanism. Any flow meter that uses a nonintrusive sensory mechanism for measuring flow can be used. For example, the so-called “mag-flow” flow meters that measure flow by the effect of a fluid passing through magnetic flux lines can be used with the present invention. Preferably, the flow meters useful with the present invention include mag-flow meters, ultrasonic flow meters, and the like.
[0026] The apparatus of the present invention includes a mixing chamber serviced by a feed line, the feed line having a flow meter and a control valve therein. Preferably the control valve is located between the flow meter and the mixing chamber. Advantageously, when used to prepare drilling mud, the apparatus of the present invention has improved precision in regard to preparing muds with a specific density because this control valve and flow meter configuration. Control valves can create turbulence and back pressure that can distort flow readings in sensors near in proximity of the valves, particularly when the valve is upstream of the flow meter. For purposes of the present invention, the terms upstream and downstream mean for two points on a pipe or other device through which a fluid is passing, fluid entering the pipe first passes the upstream point prior to passing the down stream point. This turbulence and backpressure can be worse during the periods of valve actuation but are often present even when the valve is not being actuated. In an apparatus of the present invention, the control valve being downstream from the flow meter reduces interference with the operation of the flow meter caused by the control valve which results in more accurate flow readings.
[0027] The apparatus for preparing variable density drilling muds of the present invention can be composed of any materials known to one of ordinary skill in the art preparing drillings muds to be useful for preparing such devices. The apparatus of the present invention is preferably prepared using metals such as steel, cast iron, aluminum, and the like. Where weight is critical, certain polymers and polymer composites can also be used in construction of the present invention provided that due care is exercised to ensure that all the parts thereof are of a robust design capable of withstanding the corrosive effects of drilling mud and its constituents and the operating pressures employed during drilling or completion fluid production.
[0028] While there is no official standard for piping sizes on board drilling vessels and platforms for drilling mud preparation, a common size of piping is 4 inches. Preferably the feed lines servicing the mixing chamber of the apparatus of the present invention are 4-inch lines, but any size lines can be used. The feed lines can be adapted out to 6 inches for at least 30 inches on either side of the flow meter for applications where very high throughputs are required. Preferably, the feed line and the flow meter have the same diameter and the feed is substantially straight for at least 30 inches on both sides of the flow meter.
[0029] The apparatus of the present invention has a first and second feed line servicing the mixing chamber. When used to prepare drilling muds, one of these feed lines is connected to a pressurized source of water and the other feed line is connected to a pressurized source of base drilling fluid. In a preferred embodiment, the apparatus of the present invention includes a third feed line, this feed line preferably also having a flow meter and a control valve. In the production of drilling fluids, the third line can be used to incorporate additives such as brine, viscosifiers, defoamers, fluid loss agents, and other chemicals and mixtures thereof into the drilling mud.
[0030] The apparatus of the present invention can also be prepared with a fourth feed line. In this embodiment, the first three lines are feed lines servicing the mixing chamber. Using this configuration, base fluid, brine and calcium chloride can be fed separately to the mixing chamber. In this configuration, the fourth line can be used to incorporate additives.
[0031] The apparatus of the present invention includes a mixing chamber, preferably having a mixing device. The mixing chamber of the present invention can be as simple as a mere manifold or it can be a vessel or combination of a manifold and a vessel. During the practice of the method of the present invention, the purpose of the mixing chamber is to accept the flow of fluids from the feed lines and cause the dispersion of the fluids into each other. In one embodiment, the mixing chamber includes a static mixer in the fluid path leading to the exit of the mixing chamber. In another embodiment, the mixing chamber includes at least one baffle in the fluid path leading to the exit of the mixing chamber. In yet another embodiment, the mixing chamber includes both a static mixer and a baffle.
[0032] An exit line preferably services the mixing chamber of an apparatus of the present invention. While the exit line can be of any size preferably it is a 4-inch line and even more preferably a 6-inch line. One advantage of a 6-inch exit line is that it is capable of handling the flow rates of even three 4-inch lines. In some applications, a large flow rate, such as 2,500 gallons per minute is preferable and this rate can easily be accommodated using a 6-inch exit line.
[0033] The apparatus for preparing variable density drilling muds of the present invention preferably includes at least one pressure detection device on at least one of the feed lines. In the practice of the method of the present invention, fluids are fed to the apparatus of the present invention. Preferably the fluids are pumped to the feed lines of the present invention.
[0034] Some drilling muds are corrosive, abrasive or both. As such, they can cause wear and tear on pump impellers. Stated another way, in an application of the method of the present invention, a pump having a feed source and connected to an apparatus of the present invention could be turned on and still not be effectively pumping a fluid to the apparatus. A flow meter such as those useful with the present invention is not always accurate at very high flow rates and very low flow rates. It is not unheard of that such a flow meter can output a random flow rate when in actuality there is no or very little flow through the meter. A pressure detection device can be used to verify that there is flow an apparatus of the present invention and as a signal of an operational problem.
[0035] In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, the apparatus of the present invention is controlled by an electronic control system. In such an embodiment, the flow meters are capable of sensing flow rates in the feed lines and outputting a signal to the controller that the controller can interpret as feed rate. Also in such an embodiment, the flow control valves are automatic and have an input interface which will allow an electronic controller to output a signal to the flow control valve which will actuate the valve to partially or fully open and close the valve.
[0036] The control valves of the present invention are preferably automatic which, for the purposes of the present invention, means that they are actuated by hydraulic, pneumatic or electronic servo means. Also preferably, the actuation means can be such that the valve can be either partially or fully operated. For example, in the practice of the method of the present invention, it is preferable that the control valves can be automatically opened and closed in increments of 5% or less.
[0037] In embodiments of the present invention that include an electronic control system, the electronic control system can be any such system known to be useful to one of ordinary skill in the art constructing apparatus such as the apparatus of the present invention. Preferably, the electronic control system is a computer having a microprocessor; resident memory that may include read only memories (ROM) for storing programs; tables and models; and random access memories (RAM) for storing data. The electronic control system preferably connects to the apparatus of the present invention by means of an electronic interface. The controller can be either remote or local. If the controller is remote, it can connect to the electronic interface by means of telephone lines, direct lines, and the Internet.
[0038] While an electronic controller useful with the present invention can be as simple as an interface panel wherein operator can dial in flow rates, preferably the interface is a computer and most preferably a so-called personal computer (PC). When a PC is used as the electronic controller for an apparatus of the present invention, it can be used to fully automate the process of preparing drilling muds. For example, in one embodiment of the method of the present invention, an operator enters the density of the feed materials and the desired density of the product drilling mud and the computer calculates and fully controls the processes of preparing the drilling mud.
[0039] In the method of the present invention, water and high-density base fluid is fed to an apparatus of the present invention to prepare a drilling mud. The high-density base fluid is preferably a concentrated aqueous dispersion of the weighting materials needed to prepare a selected drilling mud. For example, one preferred base fluid is 16 pounds per gallon drilling fluid wherein the weighting material is barite or hematite. In another embodiment of the method of the present invention, the weighting materials are calcium carbonate or salt. Any base fluid know to those of ordinary skill in the art to be useful in preparing drilling fluids can be used with the apparatus of the present invention.
[0040] In a particularly preferred embodiment of the present invention, an apparatus of the present invention is a portable apparatus for preparing variable density drilling mud wherein the mixing chamber and other elements are sized to fit into a rectangular form having dimensions of about 4 feet wide by 4 feet deep by 2 feet high. In this embodiment, the elements of the apparatus are attached to a frame to hold them in position both during transport and use. Also a part of this invention is a means for attaching the frame to the deck of a ship or drilling rig, and quick couplings for attaching the feed lines to hoses having compatible couplings. In one particularly preferred embodiment, the feed lines are not connected to the mixing chamber but are rather fitted on both ends with quick couple fittings as are the other points of attachment and the apparatus is shipped with hoses with compatible fittings wherein the largest single dimension is the length of the feed lines.
[0041] [0041]FIG. 1A is a schematic illustration of the basic apparatus of the present invention. A mixing chamber 101 is connected by three feed lines: 106 , 107 and 108 respectively to a source for base fluid 102 , additives 103 , and sea water 104 . An exit line 105 is similarly connected to the mixing chamber 101 .
[0042] [0042]FIG. 1B is a schematic illustration of an alternative embodiment of the basic apparatus of the present invention. In this figure, a fourth feed line 109 is used to supply a fourth component, CaCl 2 , from a source thereof to the mixing chamber 101 .
[0043] [0043]FIG. 2 is a schematic illustration of one section of the apparatus in FIG. 1 showing details from one feed line. In this embodiment, the feed line 106 includes a flow meter consisting of a sensory mechanism 201 and transmitter 204 , and a control valve 202 . Also shown are a controller 205 and the mixing chamber 101 . The sensory mechanism 201 connected to the transmitter 204 by means of a wire or wireless connection 203 . The transmitter 204 is connected to the controller 205 also by means of a wire or wireless connection. A separate wire or wireless connection 206 connects the controller and the control valve.
[0044] [0044]FIG. 3 is a cut-away illustration of a mixing chamber 101 useful with the present invention. Shown are a first feed port 302 and a second feed port 302 a . Within the cut-away section of the mixing chamber 101 is part of a static mixer 301 . Not shown on the opposite side of the static mixer is an exit port which connects to an exit line.
[0045] [0045]FIG. 4 is a schematic illustration of the method of the present invention. As in the other figures, a mixing chamber 101 is connected by means of three feed lines to a base fluid source 102 , a brine source 104 , and an additive source 103 . In each feed line is a flow meter ( 201 , 201 a , and 201 b ), a flow control valve ( 202 , 202 a , and 202 b ) and a pressure detection device ( 401 , 401 a , 401 b ). The pressure detection devices and the flow meters are connected by a wire or wireless circuit ( 403 and 402 ) to the controller 205 . The controller is connected to the flow control valves ( 202 , 202 a , and 202 b ) by means of a wire or wireless circuit 404 .
[0046] In the practice of the method of the present invention the base fluid 102 , brine 104 and additives 103 and transported through the feed lines and into the mixing chamber 101 by means of pumps, pneumatic pressure, or any other available means of transporting the fluids (not shown) such that they arrive at the mixing chamber 101 with sufficient velocity to be dispersed one within the others. Within the mixing chamber 101 , the combined fluid feeds pass through one or more static mixers, or one or more baffles or other mixing mechanism in the fluid flow path (not shown) and in the process are dispersed one within the others. The resultant drilling mud exits the mixing chamber by means of an exit line 105 and is sent to an active pit for use in drilling.
[0047] The controller 205 controls the production of drilling mud by means of the flow meters ( 201 , 201 a , and 201 b ), pressure detection devices ( 401 , 401 a , 401 b ), and control valves ( 202 , 202 a , and 202 b ). During mud production, the flow meters ( 201 , 201 a , and 201 b ) measure the flow of each feed stream. This data is sent to controller via a circuit 402 . In one embodiment, an operator sets flow rates and the controller 205 compares the preset flow rate against the rate set by the operator.
[0048] In another embodiment, the operator enters a desired mud density and the density of the feed streams that are stored within the controller 205 in memory (not shown). Using a program, also in memory (not shown), the controller then calculates the necessary feed rate for each feed stream to produce the required mud density. Optionally, the operator can enter a desired rate of production that can also be used to calculate the feed rates for each feed stream. Once this solution is calculated, the controller then sends a signal to each control valve ( 202 , 202 a , and 202 b ) to actuate the valves to open or close as is required to produce the necessary feed rates for each stream.
[0049] During mud production, if the necessary feed rates for each stream cannot be maintained, the controller 205 can actuate an alarm (not shown) or shut down the system or take any other action required by the operator. Input from the pressure detection devices ( 401 , 401 a , 401 b ) can be used to monitor the system for problems.
[0050] Not shown in the figures are power supplies, pneumatic and hydraulic lines, and the like which are known to one of ordinary skill in the art of preparing apparatus such as the apparatus of the present invention to be useful in preparing such apparatus.
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Disclosed is an apparatus for preparing variable density drilling muds. The invention is particularly useful in offshore operations where storage and transportation of consumable materials is an important economic issue. One version of the apparatus is a portable apparatus requiring minimal deck space that can be used as needed and then removed. The invention is particularly useful during offshore dynamic kill drilling.
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CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/179,557 filed May 19, 2009 the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference thereto.
[0002] This application also claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/179,544 filed May 19, 2009 the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference thereto.
[0003] This application also claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/179,535 filed May 19, 2009 the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference thereto.
[0004] This application also claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/179,522 filed May 19, 2009 the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference thereto.
BACKGROUND
[0005] Exemplary embodiments of the present invention relate to assemblies for vehicle windows and more particularly to a method for attaching a window lift assembly to a vehicle door.
[0006] Cable drive window lift systems are usually loaded into the door in a flexible state i.e., the rail(s) and cables are held together by the spring loaded conduits of the cable system. This is convenient for door assembly but costly for component cost. The flexible assembly is loaded through a hole in the door inner and attached and datumed to the outboard surface of the door inner. If door brackets are needed, then an additional component is required to be installed over the hole that was needed for the regulator load. The motor and drum housing are typically attached to the door inner with three screws, though in some applications, the motor and drum housing are integrated into one of the guide rails which allows for this fastener count to drop to one. The rail or rails are secured with two fasteners each. Door trim brackets are often added to support the door trim in the armrest or pull cup area. These brackets are attached with an additional two fasteners. Inside handles are attached to the door inner panels with an additional one to two fasteners.
[0007] Accordingly, it is desirable to provide a method of installing a window lift system wherein the system is constructed without additional components such as spring loaded conduits and brackets.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0008] In accordance with an exemplary embodiment of the present invention, a method for attaching a window lift system to a vehicle is provided, the method including the step of rotationally mounting at least one guide rail to a bracket, wherein the at least one guide rail is capable of rotating in at least one plane within a predetermined range wherein rotation of the at least one guide rail in the predetermined range maintains a cable of the window lift system under tension without a spring loaded conduit such that the cable does not become disengaged from at least one pulley rotatably mounted to the guide rail.
[0009] In accordance with another exemplary embodiment of the invention, a method of securing a dual channel window lift assembly to a vehicle door inner is provided. The method having the steps of: rotationally mounting a door bracket to a pair of guide rails each being configured for rotational movement with respect to the door bracket in a predetermined range; inserting a lower distal end of each of the pair of guide rails into a feature of the door inner wherein the feature limits movement of the lower distal end in 5-ways and the feature has a plurality of walls such that each of the pair of guide rails is not constrained in an upward direction from the feature; inserting an upward distal end of each of the pair of guide rails into another feature of the door inner, wherein the another feature limits movement of the upward distal end in at least 2 of the 5-ways; and securing the door bracket to the door inner.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0010] FIG. 1 illustrates a dual rail window lift system with spring loaded conduits;
[0011] FIG. 2 is an inboard view of the dual rail window lift system of an exemplary embodiment secured to a vehicle door inner;
[0012] FIG. 3 is an outboard view of the dual rail window lift system of an exemplary embodiment secured to a vehicle door inner;
[0013] FIG. 4 is an inboard view of the rail to door bracket securement;
[0014] FIG. 5 is an outboard view of the rail to door bracket securement;
[0015] FIG. 6 is a cross-sectional view along lines 6 - 6 of FIG. 5 ; and
[0016] FIGS. 7-10 illustrate the upper and lower attachment features of the guide rails and the door inner.
[0017] Although the drawings represent varied embodiments and features of the present invention, the drawings are not necessarily to scale and certain features may be exaggerated in order to illustrate and explain exemplary embodiments the present invention. The exemplification set forth herein illustrates several aspects of the invention, in one form, and such exemplification is not to be construed as limiting the scope of the invention in any manner.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EXEMPLARY EMBODIMENTS
[0018] Referring to the attached FIGS. exemplary embodiments of the present invention are illustrated and relate to an apparatus and method for securing a window lift assembly.
[0019] In accordance with an exemplary embodiment of the present invention, the regulator is combined with a door bracket in a manner that allows the window lift system to be loaded and datumed to the door for proper function, but also to be constructed without spring loaded conduits for lower cost.
[0020] In one exemplary embodiment, the window lift assembly is configured to provide limited rotational stability to an interface between the guide rails and the door bracket, with good stability fore/aft, up/down, and inboard/outboard. In one exemplary embodiment, the door bracket provides more functionality than just carrying the regulator, i.e., a door pull cup attachment and inside handle carrier is also provided. One non-limiting example is illustrated in U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/179,522 filed May 19, 2009 the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference thereto. Reference is also made to U.S. Patent Publication Nos. US20080222962 filed Sep. 18, 2008; and U.S. Patent Publication US20100024306 filed Jul. 31, 2009, the contents each of which are incorporated herein by reference thereto.
[0021] Exemplary embodiments of this invention allow the regulator to be assembled without cables having conduits thereby allow for lower cost cables to be used since the rails are held in position relative to each other by the door bracket. If the rails were not held in position, then the cables would come off of the pulleys. Exemplary embodiments of the present invention hold the rails in place, but also allows the rails to be located to the door once it is assembled therein. If the rails were located (datumed) by the door bracket, the rails could not be held in position to a tight enough tolerance to maintain function throughout the entire range of door build variation. By allowing the rails to be located (datumed) by the door, the traditional tolerancing stack-ups are maintained.
[0022] In an exemplary embodiment of the present invention, the regulator is combined with a door bracket in a manner that allows the regulator system to be loaded and datumed to the door for proper function, but also to be non-conduited for lower cost with only three mechanical fasteners for the entire system—regulator, trim bracket, and inside door handle.
[0023] Accordingly, an exemplary embodiment provides limited rotational stability to the interface between the guide rail and the door bracket, with good stability fore/aft, up/down, and inboard/outboard. In one embodiment, the door bracket provides more functionality than just carrying the regulator, i.e.—door pull cup attachment and inside handle carrier. This invention works because it locates the regulator and the door handle/door pull cup to the door independently, though they are installed at the same time. If the rail was located (datumed) by the door bracket, the rail could not be held in position to a tight enough tolerance to maintain function throughout the entire range of door build variation. By allowing the regulator to be located (datumed) by the door, the traditional tolerancing stack-up is maintained.
[0024] FIG. 1 shows a window lift system 10 with spring loaded conduits while FIGS. 2-10 illustrate exemplary embodiments of the present invention.
[0025] As shown, a window lift system 12 is provided wherein a pair of guide rails 14 are secured to a door bracket 16 , as discussed above, the mounting of the guide rails to the bracket is configured to provide limited rotational movement and stability to an interface between the guide rails and the door bracket, with good stability fore/aft, up/down, and inboard/outboard.
[0026] Thus, limited movement of the guide rails in the direction of arrows 18 is provided for assisting in the mounting of the lift system as it is inserted into an opening 20 in the door inner 22 so the guide rail or rails can be located or datumed to the door inner such limited movement allows for variances or door inner manufacturing tolerances.
[0027] As illustrated, exemplary embodiments allow the window lift system or window regulator to be assembled with cables 24 that do not have conduits thereby allowing for lower cost cables to be used since the rails are held in position relative to each other by the door bracket. If the rails were not held in position, then the cables would come off of the pulleys 26 secured to the guide rails. As illustrated, a motor 25 for driving a motor drum within a motor drum housing 27 is provided. The motor drum is secured to the cables and the cables are secured to a carrier 31 which moves up and down as the motor is activated to effect movement of a window (not shown). In one non-limiting embodiment, the motor is secured to the bracket and in another non-limiting embodiment the motor may be secured to the guide rail. Of course, the motor may be secured in still other locations.
[0028] Exemplary embodiments of the present invention hold the rails in place, but also allows the rails to be located to the door once it is assembled therein (e.g., movement in the direction of arrows 18 ). If the rails were located (datumed) by the door bracket, the rails could not be held in position to a tight enough tolerance to maintain function throughout the entire range of door build variation. By allowing the rails to be located (datumed) by the door, the traditional tolerancing stack-ups are maintained.
[0029] One non-limiting attachment of the rail to the door inner is shown at least in FIGS. 2-5 wherein the bottom of the rail is received in a cup or feature 50 that defines an opening 51 for receipt of a distal end 53 of the guide rail therein. The cup or feature has a plurality of walls that define opening 51 and provide 5-way locational control of the distal end of the rail therein (e.g., left to right or fore to aft; inboard and outboard and downward such that only the up direction (arrow 49 ) is not constrained by the cup or feature 50 . At the opposite end or a top distal end 55 of the rail is held in a pocket or feature 52 of the door inner for 2-way control (for/aft or right to left) while allowing the distal end to be inserted into the pocket in an outboard direction until the distal end contacts a portion of the pocket or feature and the bracket is secured to the door inner. As illustrated in FIG. 8 the top distal end of the guide rail may have an arm member that extends away from the guide rail for receipt in feature 52 while other portions of the top of the guide rail are configured to rotationally receive a pulley therein. Of course, other alternative insertion methods into features 52 of different configurations may be used for example moving the distal end in an inboard direction until the feature is contacted and then securing the bracket.
[0030] The door bracket 16 secures the center of the rail in the inboard/outboard directions and holds the rail against upward movement in the direction of arrow 49 once the bracket is secured to the door inner, thus the system is secured in a manner that allows for several degrees of freedom, which in turn allows for numerous door build variations to be accommodated.
[0031] As shown in FIGS. 4-6 one non-limiting configuration for securing the guide rails to the bracket is illustrated. Here a feature 30 of the bracket engages an opening 32 in each guide rail.
[0032] In addition, the guide rails each further comprises a resilient arm member 34 for engaging an upper curved surface 37 of the bracket after the feature engages the opening in the guide rail and the guide rail has a lower feature 38 for engaging a lower curved surface 40 of the bracket after the feature engages the opening in the guide rail such that the movement of the guide rail in the direction of arrows 18 with respect to the door bracket is allowed in a limited range while movements in other directions is prevented. Again, this movement is provided to allow for installation of the system to a door inner as it is inserted through an opening and the guide rails are located by features 50 and 52 of the door inner wherein the movement allows for door inner tolerances. Thereafter, the bracket is secured to the door.
[0033] Accordingly and in one embodiment, the system may be secured to the door inner as follows; first the lower distal end of the guide rail or rails is/are inserted into the openings of feature(s) 50 and then the upper distal ends of the guide rail or rails is/are received in feature(s) 52 thus, the guide rail or rails is/are located or datumed by the door inner and then the bracket is secured to the door inner.
[0034] In one alternative embodiment the range of movement of the guide rails with respect to the door bracket in the direction of arrows 18 may be defined by a stop feature or engagement of a portion of feature 36 on bracket 16 such that limited ranges are defined by arrows 44 . Of course, these ranges are merely provided as examples and exemplary embodiments of the present invention are not intended to be specifically limited to the ranges shown herein.
[0035] In one non-limiting exemplary embodiment, a portion 46 of feature 34 comprises an angled surface for engaging a portion of upper curved surface 37 .
[0036] Door bracket 16 further comprises a plurality of mount openings 48 for securement of the bracket and ultimately the entire window lift system to the vehicle door inner. In one non-limiting exemplary embodiment, the mount openings are positioned in one of a pair of structural arm members 50 each of which extends from portions of the door bracket that define the door pull cup attachment or inside handle carrier. In addition and in one embodiment, the structural arm members are integrally molded with the bracket. Still further and in another embodiment, a vehicle door handle 70 is mounted to one of the structural arm members.
[0037] As illustrated and in one embodiment, the mount openings 48 are located proximate to distal ends of the structural arm members. In addition and as illustrated in at least FIGS. 2 and 3 and in one non-limiting embodiment, the bracket is mounted to a peripheral portion of an opening 20 of the vehicle door inner 22 . In one implementation, the vehicle door inner is configured to have tab members or ears 54 extending into the opening 22 in order to provide a securement surface for the distal ends of the structural arm members.
[0038] Also illustrated in the FIGS. is that the window lift system is secured to the bracket and the bracket provides a simple and efficient means for securing the window lift system to the vehicle door inner.
[0039] The attachments of the rails in one exemplary embodiment is described and illustrated as follows. The bottom of the rails are held in cups or features 50 for 5-way locational control and only the up direction is not constrained. The top of the rails are held in pockets 52 for 2-way control (for/aft). The door bracket 16 secures the center of the rail inboard/outboard and holds the rails against up movement, thus the system is secured in a degrees of freedom.
[0040] Although a dual rail system is illustrated exemplary embodiments of the present invention are also contemplated to be used with single rail systems.
[0041] In one non-limiting exemplary embodiment and where applicable, the components of the window lift system or assembly as well as the vehicle door inner are manufactured from an easily molded or formed such as plastic or equivalents thereof In some instances all of the components are molded from plastic while in other embodiments only portions are molded from plastic.
[0042] As used herein, the terms “first,” “second,” and the like, herein do not denote any order, quantity, or importance, but rather are used to distinguish one element from another, and the terms “a” and “an” herein do not denote a limitation of quantity, but rather denote the presence of at least one of the referenced item. In addition, it is noted that the terms “bottom” and “top” are used herein, unless otherwise noted, merely for convenience of description, and are not limited to any one position or spatial orientation.
[0043] While the invention has been described with reference to an exemplary embodiment, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes may be made and equivalents may be substituted for elements thereof without departing from the scope of the invention. In addition, many modifications may be made to adapt a particular situation or material to the teachings of the invention without departing from the essential scope thereof. Therefore, it is intended that the invention not be limited to the particular embodiment disclosed as the best mode contemplated for carrying out this invention, but that the invention will include all embodiments falling within the scope of the appended claims.
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A method for attaching a window lift system to a vehicle is provided, the method including the step of rotationally mounting at least one guide rail to a bracket, wherein the at least one guide rail is capable of rotating in at least one plane within a predetermined range wherein rotation of the at least one guide rail in the predetermined range maintains a cable of the window lift system under tension without a spring loaded conduit such that the cable does not become disengaged from at least one pulley rotatably mounted to the guide rail.
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BACKGROUND AND SUMMARY
This invention relates to a device for use in a well for connecting the ground wire from a submersible well pump to the well casing.
In a well system, it is desirable to connect the well pump to the ground of the main electrical system. In many states, grounding of the well pump is required by the state electrical code. In Wisconsin, for example, the state electrical code specifies that the motor frame of the submersible well pump must be grounded by an equipment grounding conductor, which must be bonded to the metallic well casing.
One system for bonding the ground wire to the well casing involves drilling a hole in the well casing toward its upper end and tapping the hole. A grounding stud is then threaded into the tapped hole, and is used to establish a grounding connection between the well casing and the ground wire. A disadvantage to this system is that the procedure for drilling and tapping the hole into the well casing is carried out after the casing is installed, making the enumerated steps somewhat difficult to carry out. Additionally, piercing the well casing adversely affects the overall integrity of the casing. Further, sanitary problems can result from drilling a hole into a well casing due to outside water and other fluids entering the casing through the hole.
The present invention has as its object to provide an assembly for establishing a ground connection between the well casing and a ground wire without the need for drilling and tapping a hole in the well casing. Another object of the invention is to provide a system for establishing a ground connection which is simple in construction and easily installed at the upper end of the well casing, and which can be removed from the well casing.
In accordance with the invention, an assembly for connecting a ground wire to a well casing generally comprises a removable support member for placement into the casing toward its upper end, and means for fixing the position of the support member relative to the well casing. Ground connection means is engagable with the support member for establishing a grounding connection between the ground wire and the interior of the well casing without connection to the exterior of the well casing. The dimensions of the support member are in all respects less than the internal transverse dimension of the well casing, for allowing placement of the support member into the interior of the well casing. The support member is preferably provided with a pair of opposed suspension members, each of which includes a lateral tab, with the tabs being adapted to rest on top of the well casing for suspending the support member within the well casing.
In one embodiment, the support member extends radially between the suspension members. A threaded member extending through a threaded opening in one of the suspension members, and engagable with an interior surface of the well casing to secure the support member to the well casing. The threaded member also establishes a ground connection between the support member and the well casing. A threaded stud or the like is mounted to the other of the suspension members. A nut is engagable with the threaded stud, for connecting the ground wire to the threaded stud and establishing a ground connection to the well casing through the support member and the suspension members.
In another embodiment, the support member comprises a ring adapted for placement into the well casing, from which the suspension members extend upwardly. The suspension members and tabs fix the vertical position of the support ring relative to the well casing, while allowing lateral movement of the support ring. The ground wire is positioned between a surface of the support ring and an interior surface of the well casing, and lateral movement of the support member is caused by wedging means which bears between an interior surface of the well casing and a surface of the support ring substantially opposite the location of the grounding wire. The wedging means is operable to cause lateral movement of the support ring toward the well casing, to wedge the grounding wire between the support ring and the well casing and to establish a grounding connection of the ground wire to the well casing. The wedging means preferably comprises a screw engagable with a threaded opening formed in the support ring. Turning down the screw results in its end engaging the wall of the casing, causing movement of the support ring toward the ground wire.
In yet another embodiment, the support member comprises a ring, from which the suspension members extend upwardly. A series of openings are formed in the ring, and self-tapping screws or the like extend through the openings and bear at their ends against the interior surface of the well casing for fixing the position of the ring. A set screw extends through a threaded opening in the ring, and its inner end engages the grounding wire to force it against the inner surface of the well casing to establish a ground connection.
Various other objects, features and advantages of the invention will be made apparent from the following description of the invention taken together with the drawings.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The drawings illustrate the best mode presently contemplated of carrying out the invention.
In the drawings:
FIG. 1 is a section view through the upper end of a well casing, showing the grounding assembly of the invention in position within the well casing, with reference being made to line 1--1 of FIG. 2;
FIG. 2 is a top plan view of the assembly of the invention in position within the upper end of the well casing, as shown in FIG. 1, showing the support member in the form of a ring and with set screws fixing the position of the support member within the well casing;
FIG. 3 is an enlarged partial sectional view showing an alternate construction for establishing a ground connection between the ground wire and the well casing;
FIG. 4 is a view similar to FIG. 3, showing an alternate embodiment of the invention in which the ground wire is wedged between the inner surface of the well casing and the outer surface of the support member; and
FIG. 5 is a perspective view of another embodiment of the invention, in which the support member extends radially between the suspension members and the ground connection is established with the support member.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
FIG. 1 illustrates a well casing 10 provided with threads 12 at its upper end, which is adapted to receive a threaded well cap 14, all as is known. Alternatively, any other well cap structure known in the art may be employed, e.g. a compression well cap, and the invention described hereafter is not limited to the particular well construction illustrated.
A submersible pump (not shown) is located toward the lower end of well casing 10.
A ground wire 16 is connected at one end to the frame of the pump motor. A ground wire 18 merges with pump ground wire 16 into a single wire 20, which is adapted to be connected to well casing 10 in compliance with electrical codes, as explained previously. Ground wire 18 extends through well cap 14 and is adapted for connection to the ground of the main electrical supply.
A grounding assembly 22 is located in the upper end of well casing 10 for establishing a ground connection between wire 20 and well casing 10. Grounding assembly 22 generally includes a ring-like support member 24 and a pair of suspension members 26 and 28 (FIG. 2). Suspension members 26 and 28 are provided with laterally extending tabs 30 and 32, respectively, at their upper ends.
Support member 24 is in all transverse dimensions less than the internal diameter of well casing 10, allowing support member 24 to be placed within well casing 10. Tabs 30 and 32 are adapted to engage and rest on the upper end of well casing 10, to suspend support member 24 within casing 10.
Referring to FIG. 2, support member 24 is provided at several locations around its circumference with openings, and a series of self-tapping screws 34 are engagable with the openings formed in support member 24. The term "self-tapping screw" is intended to refer to any type of threaded screw or bolt designed to form a reliable grounding connection between grounding assembly 22 and well casing 10. Screws 34 thread into the openings formed in support member 24, and their outer ends engage and bear against the inner surface of well casing 10 at locations corresponding to the locations of the openings in support member 24 to form a grounding connection of support member 24 to well casing 10. In this manner, the vertical position of support member 24 is first fixed by tabs 30 and 32 on suspension members 26 and 28, and the lateral position of support member 24 is fixed relative to casing 10 by screws 34.
A reinforcing bar 36 extends diametrically within the interior of support member 24, and is welded at its ends to the inner surface of support member 24 for reinforcing and strengthening support member 24.
After support member 24 is fixed to casing 10 as described above, a set screw 38, which is engaged with a threaded opening formed in support member 24, is turned down so as to move toward the inner surface of casing 10. A connector member 40, which is connected to the end of ground wire 20, is aligned with set screw 38 and positioned between its end and the inner surface of casing 10. Set screw 38 is turned down until its end engages connector member 40 and secures connector member 40 against the inner surface of casing 10, so as to provide an electrical connection between casing 10 and connector member 40.
With the arrangement as described above, grounding assembly 22 acts to provide a structure which allows an electrical connection to be established between ground wire 20 and the interior of casing 10 without drilling and tapping a hole in casing 10, and without any connection to the exterior of casing 10.
An alternative arrangement for establishing a ground connection between ground wire 20 and well casing 10 is shown in FIG. 3. In this embodiment, connector member 40 is provided with an opening and set screw 38 is inserted therethrough. A lock nut 41 is engaged with the threads of set screw 38, and connector member 40 is sandwiched between lock nut 41 and the head of set screw 38.
Another embodiment of the invention is illustrated in FIG. 4. In this embodiment, support member 24 is constructed similarly to that as illustrated in FIGS. 1 and 2. A pair of suspension members extend upwardly from support member 24, and a pair of tabs 42, 44 act to suspend support member 24 within casing 10. An elongated set screw 46 is engaged with a threaded hole formed in support member 24, and is movable toward the inner surface of casing 10. In this embodiment, connector member 40 at the end of ground wire 20 is positioned between the inner surface of well casing 10 and the outer surface of support member 24 diametrically opposite the location of set screw 46. As set screw 46 is turned down in the threaded opening formed in support member 24, it acts to move support member 24 away from set screw 46 and toward the inner wall of well casing 10 opposite therefrom. This action wedges or sandwiches connector member 40 between the outer surface of support member 24 and the inner surface of well casing 10 an amount sufficient to establish a grounding connection between connector member 40 and well casing 10. With this arrangement, the positioning of set screws as illustrated and described with reference to FIG. 2 is eliminated.
A reinforcing bar such as 36 in FIG. 2 is preferably provided in the embodiment of FIG. 4 to prevent deformation of support member 24 when it is wedged toward well casing 10 as shown and described.
Yet another embodiment of the grounding assembly is illustrated at 47 in FIG. 5. In this embodiment, the support member is in the form of a flat connecting bar 48 extending between a pair of suspension members 50, 52. As with the embodiments illustrated and described previously, a pair of tabs 54, 56 are provided at the upper ends of suspension members 50, 52, respectively, for suspending the assembly 47 within well casing 10.
A threaded opening 60 is formed in suspension member 52, and a lock-down bolt 62 is engagable with opening 60. A threaded stud 64 extends inwardly from suspension member 50 and is welded at one end thereto, and a nut 66 is engagable with the threaded portion of stud 64.
If it is necessary to lengthen suspension members 50, 52 for any reason, a reinforcing rod can be connected between the inwardly facing surfaces of suspension members 50, 52. If a reinforcing rod is installed, stud 64 and bolt 62 should be maintained as close as possible to connecting bar 48, being spaced thereabove an amount sufficient to allow access with a wrench or pliers. The reinforcing rod would preferably be located above stud 64 and bolt 62.
In operation, the assembly 47 illustrated in FIG. 5 is inserted into the upper end of well casing 10 in a manner similar to that illustrated in FIG. 1, such that tabs 54 and 56 engage the upper end of well casing 10 and suspend assembly 47 therein. Lock-down bolt 62 is then turned down so that its end engages the inner surface of well casing 10, to firmly secure assembly 47 therewithin. Lock-down bolt 62 establishes an electrical connection between the inner surface of well casing 10 and assembly 47. The end of ground wire 20 is provided with a connector member having an opening of sufficient size to fit over threaded stud 64, and nut 66 is turned down on stud 64 so as to establish a grounding connection between the connector at the end of ground wire 20 and suspension member 50. Alternatively, the embodiment illustrated in FIG. 5 could be used in a manner similar to that shown in FIG. 4, in which a longer lock-down bolt 62 is employed to wedge a connector at the end of ground wire 20 between suspension member 50 and the inner surface of well casing 10.
The embodiment illustrated in FIG. 5 is advantageous in that it can be formed of a one-piece member with reinforcing rod 58 and threaded stud 64 simply welded thereto after the assembly is formed to its configuration as shown.
In any of the illustrated embodiments the grounding device can be constructed to fit into well casings having a variety of internal diameters.
Various alternatives and embodiments are contemplated as being within the scope of the following claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter regarded as the invention.
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An assembly for securing a pump ground wire to the interior of a well casing comprises a support member adapted for placement into the well casing at its upper end. The support member is suspended within the well casing by a pair of suspension members having lateral tabs for resting on top of the well casing. A ground connection system is provided for establishing a ground connection between the pump ground wire and the well casing without connection to the exterior of the casing and without forming an opening in the well casing. Various embodiments are illustrated for establishing the ground connection between the ground wire and the well casing, utilizing the support member for achieving the ground connection.
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This is divisional of Ser. No. 09/083,899 filed May 22, 1998 now U.S. Pat. No. 6,197,934.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
In general, the invention relates to rapidly dissolving collagen films, methods of preparation, and the use of these films for rapid compound delivery.
The ability to specifically deliver a compound to a particular site in the human body is a desirable goal in many areas of medicine. For example, in cancer therapy, administration of chemotherapeutic agents to a tumor site with minimal exposure to surrounding tissues would dramatically reduce undesirable side effects to the surrounding tissues, or the body as a whole, while facilitating delivery of potent doses to malignant cells.
In addition, the inhibition of wound healing is beneficial in certain circumstances, for example, following glaucoma filtration surgery (otherwise known as trabeculectomy). The initial stage in the process of wound healing is characterized by the movement of intravascular components, such as plasma and blood proteins, to the extravascular area (Peacock, In: Wound Repair, 491-492, 1984, ed. E E Peacock, WB Saunders Co, Philadelphia, Pa.). Neutrophils and macrophages then migrate to the injury site, functioning to prevent infection and promote fibroblast migration. Subsequent phases of wound healing include fibroblast secretion of collagen, collagen stabilization, angiogenesis, and wound closure (Costa et al., Opth. Surgery 24: 152-170, 1993).
During surgery for the treatment of glaucoma, a fistula is frequently created to allow for post-operative drainage of intraopthalmic fluid from the eye. Accordingly, the inhibition of fistula healing is beneficial in order to extend the drainage time and reduce intraopthalmic pressure. Several therapies have been adopted to inhibit fistula healing, including beta irradiation, 5-fluorouracil treatment, and mitomycin (also known as mitomycin-C or mitomicin) treatment (Costa et al., Opth. Surgery 24: 152-170, 1993).
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention provides a method of preparing a rapidly dissolving collagen film which includes a therapeutic compound. The method involves (i) preparing a purified solution of monoreactive-amine modified collagen, e.g., a glutaric anhydride derivatized collagen, (ii) heating the collagen solution to about 35-45° C. for a time sufficient to reduce collagen viscosity, (iii) adding the compound to the heated collagen solution, and iv) casting the solution into thin layers, wherein the solution dries and forms the film.
The invention also includes a collagen film prepared by the above described method and a collagen film which rapidly dissolves upon exposure to about 35° C. Preferably, the collagen film dissolves within five to ten minutes upon exposure to about 35° C. More preferably, the collagen film dissolves within two minutes upon exposure to about 35° C. Most preferably, the collagen film dissolves within one minute or 30 seconds upon exposure to about 35° C.
The therapeutic compound contained within the rapidly dissolving collagen film may be an inhibitor of cell proliferation, e.g., an anti-metabolic antibiotic, anti-metabolite, anti-fibrotic, anti-viral compound, or angiostatic compound. Preferably, the compound is an anti-metabolic antibiotic, e.g., mitomycin, daunorubicin, mithramycin, bleomycin, or doxorubicin.
Alternatively, the therapeutic compound may be an anti-metabolite. Examples of useful anti-metabolites include 5-fluorouracil, 5-fluorouridine-5′-monophosphate, 5-fluorodeoxyuridine, 5-fluorodeoxyuridine-5′-monophosphate, and 5-fluroorotate.
In yet other applications, the therapeutic compound contained within the rapidly dissolving collagen film is an anti-fibrotic. Examples of useful anti-fibrotics include inhibitors of prolyl hydroxylase and lysyl hydroxylase, e.g., iron chelators, α,α-dipyridyl, o-phenanthroline, proline analogs, lysine analogs, and free radical inhibitors and scavengers; inhibitors of collagen secretion, e.g., colchicine, vinblastin, cytochalasin B, copper, zinc, and EGTA; inhibitors of collagen secretion and maturation, e.g., BAPN, vincristine, and D-penicillamine; and stimulators of collagen degradation, e.g., EDTA and colchicine.
As noted above, the therapeutic compound may also be an anti-viral drug. Examples of anti-viral drugs that can be used in the invention include vidarabine, acyclovir, AZT, and amantadine.
Finally, angiostatic drugs, e.g., angiostatin, as well as other miscellaneous anti-cell proliferative drugs, e.g., tissue plasminogen activator (TPA), heparin, cytosine arabinoside, and gamma-interferon, may also be used in the rapidly dissolving collagen films described herein.
In addition to methods of collagen film preparation, the invention also provides a method of rapidly delivering a compound dose to a specific tissue site in a mammal. The method involves administering a collagen film containing the compound dose to the tissue site, wherein the collagen film rapidly dissolves upon exposure to the mammalian tissue site. Using this method to deliver toxic compounds, the toxic side effects are essentially restricted to the specific tissue site of compound delivery.
In a related aspect, the invention also includes a method of treating a mammal to inhibit cellular proliferation, e.g., wound healing or tumor growth, at a specific tissue site. The method involves administering a collagen film comprising an inhibitor of cell proliferation, e.g., an anti-metabolic antibiotic, anti-metabolite, anti-fibrotic, anti-viral compound, or angiostatic compound, to the tissue site, wherein the collagen film rapidly dissolves upon exposure to the tissue and delivers a dose of the compound sufficient to inhibit cell proliferation at the tissue site.
In preferred embodiments, the cell proliferation inhibitor is mitomycin, 5-fluorouracil, or an anti-fibrotic. In addition, in other preferred embodiments, the collagen film dissolves within five to ten minutes upon exposure to the mammalian tissue site, more preferably, within two minutes, and, most preferably, within one minute or 30 seconds. In addition, the mammal is preferably a human.
This method can be used, for example, in treating a mammal undergoing surgery for glaucoma. In this application, the collagen film is administered to the trabeculectomy-created fistula in the mammal, wherein the dose of cell proliferation inhibitor is sufficient to inhibit closure of the fistula. Preferably, the cell proliferation inhibitor used is mitomycin at a dose of 200-400 μg and may be administered in a 4×4 mm collagen film patch. Most preferably, the mitomycin dose is 400 μg.
Use of this treatment results in reduced post-operative intraocular pressure. Preferably, post-operative intraocular pressure as a result of this method is less than 16 mmHg, more preferably, less than 12 mmHg, and, most preferably, less than 6 mmHg.
As used herein, by “mono-reactive amine-modified” is meant reacted with a mono-reactive amine-modifying agent, also known as a monoacylating or sulfonating agent. Useful agents include, without limitation, anhydrides, acid halides, sulfonyl halides, and active esters. The modifying agent is preferably a compound or combination of compounds which contains an acidic, carboxylic, or sulfonide group, or generates an acidic, carboxylic, or sulfonic group during reaction.
By “inhibitor of cell proliferation” is meant an inhibitor of an increase in the number of cells located at a particular site. Such inhibition may occur by inhibition of cell migration or attachment, cell replication, cell survival, or angiogenesis.
By “specific tissue site” is meant the area of tissue directly in contact with the collagen film administered to the tissue.
By “rapidly dissolves” is meant dissolves, or melts, in approximately 30 minutes or less.
The present invention provides a number of advantages. For example, the present techniques and collagen film compositions facilitate an improved approach for delivering a compound in situations where both a precise dose and accurate placement are required. The dose can be adjusted to any desired amount, i.e., by modifying the concentration of compound in the film or the size of the film, and the solid nature of the film allows its placement at any site in the body which can be reached by surgical techniques. In addition, the invention provides for the rapid dissolution of the collagen film upon exposure to normal body temperature. Taken together, these features ensure that a delivered compound achieves a certain concentration at a specific site, reducing possible inaccuracy due to mistaken dose or improper placement.
For delivery of mitomycin or 5-fluorouracil to a post-trabeculectomy fistula, the present invention represents an improvement over current empirical techniques employed, which typically involve placing a sponge wetted with compound on the fistula site for 3-5 minutes.
The advantage of delivering essentially all compound to a specific site also provides for limited compound delivery to tissues surrounding the delivery site. This advantage is especially relevant when the compound to be delivered has toxic effects. By restricting delivery to the targeted tissues, any unintentional or unnecessary toxic damage to surrounding tissues is reduced.
Furthermore, compounds, such as mitomycin, exhibit increased stability in the collagen film as compared to stability in solution. Thus, one collagen film sample preparation can be subdivided and used for several applications over the course of several weeks. This feature provides the advantages of reducing experimental variation when administered over several days and eliminating the need for daily pre-surgical sample preparation.
Other features and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the following detailed description thereof, and from the claims.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
Described herein are methods of preparing collagen films containing therapeutic compounds that readily dissolve upon exposure to normal human body temperature (35-37° C.). These collagen films can be used for the rapid and accurate delivery of compounds to specific tissue sites.
For the purposes of this invention, collagen can be collected, solubilized, subjected to modification by mono-reactive, amine-modifying agents, and re-precipitated by any standard technique, e.g., those provided in DeVore et al. (U.S. Pat. No. 4,713,446), herein incorporated by reference. The following example is provided as an illustration and is in no way intended to limit the scope of the invention.
Preparation of Collagen
As a first step toward producing rapidly dissolving films, soluble collagen was prepared by standard procedures. Young calf hide was washed thoroughly with reagent alcohol and with deionized, pyrogen-free water, cut into approximately 1 cm 2 sections, and stirred overnight in 40 volumes of 0.5 M acetic acid. The mixture was then supplemented with pepsin (3% hide wet weight) and stirred for 72 hours. The digested, solubilized collagen was filtered through cheesecloth and precipitated by increasing the NaCl concentration to 0.8 M. The collagen was then cycled twice through steps of redissolution, in 0.5 M acetic acid, and reprecipitated. The collagen precipitate was then redissolved in 0.1 N acetic acid, dialyzed against 0.1 M acetic acid, filtered (0.45 μm), and refiltered (0.22 μm).
The purified, telopeptide-poor collagen was derivatized with glutaric anhydride as previously described (U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,631,243 and 5,492,135). Briefly, the collagen solution (approximately 3 mg/ml) was adjusted to pH 9.0 with 10 N and 1 N NaOH. While stirring the solution, glutaric anhydride was added at 10% (weight of collagen). For twenty minutes, the stirring continued, and the pH was maintained.
The pH of the solution was adjusted to 4.3 with 6 N and 1 N HCl to precipitate the derivatized collagen. The precipitate was centrifuged at 3500 rpm for 30 minutes. The pellet was washed three times in pyrogen-free deionized water and then redissolved in phosphate buffered glycerol (2% glycerol in 0.004 M phosphate buffer, pH 7.4) to achieve a final concentration of approximately 10 mg/ml.
Preparation of Collagen Films Containing Mitomycin
To prepare collagen films containing mitomycin, the collagen solution, described above, was heated in a 35° C. water bath for 30 minutes to reduce viscosity. Mitomycin (e.g., Mutamycin®, Bristol Myers Squibb, Princeton, N.J.), also known as mitomicin C, was added to the heated collagen. The collagen solution was then poured into petri dishes in a thin layer and allowed to air dry under a laminar-flow hood.
Collagen film melting time at 35° C. was measured after placing the films in 0.8% saline in a 35° C. water bath. Pre-heated collagen films melted in approximately one minute. In contrast, collagen films poured into petri dishes without pre-heating melted at 35° C. in approximately 30 minutes.
Mitomycin-containing collagen films had a final mitomycin concentration of 400 μg per 16 mm 2 . 6 mm diameter discs were cut from the film and applied to human subconjunctival fibroblasts derived from Tenon's membrane layered in 96 well plates (CSM supplemented with 10% fetal bovine serum). After 72 hours, mitomycin-induced inhibition of cell division was assessed by measuring the reduction in fluorescence intensity (RFU) using a fluorogenic CalceinAM assay (see, for example, Decherchi et al., J. Neurosci. Meth. 71: 205 (1997); Sugita, Pflitgers Arch. 429: 555 (1995); Padanilam et al., Ann. NY Acad. Sci. 720: 111 (1994); Lichtenfels et al., J. Immunol. Meth. 172: 227 (1994); and Wang et al., Human Immunol. 37: 264 (1993)). The mitomycin-containing collagen films inhibited approximately 91% of the cell division demonstrated in control cells.
Mitomycin-containing films may be stored for later use. For example, mitomycin activity in the collagen films described above was maintained for at least 6 weeks after preparation of the films (stored at 4° C.). Administration of mitomycin-collagen films, 2, 4, and 6 weeks old, demonstrated 91%, 90%, and 92% inhibition of cell division, respectively, compared to mitomycin-free controls. These values were comparable to the % cell death inhibition elicited by administration of a freshly prepared mitomycin solution (0.4 mg/ml solution, dissolved in USP sterile water).
In contrast to the stability of mitomycin in the collagen film, HPLC analysis of the mitomycin solution determined that stability was maintained for only 4 days following storage at ambient temperature and 4° C. in the dark. Dissolution and storage in 0.9% saline or phosphate buffer (pH 7.4) is not recommended due to degradation and precipitation.
Use
Rapidly dissolving collagen films containing therapeutic compounds are useful for various treatments. For example, the collagen-mitomycin film may be administered to the external opening of the fistula created during glaucoma filtering surgery (trabeculectomy). Immediately following surgery, a collagen film, e.g., a 4×4 mm patch, containing 100-1000 μg mitomycin (preferably 400 μg), is directly applied to the external opening of the fistula prior to replacing the scleral flap. Administration of the mitomycin increases the duration of fistula patency, increasing filtration from the eye and reducing intraocular pressure.
Other compounds may also be administered to the trabeculectomy-created fistula to increase filtration during recovery. For example, 5-fluorouracil-containing films may be administered in the same fashion to deliver a 5-fluorouracil dose of 25-250 μg (preferably 100 μg). Other alternative compounds that are effective for this treatment are anti-fibrotic, angiostatic, and anti-viral compounds.
Administration of the rapidly dissolving collagen films containing inhibitors of cell proliferation are also useful for treatment during recovery from other surgical procedures where prevention of wound healing is beneficial.
In addition, the collagen films of the invention may be administered to reduce cellular proliferation in specific tissue sites, such as for the localized inhibition of neoplastic or non-neoplastic cell growth. For this application, any chemotherapeutic compound may be dissolved in the collagen matrix in concentrations appropriate for inhibiting cell growth.
Other Embodiments
While the treatment regimens described herein are preferably applied to human patients, they also find use in the treatment of other animals, such as domestic pets or livestock.
Moreover, while the invention has been described in connection with specific embodiments thereof, it will be understood that it is capable of further modifications and this application is intended to cover any variations, uses, or adaptations of the invention following, in general, the principles of the invention and including such departures from the present disclosure come within known or customary practice within the art to which the invention pertains and may be applied to the essential features hereinbefore set forth, and follows in the scope of the appended claims.
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Disclosed herein are collagen films which rapidly dissolve at 35° C. Also disclosed are methods for the preparation of the collagen films and their use as a vehicle for delivering a dose of therapeutic compound to a specific tissue site.
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BACKGROUND
[0001] 1. Field of Invention
[0002] The present invention relates generally to data communication networks and devices, and relates more particularly to source packet routing in data communications networks.
[0003] 2. Description of the Related Art
[0004] As the value and use of information continues to increase, individuals and businesses seek additional ways to process and store information. One option available to users is information handling systems. An information handling system generally processes, compiles, stores, and/or communicates information or data for business, personal, or other purposes thereby allowing users to take advantage of the value of the information. Because technology and information handling needs and requirements vary between different users or applications, information handling systems may also vary regarding what information is handled, how the information is handled, how much information is processed, stored, or communicated, and how quickly and efficiently the information may be processed, stored, or communicated. The variations in information handling systems allow for information handling systems to be general or configured for a specific user or specific use such as financial transaction processing, airline reservations, enterprise data storage, or global communications. In addition, information handling systems may include a variety of hardware and software components that may be configured to process, store, and communicate information and may include one or more computer systems, data storage systems, and networking systems.
[0005] As information handling systems provide increasingly more central and critical operations in modern society, it is important that the networks are reliable. One method used to improve reliability is to provide redundant links between network devices. By employing redundant links, network traffic between two network devices that would normally be interrupted can be re-routed to the back-up link in the event that the primary link fails.
[0006] Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS) is a mechanism in high-performance telecommunications networks that directs data from one network node to the next based on fixed size, 20-bit labels that are looked up as an exact match, rather than long network addresses (typically 32 or 128 bits) that are looked up as a longest prefix match, avoiding complex lookups in a routing table. The labels identify virtual links (paths) between distant nodes rather than endpoints. MPLS can encapsulate packets of various network protocols.
[0007] In an MPLS network, data packets are assigned labelstack. The switches are referred to as LSRs (label switch routers). Packet-forwarding decisions at intermediate LSRs are made solely on the contents of the top label in the stack, without the need to examine the packet itself. Packet forwarding decisions at edge LSRs may involve lookups on other headers in the packet (e.g. MAC addresses, Virtual Local Area Networks (VLANs) and/or IPv4/IPv6 addresses). There are one or more labels in a label stack.
[0008] Most hardware used in MPLS networks has limits on the number of labels that can be pushed (at ingress) or parsed (in the core). Parsing in the core gets to the Internet Protocol (IP) and transport headers (e.g. Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) or User Datagram Protocol (UDP)) for efficient hashing of traffic flows on to links in a link aggregation or equal-cost multipath group. Alternatively, the entropy label may be used but it further reduces the usable label stack.
[0009] Technologies such as Source Packet Routing In Networking (SPRING) require the ingress to push a number of labels equal to the number of hops that the packet will traverse in the network. SPRING is a source routing technology that allows the source to specify any path, including a non-shortest path, which can be used for certain applications such as efficient load balancing. One of the technologies used for implementing SPRING is MPLS. When MPLS is used, in general, for n explicit hops, the ingress must push n labels. There are other ways to reduce the number of labels that need to be pushed; e.g. using a single label to represent a concatenation of multiple hops, sometimes referred to as “segments,” but this results in added complexity.
[0010] In MPLS-based SPRING, each label can be used to represent a hop. A certain path can be represented with a stack of labels where each label represents a hop. So the number of labels restricts the number of hops that can be specified. With the prior art hardware, the number of labels that can be pushed, n, is limited to a small number and thus restricts the number hops. For some hardware the limitation for n is 3. Therefore, only three hops can be explicitly specified.
[0011] One disadvantage of the present system is that the number of hops is limited by the number of labels that can be pushed.
[0012] Accordingly, what is needed are systems and methods that can address the deficiencies and limitations of the current hardware.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0013] Reference will be made to embodiments of the invention, examples of which may be illustrated in the accompanying figures, in which like parts may be referred to by like or similar numerals. These figures are intended to be illustrative, not limiting. Although the invention is generally described in the context of these embodiments, it should be understood that it is not intended to limit the spirit and scope of the invention to these particular embodiments. These drawings shall in no way limit any changes in form and detail that may be made to the invention by one skilled in the art without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention.
[0014] FIG. 1A depicts an example of a data structure used in MPLS.
[0015] FIG. 1B depicts an example of a data structure of a label according to embodiments of the present invention.
[0016] FIG. 2 depicts a block diagram according to embodiments of the present invention.
[0017] FIG. 3 depicts a block diagram of a memory according to embodiments of the present invention.
[0018] FIG. 4 depicts a flowchart used to implement increased label capacity according to embodiments of the present invention.
[0019] FIG. 5 depicts a flowchart used to implement a label forwarding table according to embodiments of the present invention.
[0020] FIG. 6 depicts a flowchart used to implement a label forwarding table according to embodiments of the present invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
[0021] In the following description, for purposes of explanation, specific examples and details are set forth in order to provide an understanding of the invention. It will be apparent, however, to one skilled in the art that the invention may be practiced without these details. Well known process steps may not be described in detail in order to avoid unnecessarily obscuring the present invention. Other applications are possible, such that the following examples should not be taken as limiting. Furthermore, one skilled in the art will recognize that aspects of the present invention, described herein, may be implemented in a variety of ways, including software, hardware, firmware, or combinations thereof.
[0022] Components, or modules, shown in block diagrams are illustrative of exemplary embodiments of the invention and are meant to avoid obscuring the invention. It shall also be understood that throughout this discussion that components may be described as separate functional units, which may comprise sub-units, but those skilled in the art will recognize that various components, or portions thereof, may be divided into separate components or may be integrated together, including integrated within a single system or component. It should be noted that functions or operations discussed herein may be implemented as components or modules.
[0023] Furthermore, connections between components within the figures are not intended to be limited to direct connections. Rather, data between these components may be modified, re-formatted, or otherwise changed by intermediary components (which may or may not be shown in the figure). Also, additional or fewer connections may be used. It shall also be noted that the terms “coupled” or “communicatively coupled” shall be understood to include direct connections, indirect connections through one or more intermediary devices, and wireless connections.
[0024] In the detailed description provided herein, references are made to the accompanying figures, which form a part of the description and in which are shown, by way of illustration, specific embodiments of the present invention. Although these embodiments are described in sufficient detail to enable one skilled in the art to practice the invention, it shall be understood that these examples are not limiting, such that other embodiments may be used, and changes may be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention.
[0025] Reference in the specification to “one embodiment,” “preferred embodiment,” “an embodiment,” or “embodiments” means that a particular feature, structure, characteristic, or function described in connection with the embodiment is included in at least one embodiment of the invention and may be in more than one embodiment. Also, such phrases in various places in the specification are not necessarily all referring to the same embodiment or embodiments. It shall be noted that the use of the terms “set” and “group” in this patent document shall include any number of elements. Furthermore, it shall be noted that methods or algorithms steps may not be limited to the specific order set forth herein; rather, one skilled in the art shall recognize, in some embodiments, that more or fewer steps may be performed, that certain steps may optionally be performed, and that steps may be performed in different orders, including being done some steps being done concurrently.
[0026] The present invention relates in various embodiments to devices, systems, methods, and instructions stored on one or more non-transitory computer-readable media involving the communication of data over networks. Such devices, systems, methods, and instructions stored on one or more non-transitory computer-readable media can result in, among other advantages, the ability to deploy power measurement on a component level in a live network or to design network devices.
[0027] It shall also be noted that although embodiments described herein may be within the context of power consumption in a network device, the invention elements of the current patent document are not so limited. Accordingly, the invention elements may be applied or adapted for use in other contexts.
[0028] Embodiments of the present invention can double the limitation imposed by the hardware label capacity. In many prior art hardware systems, the current limitation is 3 labels. However, even if the limitation were greater than 3, embodiments of the present invention can be employed to double the limitation.
[0029] The current label size in MPLS is 20 bits. The current hardware limitation is to 3 labels. Therefore, the number of hops that can be specified is limited to 3. Most networks have much less than one million nodes, which means a 20-bit label is overkill for this application (MPLS-based SPRING). In a simple case, each node gets an MPLS label. Thus, 3 hops is very limiting.
[0030] Embodiments of the present invention partition the label space into two labels. Using the current 20 bit label size, each of the two labels would be 10 bit labels. However, one of ordinary skill in the art would understand that any number of bits can used. For the purpose of this specification, each label will be shown as 10 bits. Also, one of ordinary skill in the art will recognize that the label space can be broken out into more than two labels, for example, three 6 bit labels can be used within the 20 bits.
[0031] A 10 bit label allows for up to about 1000 routers. Each label would represent a concatenation of two labels L 1 and L 2 . The top label (L 1 ) is in the 10 most significant bits (MS-bits). The next label (L 2 ) is in the 10 least significant bits (LS-bits). If the top level label appears by itself, it has the 10 LS-bits set to zero.
[0032] FIG. 1A depicts an example of a data structure used in MPLS. The label structure 180 includes a 20 bit label value 185 , 3 bits for experimental use 187 , a bottom of the stack bit 191 , and 8 bits used for time to live 193 . The 20 bit label value 185 is used to store the label value. The bottom of the stack bit 191 is used to indicate whether or not it is the last label on the stack. The experimental bits 187 are reserved for experimental use. The time to live bits 193 are used to encode a time to live value.
[0033] FIG. 1B depicts an example of a data structure of a label according to embodiments of the present invention. FIG. 1 shows label 100 including the 10-bit label L 1 105 in the MS-bits and the 10-bit label L 2 110 in the LS-bits. In the embodiment shown in FIG. 1 , L 1 is comprised of 10 most significant bits 112 , 114 , 116 , 118 , 120 , 122 , 124 , 126 , 128 , and 130 and L 2 is comprised of 10 least significant bits 132 , 134 , 136 , 138 , 140 , 142 , 144 , 146 , 148 , and 150 .
[0034] Using the data structure of FIG. 1B a device that can handle 3 labels will be able to encode a specific path for 6 hops. In the embodiment of FIG. 1B , label 100 represents a concatenation of two labels, L 1 and L 2 . For ease of notation purpose, it will be referred to herein as L 1 -L 2 .
[0035] This concatenation requires some changes to the way in which labels are handled and are forwarded. Typically, a single 20-bit label is the only label encoded within a single MPLS label stack entry as defined in RFC 3032 (which can be found at https://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc3032). To encode six labels in the stack (top to bottom) embodiments of the present invention would have: <L 1 ><L 2 ><L 3 ><L 4 ><L 5 ><L 6 >. In the notation used herein, the labels can be encoded in a stack, where the leftmost one is the top of the stack and the rightmost one is the bottom of the stack.
[0036] Using the 10-bit labels of the embodiment shown in FIG. 1 , embodiments of the present invention have 2 labels in each MPLS label stack entry. Thus, the six labels would be encoded as: <L 1 -L 2 ><L 3 -L 4 ><L 5 -L 6 >, where L 1 is the top of the stack label and L 6 is the bottom of the stack label.
[0037] If there are an odd number of labels, then the top label would only have the 10 LS-bits set to some value, and the MS-bits would be set to zero; a zero label is effectively the same as an “Explicit NULL” label as defined in RFC 3032. When there is an explicit null label, that is an indication for the LSR to pop the top level label and what remains is the label below it. For example, if a packet comes in with <L 1 -L 2 > and the goal is to pop L 1 and forward the packet, the outgoing packet would be represented as < 0 -L 2 >. The EXP, Time to Live (TTL) and Bottom of the Stack (BoS) bits operate as defined by MPLS in RFC 3032.
[0038] In embodiments of the present invention, special labels are ignored, for example the entropy label. They are not common and not “required.”
[0039] In MPLS operation, when a labeled packet arrives at an LSR, the action can be one of the following: swap, pop and forward, or pop and look at next label/header. The “swap” operation refers to an incoming label being swapped for an outgoing single label or an entire label stack, for example, incoming label L 1 is swapped for outgoing label L 2 or label stack <L 2 ><L 3 > . . . <Ln>. The “pop and forward” operation refers to an incoming label L 1 being popped and the next hop is already known. Pop and forward is commonly used for Penultimate Hop Pop (PHP). PHP is a technology defined in MPLS that allows the last hop router to be a router that does not support the “pop and lookup” and/or the “pop and forward” operations. A penultimate hop router is responsible for popping the label to and forwarding the packet to the final hop router.
[0040] The “pop and look at next label or header” operation refers to the following. An incoming label L 1 is popped. The router checks to see if it is the BoS label. If the BoS label, then lookup next label, else lookup next header. A header could be Media Access Control (MAC) or Internet Protocol (IP) depending on how the protocol was setup.
[0041] For an incoming non-MPLS packet at an edge LSR, the action would be “push.” A new label stack of one or more labels is pushed into the packet and it is forwarded.
[0042] Embodiments of the present invention modify the standard operations described above, but taking advantage of using the existing hardware. Since the label can be a concatenation of two labels, the operations are handled differently. For the push operation, the label stack is pushed. The label compression can start with the bottom of the stack labels. Thus, an even number of labels is pushed as <L 1 -L 2 ><L 3 -L 4 > . . . ; an odd number of labels is pushed as < 0 -L 1 ><L 2 -L 3 > . . . .
[0043] Embodiments of the present invention use a regular 20-bit label lookup for all forwarding operations of MPLS encoded packets using existing hardware. Other embodiments of the present invention use hardware to forward less than 20 bit labels, for example, 10 bit labels.
[0044] In the common case, the Label Forwarding Information Base (LFIB) is implemented as a 20-bit exact match table. Therefore, embodiments of the present invention will need to look-up all 20 bits in the top label even when only the most significant or least significant 10 bits are used.
[0045] First, the label of interest (top label) is always guaranteed to appear either in the 10 LS-bits by itself (with the 10 MS-bits of 0) or in the 10 MS-bits along with a label of one of that LSR's next-hops in the 10 LS-bits. A given LSR knows all of its nexthops via the Interior Gateway Protocol (IGP) that is used to advertise these labels. If an SDN controller is used to program these entries, then the SDN controller would also be aware of the entire network topology and the labels that correspond to each of the LSRs.
[0046] For the example where the label appears by itself or there is only one label encoded in the concatenation, the swap and pop operations are as follows. The swap operation comes in with one label and goes out with another label. So for the swap operation, incoming label < 0 -L 1 > could become outgoing label < 0 -Ln>, where Ln is the label advertised by the nexthop (note that the swap operation is not commonly used in SPRING). For the pop and forward operation, a lookup would be done on the incoming label < 0 -L 1 > and the result would be to pop the label and forward the packet. The nexthop is already known and the pop and forward operation is complete. Here, since there is only one label encoded, the operation is unchanged. For the pop and lookup operation, the incoming label < 0 -L 1 > is looked-up in the LFIP. The result can indicate to pop & lookup the next label in the stack. Again, in this example, there is only one label encoded in the concatenated label so the operation is unchanged. For the example where the label appears with the next hop label, i.e. there are two labels concatenated, the operations are modified as follows. For the swap operation the incoming label <L 1 -L 2 > will be swapped for <Ln-L 2 >. The top level label, L 1 , got swapped to the value Ln, but the next level label, L 2 , was retained. The 10 LS-bits are retained. The operation of swapping a 10-bit label in the 10 MS-bits of the label stack entry can be achieved using existing hardware.
[0047] The pop & forward operation can be implemented as a swap. The label <L 1 -L 2 > can have L 1 popped and L 2 is retained and the packet forwarded. So the outgoing label is < 0 -L 2 > and the packet is forwarded. Thus, the pop and forward operation for 10-bit labels can be implemented as a swap operation in the existing hardware.
[0048] The pop and lookup can be implemented as a swap in the existing hardware. A lookup is performed on incoming label <L 1 -L 2 > (note that this step automatically includes the lookup for the next level label L 2 ), swap it for outgoing label < 0 -L 2 > and forward the packet. Thus a separate lookup for L 2 is not needed and what would normally have been implemented as a pop followed by a lookup on the next label in the label stack is implemented as a swap operation.
[0049] For the example where MPLS started out with the first (local) label by itself which indicated a pop, the next label may now have 2 possibilities. One, the nexthop is encoded by itself. < 0 , Ln>—for that case, there is one entry for each possible nexthop. Two, the nexthop is encoded with the next-nexthop.
[0050] For each nexthop, there are x entries of the form:
[0051] <Ln, Lm>
[0052] <Ln, Lm+1>
[0053] <Ln, Lm+2>
[0054] Where Ln is the nexthop label, and Lm, Lm+1, . . . are the next-nexthops reachable from the LSR that advertised Ln. The above operation modifications are described further below in reference to FIG. 2 and Tables 1 and 2.
[0055] FIG. 2 depicts a block diagram according to embodiments of the present invention. FIG. 2 shows six MPLS LSRs, A 210 , B 220 , C 230 , D 240 , E 250 , and F 260 .
[0056] Table 1 shows an incoming label, outgoing label, action, and remarks for various operations in relation to FIG. 2 and LSR A. The table sets up the various incoming labels and the corresponding actions. For example, if the incoming label stack is <A-B>, then A is popped and the packet is forwarded to B, the nexthop. The action itself is implemented as a swap as described above. If the incoming label is <A-F>, then A is popped and the packet is forwarded to F, the nexthop. The action is implemented as a swap.
[0000]
TABLE 1
Incoming
Outgoing
Label
Label
Action
Remarks
<0-A>
—
Pop and
Lookup
<A-B>
<0-B>
Swap
A is popped, B is nexthop
<A-F>
<0-F>
Swap
A is popped, F is nexthop
<0-B>
<0-B>
Swap
Forward to B, B is the only label
<B-C>
<B-C>
Swap
Forward to B, B encoded with
next-nexthop C
<B-E>
<B-E>
Swap
Forward to B, B encoded with
next-nexthop E
<0-F>
<0-F>
Swap
Forward to F, F is only label
<F-E>
<F-E>
Swap
Forward to F, F is encoded with
next-nexthop E
*
NA
Discard
All other labels are illegal
[0057] Table 2 shows an incoming label, outgoing label, action, and remarks for various operations in relation to FIG. 2 and LSR A for the case where PHP is in use. The table sets up the various incoming labels and the corresponding actions. When using PHP, LSRs A 210 and B 220 should not appear in the incoming label since the previous router should have popped it.
[0000]
TABLE 2
Incoming
Outgoing
Label
Label
Action
Remarks
<0-A>
—
Pop and
Should never be needed
Lookup
<A-B>
—
Pop and
A and B are popped, B is
Lookup
nexthop; should not happen
<A-F>
—
Pop and
A and F are popped, F is
Lookup
nexthop; should not happen
<0-B>
—
Pop and
B is popped, B is nexthop
Forward
<B-C>
<0-C>
Swap
B is popped, C is retained
(C is next-nexthop),
B is nexthop
<B-E>
<0-E>
Swap
B is popped, E is retained
(E is next-nexthop),
B is nexthop
<0-F>
—
Pop and
F is popped, F is nexthop
forward
<F-E>
<0-E>
Swap
F is popped, E is retained
(E is next-nexthop),
F is nexthop
*
NA
Discard
All other labels are illegal
[0058] Tables 1 and 2 can both be stored in a memory at LSR A 210 , for example. In the above example, each LSR in FIG. 2 can have a memory storing tables similar to Tables 1 and 2.
[0059] FIG. 3 depicts a block diagram of a memory according to embodiments of the present invention. FIG. 3 shows a memory 300 within a LSR A 210 , B 220 , C 230 , D 240 , E 250 , or F 260 shown in FIG. 2 . Memory 300 includes table 320 with individual 20 bit label entries and action table 330 . Label table 320 points to an action in action table 330 . Action table 330 can be Table 2 shown above. For example, router A 210 can have Table 1 and Table 2. Label table 320 can include the concatenation of labels described above.
[0060] FIG. 4 depicts a flowchart used to implement increased label capacity according to embodiments of the present invention. FIG. 4 shows determining an incoming label based on communication 410 , determining an action based on the incoming label and the next label in the stack 420 , and determining an outgoing label based on the action and the incoming label 430 . As described above in reference to tables 1 and 2, an incoming label is used to determine an action and determine the outgoing label.
[0061] FIG. 5 depicts a flowchart used to implement a label forwarding table according to embodiments of the present invention. FIG. 5 shows the method used to program the label forwarding table that is used by the flowchart shown in FIG. 4 .
[0062] In FIG. 5 , the notation L_i is used to denote any instance of a label advertised by the local LSR. The notation L_j is used to denote any instance of a label advertised by a nexthop of the local LSR. The notation L_k is used to denote any instance of a label advertised by a next-nexthop of the local LSR. When referring to programming entries such <L_i-L_j> for neighbor m, it is assumed that all possible label combinations for L_i advertised by the the local LSR and L_j advertised by the nexthop LSR_m will be programmed.
[0063] FIG. 5 shows process 500 for generating label forwarding tables according to embodiments of the present invention. FIG. 5 shows programming entries in the table with < 0 -L_i> with the action pop & lookup 510 . Where M equals the number of nexthops of the local LSR and nexthops are LSR_ 1 , LSR_ 2 , . . . , LSR_M and counter m is initialized to 1 520 . Check that the local LSR is not in PHP mode 530 . If the local LSR is not in PHP mode, then program entries in the table with <L_i-L_j> with action swap to < 0 -L_j> & forward to LSR_m 540 . If the local LSR is in PHP mode, then program entries in the table with <L_i-L_j> with action pop & forward to LSR_m 550 .
[0064] N equals the number of nexthops of LSR_m (i.e. an LSR that is exactly two hops from the local LSR reachable via LSR_m), and counter n is initialized to 1 560 . Check that the local LSR is not in PHP mode 570 . If the local LSR is not in PHP mode, then program entries in the table with <L_j-L_k> with action swap to <L_j-L_k> & forward to LSR_n 580 . If the router is in PHP mode, then program entries in the table with <L_j-L_k> with action swap to < 0 -L_k> and forward to LSR_n 590 . Increment counter n 515 , check if n>N 525 and if so increment counter m 535 . If not, go back to checking if not in PHP mode 570 and continue for the next neighbor LSR_n of neighbor LSR_m of the local LSR. Check if m>M 545 . If so, end. If not, go back to checking if not in PHP mode 530 and continue for next neighbor LSR_m of local LSR.
[0065] FIG. 6 depicts a flowchart used to implement a label forwarding table according to embodiments of the present invention. FIG. 5 shows an embodiment implemented when all paths in the network are specified in packets by listing every hop explicitly in the packet. In embodiments where loose source routing is acceptable or desirable, then process 600 shown in FIG. 6 can be used for programming the table. In the embodiment shown in FIG. 6 , L={L_ 1 , L_ 2 , . . . , L_n} are labels advertised by any of the LSRs in the network.
[0066] FIG. 6 shows initializing counter i to one 605 . Check that label L_i was generated by the local LSR 610 . If L_i was generated locally, then program an entry for < 0 -L_i> with action pop & lookup 615 . If L_i was not generated locally, then program an entry for < 0 -L_i> with action swap to < 0 -Li> and forward on any shortest path towards LSR that advertised L_i 620 . Initialize counter j to one 625 . Check if i equals j 630 . If i is equal to j, then do nothing. If i is not equal to j, then check if L_j was not generated by the local LSR 635 . If L_j was not generated by the local LSR, then check if L_i was generated by the local LSR 640 . If L_i was generated locally, then check if L_j is an immediate nexthop 645 . If L_i was not generated locally, then program an entry for <L_i-L_j> with action swap to <L_i-L_j> and forward on any shortest path towards LSR that advertised L_i 650 . If L_i was generated locally and if Lj is not an immediate nexthop, the program an entry for <L_i-L_j> with action swap to < 0 -Lj> and forward along any shortest path towards the LSR that advertised L_j 660 . If L_i was generated locally, and if L_j is an immediate nexthop, then check if not operating in PHP 655 . If not operating in PHP mode, program an entry for <L_i-L_j> with action swap to < 0 -L_j> and forward to LSR that advertised L_j 665 . If operating in PHP, then program an entry for <L_i-L_j> with action pop and forward to LSR that advertised L_j 670 . Increment counter j 690 . Check if j>n 675 . If j is not greater than n, then jump to after j= 1 625 . If j is greater than n then increment counter i 680 . Check if i is greater than n 685 . If i is not greater than n, then jump to after i equals 1 605 . If i is not greater than n, then end.
[0067] One advantage of the present invention is that the total number of LSRs that can be traverse with an existing label stack size is increased.
[0068] Embodiments of the present invention use larger tables, but that is not a disadvantage since the table sizes are generally small when using a technology such as SPRING.
[0069] Embodiments of the present invention add some complexity with the IGP shortest path computation required to keep track of nexthops and next-nexthops for the case where only strict source routes are used. In cases where loose routing is needed or desirable, the method can still be used, but the local LSR must be able to account for the topology for all labels as outlined in FIG. 6 . In the worst case, the number of label entries in the forwarding table would be on the order of n 2 where n is the number of LSRs in the network.
[0070] One of ordinary skill in the art will appreciate that various benefits are available as a result of the present invention. One such benefit is that embodiments of the present invention operate in conjunction with a prior art hardware.
[0071] Another benefit is that embodiments of the present invention provide increase the number of hops that can be explicitly defined.
[0072] It shall be noted that aspects of the present invention may be encoded upon one or more non-transitory computer-readable media with instructions for one or more processors or processing units to cause steps to be performed. It shall be noted that the one or more non-transitory computer-readable media shall include volatile and non-volatile memory. It shall be noted that alternative implementations are possible, including a hardware implementation or a software/hardware implementation. Hardware-implemented functions may be realized using ASIC(s), programmable arrays, digital signal processing circuitry, or the like. Accordingly, the “means” terms in any claims are intended to cover both software and hardware implementations. Similarly, the term “computer-readable medium or media” as used herein includes software and/or hardware having a program of instructions embodied thereon, or a combination thereof. With these implementation alternatives in mind, it is to be understood that the figures and accompanying description provide the functional information one skilled in the art would require to write program code (i.e., software) and/or to fabricate circuits (i.e., hardware) to perform the processing required.
[0073] While the inventions have been described in conjunction with several specific embodiments, it is evident to those skilled in the art that many further alternatives, modifications, application, and variations will be apparent in light of the foregoing description. Thus, the inventions described herein are intended to embrace all such alternatives, modifications, applications and variations as may fall within the spirit and scope of the appended claims.
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Aspects of the present invention include increasing the number of hops that can be specifically defined in a multiprotocol label switching stack. In embodiments of the present invention, a label space can be used to represent two or more labels. In embodiments of the present invention, the label space can be used by concatenating two or more labels and redefining the multiprotocol label switching stack operations and outgoing labels.
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CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] This application is a divisional of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/001,035, filed Dec. 6, 2007, pending, which application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/028,075, filed Dec. 21, 2001, pending. The disclosure of the previously referenced U.S. patent application is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety.
STATEMENT ACCORDING TO 37 C.F.R. §1.52(e)(5)—SEQUENCE LISTING SUBMITTED ON COMPACT DISC
[0002] Pursuant to 37 C.F.R. §1.52(e)(1)(ii), a compact disc containing an electronic version of the Sequence Listing has been submitted concomitant with this application, the contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference. A second compact disc is submitted and is an identical copy of the first compact disc. The discs are labeled “copy 1” and “copy 2,” respectively, and each disc contains one file entitled “SEQUENCE LISTING 030507.txt,” which is 37 KB and created on Mar. 5, 2007.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0003] Gene control is generally thought to occur at four levels: 1) transcription (either initiation or termination), 2) processing of primary transcripts, 3) stabilization or destabilization of mRNAs, and 4) mRNA translation. The primary function of gene control in cells is to adjust the enzymatic machinery of the cell to its nutritional, chemical and physical environment.
[0004] It is generally thought that gene expression is regulated at both the levels of transcription and translation. Modulation or regulation of gene expression requires factors called transcriptional factors. The term “gene control or regulation” also refers to the formation and use of mRNA. Although control can be exerted at a number of different molecular steps, differential transcription probably most frequently underlies the differential rate of protein synthesis in prokaryotes as well as eukaryotes. It is generally thought that activator proteins (also called transcription factors or transcriptional activators) bind to DNA and recruit the transcriptional machinery in a cell to a promotor, thereby stimulating gene expression. Further, differential processing of RNA transcripts in the cell nucleus, differential stabilization of mRNA in the cytoplasm, and differential translation of mRNA into protein are also important in eukaryotic gene control. These steps define the regulatory decisions in a transcriptional circuit and misregulation at any stage can result in a variety of diseases.
[0005] Where in unicellular organisms, be it of prokaryotic or eukaryotic origin, a cell's response to its environment is influenced by many stimuli from the outside world, reflecting the often widely variable environment of the single cell, most cells in multicellular organisms experience a fairly constant environment. Perhaps for this reason, genes that are devoted to responses to environmental changes constitute a much smaller fraction of the total number of genes in multicellular organisms than in single-cell organisms.
[0006] As said above, cells react to environmental changes, which they perceive through extracellular signals. These signals can be either physical (e.g., light, temperature, pressure and electricity) or chemical (e.g., food, hormones and neurotransmitters). Cells can both sense and produce signals. This makes it possible for them to communicate with each other. In order to achieve this, there are complex signal-sensing and -producing mechanisms in uni- and multi-cellular organisms.
[0007] Two groups of chemical signals can be distinguished: membrane-permeable and membrane-impermeable signals. The membrane-permeable signal molecules comprise the large family of steroid hormones, such as estrogens, progesterone and androgens. Steroids pass the plasma membrane and bind to specific receptors, which are localized in the cytoplasm or nucleus of the cell. After binding of the hormone, the receptor undergoes a conformational change. The receptor is then able to bind to DNA itself or to proteins which can in turn interact with DNA. In general, steroid hormones can directly regulate gene expression by means of this process. The membrane-impermeable signal molecules include acetylcholine, growth factors, extracellular matrix components, thrombin, lysophosphatidic acid, the yeast mating factors and, for the social amoeba Dictyostellium discoideum, folic acid and cyclic AMP. They are recognized by receptors, which are localized on the plasma membrane of the cell. The receptors are specific for one particular signal molecule or a family of closely related signal molecules. Upon binding of their ligands, these receptors transduce the signals by several mechanisms.
[0008] The most characteristic and exacting requirement of gene control on multicellular organisms is the execution of precise developmental decisions so that the right gene is activated in the right cell at the right time. These developmental decisions include not only those related to the development of an organism per se, as for example can be seen during embryogenesis and organogenesis or in response to disease, but also relate to the differentiation or proliferation or apoptosis of those cells that merely carry out their genetic program essentially without leaving progeny behind.
[0009] Such cells, such as skin cells, precursors of red blood cells, lens cells of the eye, and antibody-producing cells, are also often regulated by patterns of gene control that serve the need of the whole organism and not the survival of an individual cell.
[0010] It is generally reasoned that there are at least three components of gene control: molecular signals, levels and mechanisms. Firstly, it is reasoned that specific signalling molecules exist to which a specific gene can respond. Secondly, control is exerted on one or more levels (i.e., the step or steps) in the chain of events leading from the transcription of DNA to the use of mRNA in protein synthesis. Thirdly, at each of those levels, specific molecular mechanisms are employed to finally exert the control over the gene to be expressed.
[0011] Many genes are regulated not by a signalling molecule that enters the cells but by molecules that bind to specific receptors on the surface of cells. Interaction between cell-surface receptors and their ligands can be followed by a cascade of intracellular events including variations in the intracellular levels of so-called second messengers (diacylglycerol, Ca 2+ , cyclic nucleotides). The second messengers in turn lead to changes in protein phosphorylation through the action of cyclic AMP, cyclic GMP, calcium-activated protein kinases, or protein kinase C, which is activated by diaglycerol.
[0012] Many of the responses to binding of ligands to cell-surface receptors are cytoplasmatic and do not involve immediate gene activation in the nucleus. Some receptor-ligand interactions, however, are known to cause prompt nuclear transcriptional activation of a specific and limited set of genes. For example, one proto-oncogene, c-fos, is known to be activated in some cell types by elevation of almost every one of the known second messengers and also by at least two growth factors, platelet-derived growth factor and epidermal growth factor. However, progress has been slow in determining exactly how such activation is achieved. In a few cases, the transcriptional proteins that respond to cell-surface signals have been characterized.
[0013] One of the clearest examples of activation of a pre-existing inactive transcription factor following a cell-surface interaction is the nuclear factor (NF)-kappaB, which was originally detected because it stimulates the transcription of genes encoding immunoglobulins of the kappa class in B-lymphocytes. The binding site for NK-kappaB in the kappa gene is well defined (see for example P. A. Baeuerle and D. Baltimore, 1988, Science 242:540), providing an assay for the presence of the active factor. This factor exists in the cytoplasm of lymphocytes complexed with an inhibitor. Treatment of the isolated complex in vitro with mild denaturing conditions dissociates the complex, thus freeing NK-kappaB to bind to its DNA site. Release of active NF-kappaB in cells is now known to occur after a variety of stimuli including treating cells with bacterial lipopolysaccharide (LPS) and extracellular polypeptides as well as chemical molecules (e.g., phobol esters) that stimulate intracellular phosphokinases. Thus a phosphorylation event triggered by many possible stimuli may account for NF-kappaB conversion to the active state. The active factor is then translocated to the cell nucleus to stimulate transcription only of genes with a binding site for active NF-kappaB.
[0014] The inflammatory response involves the sequential release of mediators and the recruitment of circulating leukocytes, which become activated at the inflammatory site and release further mediators (Nat. Med. 7:1294;2001). This response is self-limiting and resolves through the release of endogenous anti-inflammatory mediators and the clearance of inflammatory cells. The persistent accumulation and activation of leukocytes is a hallmark of chronic inflammation. Current approaches to the treatment of inflammation rely on the inhibition of pro-inflammatory mediator production and of mechanisms that initiate the inflammatory response. However, the mechanisms by which the inflammatory response resolves might provide new targets in the treatment of chronic inflammation. Studies in different experimental models of resolving inflammation have identified several putative mechanisms and mediators of inflammatory resolution. We have shown that cyclopentenone prostaglandins (cyPGs) may be endogenous anti-inflammatory mediators and promote the resolution of inflammation in vivo. Others have shown a temporal shift to the production of anti-inflammatory lipoxins during the resolution of inflammation. In recent years, apoptosis has been identified as an important mechanism for the resolution of inflammation in vivo. It has been postulated that defects in leukocyte apoptosis are important in the pathogenesis of inflammatory disease. In addition, the selective induction of apoptosis in leukocytes may offer a new therapeutic approach to inflammatory disease.
[0015] Considering that NF-kappaB is thought by many to be a primary effector of disease (A. S. Baldwin, J. Clin. Invest., 2001, 107:3-6), numerous efforts are underway to develop safe inhibitors of NF-kappaB to be used in treatment of both chronic and acute disease situations. Specific inhibitors of NF-kappaB should reduce side effects associated with drugs such as NSAIDS and glucocorticoids and would offer significant potential for the treatment of a variety of human and animal diseases. Specific diseases or syndromes where patients would benefit from NF-kappaB inhibition vary widely and range from rheumatoid arthritis, atherosclerosis, multiple sclerosis, chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyradiculoneuritis, asthma, inflammatory bowel disease, to Helicobacter pylori -associated gastritis and other inflammatory responses, and a variety of drugs that have effects on NF-kappaB activity, such as corticosteroids, sulfasalazine, 5-aminosalicylic acid, aspirin, tepoxalin, leflunomide, curcumin, antioxidants and proteasome inhibitors. These drugs are considered to be non-specific and often only applicable in high concentrations that may end up toxic for the individual treated.
[0016] Inactive cytoplasmatic forms of transcription factors can thus be activated by removal of an inhibitor, as is the case with NF-kappaB, or, alternatively, by association of two (or more) proteins, neither of which is active by itself as in the case of interferon-alpha-stimulated factor (D. E. Levy et al., 1989, Genes and Development 3:1362). After interferon-alpha attaches to its cell-surface receptor, one of the proteins is changed within a minute or less, and the two can combine. The active (combined) factor is then translocated to the cell nucleus to stimulate transcription only of genes with a binding site for the protein. Considering that interferon-alpha is a mediator of responses of the body directed at pathogens and self-antigens, modulating regulation of genes that are under influence of the interferon-alpha-stimulated factor would contribute to the treatment of a variety of human and animal diseases.
[0017] Other typical examples of signalling molecules that affect gene expression via cell-surface receptor interaction are polypeptide hormones such as insulin, glucagon, various growth factors such as EGF, VEGF, and so on.
[0018] The steroid hormones and their receptors represent one of the best understood cases that affect transcription. Because steroid hormones are soluble in lipid membranes, they can diffuse into cells. They affect transcription by binding to specific intracellular receptors that are site-specific DNA-binding molecules. Other examples of signalling molecules that enter the cell and act intra-cellularly are thyroid hormone (T 3 ), vitamin D and retinoic acid, and other small lipid-soluble signalling molecules that enter cells and modulate gene expression. The characteristic DNA-binding sites for the receptors for these signalling molecules are also known as response elements.
[0019] Another example of a small molecule that is involved in regulation of gene expression is ethylene, a gas that for example induces the expression of genes involved in fruit ripening. Also, small plant hormones, known as auxines and cytokinins regulate plant growth and differentiation directly by regulating gene expression.
[0020] Given the critical role of regulatory factors in gene regulation, the development of artificial or synthetic counterparts that could be used in methods to rectify errors in gene expression has been a long-standing goal at the interface of chemistry and biology.
DISCLOSURE OF THE INVENTION
[0021] Disclosed is a treatment of anthrax. Anthrax, the disease caused by the spore-forming Bacillus anthracis ( B. anthracis ), continues to be a worldwide problem among domesticated and wild herbivores in Asia and Africa and poses a worldwide threat when being used as biological weapons for biological warfare or bioterrorism. Human infections occur after contact with infected animals or contaminated animal products. Outbreaks or epidemics are a constant threat for endemic regions because spores can persist in the soil for long periods of time. Importation controls on certain animal products are necessary to prevent the establishment of anthrax where the disease is not endemic. Human anthrax is usually classified by the portal of entry into the host. Cutaneous anthrax, which accounts for the vast majority of human anthrax cases, is a localized infection with generally mild systemic symptoms and characterized by a painless papule that is surrounded by edema which can be quite extensive. The papule ulcerates by day 5 or 6 and develops into the characteristic black eschar of cutaneous anthrax. Inhalation anthrax, which occurs after inhaling airborne spores, gastrointestinal anthrax, resulting from ingestion of contaminated food, and, in some instances, untreated cutaneous anthrax are characterized by dissemination of the bacteria from the initial site of infection with development of a massive septicemia and toxemia. In inhalation anthrax, phagocytic cells transport the spores from the lung alveoli to the regional lymph nodes, where the spores germinate and bacteria multiply. The bacilli then spread into the bloodstream, where they are temporarily removed by the reticuloendothelial system. Prior to death, which occurs 2 to 5 days after infection, there is a sudden onset of acute symptoms characterized by hypotension, edema, and fatal shock due to an extensive septicemia and toxemia. Therapeutic intervention in general must be initiated early, as septicemic infections are nearly always fatal.
[0022] Also disclosed is the modulation of gene expression in a cell, also called gene control, in relation to the treatment of a variety of diseases such as anthrax. As said, anthrax is a disease of animals and humans and poses a significant threat as an agent of biological warfare and terrorism. Inhalational anthrax, in which spores of B. anthracis are inhaled, is almost always fatal, as diagnosis is rarely possible before the disease has progressed to a point where antibiotic treatment is ineffective. The major virulence factors of B. anthracis are a poly-D-glutamic acid capsule and anthrax toxin. Anthrax toxin consists of three distinct proteins that act in concert: two enzymes, lethal factor (LF) and edema factor (EF; an adenylate cyclase); and protective antigen (PA). The PA is a four-domain protein that binds a host cell-surface receptor by its carboxy-terminal domain; cleavage of its N-terminal domain by a furin-like protease allows PA to form heptamers that bind the toxic enzymes with high affinity through homologous N-terminal domains. The complex is endocytosed; acidification of the endosome leads to membrane insertion of the PA heptamer by forming a 14-stranded beta-barrel, followed by translocation of the toxic enzymes into the cytosol by an unknown mechanism. The binary combination of PA and LF is sufficient to induce rapid death in animals when given intravenously, and certain metalloprotease inhibitors block the effects of the toxin in vitro. Thus, LF is a potential target for therapeutic agents that would inhibit its catalytic activity or block its association with PA. LF is a protein (relative molecular mass 90,000) that is critical in the pathogenesis of anthrax. It comprises four domains: domain I binds the membrane-translocating component of anthrax toxin, the PA; domains II, III and IV together create a long deep groove that holds the 16-residue N-terminal tail of mitogen-activated protein kinase kinase-2 (MAPKK-2) before cleavage. Domain II resembles the ADP-ribosylating toxin from Bacillus cereus, but the active site has been mutated and recruited to augment substrate recognition. Domain III is inserted into domain II and seems to have arisen from a repeated duplication of a structural element of domain II. Domain IV is distantly related to the zinc metalloprotease family and contains the catalytic centre; it also resembles domain I. The structure thus reveals a protein that has evolved through a process of gene duplication, mutation and fusion into an enzyme with high and unusual specificity.
[0023] The MAPKK (SEQ ID NO:18) family of proteins is the only known cellular substrates of LF. Cleavage by LF near to their N termini removes the docking sequence for the downstream cognate MAP kinase. The effect of lethal toxin on tumor cells, for example, is to inhibit tumor growth and angiogenesis, most probably by inhibiting the MAPKK-1 and MAPKK-2 pathways. However, the primary cell type affected in anthrax pathogenesis is the macrophage. LF has been shown to cleave short N-terminal fragments from mitogen or extracellular signal-regulated MAPKK-1, MAPKK-2, MAPKK-3, and MAPKK-6, the upstream activators of extracellular signal-regulated kinase 1 (ERK1), ERK2, and p38. Recent data show that this results in inhibiting release, but not production, of the pro-inflammatory mediators, NO and tumor necrosis factor-alpha (TNF-alpha). In addition, high levels of lethal toxin lead to lysis of macrophages within a few hours by an unknown mechanism. Recent data suggests that this happens due to inhibition of growth-factor pathways leading to macrophage death. These observations suggest that at an early stage in infection, lethal toxin may reduce (or delay) the immune response, whereas at a late stage in infection, high titers of the bacterium in the bloodstream trigger macrophage lysis and the sudden release of high levels of NO and TNF-alpha. This may explain the symptoms before death which are characterized by the hyperstimulation of host macrophage inflammatory pathways, leading to dramatic hypotension and shock. These symptoms resemble those of LPS-induced septic shock. It is of note, LPS-nonresponder mice such as C3H/HeJ are also quite resistant against anthrax toxin.
[0024] The recognition sites for LF require the presence of the proline (P) residue followed by a hydrophobic residue or a glycine (G) residue, between which LF cleaves. The recognition sites further require an uncharged amino acid following the hydrophobic residue and at least one positively charged amino acid (and no negatively charged amino acid, such as Asp and Glu) within the five amino acids to the N-terminal side of the proline residue. Other residues in the sequence provide appropriate spacing between the critical residues or between the donor and acceptor, and thus their composition is not critical and can include any natural or unnatural amino acid.
[0025] The invention provides a method for modulating expression of a gene in a cell comprising providing the cell with a signalling molecule comprising an oligopeptide or functional analogue or derivative thereof Such a molecule is herein also called NMPF and referenced by number. Since peptides, and functional analogues and derivatives of relatively short amino acid sequences, are easily synthesized these days, the invention provides a method to modulate gene expression with easily obtainable synthetic compounds such as synthetic peptides or functional analogues or derivatives thereof.
[0026] The invention also provides a method for the treatment of an inflammatory condition comprising administering to a subject in need of such treatment a molecule comprising an oligopeptide peptide or functional analogue or derivative thereof, the molecule capable of reducing production of NO by a cell, in particular wherein the molecule additionally is capable of modulating translocation and/or activity of a gene transcription factor present in a cell, especially wherein the gene transcription factor comprises a NF-kappaB/Rel protein. Advantageously, the invention provides a method wherein the modulating translocation and/or activity of a gene transcription factor allows modulation of TNF-alpha production by the cell, in particular wherein the TNF-alpha production is reduced. Considering that TNF-alpha production is central to almost all, if not all, inflammatory conditions, reducing TNF-alpha production can greatly alleviate, or mitigate, a great host of inflammatory conditions that are described herein. In particular, the invention provides a method wherein the inflammatory condition comprises an acute inflammatory condition, and it is especially useful to treat anthrax-related disease, especially when considering that with anthrax, both NO and TNF-alpha reduction will greatly mitigate the course of disease. Table 6 lists oligopeptides according to the invention that have such modulatory effect.
[0027] In particular, the invention provides a method of treatment wherein the treatment comprises administering to the subject a pharmaceutical composition comprising an oligopeptide or functional analogue or derivative thereof capable of reducing production of NO by a cell, preferably wherein the composition comprises at least two oligopeptides or functional analogues or derivatives thereof capable of reducing production of NO by a cell; examples of such combinations can be selected under guidance of Table 6, whereby it suffices to select two, or more, with a desired effect, such as wherein the at least two oligopeptides are selected from the group LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), AQGV (SEQ ID NO:2) and VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3).
[0028] The invention also provides an isolated, preferably synthetic, oligopeptide or functional analogue or derivative thereof or mixture of such oligopeptides or analogues or derivatives capable of reducing production of NO by a cell. Such cell is preferably of a macrophage or DC lineage, considering the central role these cells play in the inflammatory process. The invention also provides a pharmaceutical composition comprising an oligopeptide or functional analogue or derivative according to the invention or comprising at least two oligopeptides or functional analogues or derivatives thereof capable of reducing production of NO by a cell. Furthermore, the invention provides the use of an oligopeptide or functional analogue or derivative thereof capable of reducing production of NO by a cell for the production of a pharmaceutical composition for the treatment of an inflammatory condition by the reduction of NO production by macrophages or DC in the subject to be treated.
[0029] A functional analogue or derivative of a peptide is defined as an amino acid sequence, or other sequence monomers, which has been altered such that the functional properties of the sequence are essentially the same in kind, not necessarily in amount. An analogue or derivative can be provided in many ways, for instance, through conservative amino acid substitution. Also peptidomimetic compounds can be designed that functionally or structurally resemble the original peptide taken as the starting point but that are for example composed of non-naturally occurring amino acids or polyamides. With conservative amino acid substitution, one amino acid residue is substituted with another residue with generally similar properties (size, hydrophobicity), such that the overall functioning is likely not to be seriously affected. However, it is often much more desirable to improve a specific function. A derivative can also be provided by systematically improving at least one desired property of an amino acid sequence. This can, for instance, be done by an Ala-scan and/or replacement net mapping method. With these methods, many different peptides are generated, based on an original amino acid sequence but each containing a substitution of at least one amino acid residue. The amino acid residue may either be replaced by alanine (Ala-scan) or by any other amino acid residue (replacement net mapping). This way, many positional variants of the original amino acid sequence are synthesized. Every positional variant is screened for a specific activity. The generated data are used to design improved peptide derivatives of a certain amino acid sequence.
[0030] A derivative or analogue can also, for instance, be generated by substitution of an L-amino acid residue with a D-amino acid residue. This substitution, leading to a peptide which does not naturally occur in nature, can improve a property of an amino acid sequence. It is for example useful to provide a peptide sequence of known activity of all D-amino acids in retro inversion format, thereby allowing for retained activity and increased half-life values. By generating many positional variants of an original amino acid sequence and screening for a specific activity, improved peptide derivatives comprising such D-amino acids can be designed with further improved characteristics.
[0031] A person skilled in the art is well able to generate analogous compounds of an amino acid sequence. This can, for instance, be done through screening of a peptide library. Such an analogue has essentially the same functional properties of the sequence in kind, not necessarily in amount. Also, peptides or analogues can be circularized, for example, by providing them with (terminal) cysteines, dimerized or multimerized, for example, by linkage to lysine or cysteine or other compounds with side-chains that allow linkage or multimerization, brought in tandem- or repeat-configuration, conjugated or otherwise linked to carriers known in the art, if only by a labile link that allows dissociation.
[0032] The invention also provides a signalling molecule for modulating expression of a gene in a cell comprising a small peptide or functional analogue or derivative thereof. Surprisingly, the inventors found that a small peptide acts as a signalling molecule that can modulate signal transduction pathways and gene expression. A functional analogue or derivative of a small peptide that acts as such a signalling molecule for modulating expression of one or more genes in a cell can be identified or obtained by at least one of various methods for finding such a signalling molecule as provided herein.
[0033] For example, one method as provided herein for identifying or obtaining a signalling molecule comprising a peptide or functional derivative or analogue thereof capable of modulating expression of a gene in a cell comprises providing the cell with a peptide or derivative or analogue thereof and determining the activity and/or nuclear translocation of one or more gene transcription factors. Such activity can be determined in various ways using means and/or methods honed to the specific transcription factor(s) under study. In the detailed description, it is provided to study NF-kappaB/Rel protein translocation and/or activity, but it is, of course, also easily possible to study translocation and/or activity of any other transcription factor for which such tools are available or can be designed. One such other transcription factor is for example the interferon-alpha-stimulated factor as discussed above. Other useful transcription factors to study in this context comprise c-Jun, ATF-2, Fos, and their complexes, ELK-1, EGR-1, IRF-1, IRF-3/7, AP-1, NF-AT, C/EBPs, Sp1, CREB, PPARgamma, and STAT proteins to name a few. Considering that many proteins are subject to proteolytic breakdown whereby oligopeptide fragments are generated, many already before the full protein even has exerted a function, it is hereby established that oligopeptide fragments of such proteins (of which a non-extensive list is given in the detailed description, but one can for example think of MAPKK-2 that can give rise to a peptide MLARRKPVLPALTINP (SEQ ID NO:4), and subsequently to a peptide comprising MLARRKP (SEQ ID NO:5) or MLAR (SEQ ID NO:6) or VLPALT (SEQ ID NO:7) or VLPAL (SEQ ID NO:8), but also of nitric oxide synthase that can give rise to peptides FPGC (SEQ ID NO:9) or PGCP (SEQ ID NO:10), GVLPAVP (SEQ ID NO:11), LPA, VLPAVP (SEQ ID NO:12), or PAVP (SEQ ID NO:13) after proper proteolysis) are involved in feedback mechanisms regulating gene expression, likely by the effect of transcription factors on gene expression. In addition, oligopeptide fragments of proteins (of which a non-extensive list is given in the detailed description) can also modulate the activity of extracellular components such as factor XIII (examples of oligopeptide fragments obtained from factor XIII are LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), LQGVVPRGV (SEQ ID NO:14), GVVP (SEQ ID NO:15), VPRGV (SEQ ID NO:16), PRG, PRGV (SEQ ID NO:17) or activated protein C (APC), thereby eventually leading to the modulation of intracellular signal transduction pathways and gene(s) expression.
[0034] As said, the invention provides active oligopeptides acting as a signalling molecule. To allow for improved bio-availability of such a signalling molecule (which is useful as a pharmacon, especially when produced artificially), the invention also provides a method for determining whether a small peptide or derivative or analogue thereof can act as a functional signalling molecule according to the invention, the method further comprising determining whether the signalling molecule is membrane-permeable.
[0035] The invention for example provides a process or method for obtaining information about the capacity or tendency of an oligopeptide, or a modification or derivative thereof, to regulate expression of a gene comprising the steps of
a) contacting the oligopeptide, or a modification or derivative thereof, with at least one cell; b) determining the presence of at least one gene product in or derived from the cell. It is preferred that the oligopeptide comprises an amino acid sequence corresponding to a fragment of a naturally occurring polypeptide, such as hCG, or MAPKK (SEQ ID NO:18), or another kinase, be it of plant or animal cell, or of eukaryotic or prokaryotic origin, or a synthase of a regulatory protein in a cell, such as wherein the regulatory protein is a (pro-) inflammatory mediator, such as a cytokine. Several candidate proteins and peptide fragments are listed in the detailed description which are a first choice for such an analysis from the inventors' perspective, but the person skilled in the art and working in a specific field of interest in biotechnology shall immediately understand which protein to select for such analyses for his or her own purposes related to his or her field.
[0038] In particular, it is provided to perform a process according to the invention further including a step c) comprising determining the presence of the gene product in or derived from a cell which has not been contacted with the oligopeptide, or a modification or derivative thereof, and determining the ratio of gene product found in step b to gene product found in step c, as can easily been done with the present-day GENECHIP® array technology (see, for example, the detailed description herein) and related methods of expression profiling known in the art.
[0039] Another method provided herein for identifying or obtaining information on a signalling molecule (or for that matter the signalling molecule itself, considering that the next step of synthesizing the molecule, generally being a short peptide, is wholly within the art) comprising a peptide or functional derivative or analogue thereof capable of modulating expression of a gene in a cell comprises providing the cell with a peptide or derivative or analogue thereof and determining relative up-regulation and/or down-regulation of at least one gene expressed in the cell. The up-regulation can classically be studied by determining via, for example, Northern or Western blotting or nucleic acid detection by PCR or immunological detection of proteins whether a cell or cells make more (in the case of up-regulation) or less (in the case of down-regulation) of a gene expression product such as mRNA or protein after the cell or cells have been provided with the peptide or derivative or analogue thereof. Of course, various methods of the invention can be combined to better analyze the functional analogue of the peptide or derivative or analogue under study. Furthermore, relative up-regulation and/or down-regulation of a multitude or clusters of genes expressed in the cell can be easily studied as well, using libraries of positionally or spatially addressable predetermined or known relevant nucleic acid sequences or unique fragments thereof bound to an array or brought in an array format, using for example a nucleic acid library or so-called GENECHIP® array expression analysis systems. Lysates of cells or preparations of cytoplasma and/or nuclei of cells that have been provided with the peptide or derivative or analogue under study are then contacted with the library and relative binding of, for example, mRNA to individual nucleic acids of the library is then determined, as further described herein in the detailed description.
[0040] A functional analogue or derivative of a small peptide that can act as a signalling molecule for modulating expression of a gene in a cell can also be identified or obtained by a method for identifying or obtaining a signalling molecule comprising an oligopeptide or functional derivative or analogue thereof capable of modulating expression of a gene in a cell comprising providing a peptide or derivative or analogue thereof and determining binding of the peptide or derivative or analogue thereof to a factor related to gene control. Such a factor related to gene control can be any factor related to transcription (either initiation or termination), processing of primary transcripts, stabilization or destabilization of mRNAs, and mRNA translation.
[0041] Binding of a peptide or derivative or analogue thereof to such a factor can be determined by various methods known in the art. Classically, peptides or derivatives or analogues can be (radioactively) labelled and binding to the factor can be determined by detection of a labelled peptide-factor complex, such as by electrophoresis, or other separation methods known in the art. However, for determining binding to such factors, array techniques, such as used with peptide libraries, can also be employed, comprising providing a multitude of peptides or derivatives or analogues thereof and determining binding of at least one of the peptides or derivatives or analogues thereof to a factor related to gene control.
[0042] In a preferred embodiment, the factor related to gene control comprises a transcription factor, such as an NF-kappaB-Rel protein or another transcription factor desired to be studied. When binding of a functional analogue according to the invention to such factor has been established, it is, of course, possible to further analyze the analogue by providing a cell with the peptide or derivative or analogue thereof and determining the activity and/or nuclear translocation of a gene transcription factor in the cell, and/or by providing a cell with the peptide or derivative or analogue thereof and determining relative up-regulation and/or down-regulation of at least one gene expressed in the cell.
[0043] The invention thus provides a signalling molecule useful in modulating expression of a gene in a cell and/or useful for reducing NO production by a cell and identifiable or obtainable by employing a method according to the invention. Useful examples of such a signalling molecule can be selected from the group of oligopeptides LQG, AQG, LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), AQGV (SEQ ID NO:2), LQGA (SEQ ID NO:19), VLPALPQVVC (SEQ ID NO:20), VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3), ALPALP (SEQ ID NO:21), VAPALP (SEQ ID NO:22), ALPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:23), VLPAAPQ (SEQ ID NO:24), VLPALAQ (SEQ ID NO:25), LAGV (SEQ ID NO:26), VLAALP (SEQ ID NO:27), VLPALA (SEQ ID NO:28), VLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:29), VLAALPQ (SEQ ID NO:30), VLPALPA (SEQ ID NO:31), GVLPALP (SEQ ID NO:32), GVLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:33), LQGVLPALPQVVC (SEQ ID NO:34), VVCNYRDVRFESIRLPGCPRGVNPVVSYAVALSCQCAL (SEQ ID NO:35), RPRCRPINATLAVEK (SEQ ID NO:36), EGCPVCITVNTTICAGYCPT (SEQ ID NO:37), SKAPPPSLPSPSRLPGPS (SEQ ID NO:38), SIRLPGCPRGVNPVVS (SEQ ID NO:39), LPGCPRGVNPVVS (SEQ ID NO:40), LPGC (SEQ ID NO:41), MTRV (SEQ ID NO:42), MTR, VVC, QVVC (SEQ ID NO:43) and functional analogues or derivatives thereof
[0044] A preferred size of a signalling molecule according to the invention is at most 30 to 40 amino acids, although much smaller molecules, in particular of oligopeptide size, have been shown to be particularly effective. Surprisingly, the invention provides here the insight that gene expression can be modulated or regulated by small peptides, which are most likely breakdown products of larger polypeptides such as chorionic gonadotrophin (CG) and growth hormones or growth factors such as fibroblast growth factor, EGF, VEGF, RNA 3′ terminal phosphate cyclase and CAP18. In principle, such regulating peptide sequences can be derived from a part of any protein of polypeptide molecule produced by prokaryotic and/or eukaryotic cells, and the invention provides the insight that breakdown products of polypeptides, preferably oligopeptides at about the sizes as provided herein, are naturally involved as signalling molecules in modulation of gene expression. In particular, as signalling molecule, a (synthetic) peptide is provided obtainable or derivable from beta-human chorionic gonadotrophin (beta-hCG), preferably from nicked beta-HCG. It was thought before that breakdown products of nicked-beta hCG were involved in immuno-modulation (PCT International Patent Application WO99/59671) or in the treatment of wasting syndrome (PCT International Patent Application WO97/49721) but a relationship with modulation of gene expression was not forwarded in these publications. Of course, such an oligopeptide, or functional equivalent or derivative thereof, is likely obtainable or derivable from other proteins that are subject to breakdown or proteolysis and that are close to a gene regulatory cascade. Preferably, the peptide signalling molecule is obtained from a peptide having at least ten amino acids such as a peptide having an amino acid sequence MTRVLQGVLPALPQVVC (SEQ ID NO:44), SIRLPGCPRGVNPVVS (SEQ ID NO:39), VVCNYRDVRFESIRLPGCPRGVNPVVSYAVALSCQCAL (SEQ ID NO:35), RPRCRPINATLAVEKEGCPVCITVNTTICAGYCPT (SEQ ID NO:45), CALCRRSTTDCGGPKDHPLTC (SEQ ID NO:46), SKAPPPSLPSPSRLPGPS (SEQ ID NO:38), CRRSTTDCGGPKDHPLTC (SEQ ID NO:47), TCDDPRFQDSSSSKAPPPSLPSPSRLPGPSDTPILPQ (SEQ ID NO:48) or functional fragment (e.g., a breakdown product) or functional analogue thereof Functional analogue herein relates to the signalling molecular effect or activity as for example can be measured by measuring nuclear translocation of a relevant transcription factor, such as NF-kappaB in an NF-kappaB assay, or AP-1 in an AP-1 assay, or by another method as provided herein. Fragments can be somewhat (i.e., one or two amino acids) smaller or larger on one or both sides, while still providing functional activity.
[0045] Not wishing to be bound by theory, it is postulated herein that an unexpected mode of gene regulation has been uncovered. Polypeptides, such as endogenous CG, EGF, etc., but also polypeptides of pathogens such as viral, bacterial or protozoal polypeptides, are subject to breakdown into distinct oligopeptides, for example by intracellular proteolysis. Distinct proteolytic enzymes are widely available in the cell, for example in eukaryotes in the lysosomal or proteasomal system. Some of the resulting breakdown products are oligopeptides of 3 to 15, preferably 4 to 9, most preferably 4 to 6, amino acids long that are surprisingly not without any function or effect to the cell, but as demonstrated herein may be involved, possibly via a feedback mechanism in the case of breakdown of endogenous polypeptides, as signalling molecules in the regulation of gene expression, as demonstrated herein by the regulation of the activity or translocation of a gene transcription factor such as NF-kappaB by for example peptides LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), VLPALPQVVC (SEQ ID NO:20), LQGVLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:49), LQG, GVLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:33), VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3), VLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:29), GVLPALP (SEQ ID NO:32), VVC, MTRV (SEQ ID NO:42), and MTR. Synthetic versions of these oligopeptides as described above, and functional analogues or derivatives of these breakdown products, are herein provided to modulate gene expression in a cell and be used in methods to rectify errors in gene expression or the treatment of disease. Oligopeptides such as LQG, AQG, LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), AQGV (SEQ ID NO:2), LQGA (SEQ ID NO:19), VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3), ALPALP (SEQ ID NO:21), VAPALP (SEQ ID NO:22), ALPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:23), VLPAAPQ (SEQ ID NO:24), VLPALAQ (SEQ ID NO:25), LAGV (SEQ ID NO:26), VLAALP (SEQ ID NO:27), VLPALA (SEQ ID NO:28), VLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:29), VLAALPQ (SEQ ID NO:30), VLPALPA (SEQ ID NO:31), GVLPALP (SEQ ID NO:32), GVLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:33), LQGVLPALPQVVC (SEQ ID NO:34), SIRLPGCPRGVNPVVS (SEQ ID NO:39), SKAPPPSLPSPSRLPGPS (SEQ ID NO:38), LPGCPRGVNPVVS (SEQ ID NO:40), LPGC (SEQ ID NO:41), MTRV (SEQ ID NO:42), MTR, VVC, or functional analogues or derivatives (including breakdown products) of the longer sequences thereof, are particularly effective.
[0046] By using the insight as expressed herein, in a preferred embodiment, the invention provides a method for modulating expression of a gene in a cell comprising providing the cell with a signalling molecule comprising an oligopeptide or functional analogue or derivative thereof wherein the signalling molecule is membrane-permeable in that it enters the cell. Most small peptides as described herein already have an inherent propensity to become intracellularly involved, but signalling molecules as provided herein can also be provided with additional peptide sequences, such as arginine- or lysine-rich stretches of amino acids, that allow for improved internalization across a lipid bilayer membrane, and may possibly be cleaved off later by internal proteolytic activity.
[0047] In a preferred embodiment, the invention provides a method for modulating expression of a gene in a cell comprising providing the cell with a signalling molecule comprising a small peptide (amino acid sequence) or functional analogue or derivative thereof, wherein the signalling molecule modulates NF-kappaB/Rel protein conversion or translocation. As said, NF-κB was originally identified as a gene transcription factor that bound to an enhancer element in the gene for the Igκ light chain and was believed to be B cell-specific. However, subsequent studies revealed that NF-kappaB/Rel proteins are ubiquitously expressed and play a central role as transcription factor in regulating the expression of many genes, particularly those involved in immune, inflammatory, developmental and apoptotic processes. NF-κB related gene transcription factors can be activated by different stimuli such as microbial products, proinflammatory cytokines, T- and B-cell mitogens, and physical and chemical stresses. NF-κB in turn regulates the inducible expression of many cytokines, chemokines, adhesion molecules, acute phase proteins, and antimicrobial peptides.
[0048] NF-κB represents a group of structurally related and evolutionarily conserved gene transcription factors. So far, five mammalian NF-κB proteins named Rd (c-Rel), RelA (p65), RelB, NF-kappaB1 (p50 and its precursor p105), and NF-KappaB2 (p52 and it precursor p100) have been described. NF-κB proteins can exist as homo- or heterodimers, and although most NF-κB dimers are activators of transcription, the p50/p50 and p52/p52 homodimers often repress the transcription of their target genes. In Drosophila, three NF-κB homologs named Dorsal, Dif, and Relish have been identified and characterized. Structurally, all NF-κB/Rel proteins share a highly conserved NH 2 -terminal Rd homology domain (RHD) that is responsible for DNA binding, dimerization, and association with inhibitory proteins known as IκBs. In resting cells, NF-κB/Rel dimers are bound to IκBs and retained in an inactive form in the cytoplasm. Like NF-κB, IkBs are also members of a multigene family containing seven known mammalian members including IκBα, IκBβ, Iκbγ, IκBε, Bcl-3, the precursor Rel-proteins, p100 and p105, and one Drosophila IκB named Cactus. The IκB family is characterized by the presence of multiple copies of ankyrin repeats, which are protein-protein interaction motifs that interact with NF-κB via the RHD. Upon appropriate stimulation, IκB is phosphorylated by IκB kinases (IKKs), polyubiquitinated by a ubiquitin ligase complex, and degraded by the 26S proteosome. Consequently, NF-κB is released and translocates into the nucleus to initiate gene expression.
[0049] NF-κB related transcription factors regulate the expression of a wide variety of genes that play critical roles in innate immune responses. Such NF-κB target genes include those encoding cytokines (e.g., IL-1, IL-2, IL-6, IL-12, TNF-α, LTα, LTβ, and GM-CSF), adhesion molecules (e.g., ICAM, VCAM, endothelial leukocyte adhesion molecule [ELAM]), acute phase proteins (e.g., SAA), and inducible enzymes (e.g., iNOS and COX-2). In addition, it has been demonstrated recently that several evolutionary conserved antimicrobial peptides, e.g., β-defensins, are also regulated by NF-κB, a situation similar to Drosophila. Besides regulating the expression of molecules involved in innate immunity, NF-κB also plays a role in the expression of molecules important for adaptive immunity, such as MHC proteins, and the expression of critical cytokines such as IL-2, IL-12 and IFN-γ. Finally NF-κB plays an important role in the overall immune response by affecting the expression of genes that are critical for regulating the apoptotic process, such as c-IAP-1 and c-IAP-2, Fas ligand, c-myc, p53, and cyclin D1.
[0050] Under normal conditions, NF-kappaB is rapidly activated upon microbial and viral invasion, and this activation usually correlates with resistance of the host to infection. However, persistent activation of NF-kappaB may lead to the production of excessive amounts of pro-inflammatory mediators such as IL-12 and TNF-alpha, resulting in tissue damage, as in insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus, atherosclerosis, Crohn's disease, organ failure, and even death of the host, as in bacterial infection-induced septic shock. It is interesting to note that in order to survive in the host, certain pathogens, such as Bordetella, Yersinia, Toxoplasma gondii and African Swine Fever Virus have evolved mechanisms to counteract or escape the host system by inhibiting NF-kappaB activation. On the other hand, some viruses, including HIV-1, CMV and SV-40, take advantage of NF-kappaB as a host factor that is activated at sites of infection.
[0051] Furthermore, the invention provides a method to explore alterations in gene expression in antigen-presenting cells such as dendritic cells in response to microbial exposure by analyzing a gene-expression profile of dendritic cells in response to microorganisms such as for example bacteria such as Escherichia coli, or other pathogenic bacteria, fungi or yeasts such as Candida albicans, viruses such as influenza virus and the effect of (simultaneous) treatment of these diseases with a signalling molecule according to the invention. For example, human monocyte-derived dendritic cells are cultured with one or more pathogens for 1-36 hours, and gene expression is analyzed using an oligonucleotide array representing a (be it large or small) set of genes. When the pathogens regulate the expression of a core set of a distinct number of genes, these genes may be classified according to their kinetics of expression and function. Generally, within 4 hours of pathogen exposure, genes associated with pathogen recognition and phagocytosis will be down-regulated, whereas genes for antigen processing and presentation are up-regulated 8 hours post-exposure. Treatment of such dendritic cells with a signalling molecule according to the invention (be it simultaneous or before or after the treatment of the cells with the pathogen) allows studying the effect a signalling molecule according to the invention has on the effect a pathogen has on an antigen-presenting cell.
[0052] In short, the invention surprisingly provides a signalling molecule capable of modulating expression of a gene in a cell, the molecule being a short peptide, preferably of at most 30 amino acids long, or a functional analogue or derivative thereof. In a much preferred embodiment, the peptide is an oligopeptide of from about 3 to about 15 amino acids long, preferably 4 to 12, more preferably 4 to 9, most preferably 4 to 6 amino acids long, or a functional analogue or derivative thereof. Of course, such signalling molecule can be longer, for example by extending it (N- and/or C-terminally), with more amino acids or other side groups, which can for example be (enzymatically) cleaved off when the molecule enters the place of final destination. Such extension may even be preferable to prevent the signalling molecule from becoming active in an untimely fashion; however, the core or active fragment of the molecule comprises the aforementioned oligopeptide or analogue or derivative thereof.
[0053] In particular, the invention provides a modulator of NF-kappaB/Rel protein activation comprising a signalling molecule according to the invention. Such modulators are widely searched after these days. Furthermore, the invention provides use of a signalling molecule according to the invention for the production of a pharmaceutical composition for the modulation of gene expression.
[0054] Also, the invention provides a method for the treatment of bone disease such as osteoporosis comprising administering to a subject in need of such treatment a molecule comprising an oligopeptide peptide or functional analogue thereof, the molecule capable of modulating production of NO and/or TNF-alpha by a cell. Such a method of treatment is particularly useful in post-menopausal women that no longer experience the benefits of being provided with a natural source of several of the signalling molecules as provided herein, hCG and its breakdown products. Furthermore, the invention provides a method for the treatment of an inflammatory condition associated with TNF-alpha activity of fibroblasts, such as seen with chronic arthritis or synovitis, comprising administering to a subject in need of such treatment a molecule comprising an oligopeptide peptide or functional analogue thereof wherein the molecule is capable of modulating translocation and/or activity of a gene transcription factor present in a cell, in particular of the NF-kappaB factor. Such a treatment can be achieved by systemic administration of a signalling molecule according to the invention, but local administration in joints, bursae or tendon sheaths is provided as well. The molecule can be selected from Table 6 or identified in a method according to the invention. It is preferred when the treatment comprises administering to the subject a pharmaceutical composition comprising an oligopeptide or functional analogue thereof also capable of reducing production of NO by a cell, for example, wherein the composition comprises at least two oligopeptides or functional analogues thereof, each capable of reducing production of NO and/or TNF-alpha by a cell, in particular wherein the at least two oligopeptides are selected from the group LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), AQGV (SEQ ID NO:2) and VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3).
[0055] Furthermore, the invention provides use of an oligopeptide or functional analogue thereof capable of reducing production of NO and/or TNF-alpha by a cell for the production of a pharmaceutical composition for the treatment of an inflammatory condition or a post-menopausal condition, or a bone disease such as osteoporosis, or for the induction of weight loss. The term “pharmaceutical composition” as used herein is intended to cover both the active signalling molecule alone or a composition containing the signalling molecule together with a pharmaceutically acceptable carrier, diluent or excipient. Acceptable diluents of an oligopeptide as described herein in the detailed description are for example physiological salt solutions or phosphate buffered salt solutions. In one embodiment of the present invention, a signal molecule is administered in an effective concentration to an animal or human systemically, e.g., by intravenous, intra-muscular or intraperitoneal administration. Another way of administration comprises perfusion of organs or tissue, be it in vivo or ex vivo, with a perfusion fluid comprising a signal molecule according to the invention. Topical administration, e.g., in ointments or sprays, may also apply, e.g., in inflammations of the skin or mucosal surfaces of for example mouth, nose and/or genitals. Local administration can occur in joints, bursae, tendon sheaths, in or around the spinal cord at locations where nerve bundles branch off, at the location of hernias, in or around infarcted areas in brain or heart, etc. The administration may be done as a single dose, as a discontinuous sequence of various doses, or continuously for a period of time sufficient to permit substantial modulation of gene expression. In the case of a continuous administration, the duration of the administration may vary depending upon a number of factors which would readily be appreciated by those skilled in the art.
[0056] The administration dose of the active molecule may be varied over a fairly broad range. The concentrations of an active molecule which can be administered would be limited by efficacy at the lower end and the solubility of the compound at the upper end. The optimal dose or doses for a particular patient should and can be determined by the physician or medical specialist involved, taking into consideration well-known relevant factors such as the condition, weight and age of the patient, etc.
[0057] The active molecule may be administered directly in a suitable vehicle, such as e.g., phosphate-buffered saline (PBS) or solutions in alcohol or DMSO. Pursuant to preferred embodiments of the present invention, however, the active molecule is administered through a single dose delivery using a drug-delivery system, such as a sustained-release delivery system, which enables the maintenance of the required concentrations of the active molecule for a period of time sufficient for adequate modulation of gene expression. A suitable drug-delivery system would be pharmacologically inactive or at least tolerable. It should preferably not be immunogenic nor cause inflammatory reactions, and should permit release of the active molecule so as to maintain effective levels thereof over the desired time period. A large variety of alternatives are known in the art as suitable for purposes of sustained release and are contemplated as within the scope of the present invention. Suitable delivery vehicles include, but are not limited to, the following: microcapsules or microspheres; liposomes and other lipid-based release systems; viscous instillates; absorbable and/or biodegradable mechanical barriers and implants; and polymeric delivery materials, such as polyethylene oxide/polypropylene oxide block copolymers, polyesters, cross-linked polyvinylalcohols, polyanhydrides, polymethacrylate and polymethacrylamide hydrogels, anionic carbohydrate polymers, etc. Useful delivery systems are well known in the art.
[0058] A highly suitable formulation to achieve the active molecule release comprises injectable microcapsules or microspheres made from a biodegradable polymer, such as poly(dl-lactide), poly(dl-lactide-co-glycolide), polycaprolactone, polyglycolide, polylactic acid-co-glycolide, poly(hydroxybutyric acid), polyesters or polyacetals. Injectable systems comprising microcapsules or microspheres having a diameter of about 50 to about 500 micrometers offer advantages over other delivery systems. For example, they generally use less active molecules and may be administered by paramedical personnel. Moreover, such systems are inherently flexible in the design of the duration and rate of separate drug release by selection of microcapsule or microsphere size, drug loading and dosage administered. Further, they can be successfully sterilized by gamma irradiation.
[0059] The design, preparation and use of microcapsules and microspheres are well within the reach of persons skilled in the art and detailed information concerning these points is available in the literature. Biodegradable polymers (such as lactide, glycolide and caprolactone polymers) may also be used in formulations other than microcapsules and microspheres; e.g., premade films and spray-on films of these polymers containing the active molecule would be suitable for use in accordance with the present invention. Fibers or filaments comprising the active molecule are also contemplated as within the scope of the present invention.
[0060] Another highly suitable formulation for a single-dose delivery of the active molecule in accordance with the present invention involves liposomes. The encapsulation of an active molecule in liposomes or multilamellar vesicles is a well-known technique for targeted drug delivery and prolonged drug residence. The preparation and use of drug-loaded liposomes is well within the reach of persons skilled in the art and well documented in the literature.
[0061] Yet another suitable approach for single-dose delivery of an active molecule in accordance with the present invention involves the use of viscous instillates. In this technique, high molecular weight carriers are used in admixture with the active molecule, giving rise to a structure which produces a solution with high viscosity. Suitable high molecular weight carriers include, but are not limited to, the following: dextrans and cyclodextrans; hydrogels; (cross-linked) viscous materials, including (cross-linked) viscoelastics; carboxymethylcellulose; hyaluronic acid; and chondroitin sulfate. The preparation and use of drug-loaded viscous instillates is well known to persons skilled in the art.
[0062] Pursuant to yet another approach, the active molecule may be administered in combination with absorbable mechanical barriers such as oxidized regenerated cellulose. The active molecule may be covalently or non-covalently (e.g., ionically) bound to such a barrier, or it may simply be dispersed therein.
[0063] A pharmaceutical composition as provided herein is particularly useful for the modulation of gene expression by inhibiting NF-kappaB/Rel protein activation.
[0064] NF-kappaB/Rel proteins are a group of structurally related and evolutionarily conserved proteins (Rel). Well known are c-Rel, RelA (p65), RelB, NF-kappaB1 (p50 and its precursor p105), and NF-kappaB2 (p52 and its precursor p100). Most NF-kappaB dimers are activators of transcription; p50/p50 and p52/p52 homodimers repress the transcription of their target genes. All NF-kappaB/Rel proteins share a highly conserved NH2-terminal Rel homology domain (RHD). RHD is responsible for DNA binding, dimerization, and association with inhibitory proteins known as IkappaBs. In resting cells, NF-kappaB/Rel dimers are bound to IkappaBs and retained in an inactive form in the cytoplasm. IkappaBs are members of a multigene family (IkappaBalpha, IkappaBbeta, IkappaBgamma, IkappaBepsilon, Bcl-3, and the precursor Rel-proteins, p100 and p105. Presence of multiple copies of ankyrin repeats interact with NF-kappaB via the RHD (protein-protein interaction. Upon appropriate stimulation, IkappaB is phosphorylated by IkappaB Kinase (IKKs), polyubiquitinated by ubiquitin ligase complex, and degraded by the 26S proteosome. NF-kappaB is released and translocates into nucleus to initiate gene expression.
[0065] NF-kappaB regulation of gene expression includes innate immune responses: such as regulated by cytokines IL-1, IL-2, IL-6, IL-12, TNF-alpha, LT-alpha, LT-beta, GM-CSF; expression of adhesion molecules (ICAM, VCAM, endothelial leukocyte adhesion molecule [ELAM]), acute phase proteins (SAA), ilnducible enzymes (iNOS and COX-2) and antimicrobial peptides (beta-defensins). For adaptive immunity, MHC proteins IL-2, IL-12 and IFN-alpha are regulated by NF-kappaB. Regulation of overall immune response includes the regulation of genes critical for regulation of apoptosis (c-IAP-1 and c-IAP-2, Fas Ligand, c-myc, p53 and cyclin D1.
[0066] Considering that NF-kappaB and related transcription factors are cardinal pro-inflammatory transcription factors, and considering that the invention provides a signalling molecule, such as an oligopeptide and functional analogues or derivatives thereof that are capable of inhibiting NF-kappaB and likely also other pro-inflammatory transcription factors, herein also called NF-kappaB inhibitors, the invention provides a method for modulating NF-kappaB activated gene expression, in particular for inhibiting the expression and thus inhibiting a central pro-inflammatory pathway.
[0067] The consequence of this potency to inhibit this pro-inflammatory pathway is wide and far-reaching. The invention for example provides a method to mitigate or treat inflammatory airway disease such as asthma. Generally, asthma patients show persistent activation of NF-kappaB of cells lining the respiratory tract. Providing these patients, for example, by aerosol application, with a signalling molecule according to the invention, such as LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) or AQGV (SEQ ID NO:2) or MTRV (SEQ ID NO:42) or functional analogue or derivative thereof, will alleviate the inflammatory airway response of these individuals by inhibiting NF-kappaB activation of the cells. Such compositions can advantageously be made with signalling molecules that are taken up in liposomes.
[0068] As said, inflammation involves the sequential activation of signalling pathways leading to the production of both pro- and anti-inflammatory mediators. Considering that much attention has focused on pro-inflammatory pathways that initiate inflammation, relatively little is known about the mechanisms that switch off inflammation and resolve the inflammatory response. The transcription factor NF-kB is thought to have a central role in the induction of pro-inflammatory gene expression and has attracted interest as a new target for the treatment of inflammatory disease. However NF-kB activation of leukocytes recruited during the onset of inflammation is also associated with pro-inflammatory gene expression, whereas such activation during the resolution of inflammation is associated with the expression of anti-inflammatory genes and the induction of apoptosis. Inhibition of NF-kB during the resolution of inflammation protracts the inflammatory response and prevents apoptosis. This shows that NF-kB has an anti-inflammatory role in vivo involving the regulation of inflammatory resolution. The invention provides a tool to modulate the inflammation at the end phase, a signalling molecule or modulator as provided herein allows the modulation of the NF-kappaB pathway at different stages of the inflammatory response in vivo, and in a particular embodiment, the invention provides a modulator of NF-kappaB for use in the resolution of inflammation, for example through the regulation of leukocyte apoptosis. Useful oligopeptides can be found among those that accelerate shock.
[0069] The invention also provides a method to mitigate or treat neonatal lung disease, also called chronic lung disease of prematurity, a condition often seen with premature children who develop a prolonged pulmonary inflammation or bronchopulmonary dysplasia. Treating such premature children with an NF-kappaB inhibitor, such as oligopeptide LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), or functional analogue or derivative thereof, as provided herein allows such lung conditions to be prevented or ameliorated as well.
[0070] Recent advances in bone biology provide insight into the pathogenesis of bone diseases. The invention also provides a method of treatment of a post-menopausal condition such as osteoporosis comprising modulation and inhibition of osteoclast differentiation and inhibiting TNF-alpha induced apoptosis of osteoblasts, thereby limiting the dissolve of bone structures, otherwise so prominent in post-menopausal women that have no longer a natural source of hCG and thus lack the modulatory effect of the signal molecules that are derived of hCG as shown herein. The invention thus also provides a method of treatment of a bone disease, such as osteoporosis (which is often, but not exclusively, seen with post-menopausal women). Furthermore, NO and TNF-alpha modulators as provided herein inhibit the inflammatory response and bone loss in periodontitis. Furthermore, considering that there is a correlation between TNF-alpha activity and severity of clinical manifestations in ankylosing spondylitis, the invention provides the treatment of spondylitis by use of a signalling molecule as provided herein.
[0071] Furthermore, considering that an important pathogenic component in the development of insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus (type 1) comprises over-activation of the NF-kappaB pathway as seen in dendritic cells, treatment with an NF-kappaB inhibitor according to the invention will lead to reduced symptoms of diabetes, or at least to a prolonged time to onset of the disease. Particularly effective oligopeptide signalling molecules according to the invention in this context are GVLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:33), LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), MTRV (SEQ ID NO:42), VLPALPQVVC (SEQ ID NO:20), VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3), VLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:29), LPGCPRGVNPVVS (SEQ ID NO:40), LPGC (SEQ ID NO:41), VVCNYRDVRFESIRLPGCPRGVNPVVSYAVALSCQCAL (SEQ ID NO:35), and CPRGVNPVVS (SEQ ID NO:50), which were shown herein to postpone onset of diabetes in an Non-obese Diabetic Mouse (NOD). Another approach to treatment of diabetes, in particular insulin-independent diabetes (type 2), comprises inhibition of the PPARgamma cascade with an oligopeptide signalling molecule or functional analogue or derivative thereof.
[0072] Another use that is provided relates to a method for combating or treating auto-immune disease. A non-limiting list of immune diseases includes:
[0073] Hashimoto's thyroiditis, primary myxoedema thyrotoxicosis, pernicious anemia, autoimmune atrophic gastritis, Addison's disease, premature menopause, insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus, stiff-man syndrome, Goodpasture's syndrome, myasthenia gravis, male infertility, pemphigus vulgaris, pemphigoid, sympathetic ophthalmia, phacogenic uveitis, multiple sclerosis, autoimmune hemolytic anemia, idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura, idiopathic leucopenia, primary biliary cirrhosis, active chronic hepatitis, cryptogenic cirrhosis, ulcerative colitis, Sjogren's syndrome, rheumatoid arthritis, dermatomyositis, polymyositis, scleroderma, mixed connective tissue disease, discoid lupus erythematosus, and systemic lupus erythematosus.
[0074] Another use that is provided relates to a method for combating or treating infections caused by microorganisms, in particular those infections that are caused by micro-organisms that activate the NF-kappaB pathway during infections.
[0075] Such microorganisms are manifold, including bacteria, viruses, fungi, and protozoa, but other pathogens (e.g., worms) can have the same effect. Activation of the NF-kappaB pathway by a microbial infection in general occurs via activation of the Toll-like receptor pathway. The invention provides a method to modulate and in particular to inhibit parts of gene expression that are related to the inflammatory responses of an organism that are generally activated through one of the Toll-like receptor pathways.
[0076] Toll-like receptor-mediated NF-kappaB activation is central in recognition of pathogens by a host. Such recognition of pathogens generally occurs through germline-encoded molecules, the so-called pattern recognition receptors (PRRs). These PRRs recognize widespread pathogen-associated molecular patterns (PAMPs). The pattern recognition receptors are expressed as either membrane-bound or soluble proteins. They include CD14, beta2-integrins (CD11/CD18), C-type lectins, macrophage scavenger receptors, complement receptors (CR1/CD35, CR2/CD21) and Toll-like receptors (TLRs). TLRs are distinguished from other PRRs by their ability to recognize and discriminate between different classes of pathogens. TLRs represent a family of transmembrane proteins that have an extracellular domain comprising multiple copies of leucine-rich repeats (LRRs) and a cytoplasmic Toll/IL-1R (TIR) motif that has significant homology to the intracellular signalling domain of the type I IL-1 receptor (IL-1RI). Therefore, TLRs are thought to belong to the IL-1R superfamily.
[0077] Pathogen-associated molecular patterns (PAMPS) are not expressed by hosts but are components of the pathogenic microorganism. Such PAMPS comprise bacterial cell wall components such as lipopolysaccharides (LPS), lipoproteins (BLP), peptidoglycans (PGN), lipoarabinomannan (LAM), lipoteichoic acid (LTA), DNA containing unmethylated CpG motifs, yeast and fungal cell wall mannans and beta-glucans, double-stranded RNA, several unique glycosylated proteins and lipids of protozoa, and so on.
[0078] Recognition of these PAMPS foremost provides for differential recognition of pathogens by TLRs. For example, TLR2 is generally activated in response to BLPs, PGNs of gram-positive bacteria, LAM of mycobacteria, and mannans of yeasts, whereas TLR4 is often activated by LPS of gram-negative bacteria and LTA of gram-negative bacteria; also a secreted small molecule MD-2 can account for TLR4 signalling.
[0079] Several oligopeptides capable of modulating gene expression according to the invention have earlier been tested, both ex vivo and in vivo, and in small animals, but a relationship with modulation of gene expression was not brought forward. A beneficial effect of these oligopeptides on LPS-induced sepsis in mice, namely the inhibition of the effect of the sepsis, was observed. Immunomodulatory effects with these oligopeptides have been observed in vitro and in ex vivo such as in T-cell assays showing the inhibition of pathological Th1 immune responses, suppression of inflammatory cytokines (MIF), increase in production of anti-inflammatory cytokines (IL-10, TGF-beta) and immunomodulatory effects on antigen-presenting cells (APC) like dendritic cells, monocytes and macrophages.
[0080] Now that the insight has been provided that distinct synthetic oligopeptides or functional analogues or derivatives thereof, for example those that resemble breakdown products which can be derived by proteolysis from endogenous proteins such as hCG, can be used to modulate gene expression, for example by NF-kappaB inhibition, such oligopeptides find much wider application. Release of active NF-kappaB in cells is now known to occur after a variety of stimuli including treating cells with bacterial lipopolysaccharide (LPS) and the interaction with a Toll-like receptor (see for example Guha and Mackman, Cell. Sign. 2001, 13:85-94). In particular, LPS stimulation of dendritic cells, monocytes and macrophages induces many genes that are under the influence of activation by transcription factors such as NF-kappaB, p50, EGR-1, IRF-1 and others that can be modulated by a signalling molecule according to the invention. Considering that LPS induction of EGR-1 is required for maximal induction of TNF-alpha, it is foreseen that inhibition of EGR-1 considerably reduces the effects of sepsis seen after LPS activation. Now knowing the gene modulatory effect of the signalling molecules such as oligopeptides as provided herein allows for rational design of signal molecule mixtures that better alleviate the symptoms seen with sepsis. One such mixture, a 1:1:1 mixture of LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), AQGV (SEQ ID NO:2) and VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3) was administered to primates in a gram-negative induced rhesus monkey sepsis model for prevention of septic shock and found to be effective in this primate model. Accordingly, the invention provides a pharmaceutical composition for the treatment of sepsis in a primate and a method for the treatment of sepsis in a primate comprising subjecting the primate to a signalling molecule according to the invention, preferably to a mixture of such signalling molecules. Administration of such a signalling molecule or mixture preferably occurs systematically, e.g., by intravenous or intraperitoneal administration. In a further embodiment, such treatment also comprises the use of for example an antibiotic, however, only when such use is not contra indicated because of the risk of generating further toxin loads because of lysis of the bacteria subject to the action of those antibiotics in an individual thus treated.
[0081] Other use that is contemplated relates to a method for combating or treating viral infections, in particular those infections that are caused by viruses that activate the NF-kappaB pathway during infections. Such virus infections are manifold; classical examples are hepatitis B virus-induced cell transformation by persistent activation of NF-kappaB. Use of a signalling molecule according to the invention is herein provided to counter or prevent this cell transformation.
[0082] Other disease where persistent NF-kappaB activation is advantageously inhibited by a signalling molecule according to the invention is a transplantation-related disease such as transplantation-related immune responses, graft-versus-host-disease, in particular with bone-marrow transplants, acute or chronic xeno-transplant rejection, and post-transfusion thrombocytopenia.
[0083] Another case where persistent NF-kappaB activation is advantageously inhibited by a signalling molecule according to the invention is found in the prevention or mitigation of ischemia-related tissue damage seen after infarcts, seen for example in vivo in brain or heart, or ex vivo in organs or tissue that is being prepared or stored in preparation of further use as a transplant. Ischemia-related tissue damage can now be mitigated by perfusing the (pre)ischemic area with a signalling molecule according to the invention that inhibits NF-kappaB activation. Examples of conditions where ischemia (also called underperfusion) plays a role include eclampsia which can be ascribed to focal cerebral ischemia resulting from vasoconstriction, consistent with the evidence of changes detected by new cerebral imaging techniques. The liver dysfunction intrinsic to the HELLP (hemolysis, elevated liver enzymes, and low platelet count) syndrome could also be attributed to the effects of acute underperfusion. Other conditions of ischemia are seen after coronary occlusion, leading to irreversible myocardial damage produced by prolonged episodes of coronary artery occlusion and reperfusion in vivo, which has already been discussed in PCT/NL01/00259 as well.
[0084] Now that the insight has been provided that distinct synthetic oligopeptides, for example those that resemble breakdown products which can be derived by proteolysis from endogenous proteins such as hCG, can be used to modulate gene expression, for example by NF-kappaB inhibition, the oligopeptides find much wider application. For example, the invention provides a method for perfusing a transplant with a perfusing fluid comprising at least one signalling molecule according to the invention; ischemic or pre-implantation damage due to activation of NF-kappaB in the transplant can then be greatly diminished, allowing a wider use of the transplants.
[0085] The invention provides a signalling molecule useful in modulating expression of a gene in a cell. Several examples of the use of such a signalling molecule for the production of a pharmaceutical composition for the treatment of medical or veterinary conditions are herewith given. In one embodiment, the invention provides such use in the treatment of an immune-mediated disorder, in particular of those cases whereby a central role of NF-kappaB/Rel proteins in the immune response is found. However as said, modulating gene expression via modulating activity of other transcription factors, such as AP-1 or PPARgamma, and others is also provided, now that the gene modulating role of signalling molecules such as the oligopeptides or analogues or derivatives thereof is understood. As also said, now knowing that oligopeptides, likely breakdown products, play such a central role in modulation of gene expression, the invention provides straightforward ways for identifying further gene expression modulating oligopeptides, and provides synthetic versions of these, and analogues and derivatives thereof for use in a wide variety of disorders and for use in the preparation of a wide variety of pharmaceutical compositions. Examples of such treatment and useful pharmaceutical compositions are for example found in relation to conditions wherein the immune-mediated disorder comprises chronic inflammation, such as diabetes, multiple sclerosis or acute or chronic transplant rejection, in particular in those cases whereby antigen-presenting cells (APCs) or dendritic cells (DCs) are enhanced by (overactive) and persistent NF-kappaB expression or wherein the immune-mediated disorder comprises acute inflammation, such as septic or anaphylactic shock or acute transplant rejection. Other immune-mediated disorders that can.be treated with a pharmaceutical composition comprising a signalling molecule according to the invention comprise auto-immune disease, such as systemic lupus erythematosus or rheumatoid arthritis (in particular by inhibiting IL-8 and/or IL-15 production by inhibiting NF-kappaB activity on the expression of these genes), allergy, such as asthma or parasitic disease, overly strong immune responses directed against an infectious agent, such as a virus or bacterium (in particular responses that include rapid hemorrhagic disease caused by infection with organisms such as Yersinia pestis, Ebola-virus, Staphylococcus aureus (e.g., in cases of tampon-disease), bacterial (such as meningococcal) or viral meningitis and/or encephalitis, and other life-threatening conditions). Such overly strong responses are seen with for example pre-eclampsia, recurrent spontaneous abortions (RSA) or preterm parturition or other pregnancy-related disorders. Especially with forms of eclampsia/pre-eclampsia that are associated with genetically programmed increased production of tumor-growth factor beta-1, treatment according to the invention is recommended. Also, in situations where RSA is likely attributable to increased IL-10 levels during pregnancy, or to increased TNF-alpha activity, for example due to the presence of an unfavorable allele, in particular of a G to A polymorphism in the promotor of the gene encoding TNF-alpha, treatment with a pharmaceutical composition as provided herein is recommended. Treatment directed at such pregnancy-related immune disorders is herein also provided by inhibiting NF-kappaB activity directed at activating natural killer (NK) cell activity. Also, LPS-induced reduced fertility, or abortions, seen in pregnant sows can be reduced by applying a signalling molecule or method as provided herein.
[0086] Such use in treatment of an immune-mediated disorder preferably comprises regulating relative ratios and/or cytokine activity of lymphocyte, dendritic or antigen-presenting cell subset-populations in a treated individual, in particular wherein the subset populations comprise Th1 or Th2, or DC1 or DC2 cells. Other embodiments of the invention comprise use of a signalling molecule according to the invention for the manufacture of a medicament for modulating a cardiovascular or circulatory disorder, such as coronary arterial occlusion and also in a pregnancy-related cardiovascular or circulatory disorder.
[0087] Furthermore, the invention provides a pharmaceutical composition for modulating a cardiovascular or circulatory disorder, in particular a pregnancy-related cardiovascular or circulatory disorder, comprising a signalling molecule according to the invention or mixtures thereof Such a composition finds its use in a method for modulating a cardiovascular or circulatory disorder, in particular a pregnancy-related cardiovascular or circulatory disorder, comprising subjecting an animal (in particular a mammal) to treatment with at least one signalling molecule according to the invention. Non-pregnancy-related disorders that are for example related to hypercholesterolemia are susceptible to treatment with a signalling molecule according to the invention as well. For example, apolipoprotein E (apoE) deficiency is associated with a series of pathological conditions including dyslipidemia, atherosclerosis, Alzheimer's disease, increased body weight and shorter life span. Inheritance of different alleles of the polymorphic apoE gene is responsible for 10% of the variation in plasma cholesterol in most populations. Individuals homozygous for one variant, apoE2, can develop type III dysbetalipoproteinemia if an additional genetic or environmental factor is present. Some much rarer alleles of apoE produce dominant expression of this disorder in heterozygous individuals. ApoE is a ligand for the LDL receptor and its effects on plasma cholesterol are mediated by differences in the affinity of the LDL receptor for lipoproteins carrying variant apoE proteins. The factors that regulate apoE gene transcription have been investigated extensively by the expression of gene constructs in transgenic mice and involve complex interactions between factors that bind elements in the 5′ promoter region, in the first intron and in 3′ regions many kilobases distant from the structural gene. Deletion of the apoE gene is associated with changes in lipoprotein metabolism (plasma total cholesterol), HDL cholesterol, HDL/TC, and HDL/LDL ratios, esterification rate in apo B-depleted plasma, plasma triglyceride, hepatic HMG-CoA reductase activity, hepatic cholesterol content, decreased plasma homocyst(e)ine and glucose levels, and severe atherosclerosis and cutaneous xanthomatosis. The invention provides a method and a signalling molecule for the treatment of conditions that are associated with dysfunctional LDL receptors such as apoE and other members of the apolipoprotein family. In particular, use of a signalling molecule comprising GVLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:33) and/or VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3) or a functional analogue or derivative thereof is preferred.
[0088] The invention also provides use of a signalling molecule for the preparation of a pharmaceutical composition or medicament and methods of treatment for various medical conditions that are other than use in the preparation of a pharmaceutical composition for the treatment of an immune-mediated disorder or a method of treatment of an immune-mediated disorder. For example, the invention provides topical application, for example in an ointment or spray comprising a signal molecule according to the invention, for the prevention or mitigation of skin afflictions, such as eczemas, psoriasis, but also of skin damage related to over-exposure to UV-light.
[0089] Also, use is contemplated in palliative control, whereby a gene related to prostaglandin synthesis is modulated such that COX2 pathways are effected.
[0090] Furthermore, the invention also provides use of a signalling molecule for the preparation of a pharmaceutical composition or medicament and methods of treatment for various medical conditions that are other than use in the preparation of a pharmaceutical composition for the treatment of wasting syndrome, such as the treatment of particular individuals that are suffering from infection with HIV or a method of treatment of wasting syndrome of such individuals.
[0091] In one embodiment, the invention provides the use of a signalling molecule according to the invention for the preparation of a pharmaceutical composition or medicament for modulating angiogenesis or vascularization, in particular during embryonal development, or after transplantation to stimulate vascularization into the transplanted organ or inhibit it in a later phase. Signalling molecules that effect angiogenesis are disclosed herein in the detailed description.
[0092] Use as provided herein also comprises regulating TNF-alpha receptor (e.g., CD27) expression on cells, thereby modulating the relative ratios and/or cytokine activity of lymphocyte, dendritic or antigen-processing cell subset-populations in a treated individual. As for example described in the detailed description, the particular oligopeptide according to the invention is capable of down-regulating CD27 expression on cells of the T-cell lineage.
[0093] Down-regulating TNF-alpha itself is also particularly useful in septic-shock-like conditions that not only display increased TNF-alpha activity but display further release of other inflammatory compounds, such as NO. NO production is a central mediator of the vascular and inflammatory response. Our results show that inflammatory cells like macrophages stimulated with an inflammatory active compound such as LPS produce large amounts of NO. However, these cells co-stimulated with most of the NMPF peptides (NMPF peptide 1 to 14, 43 to 66 and 69), even in a very low dose (1 pg/ml), inhibited production of NO. Typical septic-shock-like conditions that can preferably be treated by down-regulating TNF-alpha and NO production comprise disease conditions such as those caused by Bacillus anthracis (anthrax) and Yersinia pestis toxins or infections with these micro-organisms likely involved in bio-terrorism. Anthrax toxin is produced by Bacillus anthracis, the causative agent of anthrax, and is responsible for the major symptoms of the disease. Clinical anthrax is rare, but there is growing concern over the potential use of B. anthracis in biological warfare and terrorism. Although a vaccine against anthrax exists, various factors make mass vaccination impractical. The bacteria can be eradicated from the host by treatment with antibiotics, but because of the continuing action of the toxin, such therapy is of little value once symptoms have become evident. Thus, a specific inhibitor of the toxin's action will prove a valuable adjunct to antibiotic therapy. The toxin consists of a single receptor-binding moiety, termed “protective antigen” (PA), and two enzymatic moieties, termed “edema factor” (EF) and “lethal factor” (LF). After release from the bacteria as nontoxic monomers, these three proteins diffuse to the surface of mammalian cells and assemble into toxic, cell-bound complexes.
[0094] Cleavage of PA into two fragments by a cell-surface protease enables the fragment that remains bound to the cell, PA63, to heptamerize and bind EF and LF with high affinity. After internalization by receptor-mediated endocytosis, the complexes are trafficked to the endosome. There, at low pH, the PA moiety inserts into the membrane and mediates translocation of EF and LF to the cytosol. EF is an adenylate cyclase that has an inhibitory effect on professional phagocytes, and LF is a protease that acts specifically on macrophages, causing their death and the death of the host.
[0095] Down-regulating TNF-alpha itself, and/or a receptor for TNF-alpha, as is herein also provided, is also beneficial in individuals with Chagas cardiomyopathy.
[0096] Also, use of a signalling molecule according to the invention for the preparation of a pharmaceutical composition for modulation of vascularization or angiogenesis in wound repair, in particular of burns, is herein provided. Also, use of a pharmaceutical composition as provided herein is provided in cases of post-operative physiological stress, whereby not only vascularization will benefit from treatment, but the general well-being of the patient is improved as well.
[0097] Another use of a signalling molecule according to the invention comprises its use for the preparation of another pharmaceutical composition for the treatment of cancer. Such a pharmaceutical composition preferably acts via modulating and up-regulating apoptotic responses that are classically down-regulated by NF-kappaB activity. Inhibiting the activity with a signalling molecule according to the invention allows for increased cell death of tumorous cells. Another anti-cancerous activity of a signalling molecule as provided herein comprises down-regulation of c-myb, in particular in the case of hematopoietic tumors in humans. In this context, down-regulation of 14.3.3 protein is also provided.
[0098] A further use of a signalling molecule according to the invention comprises its use for the preparation of a further pharmaceutical composition for the treatment of cancer. Such a pharmaceutical composition preferably acts via modulating and down-regulating transferrine receptor availability, in particular on tumorous cells. Transferrine receptors are classically up-regulated by NF-kappaB activity. Inhibiting the activity with a signalling molecule according to the invention allows for reduced iron up-take and increased cell death of tumorous cells. In particular, erythroid and thromboid cells are susceptible to the treatment.
[0099] Yet a further use of a signalling molecule according to the invention comprises its use for the preparation of yet another pharmaceutical composition for the treatment of cancer, in particular of cancers that are caused by viruses, such as is the case with retroviral-induced malignancies and other viral-induced malignancies. Such a pharmaceutical composition preferably acts via modulating and down-regulating cell-proliferative responses that are classically up-regulated by virus-induced transcriptional or NF-kappaB activity. Inhibiting the activity with a signalling molecule according to the invention allows for decreased proliferation and increased cell death of tumorous cells. Such a pharmaceutical composition may also act via modulating angiogenic responses induced by IL-8, whereby for example inhibition of IL-8 expression via inhibition of transcription factor AP-1 or NF-kappaB expression results in the inhibition of vascularization-dependent tumor growth.
[0100] Furthermore, the invention provides the use of a signalling molecule for the preparation of a pharmaceutical composition for optimizing human or animal fertility and embryo survival, and a method for optimizing fertility and embryo survival. In particular, the invention provided for a method and composition allowing the down-regulation of TNF-alpha in the fertilized individual, optimally in combination with a composition and method for up-regulating IL-10 in the individual. Such a composition and method find immediate use in both human and veterinary medicine.
[0101] Also, the invention provides the use of a signalling molecule for the preparation of a pharmaceutical composition for modulating the body weight of an individual, in particular by modulating gene expression of a gene under influence of peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma (PPARgamma) activation and lipid metabolism by applying a signalling molecule according to the invention, and a method for modulating body weight comprising providing an individual with a signalling molecule according to the invention.
[0102] A further use of a signalling molecule as provided herein lies in the modulation of expression of a gene in a cultured cell. Such a method as provided herein comprises subjecting a signalling molecule according to the invention to the cultured cell. Proliferation and/or differentiation of cultured cells (cells having been or being under conditions of in vitro cell culture known in the art) can be modulated by subjecting the cultured cell to a signalling molecule according to the invention. It is contemplated that for example research into proliferation or differentiation of cells, such as stem-cell research, will benefit greatly from understanding that a third major way of effecting gene modulation exists and considering the ease of application of synthetic peptides, and analogues or derivatives thereof.
[0103] Furthermore, it is contemplated that a signalling molecule as provided herein finds an advantageous use as a co-stimulatory substance in a vaccine, accompanying modern day adjuvants or replacing the classically used mycobacterial adjuvants, especially considering that certain mycobacteria express hCG-like proteins, of which it is now postulated that these bacteria have already made use of this third pathway found in gene modulation as provided herein by providing the host with breakdown products mimicking the signalling molecules identified herein. Treatment and use of the compositions as provided herein is not restricted to animals only, plants and other organisms are also subject to this third pathway as provided herein. Furthermore, now that the existence of such a pathway has been demonstrated, it is herein provided to make it a subject of diagnosis as well, for example to determine the gene modulatory state of a cell in a method comprising determining the presence or absence of a signalling molecule as provided herein or determining the presence or absence of a protease capable of generating such a signalling molecule from a (preferable endogenous) protein.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES
[0104] FIGS. 1-2 . Bone marrow (BM) cell yield of treated BALB/c mice (n=6). BM cells were isolated from treated mice and cultured in vitro in the presence of rmGM-CSF for nine days. These figures show cell yield after nine days of culture of BM cells isolated from mice treated with PBS, LPS or LPS in combination with NMPF peptides 4, 46, 7 and 60. In these figures cell yield is expressed in relative percentage of cells compared to PBS. Each condition consists of six Petri dishes and results shown in these figures are representative of six dishes. Differences of ≧20% were considered significant and line bars represent significant data as compared to the LPS control group. A representative experiment is shown. Findings involving all experimental conditions were entirely reproduced in three additional experiments.
[0105] FIG. 3 . Effect of in vivo treatment on MHC-II expression on CD11c + cells. Bone marrow (BM) cells were isolated from treated BALB/c mice (n=6) and cultured in vitro in the presence of rmGM-CSF for nine days. This figure shows MHC-II expression expressed in mean fluorescence intensity (MFI) after nine days of culturing of BM cells isolated from PBS, LPS or LPS in combination with NMPF. Each condition consists of six Petri dishes and results shown in these figures are representative of six dishes. Differences of ≧20% were considered significant and line bars represent significant data as compared to the LPS control group. A representative experiment is shown. Findings involving all experimental conditions were entirely reproduced in three additional experiments.
[0106] FIGS. 4-7 . Bone marrow (BM) cell yield of in vitro treated BM cultures. BM cells from BALB/c mice (n=3) were cultured in vitro and treated with either PBS, LPS (t=6 day), NMPF 4, 7, 46, 60 (t=0 or t=6 day) or a combination of NMPF with LPS (t=6 day), in the presence of rmGM-CSF for nine days. These figures show cell yield expressed in relative percentage of cells compared to PBS after nine days of culture of BM cells. Each condition consists of six Petri dishes and results shown in these figures are representative of six dishes. Differences of ≧20% were considered significant. Line bars represent significant data as compared to LPS control group and dotted bars represent significant data as compared to PBS group. A representative experiment is shown. Findings involving all experimental conditions were entirely reproduced in three additional experiments.
[0107] FIGS. 8-11 . Effect of in vitro treatment on MHC-II expression on CD11c + cells. BM cells from BALB/c mice (n=3) were cultured in vitro and treated with either PBS, LPS (t=6 day), NMPF 4, 7, 46, 60 (t=0 or t=6 days) or a combination of NMPF with LPS (t=6 days), in the presence of rmGM-CSF for nine days. These figures show MHC-II expressed in mean fluorescence intensity (MFI) of CD11c-positive cells after nine days of culturing of BM cells. Each condition consists of six Petri dishes, and results shown in these figures are representative of six dishes. Differences of ≧20% were considered significant. Line bars represent significant data as compared to LPS control group and dotted bars represent significant data as compared to PBS group. A representative experiment is shown. Findings involving all experimental conditions were entirely reproduced in three additional experiments.
[0108] FIGS. 12-15 . Bone marrow (BM) cell yield of treated BALB/c mice (n=6). BM cells were isolated from treated mice and cultured ex vivo in the presence of rmGM-CSF for nine days. These figures show cell yield after nine days of culture of BM cells in suspension (unattached) and attached to Petri dish (attached). BM cells were isolated from mice treated with PBS, LPS or LPS in combination with different NMPF peptides. In these figures cell yield is expressed in relative percentage of cells compared to PBS. Each condition consists of six Petri dishes and results shown here are representative of six dishes. Differences of ≧20% were considered significant and line bars represent significant data as compared to LPS control group. A representative experiment is shown. Findings involving all experimental conditions were entirely reproduced in three additional experiments.
[0109] FIGS. 16-17 . Bone marrow (BM) cell yield of in vitro treated BM cultures from NOD mice. BM cells from 15 week old female NOD mice (n=3) were cultured in vitro and treated with either PBS or NMPF in the presence of rmGM-CSF for nine days. These figures show cell yield after nine days of culture of BM cells in suspension (unattached) and attached to Petri dishes (attached). In these figures cell yield is expressed in relative percentage of cells compared to PBS. Each condition consists of six Petri dishes and results shown here are representative of six dishes. Differences of ≧20% were considered significant and dotted bars represent significant data as compared to PBS control group. A representative experiment is shown. Findings involving all experimental conditions were entirely reproduced in three additional experiments.
[0110] FIGS. 18-30 . In vivo treatment of fertilized chicken eggs with NMPF and the effect of NMPF on angiogenesis. Fertile chicken eggs (day 0) were treated with either PBS, NMPF, VEGF or VEGF in combination with NMPF. Ten eggs were injected for every condition. On day 8 of incubation, the embryos were removed from the eggs and were placed in a 100-mm Petri dish. The embryo and the blood vessels were photographed in vivo with the use of a microscope. Of each egg, one overview picture was taken and four detailed pictures of the blood vessels were taken. Quantification of angiogenesis (vessel branches) was accomplished by counting the number of blood vessel branches. Quantification of this vasculogenesis was accomplished by measuring the blood vessel thickness. The number of blood vessel branches and vessel thickness were measured in the pictures and were correlated to a raster (in the pictures) of 10 mm 2 for comparison. The mean number of branches and the mean blood vessel thickness of each condition (N=10) were calculated and compared to either the PBS or VEGF controls using a Student's T-test. Line bars represent significant (p<0.05) data as compared to PBS control group and dotted bars represent significant (p<0.05) data as compared to VEGF group. FIGS. 18-28 show the effect of NMPF on vessel branches. FIGS. 29-30 show the effect of NMPF on vessel thickness.
[0111] FIG. 31 . Detection of NF-kB via EMSA. This figure shows the presence of NF-kB in the nuclear extracts of RAW264.7 cells treated with LPS or NMPF in combination with LPS for 4 hours. Numbers 1-13 correspond to nuclear extracts from cells treated with NMPF and LPS. CTL corresponds to nuclear extracts from cells treated with LPS only. Specificity of the radioactively labeled NF-kB probe is shown by competition with the unlabeled oligonucleotide (u1, u2, u3) in three different concentrations (1×, 10×, 100×) with nuclear extracts of CTL and olg corresponding to samples containing only labeled oligonucleotide (without nuclear extract). Description: (NMPF-1)VLPALPQVVC (SEQ ID NO:20), (NMPF-2)LQGVLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:49), (NMPF-3)LQG, (NMPF-4)LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), (NMPF-5)GVLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:33), (NMPF-6)VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3), (NMPF-7)VLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:29), (NMPF-8)GVLPALP (SEQ ID NO:32), (NMPF-9)VVC, (NMPF-11)MTRV (SEQ ID NO:42), (NMPF-12)MTR.
[0112] FIG. 32 . HPLC chromatograph (wave length 206) in which data profile obtained from the nuclear protein extracts of LPS and LPS in combination with NMPF stimulated RAW264.7 cells are overlayed.
[0113] FIG. 33 . MSn analysis of NMPF-4 peptide.
[0114] FIG. 34 . MSn analysis of a fraction from nuclear extract of LPS stimulated RAW264.7 cells. Upper panel shows full spectrum of the fraction and lower panel shows the MS/MS spectrum of mass 413.13.
[0115] FIG. 35 . MSn analysis of a fraction from nuclear extract of LPS in combination with NMPF-4 stimulated RAW264.7 cells. Upper panel shows full spectrum of the fraction and lower panel shows the MS/MS spectrum of mass 416.07.
[0116] FIGS. 36-47 . Effect of NMPF on septic shock syndrome in Rhesus monkeys. On the time point 70 minutes, E. coli was infused and at the end of E. coli infusion (time point 190 minutes), BAYTRIL® antibiotic was injected. The control monkey (monkey 429) was treated with 0.9% NaCl at the time point of 100 minutes, whereas the NMPF treated monkeys (monkey 459 and 427) received the NMPF treatment at the same time point as the control monkey. Heart rate (beats per minute), blood pressure (mmHg), difference between systolic and diastolic blood pressure and blood oxygen concentration (saturation in %) of the control monkey 429 ( FIGS. 36-39 ), NMPF treated monkeys 459 ( FIGS. 40-43 ) and 427 ( FIGS. 44-47 ) in the time (minutes) during the experiment are shown.
[0117] FIG. 48 . These figures (parts A-C) show the NO production of LPS (10 μg/ml) stimulated RAW 264.7 macrophages co-stimulated with different NMPF peptides (1 pg/ml).
[0118] FIG. 49 . These figures (parts A-C) show the NO production of LPS (10 μg/ml) stimulated RAW 264.7 macrophages co-stimulated with different NMPF peptides with three different concentrations.
[0119] FIG. 50 . This figure shows the percentage of diabetic NOD mice treated for 2 weeks with the various NMPF peptides.
[0120] FIG. 51 . This figure shows the performed glucose tolerance test (GTT) in NOD mice treated with NMPF peptides (A), and fasting blood glucose levels (B).
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
[0121] Cells react to environmental and intrinsic changes, which they perceive through extracellular and inter- as well as intracellular signals. The nature of these signals can be either for example physical or chemical. Moreover, different classes of molecules present in blood react to each other and induce a cascade of reactions that have direct effects on other molecules and/or eventually lead to cellular responses, for example complement system and blood coagulation proteins.
[0122] Many genes are regulated not by a signalling molecule that enters the cells but by molecules that bind to specific receptors on the surface of cells for example receptors with enzymatic activity (receptor tyrosine kinases, receptor-like protein tyrosine phosphatases, receptor serine/threonine kinases, histidine kinases, guanylyl cyclases) and receptors without enzymatic activity (cytokine receptors, integrins, G-protein-coupled receptors). Interaction between cell-surface receptors and their ligands can be followed by a cascade of intracellular events that modulate one or more intracellular-transducing proteins, including variations in the intracellular levels of so-called second messengers (diacylglycerol, Ca 2+ , cyclic nucleotides, inositol(1,4,5)trisphosphate, phosphatidylinositol(3,4,5)trisphosphate, phosphatidylinositol transfer protein (PITP)). This leads to the activation or inhibition of a so-called “effector protein.” The second messengers in turn lead to changes in protein for example protein phosphorylation through the action of cyclic AMP, cyclic GMP, calcium-activated protein kinases, or protein kinases (for example AGC group serine/threonine protein kinases, CAMK group serine/threonine protein kinases, CMGC group serine/threonine kinases, protein tyrosine kinase group, or others like MEK/Ste7p). Phosphorylation by protein kinases is one of the regulatory mechanisms in signal transmission that modulate different cellular pathways such as Ras/MAPK pathway, MAP kinase pathway, JAK-STAT pathway, wnt-pathway. In many instances, this all results in altered gene expression (for example genes for the regulation of other genes, cell survival, growth, differentiation, maturation, functional activity).
[0123] Many of the responses to binding of ligands to cell-surface receptors are cytoplasmatic and do not involve immediate gene activation in the nucleus. In some instances, a pre-existing inactive transcription factor following a cell-surface interaction is activated that leads to immediate gene activation. For example, the protein NF-kappaB, which can be activated within minutes by a variety of stimuli, including membrane receptors (for example pattern recognition receptors like Toll-like receptor binding to pathogen-associated molecular patterns), inflammatory cytokines such as TNF-α, IL-1, T-cell activation signals, growth factors and stress inducers.
[0124] Our genomic experiment with NMPF peptide LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) showed very immediate effects on signal transduction and gene regulation since the cells were treated with the peptide for only four hours. In this short period of time LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) down-regulated at least 120 genes and up-regulated at least six genes in the presence of a strong stimulator (PHA/IL-2 stimulated T-cell line (PM1)), demonstrating the profound effect on signalling molecules according to the invention and modulatory effect on gene expression. The genes affected by LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) include oncogenes, genes for transcription factors, intracellular enzymes, membrane receptors, intracellular receptors, signal transducing proteins (for example kinases) and some genes for unknown molecules. This shows that LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) as an example of the synthetic signalling molecule (oligopeptide or functional analogue or derivative thereof) as described here, has a broad spectrum of effects at different extracellular and intracellular levels. In addition, our HPLC/MS data have shown the presence of LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) in the nucleus of a macrophage cell line (RAW267.4) within a half hour and also indicates the direct effects on DNA level as well as at an intracellular level, which is further supported by NF-kappaB experiments. The ultimate modulatory effect of LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) is dependent on, for example, type of the cell, differentiation and maturation status of the cell, the functional status and the presence of other regulatory molecules. This was evident by a shock experiment in which different NMPF peptides had similar or different effects on the disease. The same results were obtained with DC, fertilized chicken egg experiments, and CAO experiments; NMPF effects were dependent on type of co-stimulation (GM-CSF alone or in combination with LPS, or VEGF) and time of the treatment. Due to this, NMPF have the ability to modulate cellular responses at different levels.
[0125] The invention is further explained with the aid of the following illustrative examples.
EXAMPLES
Materials and Methods
[0126] Peptide Synthesis
[0127] The peptides as mentioned in this document such as LQG, AQG, LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), AQGV (SEQ ID NO:2), LQGA (SEQ ID NO:19), VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:13), ALPALP (SEQ ID NO:21), VAPALP (SEQ ID NO:22), ALPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:23), VLPAAPQ (SEQ ID NO:24), VLPALAQ (SEQ ID NO:25), LAGV (SEQ ID NO:26), VLAALP (SEQ ID NO:27), VLPALA (SEQ ID NO:28), VLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:29), VLAALPQ (SEQ ID NO:30), VLPALPA (SEQ ID NO:31), GVLPALP (SEQ ID NO:32), VVCNYRDVRFESIRLPGCPRGVNPVVSYAVALSCQCAL (SEQ ID NO:35), RPRCRPINATLAVEKEGCPVCITVNTTICAGYCPT (SEQ ID NO:45), SKAPPPSLPSPSRLPGPS (SEQ ID NO:38), LQGVLPALPQVVC (SEQ ID NO:34), SIRLPGCPRGVNPVVS (SEQ ID NO:39), LPGCPRGVNPVVS (SEQ. ID NO:40), LPGC (SEQ ID NO:41), MTRV (SEQ ID NO:42), MTR, and VVC were prepared by solid-phase synthesis (Merrifield, 1963) using the fluorenylmethoxycarbonyl (Fmoc)/tert-butyl-based methodology (Atherton, 1985) with 2-chlorotrityl chloride resin (Barlos, 1991) as the solid support. The side-chain of glutamine was protected with a trityl function. The peptides were synthesized manually. Each coupling consisted of the following steps: (i) removal of the alpha-amino Fmoc-protection by piperidine in dimethylformamide (DMF), (ii) coupling of the Fmoc amino acid (3 eq) with diisopropylcarbodiimide (DIC)/1-hydroxybenzotriazole (HOBt) in DMF/N-methylformamide (NMP) and (iii) capping of the remaining amino functions with acetic anhydride/diisopropylethylamine (DIEA) in DMF/NMP. Upon completion of the synthesis, the peptide resin was treated with a mixture of trifluoroacetic acid (TFA)/H 2 O/triisopropylsilane (TIS) 95:2.5:2.5. After 30 minutes, TIS was added until decolorization. The solution was evaporated in vacuo and the peptide precipitated with diethylether. The crude peptides were dissolved in water (50-100 mg/ml) and purified by reverse-phase high-performance liquid chromatography (RP-HPLC). HPLC conditions were: column: VYDAC® column TP21810C18 (10×250 mm); elution system: gradient system of 0.1% TFA in water v/v (A) and 0.1% TFA in acetonitrile (ACN) v/v (B); flow rate 6 ml/minute; absorbance was detected from 190-370 nm. There were different gradient systems used. For example for peptides LQG and LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1): 10 minutes 100% A followed by linear gradient 0-10% B in 50 minutes. For example for peptides VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3) and VLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:29): 5 minutes 5% B followed by linear gradient 1% B/minute. The collected fractions were concentrated to about 5 ml by rotation film evaporation under reduced pressure at 40° C. The remaining TFA was exchanged against acetate by eluting two times over a column with anion exchange resin (MERCK® II exchange resin) in acetate form. The eluate was concentrated and lyophilized in 28 hours. Peptides later were prepared for use by dissolving them in PBS.
Transcription Factor Experiment
[0128] Macrophage cell line. The RAW 264.7 macrophages, obtained from American Type Culture Collection (Manassas, Va.), were cultured at 37° C. in 5% CO 2 using DMEM containing 10% FBS and antibiotics (100 U/ml of penicillin and 100 μg/ml streptomycin). Cells (1×10 6 /ml) were incubated with peptide (10 μg/ml) in a volume of 2 ml. After 8 hours of cultures, cells were washed and prepared for nuclear extracts.
[0129] Nuclear extracts. Nuclear extracts and EMSA were prepared according to Schreiber et al. in Methods (Schriber et al. 1989, Nucleic Acids Research 17). Briefly, nuclear extracts from peptide-stimulated or nonstimulated macrophages were prepared by cell lysis followed by nuclear lysis. Cells were then suspended in 400 μl of buffer (10 mM HEPES (pH 7.9), 10 mM KCl, 0.1 mM KCL, 0.1 mM EDTA, 0.1 mM EGTA, 1 mM DTT, 0.5 mM PMSF and protease inhibitors), vigorously vortexed for 15 seconds, left standing at 4° C. for 15 minutes, and centrifuged at 15,000 rpm for 2 minutes. The pelleted nuclei were resuspended in buffer (20 mM HEPES (pH 7.9), 10% glycerol, 400 mM NaCl, 1 mM EDTA, 1 mM EGTA, 1 mM DTT, 0.5 mM PMSF and protease inhibitors) for 30 minutes on ice, then the lysates were centrifuged at 15,000 rpm for 2 minutes. The supernatants containing the solubilized nuclear proteins were stored at −70° C. until used for the Electrophoretic Mobility Shift Assays (EMSA).
[0130] EMSA. Electrophoretic mobility shift assays were performed by incubating nuclear extracts prepared from control (RAW 264.7) and peptide-treated RAW 264.7 cells with a 32P-labeled double-stranded probe (5′ AGCTCAGAGGGGGACTTTCCGAGAG 3′ (SEQ ID NO:51)) synthesized to represent the NF-kappaB binding sequence. Shortly, the probe was end-labeled with T4 polynucleotide kinase according to manufacturer's instructions (Promega, Madison, Wis.). The annealed probe was incubated with nuclear extract as follows: in EMSA, binding reaction mixtures (20 μl) contained 0.25 μg of poly(dI-dC) (Amersham Pharmacia Biotech) and 20,000 rpm of 32P-labeled DNA probe in binding buffer consisting of 5 mM EDTA, 20% Ficoll, 5 mM DTT, 300 mM KCl and 50 mM HEPES. The binding reaction was started by the addition of cell extracts (10 μg) and was continued for 30 minutes at room temperature. The DNA-protein complex was resolved from free oligonucleotide by electrophoresis in a 6% polyacrylamide gel. The gels were dried and exposed to x-ray films.
[0131] ApoE Experiments
[0132] Apolipoprotein E (apoE) deficiency is associated with a series of pathological conditions including dyslipidemia, atherosclerosis, Alzheimer's disease, increased body weight and shorter life span. Inheritance of different alleles of the polymorphic apoE gene is responsible for 10% of the variation in plasma cholesterol in most populations. Individuals homozygous for one variant, apoE2, can develop type III dysbetalipoproteinemia if an additional genetic or environmental factor is present. Some much rarer alleles of apoE produce dominant expression of this disorder in heterozygous individuals. ApoE is a ligand for the LDL receptor and its effects on plasma cholesterol are mediated by differences in the affinity of the LDL receptor for lipoproteins carrying variant apoE proteins. The factors that regulate apoE gene transcription have been investigated extensively by the expression of gene constructs in transgenic mice and involve complex interactions between factors that bind elements in the 5′ promoter region, in the first intron and in 3′ regions many kilobases distant from the structural gene. Deletion of the apoE gene is associated with changes in lipoprotein metabolism (plasma total cholesterol), HDL cholesterol, HDL/TC, and HDL/LDL ratios, esterification rate in apo B-depleted plasma, plasma triglyceride, hepatic HMG-CoA reductase activity, hepatic cholesterol content, decreased plasma homocyst(e)ine and glucose levels, and severe atherosclerosis and cutaneous xanthomatosis.
Results
NF-kB Experiments
[0133] The transcription factor NF-kB participates in the transcriptional regulation of a variety of genes. Nuclear protein extracts were prepared from LPS and peptide treated RAW264.7 cells or from LPS-treated RAW264.7 cells. In order to determine whether the peptide modulates the translocation of NF-kB into the nucleus, on these extracts EMSA was performed. FIG. 31 shows the amount of NF-kB present in the nuclear extracts of RAW264.7 cells treated with LPS or LPS in combination with peptide for 4 hours. Here we see that indeed some peptides are able to modulate the translocation of NF-kB since the amount of labeled oligonucleotide for NF-kB is reduced. In this experiment, peptides that show the modulation of translocation of NF-kB are: (NMPF-1)VLPALPQVVC (SEQ ID NO:20), (NMPF-2)LQGVLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:49), (NMPF-3)LQG, (NMPF-4)LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), (NMPF-5)GVLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:33), (NMPF-6)VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3), (NMPF-7)VLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:29), (NMPF-8)GVLPALP (SEQ ID NO:32), (NMPF-9)VVC, (NMPF-11)MTRV (SEQ ID NO:42), (NMPF-12)MTR.
[0134] Nuclear Location of Peptide Experiment
[0135] A reverse-phase high-performance liquid chromatography (RP-HPLC) method was used to prove the presence of synthetic oligopeptide in the nuclear extracts. We used a Shimadzu HPLC system equipped with VYDAC® monomeric C18 column (column 218MS54, LC/MS C18 reversed phase, 300A, 5 μm, 4.6 mm ID×250 mm L); elution system: gradient system of 0.01% TFA and 5% acetonitrile (CAN) in water v/v (A) and 0.01% TFA in 80% acetonitrile (ACN) v/v (B); flow rate 0.5 ml/minute; absorbance was detected from 190-370 nm. The gradient time program was as follows:
[0000]
Time (minutes)
Buffer B concentration
0.01
0
5.0
0
30.0
80
40.0
100
60.0
100
65.0
0
70.0
0
[0136] The elution time of peptide LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) was determined by injecting 2 μg of the peptide in a separate run. Mass spectrometry (MS) analysis of fraction which contained possible NMPF-4 (LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1)) (elution time was determined by injecting the peptide in the same or separate run) was performed on LCQ Deca XP (Thermo Finnigan).
Results
Nuclear Location of Peptide Experiment
[0137] The nuclear protein extracts used in EMSA experiments were also checked for the presence of LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) by means of HPLC and MS. FIG. 32 shows HPLC chromatograph (wavelength 206) in which data profiles obtained from the nuclear protein extracts of LPS and LPS in combination with NMPF-4 (LQGV) (SEQ ID NO:1) stimulated RAW264.7 cells are overlayed. This figure also shows the presence or absence of a number of molecule signals in the nuclear extracts of oligopeptide+LPS-treated cells as compared to nuclear extracts of LPS-treated cells. Since the HPLC profile of LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) showed that the peptide elutes at around 12 minutes (data not shown), the fraction corresponding to region 10-15 minutes was collected and analyzed for the presence of this peptide in MS.
[0138] The peptide's molecular weight is around 416 Daltons. Besides 416 mass, FIG. 33 shows some other molecular weights. This is to be explained by the high concentration of the peptide which induces the formation of dimers and sodium-adducts (m/z 416—[M+H]+, 438—[M+Na]+, 831—[2M+H]+, 853—[2M+Na]+, 1245—[3M+H]+, 1257—[3M+Na]+). FIG. 34 shows the MS results of 10 to 15 minutes fraction of nuclear extract obtained from LPS-stimulated cells. These results show the absence of 416 dalton mass, while FIG. 35 shows the presence of 416 dalton mass of which the MSn data ( FIG. 35 ) and MS-sequence confirm the presence of LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) peptide in the nuclear protein extract obtained from LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) +LPS stimulated RAW264.7 cells.
Endotoxin Shock Model (Sepsis)
[0139] Sepsis. For the endotoxin model, BALB/c mice were injected i.p. with 8-9 mg/kg LPS ( E. coli 026:B6; Difco Lab., Detroit, Mich., USA). Control groups (PBS) were treated with PBS i.p. only. To test the effect of NMPF from different sources (synthetic, commercial hCG preparation [c-hCG]), we treated BALB/c mice with a dose of 300-700 IU of different hCG preparations (PG23; PREGNYL® hCG batch no. 235863, PG25; PREGNYL® hCG batch no. 255957) and with synthetic peptides (5 mg/kg) after two hours of LPS injection. In other experiments, BALB/c mice were injected i.p: either with 10 mg/kg or with 11 mg/kg LPS ( E. coli 026:B6; Difco Lab., Detroit, Mich., USA). Subsequently, mice were treated after 2 hours and 24 hours of LPS treatment with NMPF peptides.
[0140] Semi-quantitative sickness measurements. Mice were scored for sickness severity using the following measurement scheme:
1 Percolated fur, but no detectable behavior differences compared to normal mice. 2 Percolated fur, huddle reflex, responds to stimuli (such as tap on cage), just as active during handling as healthy mouse. 3 Slower response to tap on cage, passive or docile when handled, but still curious when alone in a new setting. 4 Lack of curiosity, little or no response to stimuli, quite immobile. 5 Labored breathing, inability or slow to self-right after being rolled onto back (moribund) 6 Sacrificed
Results
Endotoxin Shock Model (Sepsis)
[0147] Sepsis experiments. To determine the effect of synthetic peptides (NMPF) in high-dose LPS shock model, BALB/c mice were injected intraperitoneally with different doses of LPS and survival was assessed daily for 5 days. In this experiment (for the LPS endotoxin model), BALB/c mice were injected i.p. with 8-9 mg/kg LPS ( E. coli 026:B6; Difco Lab., Detroit, Mich., USA). Control groups (PBS) were treated with PBS i.p. only. We treated BALB/c mice with a dose of 300-700 IU of different hCG preparations (PG23; PREGNYL® HCG batch no. 235863, PG25; PREGNYL® HCG batch no. 255957) or with peptides (5 mg/kg) after two hours of LPS injection.
[0148] These experiments showed (Table 1) that NMPF peptides 4, 6, 66 and PG23 inhibited shock completely (all mice had in first 24 hours sickness scores not higher than 2; shortly thereafter they recovered completely and had sickness scores of 0), while peptides 2, 3 and 7 accelerated shock (all mice had in first 24 hours sickness scores of 5 and most of them died, while the control mice treated with LPS+PBS had sickness scores of 3-4 in first 24 hours and most of them died after 48 hours with sickness scores of 5; 17% survival rate at 72 hours). In addition, peptides 1, 5, 8, 9, 11, 12, 13, 14 and 64 showed in a number of different experiments variability in effectiveness as well as in the kind (inhibitory vs accelerating) of activity. This variability is likely attributable to the rate of breakdown of the various peptides and the different effects the various peptides and their breakdown products have in vivo. In addition, these experiments also showed the variability in anti-shock activity in c-hCG preparations that is likely attributable to the variation in the presence of anti-shock and shock-accelerating NMPF. Visible signs of sickness were apparent in all of the experimental animals, but the kinetics and obviously the severity of this sickness were significantly different. These data are representative of at least ten separate experiments.
[0149] In Table 2 we see the effect of ALA-replacement (PEPSCAN) in peptide LQG, LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3), VLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:29) in septic shock experiments. We conclude that the change in even one amino acid by a neutral amino acid can lead to different activity. So, genomic differences as well as polymorphism in these peptides can regulate the immune response very precisely. Derivatives of these peptides, for example (but not limited to) by addition of classical and non-classical amino acids or derivatives that are differentially modified during or after synthesis, for example benzylation, amidation, glycosylation, proteolytic cleavage, linkage to an antibody molecule or other cellular ligand, etc. could also lead to a better effectiveness of the activity.
[0150] To determine whether treatment of BALB/c mice with NMPF inhibits septic shock at different stages of disease, synthetic peptides (NMPF) were injected i.p. at 2 and 24 hours after the induction of septic shock with high dose LPS (10 mg/kg).
[0151] As shown in Tables 3 and 4, control mice treated with PBS after the shock induction reached a sickness score of 5 at 14 and 24 hours, and remained so after the second injection with PBS. The survival rate in control group mice was 0% at 48 hours. In contrast to control mice, mice treated with NMPF 9, 11, 12, 43, 46, 50 and 60 reached a maximum sickness score of 2-3 at 24 hours after the induction of septic shock and further reached a maximum sickness score of 1-2 at 48 hours after the second injection of NMPF. In addition, mice treated with NMPF 5, 7, 8, 45, 53 and 58 reached a sickness score of 5 and after the second injection with NMPF all mice returned to a sickness score of 1-2 and survival rates in NMPF groups were 100%. Mice treated with NMPF 3 reached sickness scores of 3-4 and the second NMPF injection did save these mice. These experiments show that NMPF peptides have anti-shock activity at different stages of the disease and NMPF have anti-shock activity even at the disease stage when otherwise irreversible damage had been done. This indicates that NMPF have effects on different cellular levels and also have repairing and regenerating capacity.
Dendritic Cell Experiments
[0152] Mice. The mouse strain used in this study was BALB/c (Harlan, Bicester, Oxon, GB). All mice used in experiments were females between 8 and 12 weeks of age.
[0153] Mice were housed in a specific-pathogen-free facility. The Animal Use Committee at the Erasmus University Rotterdam, The Netherlands, approved all studies.
[0154] In vivo treatment. At least six mice per group were injected intraperitoneally (i.p.) with LPS (10 mg/kg; Sigma). After 2 and 24 hours of LPS induction, mice were injected i.p. with either NMPF (5 mg/kg) or Phosphate Buffered Saline (PBS), in a volume of 100 μl. LPS-induced shock in this model had more than 90% mortality at 48 hours.
[0155] Bone marrow cell culture. From treated mice, bone-marrow cells were isolated and cultured as follows. BALB/c mice were killed by suffocation with CO 2 . The femurs and tibiae were removed and freed of muscles and tendons under aseptic conditions. The bones were placed in R10 medium (RPMI 1640, supplemented with 50 U/ml penicillin, 50 μg/ml streptomycin, 0.2 M Na-pyruvate, 2 mM glutamine, 50 μM 2-mercaptoethanol and 10% fetal calf serum (Bio Whittaker, Europe)).
[0156] The bones were then cleaned more thoroughly by using an aseptic tissue and were transferred to an ice cold mortier with 2 ml of R10 medium. The bones were crushed with a mortel to get the cells out of the bones. Cells were filtered through a sterile 100 μM filter (Beckton Dickinson Labware) and collected in a 50 ml tube (FALCON). This procedure was repeated until bone parts appeared translucent.
[0157] The isolated cells were resuspended in 10 ml of R10 and 30 ml of Geys medium was added. The cell suspension was kept on ice for 30 minutes to lyse the red blood cells. Thereafter, the cells were washed twice in R10 medium. Upon initiation of the culture, the cell concentration was adjusted to 2×10 5 cells per ml in R10 medium supplemented with 20 ng/ml recombinant mouse Granulocyte Monocyte-Colony Stimulating Factor (rmGM-CSF; BioSource International, Inc., USA) and seeded in 100 mm non-adherent bacteriological Petri dishes (Falcon). For each condition, six Petri dishes were used and for further analysis, cells were pooled and analyzed as described ahead. The cultures were placed in a 5% CO 2 -incubator at 37° C. Every three days after culture initiation, 10 ml fresh R10 medium supplemented with rmGM-CSF at 20 ng/ml was added to each dish.
[0158] Nine days after culture initiation, non-adherent cells were collected and counted with a COULTER® Counter (Coulter).
[0159] Alternatively, BM cells from untreated mice were isolated and cultured as described above and were in vitro treated with the following conditions: NMPF-4, NMPF-46, NMPF-7, NMPF-60 (20 μg/ml) were added to the culture either at day 0 or day 6 after culture initiation, or LPS (1 μg/ml) was added to the culture at day 6 with or without the NMPF.
[0160] Immunofluorescence staining. Cells (2×10 5 ) were washed with FACS-buffer (PBS with 1% BSA and 0.02% sodium azide) and transferred to a round-bottomed 96-well plate (NUNC). The antibodies used for staining were against MHC-II (I-A/I-E) PE and CD11c/CD18 FITC (PharMingen/Becton Dickinson, Franklin Lakes, N.J., US).
[0161] Cells were resuspended in 200 μl FACS-buffer containing both of the antibodies at a concentration of 2.5 ng/μl per antibody. Cells were then incubated for 30 minutes at 4° C. Thereafter, cells were washed three times and finally resuspended in 200 μl FACS-buffer for flow-cytometric analysis in a FACSCalibur flow cytometer (Becton Dickinson, Heidelberg, Germany). All FACS-data were analyzed with CellQuest software (Becton Dickinson, Heidelberg, Germany).
[0162] Statistical analysis. All differences greater than 20% are considered to be significant.
Results
Dendritic Cell Experiments
[0163] Cell yield of ex vivo bone-marrow cell cultures. To determine the in vivo effect of LPS and NMPF treatment on the cell yield obtained from a nine-day culture of bone-marrow with rmGM-CSF, cells were isolated from the BM of treated mice and cultured, harvested and counted as described. As shown in FIGS. 1 and 2 , the cell yield of the bone-marrow cultures of LPS (10 mg/kg) treated mice is significantly decreased compared to PBS-treated mice. Mice treated with NMPF-4, NMPF-7, NMPF-46 and NMPF-60 after LPS shock induction had a significantly increased cell yield compared to LPS in the presence of rmGM-CSF. In addition, BM cultures from NMPF 46 treated mice gave a significantly increased cell yield even compared to the PBS group.
[0164] Immunofluorescence staining of in vivo treated bone-marrow derived DC. Culture of BM cells in the presence of rmGM-CSF gave rise to an increased population of cells that are positive for CD11c and MHC-II. Cells positive for these cell membrane markers are bone-marrow derived dendritic cells (DC). DC are potent antigen-presenting cells (APC) and modulate immune responses. In order to determine the maturation state of myeloid-derived DC, cells were stained with CD11c and MHC-II.
[0165] As shown in FIG. 3 , the expression of the MHC-II molecule was significantly decreased on CD11c-positive cells from LPS-treated mice as compared to the PBS group. This decrease in MHC-II expression was further potentiated by the in vivo treatment with NMPF-4 and NMPF-46. However, treatment of mice with NMPF-7 and NMPF-60 significantly increased the expression of the MHC-II molecule even as compared to the PBS group.
[0166] Cell yields of in vitro bone-marrow cell cultures. To determine the effect of LPS and NMPF in vitro on the cell yield of a nine-day culture of bone-marrow cells, we isolated the BM cells from untreated BALB/c mice and cultured them in the presence of rmGM-CSF. In addition to rmGM-CSF, cultures were supplemented with NMPF at either day 0 or day 6 with or without the addition of LPS at day 6.
[0167] As shown in FIGS. 4-7 , there is a significant decrease in cell yield in LPS-treated BM cells as compared to PBS. BM cells treated with NMPF-4, -7, -46 or -60 at time point t=0 or t=6 without LPS showed a significant increase in cell yield as compared to the PBS group. However, BM cell cultures treated with NMPF-4 at time point t=6 showed significant decrease in cell yield as compared to the PBS group and this effect is comparable with the effect of LPS ( FIG. 4 ). In addition, BM cells treated with NMPF-4, -7, -46 or -60 at time point t=6 in combination with LPS showed a significant increase in cell yield as compared to the LPS group, and even in the group of NMPF-7, the cell yield was significantly increased as compared to the PBS group.
[0168] Immunofluorescence staining of in vitro treated bone-marrow derived DC. To determine the maturation state of DC, CD11c-positive cells were stained for MHC-II antibody. FIGS. 8-11 show that there is an opposite effect of LPS on MHC-II expression as compared to in vivo experiments, namely, MHC-II expression is significantly increased with LPS treatment in vitro as compared to PBS. NMPF 4 with LPS further potentiated the effect of LPS, while NMPF 7 with or without LPS (t=6 day), significantly inhibited the expression of MHC-II as compared to LPS and PBS, respectively. However, cells treated with NMPF 46 without LPS (t=0) showed significantly increased expression of MHC-II on CD11c-positive cells. Furthermore, no significant differences were found in the group NMPF 60 with or without LPS on MHC-II expression as compared to LPS and PBS treated cells.
[0169] To determine the in vivo effect of LPS and NMPF treatment on the cell yield obtained from a nine-day culture of bone-marrow with rmGM-CSF, cells were isolated from the BM of treated mice and cultured, harvested and counted as described. The cell yield of “attached” cells was significant increased with NMPF-4, -7, -9, -11, -43, -46, -47, -50, -53, -58 and -60, and even in the group of NMPF-7, -46 and -60, the cell yield was significantly increased as compared to the PBS group ( FIGS. 14-15 ). In addition, cell yield of “unattached” cells was significant increased with NMPF-4, -7, -9, -11, -46, -50, -53, -58 and -60, and again in the group of NMPF-46, the cell yield was significantly increased as compared to the PBS group ( FIGS. 12-13 ).
[0170] To determine the effect of LPS and NMPF in vitro on the cell yield of a nine-day culture of bone-marrow cells of female NOD mice, we isolated the BM cells from untreated NOD mice and cultured them in the presence of rmGM-CSF. In addition to rmGM-CSF, cultures were supplemented with NMPF. In these experiments, the bone-marrow cell yield of “unattached” cells was significantly increased with NMPF-1, -2, -3, -4, -5, -6, -7, -8, -9, -12 and -13 as compared to the PBS group and no effect was observed with NMPF 11 ( FIG. 16 ). The “attached” bone-marrow cells of these experiments showed different yield than the “unattached” cells, namely there was a significant increase in cell yield in cultures treated with NMPF-3 and -13, while cultures treated with NMPF-2 and -6 showed significant decrease in the cell yield as compared to PBS ( FIG. 17 ) (additional results are summarized in Table 5).
Coronary Artery Occlusion (CAO) Experiments
[0171] CAO induction and treatment. NMPF have immunoregulatory effects in chronic inflammatory as well as acute inflammatory mice models. Since certain cytokines like TGF-beta1, TNF-alpha, IL-1 and ROS (reactive oxygen species) have been implicated in irreversible myocardial damage produced by prolonged episodes of coronary artery occlusion and reperfusion in vivo that leads to ischemia and myocardial infarction, we tested the cardio-protective properties of peptides in ad libitum fed male Wistar rats (300 g). The experiments were performed in accordance with the Guiding Principles in the Care and Use of Animals as approved by the Council of the American Physiological Society and under the regulations of the Animal Care Committee of the Erasmus University Rotterdam. Shortly, rats (n=3) were stabilized for 30 minutes followed by i.v. of 1 ml of peptide treatment (0.5 mg/ml) in 10 minutes. Five minutes after completion of treatment, rats were subjected to a 60-minute coronary artery occlusion (CAO). In the last 5 minutes of CAO, rats were again treated over 10 minutes i.v. with 1 ml of peptide (0.5 mg/ml) followed by 120 minutes of reperfusion (IP). Experimental and surgical procedures are described in detail in Cardiovascular Research 37 (1998) 76-81. At the end of each experiment, the coronary artery was re-occluded and was perfused with 10 ml Trypan Blue (0.4%, Sigma Chemical Co.) to stain the normally perfused myocardium dark blue and delineate the nonstained area at risk (AR). The heart was then quickly excised and cut into slices of 1 mm from apex to base. From each slice, the right ventricle was removed and the left ventricle (LV) was divided into the AR and the remaining left ventricle, using micro-surgical scissors. The AR was then incubated for 10 minutes in 37° C. Nitro-Blue-Tetrazolium (Sigma Chemical Co.; 1 mg per 1 ml Sorensen buffer, pH 7.4), which stains vital tissue purple but leaves infarcted tissue unstained. After the infarcted area (IA) was isolated from the noninfarcted area, the different areas of the LV were dried and weighed separately. Infarct size was expressed as percentage of the AR. Control rats were treated with PBS.
Results
Coronary Artery Occlusion (CAO) Experiments
[0172] Our CAO data showed that 15 rats in the control group treated with only PBS had an infarcted area of 70±2% (average±standard error) after 60-minutes of CAO followed by 2 hours of reperfusion. While rats treated with peptides VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3), LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), VLPALPQVVC (SEQ ID NO:20), LQGVLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:49), LAGV (SEQ ID NO:26), LQAV (SEQ ID NO:52) and MTRV (SEQ ID NO:42) showed infarcted areas of 62±6%, 55±6%, 55±5%, 67±2%, 51±4%, 62±6% and 68±2%, respectively, here, we see that certain peptides (such as VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3), LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), VLPALPQVVC (SEQ ID NO:20), LAGV (SEQ ID NO:26)) have a protective effect on the area at risk for infarction. In addition, peptide LQAV (SEQ ID NO:52) showed a smaller infarcted area but, in some instances, the area was hemorrhagic infarcted. In addition, NMPF-64 (LPGCPRGVNPVVS (SEQ ID NO:40)) also had protective effect (35%) in CAO experiments. It is important to note that mice treated with certain above-mentioned peptides showed less viscosity of blood. Apart from immunological effect, these peptides may also have an effect on the blood coagulation system directly or indirectly since there is certain homology with blood coagulation factors (for additional results of NMPF peptides, see Table 5). So, in both models, the circulatory system plays an important role in the pathogenesis of the disease.
Chicken Eggs Experiments
[0173] In vivo treatment of fertilized chicken eggs with NMPF. Fertile chicken eggs (Drost Loosdrecht BV, the Netherlands) were incubated in a diagonal position in an incubator (Pas Reform BV, the Netherlands) at 37° C. and 32% relative humidity.
[0174] Solutions of NMPF peptides (1 mg/ml) and VEGF were made in PBS. At least ten eggs were injected for every condition. The treatment was performed as follows: on day 0 of incubation, a hole was drilled into the eggshell to open the air cell. A second hole was drilled 10 mm lower and right from the first hole for injection. The holes in the eggshell were disinfected with jodium. The NMPF peptides (100 μg/egg) and/or VEGF (100 ng/ml) were injected in volume of 100 μl. The holes in the eggshell were sealed with tape (Scotch Magic™ Tape, 3M) and the eggs were placed into the incubator.
[0175] Quantification of angiogenesis. On day 7 of incubation, the eggs were viewed under a UV lamp to check if the embryos were developing in a normal way and the dead embryos were counted. On day 8 of incubation, the embryos were removed from the eggs by opening the shell at the bottom of the eggs. The shell membrane was carefully dissected and removed. The embryos were placed in a 100-mm Petri dish. The embryo and the blood vessels were photographed (Nikon E990, Japan) in vivo with the use of a microscope (Zeiss Stemi SV6, Germany). One overview picture was taken and four detailed pictures of the blood vessels were taken. Only eggs with vital embryos were evaluated.
[0176] Data analysis. Quantification of angiogenesis was accomplished by counting the number of blood vessel branches. Quantification of vasculogenesis was accomplished by measuring the blood vessel thickness. The number of blood vessel branches and the blood vessel thickness were counted in the pictures (four pictures/egg) using CorelDRAW®7™. Thereafter, the number of blood vessel branches and the thickness of the blood vessels were correlated to a raster of microscope (10 mm 2 ) for comparison. The mean number of branches and the mean blood vessel thickness of each condition (n=10) were calculated and compared to the PBS control eggs using a Student's T-test.
Results
Chicken Egg Experiments
[0177] In order to determine the effect of NMPF on angiogenesis and vasculogenesis, we treated fertilized chicken eggs with NMPF or NMPF in combination with VEGF as described in the materials and methods section herein. FIGS. 18-28 show that NMPF 3, 4, 9 and 11 promoted angiogenesis (p<0.05), while NMPF-VEGF-7, -43, -44, -45, -46, -51 and -56 inhibited angiogenesis (p<0.05). NMPF 6, 7, 12, 45, 46 and 66 were able to inhibit angiogenesis induced by VEGF. Moreover, NMPF 6 itself did not show any effect on angiogenesis, but it inhibited (p<0.05) NMPF 3-induced angiogenesis.
[0178] FIGS. 29-30 show that NMPF-1, -2, -3, -4, -6, -7, -8, -12, -50, -51, and -52 had vasculogenesis-inhibiting (p<0.05) effect, while only NMPF 44 promoted (p<0.05) vasculogenesis.
NOD Experiment
[0179] Mice. Female NOD mice at the age of 13-14 weeks were treated i.p. with PBS (n=6) or NMPF peptides (VLPALPQVVC (SEQ ID NO:20), LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), GVLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:33), VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3), VLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:29), MTRV (SEQ ID NO:42), LPGCPRGVNPVVS (SEQ ID NO:40), CPRGVNPVVS (SEQ ID NO:50), LPGC (SEQ ID NO:41), MTRVLQGVLPALPQVVC (SEQ ID NO:44), VVCNYRDVRFESIRLPGCPRGVNPVVSYAVALSCQCAL (SEQ ID NO:35)) (5 mg/kg, n=6) three times a week for 2 weeks. Every four days, urine was checked for the presence of glucose (Gluketur Test; Boehringer Mannheim, Mannheim, Germany). All mice used in these studies were maintained in a pathogen-free facility. They were given free access to food and water. The experiments were approved by the Animal Experiments Committee of the Erasmus University Rotterdam. Diabetes was assessed by measurement of the venous blood glucose level using an Abbott Medisense Precision glucometer. Mice were considered diabetic after two consecutive glucose measurements≧11 mmol/l (200 mg/dl). Onset of diabetes was dated from the first consecutive reading.
[0180] Glucose tolerance test (GTT) was performed at 28 weeks of age in fasted mice (n=5) by injecting 1 g/kg D-glucose intraperitoneally (i.p.). At 0 (fasting), 5, 30 and 60 minutes, blood samples were collected from the tail and tested for glucose content.
NO Experiment
[0181] Cell culture. The RAW 264.7 murine macrophage cell line, obtained from American Type Culture Collection (Manassas, Va., USA), were cultured at 37° C. in 5% CO 2 using DMEM containing 10% fetal calf serum (FCS), 50 U/ml penicillin, 50 μg/ml streptomycin, 0.2 M Na-pyruvate, 2 mM glutamine and 50 μM 2-mercaptoethanol (Bio Whittaker, Europe). The medium was changed every 2 days.
[0182] Nitrite measurements. Nitrite production was measured in the RAW 264.7 macrophage supernatants. The cells (7.5×10 5 /ml) were cultured in 48-well plates in 500 μl of culture medium. The cells were stimulated with LPS (10 microg/ml) and/or NMPF (1 pg/ml, 1 ng/ml, 1 μg/ml) for 24 hours, then the culture media were collected. Nitrite was measured by adding 100 microl of Griess reagent (Sigma) to 100 microl samples of culture medium. The OD 540 was measured using a microplate reader, and the nitrite concentration was calculated by comparison with the OD 540 produced using standard solutions of sodium nitrite in the culture medium.
Results
NOD Experiment
[0183] In order to determine whether NMPF has effect on the disease development in NOD mice, we tested NMPF on pre-diabetic female NOD mice at the age of 13-14 weeks. After only two weeks of treatment (injection of NMPF (5 mg/kg) every other day), glucosuria data of all NOD mice was analyzed at the age of 17 weeks. Profound anti-diabetic effect (mice negative for glucosuria) was observed in different NMPF groups as compared to the PBS group, especially in NMPF groups treated with peptide VLPALPQVVC (SEQ ID NO:20), VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3), MTRV (SEQ ID NO:42), LPGCPRGVNPVVS (SEQ ID NO:40) and LPGC (SEQ ID NO:41). In addition, impairment of the glucose tolerance test was positively correlated to insulitis, but negatively correlated to the number of functional beta cells; also this test showed that NOD mice successfully treated with NMPF were tolerant for glucose as compared to the PBS group. Our results show that PBS treated NOD mice were all diabetic at the age of 23 weeks. Whereas, NOD mice treated three times a week for two weeks with NMPF showed profound inhibition of diabetes development. The strongest anti-diabetic effects were seen with NMPF-1, -4, -5, -6, -7, -65, -66 and commercial hCG preparation (PREGNYL® hCG, Organon, Oss, The Netherlands, batch no. 235863). These mice had a low fasting blood glucose level and were tolerant for glucose (data partially shown). However, NMPF-71 showed no effect on the incidence of diabetes, while NMPF-64 and NMPF-11 had a moderate anti-diabetic effect.
NO Experiment
[0184] NO production is a central mediator of the vascular and inflammatory response. Our results show that macrophages (RAW 264.7) stimulated with LPS produce large amounts of NO. However, these cells co-stimulated with most of the NMPF peptides (NMPF peptides 1 to 14, 43 to 66 and 69) even in a very low dose (1 pg/ml) inhibited the production of NO.
Results
[0185] apoE Experiment
[0186] The invention provides a method and a signalling molecule for the treatment of conditions that are associated with dysfunctional LDL receptors such as apoE and other members of the apolipoprotein family. In particular, use of a signalling molecule comprising GVLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:33) (NMPF-5) and/or VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3) (NMPF-6) or a functional analogue or derivative thereof is preferred. Groups of apoE deficient mice (n=6 per group) were fed a high cholesterol food and given PBS or NMPF every other day intraperitoneally. After 2.5 weeks, body weight was determined as shown in the Table below.
[0000]
Average Weight
(g)
SD (g)
p-value
ApoE−/− PBS
31.667
1.007
ApoE−/− NMPF-4
31.256
1.496
0.536
ApoE−/− NMPF-5
29.743
1.160
0.019
Background/PBS
26.760
1.582
10 −6
ApoE−/− NMPF-6
29.614
1.064
0.004
Analysis of Different Peptides in Data Bases
[0187] Examples of different data bases in which peptides were analyzed are:
Proteomics tools: Similarity searches BLAST data base (ExPasy, NCBI) SMART (EMBL) PATTINPROT (PBIL) Post-translational modification prediction SignalP (CBS) Primary structure analysis HLA Peptide Binding Predictions (BIMAS) Prediction of MHC type I and II peptide binding (SYFPEITHI) Amino acid scale representation (Hydrophobicity, other conformational parameters, etc.) (PROTSCALE) Representations of a protein fragment as a helical wheel (HelixWheel/HelixDraw)
Results
[0199] A non-extensive list of relevant oligopeptides useful for application in a method to identify signalling molecules according to the invention derivable from protein databases follows.
[0200] pdb|1DE7|1DE7-A INTERACTION OF FACTOR XIII ACTIVATION PEPTIDE WITH ALPHA-THROMBIN
[0000]
LQGV,
(SEQ ID NO: 1)
LQGVV,
(SEQ ID NO: 53)
LQGVVP
(SEQ ID NO: 54)
[0201] pdb|1DL6|1DL6-A SOLUTION STRUCTURE OF HUMAN TFIIB N-TERMINAL DOMAIN
[0000]
LDALP
(SEQ ID NO: 55)
[0202] pdb|1QMH|1QMH-A CRYSTAL STRUCTURE OF RNA 3′-TERMINAL PHOSPHATE CYCLASE, A UBIQUITOUS ENZYME
[0000]
LQTV,
(SEQ ID NO: 56)
VLPAL,
(SEQ ID NO: 8)
LVLQTVLPAL
(SEQ ID NO: 57)
[0203] pdb|1LYP|1LYP CAP18 (RESIDUES 106-137)
[0000]
IQG, IQGL,
(SEQ ID NO: 58)
LPKL,
(SEQ ID NO: 59)
LLPKL
(SEQ ID NO: 60)
[0204] pdb|1B9O|1B9O-A HUMAN ALPHA-LACTALBUMIN
[0000]
LPEL
(SEQ ID NO: 61)
[0205] pbd|1GLU|1GLU-A GLUCOCORTICOID RECEPTOR (DNA-BINDING DOMAIN)
[0000]
PARP
(SEQ ID NO: 62)
[0206] pdb|2KIN|2KIN-B KINESIN (MONOMERIC) FROM RATTUS NORVEGICUS
[0000]
MTRI
(SEQ ID NO: 63)
[0207] pdb|1SMP|1SMP-I MOL_ID: 1; MOLECULE: SERRATIA METALLO PROTEINASE; CHAIN: A
[0000]
LQKL,
(SEQ ID NO: 64)
LQKLL,
(SEQ ID NO: 65)
PEAP,
(SEQ ID NO: 66)
LQKLLPEAP
(SEQ ID NO: 67)
[0208] pdb|1ES7|1ES7-B COMPLEX BETWEEN BMP-2 AND TWO BMP RECEPTOR IA ECTODOMAINS
[0000]
LPQ, PTLP,
(SEQ ID NO: 68)
LQPTL
(SEQ ID NO: 69)
[0209] pdb|1BHX|1BHX-F X-RAY STRUCTURE OF THE COMPLEX OF HUMAN ALPHA THROMBIN WITH THE INHIBITOR SDZ 229-357
[0000]
LQV, LQVV
(SEQ ID NO: 70)
[0210] pdb|1VCB|1VCB-A THE VHL-ELONGINC-ELONGINB STRUCTURE
[0000]
PELP
(SEQ ID NO: 71)
[0211] pdb|1CQK|1CQK-A CRYSTAL STRUCTURE OF THE CH3 DOMAIN FROM THE MAK33 ANTIBODY
[0000]
PAAP,
(SEQ ID NO: 72)
PAAPQ,
(SEQ ID NO: 73)
PAAPQV
(SEQ ID NO: 74)
[0212] pdb|1FCB|1FCB-A FLAVOCYTOCHROME
LQG
[0214] pdb|1LDC|1LDC-A L-LACTATE DEHYDROGENASE: CYTOCHROME C OXIDOREDUCTASE (FLAVOCYTOCHROME B=2=) (E.C.1.1.2.3) MUTANT WITH TYR 143 REPLACED BY PHE (Y143F) COMPLEXED WITH PYRUVATE
LQG
[0216] pdb|1BFB|1BFB BASIC FIBROBLAST GROWTH FACTOR COMPLEXED WITH HEPARIN TETRAMER FRAGMENT
[0000]
LPAL,
(SEQ ID NO: 75)
PALP,
(SEQ ID NO: 76)
PALPE
(SEQ ID NO: 77)
[0217] pdb1|MBF|1MBF MOUSE C-MYB DNA-BINDING DOMAIN REPEAT 1
LPN
[0219] pdb|1R2A|1R2A-A THE MOLECULAR BASIS FOR PROTEIN KINASE A
[0000]
LQG, LTELL (SEQ ID NO: 78)
[0220] pdb|I1CKA|1CKA-B C-CRK (N-TERMINAL SH3 DOMAIN) (C-CRKSH3-N) COMPLEXED WITH C3G PEPTIDE (PRO-PRO-PRO-ALA-LEU-PRO-PRO-LYS-LYS-ARG (SEQ ID NO:79))
[0000]
PALP
(SEQ ID NO: 76)
[0221] pdb|I1RLQ|1RLQ-R C-SRC (SH3 DOMAIN) COMPLEXED WITH THE PROLINE-RICH LIGAND RLP2 (RALPPLPRY (SEQ ID NO:176)) (NMR, MINIMIZED AVERAGE STRUCTURE)
[0000]
LPPL,
(SEQ ID NO: 80)
PPLP
(SEQ ID NO: 81)
[0222] pdb|1TNT|1TNT MU TRANSPOSASE (DNA-BINDING DOMAIN) (NMR, 33 STRUCTURES)
[0000]
LPG, LPGL,
(SEQ ID NO: 82)
LPK
[0223] pdb|1GJS|1GJS-A SOLUTION STRUCTURE OF THE ALBUMIN BINDING DOMAIN OF STREPTOCOCCAL PROTEIN G
[0000]
LAAL,
(SEQ ID NO: 83)
LAALP
(SEQ ID NO: 84)
[0224] pdb|1GBR|1GBR-B GROWTH FACTOR RECEPTOR-BOUND PROTEIN 2 (GRB2, N-TERMINAL SH3 DOMAIN) COMPLEXED WITH SOS-A PEPTIDE (NMR, 29 STRUCTURES)
[0000]
LPKL,
(SEQ ID NO: 59)
PKLP
(SEQ ID NO: 85)
[0225] pdb|1A78|1A78-A COMPLEX OF TOAD OVARY GALECTIN WITH THIO-DIGALACTOSE
[0000]
VLPSIP
(SEQ ID NO: 86)
[0226] pdb|1 ISA|1ISA-A IRON(II) SUPEROXIDE DISMUTASE (E.C. 1.15.1.1)
[0000]
LPAL,
(SEQ ID NO: 75)
PALP
(SEQ ID NO: 76)
[0227] pdb|1FZV|1FZV-A THE CRYSTAL STRUCTURE OF HUMAN PLACENTA GROWTH FACTOR-1 (PLGF-1), AN ANGIOGENIC PROTEIN AT 2.0A RESOLUTION
[0000]
PAVP,
(SEQ ID NO: 13)
MLPAVP
(SEQ ID NO: 87)
[0228] pdb|1JLI|1JLI HUMAN INTERLEUKIN 3 (IL-3) MUTANT WITH TRUNCATION AT BOTH N- AND C-TERMINI AND 14 RESIDUE CHANGES, NMR, MINIMIZED AVERAGE
[0000]
LPC, LPCL,
(SEQ ID NO: 88)
PCLP
(SEQ ID NO: 89)
[0229] pdb|1HSS|1HSS-A 0.19 ALPHA-AMYLASE INHIBITOR FROM WHEAT
[0000]
VPALP
(SEQ ID NO: 90)
[0230] pdb|3CRX|3CRX-A CRE RECOMBINASE/DNA COMPLEX INTERMEDIATE I
[0000]
LPA, LPAL,
(SEQ ID NO: 75)
PALP
(SEQ ID NO: 76)
[0231] pdb|1PRX|1PRX-A HORF6 A NOVEL HUMAN PEROXIDASE ENZYME
[0000]
PTIP,
(SEQ ID NO: 91)
VLPTIP
(SEQ ID NO: 92)
[0232] pdb|1RCY|1RCY RUSTICYANIN (RC) FROM THIOBACILLUS FERROOXIDANS
[0000]
VLPGFP
(SEQ ID NO: 93)
[0233] pdb|1A3Z|1A3Z REDUCED RUSTICYANIN AT 1.9 ANGSTROMS
[0000]
PGFP,
(SEQ ID NO: 94)
VLPGFP
(SEQ ID NO: 93)
[0234] pdb|1GER|1GER-A GLUTATHIONE REDUCTASE (E.C.1.6.4.2) COMPLEXED WITH FAD
[0000]
LPALP,
(SEQ ID NO: 95)
PALP
(SEQ ID NO: 76)
[0235] pdb|1PBW|1PBW-A STRUCTURE OF BCR-HOMOLOGY (BH) DOMAIN
[0000]
PALP
(SEQ ID NO: 76)
[0236] pdb|1BBS|1BBS RENIN (E.C.3.4.23.15)
[0000]
MPALP
(SEQ ID NO: 96)
[0237] AI188872 11.3 366 327 18 382 [ Homo sapiens ]qd27c01.x1 Soares_placenta — 8to9weeks — 2NbHP8to9W Homo sapiens cDNA clone IMAGE:1724928 3′ similar to gb:J00117 CHORIOGONADOTROPIN BETA CHAIN PRECURSOR (HUMAN); mRNA sequence; minus strand; translated
[0000]
MXRVLQGVLPALPQVVC,
(SEQ ID NO: 97)
MXRV, MXR
(SEQ ID NO: 98)
[0238] AI126906 19.8 418 343 1 418 [ Homo sapiens ]qb95f01.x1 Soares_fetal_heart NbHH19W Homo sapiens cDNA clone IMAGE:1707865 3′ similar to gb:J00117 CHORIOGONADOTROPIN BETA CHAIN PRECURSOR (HUMAN); mRNA sequence; minus strand; translated
[0000]
ITRVMQGVIPALPQVVC
(SEQ ID NO: 99)
[0239] AI221581 29.1 456 341 23 510 [ Homo sapiens ]qg20a03.x1 Soares_placenta — 8to9weeks — 2NbHP8to9W Homo sapiens cDNA clone IMAGE:1760044 3′ similar to gb:J00117 CHORIOGONADOTROPIN BETA CHAIN PRECURSOR (HUMAN); mRNA sequence; minus strand; translated
[0000]
MTRVLQVVLLALPQLV
(SEQ ID NO: 100)
[0240] Mm.42246.3 Mm.42246 101.3 837 304 28 768 GENE=Pck1 PROTSIM=pir:T24168 phosphoenolpyruvate carboxykinase 1, cytosolic; translated
[0000]
KVIQGSLDSLPQAV,
(SEQ ID NO: 101)
LDSL, LPQ
(SEQ ID NO: 102)
[0241] Mm.22430.1 Mm.22430 209.4 1275 157 75 1535 GENE=Ask-pending PROTSIM=pir:T02633 activator of S phase kinase; translated
[0000]
VLQAILPSAPQ,
(SEQ ID NO: 103)
LQA, LQAIL,
(SEQ ID NO: 104)
PSAP, LPS
(SEQ ID NO: 105)
[0242] Hs.63758.4 Hs.63758 93.8 3092 1210 51 2719 GENE=TFR2 PROTSIM=pir:T30154 transferrin receptor 2; translated
[0000]
KVLQGRLPAVAQAV,
(SEQ ID NO: 106)
LQG, LPA, LPAV
(SEQ ID NO: 107)
[0243] Mm.129320.2 Mm.129320 173.0 3220 571 55 2769 GENE=PROTSIM=pir:T16409 Sequence 8 from Patent WO9950284; translated
[0000]
LVQKVVPMLPRLLC,
(SEQ ID NO: 108)
LVQ, LPRL,
(SEQ ID NO: 109)
PMLP
(SEQ ID NO: 110)
[0244] Mm.22430.1 Mm.22430 209.4 1275 157 75 1535 GENE=Ask-pending PROTSIM=pir:T02633 activator of S phase kinase; translated
[0000]
VLQAILPSAPQ,
(SEQ ID NO: 103)
LQA, LQAIL,
(SEQ ID NO: 104)
PSAP,
(SEQ ID NO: 105)
PSAPQ
(SEQ ID NO: 111)
[0245] P20155 IAC2_HUMAN Acrosin-trypsin inhibitor II precursor (HUSI-II) [SPINK2] [ Homo sapiens ]
[0000]
LPGCPRHFNPV,
(SEQ ID NO: 112)
LPG, LPGC
(SEQ ID NO: 41)
[0246] Rn.2337.1 Rn.2337 113.0 322 104 1 327 GENE=PROTSIM=PRF:1402234A Rat pancreatic secretory trypsin inhibitor type II (PSTI-II) mRNA, complete cds; minus strand; translated
[0000]
LVGCPRDYDPV,
(SEQ ID NO: 113)
LVG, LVGC
(SEQ ID NO: 114)
[0247] Hs.297775.1 Hs.297775 43.8 1167 753 31 1291 GENE=PROTSIM=sp:O00268 ESTs, Weakly similar to T2D3_HUMAN TRANSCRIPTION INITIATION FACTOR TFIID 135 KDA SUBUNIT [ H. sapiens ]; minus strand; translated
[0000]
PGCPRG,
(SEQ ID NO: 115)
PGCP
(SEQ ID NO: 10)
[0248] Mm.1359.1 Mm.1359 PROTSTM=pir.A39743 urokinase plasminogen activator receptor
[0000]
LPGCP,
(SEQ ID NO: 116)
PGCP,
(SEQ ID NO: 10)
LPG, LPGC
(SEQ ID NO: 41)
[0249] sptrembl|O56177|O56177 ENVELOPE GLYCOPROTEIN
[0000]
VLPAAP,
(SEQ ID NO: 117)
PAAP
(SEQ ID NO: 72)
[0250] sptrembl|O9W234|Q9W234 CG13509 PROTEIN.//:trembl|AE003458|AE003458 — 7 gene: “CG13509”; Drosophila melanogaster genomic scaffold
[0000]
LAGTIPATP,
(SEQ ID NO: 118)
LAG, PATP
(SEQ ID NO: 119)
[0251] swiss|P81272|NS2B HUMAN NITRIC-OXIDE SYNTHASE IIB (EC 1.14.13.39) (NOS, TYPE II B) (NOSIIB) (FRAGMENTS)
[0000]
GVLPAVP,
(SEQ ID NO: 11)
LPA, VLPAVP,
(SEQ ID NO: 12)
PAVP
(SEQ ID NO: 13)
[0252] sptrembl|O30137|O30137 HYPOTHETICAL 17.2 KDA
[0000]
GVLPALP,
(SEQ ID NO: 32)
PALP,
(SEQ ID NO: 76)
LPAL
(SEQ ID NO: 75)
[0253] sptrembl|Q9IYZ3|Q9IYZ3 DNA POLYMERASE
[0000]
GLLPCLP,
(SEQ ID NO: 120)
LPC, LPCL,
(SEQ ID NO: 88)
PCLP
(SEQ ID NO: 89)
[0254] sptrembl|Q9PVW5|Q9PVW5 NUCLEAR PROTEIN NP220
[0000]
PGAP,
(SEQ ID NO: 121)
LPQRPRGPNP,
(SEQ ID NO: 122)
LPQ, PRGP,
(SEQ ID NO: 123)
PNP
[0255] Hs.303116.2 PROTSIM=pir;T33097 stromal cell-derived factor 2-like1; translated
[0000]
GCPR
(SEQ ID NO: 124)
[0256] pdb|1DU3|1DU3-A CRYSTAL STRUCTURE OF TRAIL-SDR5
[0000]
GCPRGM
(SEQ ID NO: 125)
[0257] pdb|1D0G|1D0G-R CRYSTAL STRUCTURE OF DEATH RECEPTOR 5 (DR5) BOUND TO APO2L/TRAIL
[0000]
GCPRGM
(SEQ ID NO: 125)
[0258] pdb|1BIO|1BIO HUMAN COMPLEMENT FACTOR D IN COMPLEX WITH ISATOIC ANHYDRIDE INHIBITOR
[0000]
LQHV
(SEQ ID NO: 126)
[0259] pdb|4NOS|4NOS-A HUMAN INDUCIBLE NITRIC OXIDE SYNTHASE WITH INHIBITOR
[0000]
FPGC,
(SEQ ID NO: 9)
PGCP
(SEQ ID NO: 10)
[0260] pdb|1FL7|1FL7-B HUMAN FOLLICLE STIMULATING HORMONE
[0000]
PARP,
(SEQ ID NO: 62)
VPGC
(SEQ ID NO: 127)
[0261] pdb|1HR6|1HR6-A YEAST MITOCHONDRIAL PROCESSING PEPTIDASE
[0000]
CPRG,
(SEQ ID NO: 128)
LKGC
(SEQ ID NO: 129)
[0262] pdb|1BFA|1BFA RECOMBINANT BIFUNCTIONAL HAGEMAN FACTOR/AMYLASE INHIBITOR FROM
[0000]
PPGP,
(SEQ ID NO: 130)
LPGCPREV,
(SEQ ID NO: 131)
LPGC,
(SEQ ID NO: 41)
PGCP,
(SEQ ID NO: 10)
CPRE
(SEQ ID NO: 132)
[0263] swissnew|P01229|LSHB_HUMAN Lutropin beta chain precursor
[0000]
MMRVLQAVLPPLPQVVC,
(SEQ ID NO: 133)
MMR, MMRV,
(SEQ ID NO: 134)
LQA, LQAV,
(SEQ ID NO: 52)
VLPPLP,
(SEQ ID NO: 135)
PPLP,
(SEQ ID NO: 81)
QVVC,
(SEQ ID NO: 43)
VVC, VLPPLPQ,
(SEQ ID NO: 136)
AVLPPLP,
(SEQ ID NO: 137)
AVLPPLPQ
(SEQ ID NO: 138)
[0264] swissnew|P07434|CGHB_PAPAN Choriogonadotropin beta chain precursor
[0000]
MMRVLQAVLPPVPQVVC,
(SEQ ID NO: 139)
MMR, MMRV,
(SEQ ID NO: 134)
LQA, LQAG,
(SEQ ID NO: 140)
VLPPVP,
(SEQ ID NO: 141)
VLPPVPQ,
(SEQ ID NO: 142)
QVVC,
(SEQ ID NO: 43)
VVC, AVLPPVP,
(SEQ ID NO: 143)
AVLPPVPQ
(SEQ ID NO: 144)
[0265] swissnew|Q28376|TSHB_HORSE Thyrotropin beta chain precursor
[0000]
MTRD,
(SEQ ID NO: 145)
LPK, QDVC,
(SEQ ID NO: 146)
DVC, IPGC,
(SEQ ID NO: 147)
PGCP
(SEQ ID NO: 10)
[0266] swissnew|P95180|NUOB_MYCTU NADH dehydrogenase I chain B
[0000]
LPGC,
(SEQ ID NO: 41)
PGCP
(SEQ ID NO: 10)
[0267] sptrembl|Q9Z284|Q9Z284 NEUTROPHIL ELASTASE
[0000]
PALP,
(SEQ ID NO: 76)
PALPS
(SEQ ID NO: 148)
[0268] sptrembl|Q9UCG8|Q9UCG8 URINARY GONADOTROPHIN PEPTIDE (FRAGMENT).
[0000]
LPGGPR,
(SEQ ID NO: 149)
LPG, LPGG,
(SEQ ID NO: 150)
GGPR
(SEQ ID NO: 151)
[0269] XP — 028754 growth hormone releasing hormone [ Homo sapiens ]
[0000]
LQRG,
(SEQ ID NO: 152)
LQRGV,
(SEQ ID NO: 153)
LGQL
(SEQ ID NO: 154)
[0270] SignalP (CBS)
SignalP predictions: (for example)
[0000]
MTRVLQGVLPALP
(SEQ ID NO: 155)
QVVC
(SEQ ID NO: 43)
[0272] HLA Peptide Binding Predictions (BIMAS)
[0273] (For example)
[0000]
Half time of
dissociation
HLA molecule type 1 (A_0201):
VLQGVLPAL
(84)
(SEQ ID NO: 156)
GVLPALPQV
(51)
(SEQ ID NO: 157)
VLPALPQVV
(48)
(SEQ ID NO: 158)
RLPGCPRGV
(14)
(SEQ ID NO: 159)
TMTRVLQGV
(115)
(SEQ ID NO: 160)
scores
MHC II (H2-Ak 15-mers)
C P T M T R V L Q G V L P A L
14
(SEQ ID NO: 161)
P G C P R G V N P V V S Y A V
14
(SEQ ID NO: 162)
HLA-DRB1*0101 15-mers
P R G V N P V V S Y A V A L S
29
(SEQ ID NO: 163)
T R V L Q G V L P A L P Q V V
28
(SEQ ID NO: 164)
L Q G V L P A L P Q V V C N Y
22
(SEQ ID NO: 165)
HLA-DRB1*0301 (DR17)
C P T M T R V L Q G V L P A L
26
15-mers
(SEQ ID NO: 161)
M T R V L Q G V L P A L P Q V
21
(SEQ ID NO: 166)
S I R L P G C P R G V N P V V
17
(SEQ ID NO: 167)
[0000]
TABLE 1
Results of shock experiments in mice
(HRS)
0
16
40
72
% SURVIVAL IN TIME
TEST SUBSTANCE
PBS
100
100
67
17
PG23
100
100
100
100
PG25
100
83
83
83
PEPTIDE
NMPF
SEQUENCE
1
VLPALPQVVC
100
100
50
17
(SEQ ID NO: 20)
2
LQGVLPALPQ
100
67
0
0
(SEQ ID NO: 49)
3
LQG
100
83
20
17
4
LQGV
100
100
100
100
(SEQ ID N0: 1)
5
GVLPALPQ
100
100
80
17
(SEQ ID NO: 33)
6
VLPALP
100
100
100
100
(SEQ ID NO: 3)
7
VLPALPQ
100
83
0
0
(SEQ ID NO: 168)
8
GVLPALP
100
100
83
67
(SEQ ID NO: 32)
9
VVC
100
100
50
50
11
MTRV
100
100
67
50
(SEQ ID NO: 42)
12
MTR
100
100
67
50
13
LQGVLPALPQVVC
100
100
100
100
(SEQ ID NO: 34)
14
(CYCLIC) LQGVLPALPQVVC
100
83
83
83
(SEQ ID NO: 34)
64
LPGCPRGVNPVVS
100
100
100
100
(SEQ ID NO: 40)
66
LPGC
100
100
100
100
(SEQ ID NO: 41)
[0000]
TABLE 2
Additional results of shock experiments
NMPF SEQUENCE ID:
ANTI-SHOCK EFFECT
LQGV
+++
(SEQ ID NO: l)
AQGV
+++
(SEQ ID NO: 2)
LQGA
+++
(SEQ ID NO: 19)
VLPALP
+++
(SEQ ID NO: 3)
ALPALP
++
(SEQ ID NO: 21)
VAPALP
++
(SEQ ID NO: 22)
ALPALPQ
++
(SEQ ID NO: 23)
VLPAAPQ
++
(SEQ ID NO: 24)
VLPALAQ
+++
(SEQ ID NO: 25)
SHOCK ACCELERATING EFFECT
LAGV
+++
(SEQ ID NO: 26)
LQAV
+++
(SEQ ID NO: 52)
VLAALP
+++
(SEQ ID NO: 27)
VLPAAP
+++
(SEQ ID NO: l17)
VLPALA
+++
(SEQ ID NO: 28)
VLPALPQ
+++
(SEQ ID NO: 29)
VLAALPQ
+++
(SEQ ID NO: 30)
VLPALPA
+++
(SEQ ID NO: 31)
[0000]
TABLE 3
Further additional results of shock experiments
% SURVIVAL
IN TIME (HRS)
Tx
Tx
NMPF PEPTIDES
0
14
24
48
PBS
100
100
100
0
NMPF-3
100
100
100
0
NMPF-5
100
100
100
100
NMPF-7
100
100
100
67
NMPF-8
100
100
100
100
NMPF-9
100
100
100
100
NMPF-11
100
100
100
100
NMPF-12
100
100
100
100
NMPF-43
100
100
100
100
NMPF-45
100
100
100
100
NMPF-46
100
100
100
100
NMPF-50
100
100
100
100
NMPF-53
100
100
100
100
NMPF-58
100
100
100
100
NMPF-60
100
100
100
100
[0000]
TABLE 4
Further additional results
SICKNESS SCORES
Tx
Tx
NMPF PEPTIDES
0
14
24
48
PBS
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
5, 5, 5, 5, 4, 4
5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5
††††††
NMPF-3
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 4
4, 4, 4, 4, 4, 4
††††††
NMPF-5
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5
5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5
2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2
NMPF-7
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
1, 1, 4, 4, 4, 4
5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5
2, 2, 2, 2, ††
NMPF-8
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
3, 3, 5, 5, 5, 5
5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5
2, 2, 4, 4, 4, 5
NMPF-9
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
3, 3, 4, 4, 5, 5
2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2
1, 1, 2, 2, 2, 2
NMPF-11
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
1, 1, 3, 3, 4, 4,
2, 2, 2, 2, 4, 4
1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1
NMPF-12
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
1, 1, 1, 1, 3, 3
1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1
1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1
NMPF-43
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
1, 1, 4, 4, 4, 4
1, 1, 1, 1, 3, 3
2, 2, 2, 2, 2, 2
NMPF-45
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
5, 5, 5, 5, 4, 4
3, 3, 4, 4, 5, 5
2, 2, 4, 4, 5, 5
NMPF-46
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
1, 1, 2, 2, 3, 3
1, 1, 2, 2, 2, 2
1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1
NMPF-50
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
1, 1, 1, 1, 3, 3
2, 2, 2, 2, 3, 3
1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1
NMPF-53
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5
5, 5, 5, 5, 5, 5
1, 1, 2, 2, 2, 2
NMPF-58
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
5, 5, 5, 5, 3, 3
5, 5, 5, 5, 3, 3
1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1
NMPF-60
0, 0, 0, 0, 0, 0
1, 1, 4, 4, 2, 2
2, 2, 2, 2, 4, 4
1, 1, 1, 1, 1, 1
[0000]
TABLE 5
Summary of results of the various peptides in the various experiments.
ID
SEQUENCE
SEPSIS
ANGIOGENESIS
CAO
DC
NOD
NMPF-1
VLPALPQVVC
−+
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 20)
NMPF-2
LQGVLPALPQ
−+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 49)
NMPF-3
LQG
−+
+
+
+
NMPF-4
LQGV
+
+
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 1)
NMPF-5
GVLPALPQ
−+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 33)
NMPF-6
VLPALP
+
+
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 3)
NMPF-7
VLPALPQ
+
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 29)
NMPF-8
GVLPALP
−+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 32)
NMPF-9
VVC
+
+
+
NMPF-10
QVVC
(SEQ ID NO: 43)
NMPF-11
MTRV
+
+
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 42)
NMPF-12
MTR
−+
+
+
NMPF-13
LQGVLPALPQVVC
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 34)
NMPF-14
cyclic- LQGVLPALPQVVC
+
(SEQ ID NO: 34)
NMPF-43
AQG
+
+
+
NMPF-44
LAG
+
NMPF-45
LQA
+
+
NMPF-46
AQGV
+
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 2)
NMPF-47
LAGV
−+
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 26)
NMPF-48
LQAV
(SEQ ID NO: 52)
NMPF-49
LQGA
+
(SEQ ID NO: 19)
NMPF-50
ALPALP
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 21)
NMPF-51
VAPALP
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 22)
NMPF-52
VLAALP
(SEQ ID NO: 27)
NMPF-53
VLPAAP
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 117)
NMPF-54
VLPALA
(SEQ ID NO: 28)
NMPF-55
ALPALPQ
+
(SEQ ID NO: 23)
NMPF-56
VAPALPQ
+
(SEQ ID NO: 173)
NMPF-57
VLAALPQ
(SEQ ID NO: 30)
NMPF-58
VLPAAPQ
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 24)
NMPF-59
VLPALAQ
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 25)
NMPF-60
VLPALPA
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 31)
NMPF-61
VVCNYRDVRFESIRLPGCPRGVNPVVSYAVALSCQCAL
−+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 35)
NMPF-62
VVCNYRDVRFESIRLPGCPRGVNPVVSYAVALSCQ
(SEQ ID NO: 169)
NMPF-63
SIRLPGCPRGVNPVVS
−+
(SEQ ID NO: 39)
NMPF-64
LPGCPRGVNPVVS
+
(SEQ ID NO: 40)
NMPF-65
CPRGVNPVVS
(SEQ ID NO: 50)
NMPF-66
LPGC
+
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 41)
NMPF-67
CPRGVNP
(SEQ ID NO: 170)
NMPF-68
PGCP
−+
(SEQ ID NO: 10)
NMPF-69
RPRCRPINATLAVEKEGCPVCITVNTTICAGYCPT
(SEQ ID NO: 45)
NMPF-70
MTRVLQGVLPALPQ
−+
(SEQ ID NO: 171)
NMPF-71
MTRVLPGVLPALPQVVC
−+
(SEQ ID NO: 174)
NMPF-74
CALCRRSTTDCGGPKDHPLTC
(SEQ ID NO: 46)
NMPF-75
SKAPPPSLPSPSRLPGPC
(SEQ ID NO: 172)
NMPF-76
TCDDPRFQDSSSSKAPPPSLPSPSRLPGPSDTPILPQ
(SEQ ID NO: 48)
+ = effects; −+ = variable effect; no entry is no effect or not yet tested when table was assembled
[0000]
TABLE 6
MODULATION OF NO AND/OR TNF-∀
ID
SEQUENCE
TNF-A
NO
TNF-A and NO
NMPF-1
VLPALPQVVC
++
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 20)
NMPF-2
LQGVLPALPQ
−+
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 49)
NMPF-3
LQG
+
++++
++++
NMPF-4
LQGV
++++
++++
+++++++
(SEQ ID NO: 1)
NMPF-5
GVLPALPQ
++++
++++
+++++++
(SEQ ID NO: 33)
NMPF-6
VLPALP
++++
++++
+++++++
(SEQ ID NO: 3)
NMPF-7
VLPALPQ
++++
++++
+++++++
(SEQ ID NO: 29)
NMPF-8
GVLPALP
++++
++++
+++++++
(SEQ ID NO: 32)
NMPF-9
VVC
++++
++++
+++++++
NMPF-10
QVVC
++++
+++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 43)
NMPF-11
MTRV
++++
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 42)
NMPF-12
MTR
++++
++++
++++
NMPF-13
LQGVLPALPQVVC
++
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 34)
NMPF-14
cyclic- LQGVLPALPQVVC
++
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 34)
NMPF-43
AQG
++++
++++
+++++++
NMPF-44
LAG
−+
++++
++++
NMPF-45
LQA
++++
++++
+++++++
NMPF-46
AQGV
++++
++++
+++++++
(SEQ ID NO: 2)
NMPF-47
LAGV
++
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 26)
NMPF-48
LQAV
++
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 52)
NMPF-49
LQGA
++
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 19)
NMPF-50
ALPALP
++++
++++
+++++++
(SEQ ID NO: 21)
NMPF-51
VAPALP
+
+++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 22)
NMPF-52
VLAALP
++
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 27)
NMPF-53
VLPAAP
++++
++++
+++++++
(SEQ ID NO: 117)
NMPF-54
VLPALA
+
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 28)
NMPF-55
ALPALPQ
+
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 23)
NMPF-56
VAPALPQ
−+
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 173)
NMPF-57
VLAALPQ
+
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 30)
NMPF-58
VLPAAPQ
++++
++++
+++++++
(SEQ ID NO: 24)
NMPF-59
VLPALAQ
++
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 25)
NMPF-60
VLPALPA
++++
++++
+++++++
(SEQ ID NO: 31)
NMPF-61
VVCNYRDVRFESIRLPGCPRGVNPVVSYAVALSCQCAL
−+
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 35)
NMPF-62
VVCNYRDVRFESIRLPGCPRGVNPVVSYAVALSCQ
−+
+++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 169)
NMPF-63
SIRLPGCPRGVNPVVS
−+
++
++
(SEQ ID NO: 39)
NMPF-64
LPGCPRGVNPVVS
++
++++
++++
(SEQ ID NO: 40)
NMPF-65
CPRGVNPVVS
++
+++
+++
(SEQ ID NO: 50)
NMPF-66
LPGC
+++
++
+++
(SEQ ID NO: 41)
NMPF-67
CPRGVNP
−+
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 170)
NMPF-68
PGCP
+
+
+++
(SEQ ID NO: 10)
NMPF-69
RPRCRPINATLAVEKEGCPVCITVNTTICAGYCPT
−+
++
++
(SEQ ID NO: 45)
NMPF-70
MTRVLQGVLPALPQ
−+
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 171)
NMPF-71
MTRVLPGVLPALPQVVC
−+
−+
−+
(SEQ ID NO: 174)
NMPF-74
CALCRRSTTDCGGPKDHPLTC
−+
++
+
(SEQ ID NO: 46)
NMPF-75
SKAPPPSLPSPSRLPGPS
+
++
++
(SEQ ID NO: 172)
NMPF-76
TCDDPRFQDSSSSKAPPPSLPSPSRLPGPSDTPILPQ
+
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 48)
NMPF-78
CRRSTTDCGGPKDHPLTC
+
+
+
(SEQ ID NO: 47)
from −+ to +++++++ indicates from barely active to very active in modulating
Monkey Experiment
[0274] Efficacy of NMPF, here a mixture 1:1:1 of LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), AQGV (SEQ ID NO:2) and VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3), administered in a gram-negative induced rhesus monkey sepsis model for prevention of septic shock.
[0275] Overwhelming inflammatory and immune responses are essential features of septic shock and play a central part in the pathogenesis of tissue damage, multiple organ failure, and death induced by sepsis. Cytokines, especially tumor necrosis factor (TNF)-α interleukin (IL)-1β, and macrophage migration inhibitory factor (MIF), have been shown to be critical mediators of septic shock. Yet, traditional anti-TNF and anti-IL-1 therapies have not demonstrated much benefit for patients with severe sepsis. We have designed peptides that block completely LPS induced septic shock in mice, even when treatment with these peptides is started up to 24 hours after LPS injection. These peptides are also able to inhibit the production of MIF. This finding provides the possibility of therapeutic use of these peptides for the treatment of patients suffering from septic shock. Since primates are evolutionary more closer to humans, we tested these peptides for their safety and effectiveness in a primate system.
[0000]
EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN
EXPERIMENTAL
TREATMENT
(independent variable,
e.g., placebo treated
GROUP
control group)
BIOTECHNIQUES
NUMBER
animal I
i.v. infusion of a lethal
Live E. coli infusion
N = 1
dose of live
Blood sampling
Escherichia. coli (10E10
No recovery (section)
CFU/kg) +
antibiotics +
placebo treated
animal II
i.v. infusion of a lethal
Live E. coli infusion
N = 1
dose of live
Blood sampling
Escherichia. coli (10E10
No recovery (section)
CFU/kg) +
antibiotics +
oligopeptide (5 mg/kg
of each of 3 peptides)
[0276] Only naive monkeys were used in this preclinical study to exclude any interaction with previous treatments. The animals were sedated with ketamine hydrochloride. Animals were intubated orally and allowed to breathe freely. The animals were kept anesthetized with O 2 /N 2 O/isoflurane. The animals received atropin as pre-medication for O 2 /N 2 O/isoflurane anesthesia. A level of surgical anesthesia was maintained during the 2 hours infusion of E. coli and for 6 hours following E. coli challenge, after which the endotracheal tubes were removed and the animals were euthanized. Before bacteria were induced, a one-hour pre-infusion monitoring of heart-rate and blood pressure was performed.
[0277] Two rhesus monkeys were infused with a 10 10 CFU per kg of the Gram-negative bacterium E. coli to induce a fatal septic shock. One monkey received placebo-treatment and was sacrificed within 7 hours after infusion of the bacteria without recovery from the anesthesia. The second monkey received treatment with test compound and was sacrificed at the same time point.
[0278] In a limited dose-titration experiment performed with the same bacterium strain in 1991, the used dose proved to induce fatal shock within 8 hours. In recent experiments, a three-fold lower dose was used inducing clear clinical and pathomorphological signs of septic shock without fatal outcome.
[0279] The monkeys were kept anesthetized throughout the observation period and sacrificed 7 hours after the start of the bacterium infusion for pathological examination. The animals underwent a gross necropsy in which the abdominal and thorax cavities were opened and internal organs examined in situ.
[0000] Full Description of the Experiment with Three Rhesus Monkeys
[0280] The study was conducted in rhesus monkeys ( Maccaca mulatta ). Only experimentally naive monkeys were used in the study to exclude any interaction with previous treatments. Prior to the experiment, the state of health of the animals was assessed physically by a veterinarian. All animals had been declared to be in good health and were free of pathogenic ecto- and endoparasites and common bacteriological infections: Yersinia pestis, Yersinia enterocolitica, Yersinia pseudotuberculosis, Shigella, Aeromonas hydrophilia, pathogenic Campylobacter species and Salmonella.
[0281] Reagents. The Escherichia coli strain was purchased from ATCC ( E. coli; 086a: K61 serotype, ATCC 33985). In a control experiment, the strain proved equally susceptible to bactericidal factors in human and rhesus monkey serum. Prior to the experiment, a fresh culture was set-up; the E. coli strain was cultured for one day, harvested and washed thoroughly to remove free endotoxine. Prior to infusion into the animal, the number and viability of the bacteria were assessed. Serial dilutions of the E. coli stock were plated on BHI agar and cultured overnight at 37° C. The colonies on each plate were counted and the number of colony-forming units per ml was calculated. The body weight measurement of the day of the experiment was used to calculate the E. coli dose and E. coli stock was suspended in isotonic saline (N.P.B.I., Emmer-Compascuum, The Netherlands) at the concentration needed for infusion (total dose volume for infusion approximately 10 ml/kg. The E. coli suspension was kept on ice until infusion.
[0282] Antibiotic was used to synchronize the shock induction in the monkeys. BAYTRIL® antibiotic (BAYTRIL® antibiotic 2.5%, Bayer, Germany) was used instead of gentamycin, as the strain proved only marginally susceptible to the latter antibiotic.
[0283] Individual animals were identified by a number or letter combination tattooed on the chest.
[0284] Experimental design.
[0000]
EXPERIMENTAL
GROUP
TREATMENT
(number/
(independent variable,
letter or other
e.g., placebo treated
identification
control group)
NUMBER
SEX
Animal I
i.v. infusion of a lethal
Live E. coli infusion
N = 1
F
dose of live Escherichia
Blood sampling
coli (10E10 CFU/kg) +
No recovery
antibiotic +
placebo treated
Animal II
i.v. infusion of a lethal
Live E. coli infusion
N = 1
F
dose of live Escherichia
Blood sampling
coli (10E10 CFU/kg) +
No recovery (section)
antibiotic +
NMPF-4, -6, -46; each
5 mg/kg
Animal III
i.v. infusion of a lethal
Live E. coli infusion
N = 1
F
dose of live Escherichia
Blood sampling
coli (10E10 CFU/kg) +
Recovery and survival
antibiotic +
NMPF-4, -6, -46; each
5 mg/kg
[0285] Anesthesia. All animals were fasted overnight prior to the experiment. On the morning of the experiment, the animals were sedated with ketamine hydrochloride (Tesink, The Netherlands) and transported to the surgery. The animal was placed on its side on a temperature-controlled heating pad to support body temperature. Rectal temperature was monitored using a Vet-OX 5700. The animals were intubated orally and were allowed to breathe freely. The animals were kept anesthetized using O 2 /N 2 O/isoflurane inhalation anesthesia during the E. coli infusion and the seven-hour observation period following E. coli challenge, after which the endotracheal tubes were removed and the animals were euthanized or allowed to recover from anesthesia. The femoral or the cephalic vein was cannulated and used for infusing isotonic saline, live E. coli and antibiotic administration. Insensible fluid loss was compensated for by infusing isotonic saline containing 2.5% glucose (Fresenius, 's Hertogenbosch, The Netherlands) at a rate of 3.3 ml/kg/hr.
[0286] Preparative actions. During anesthesia the animals were instrumented for measurement of blood pressure (with an automatic cuff), heart rate and body temperature. Isotonic saline was infused at 3.3 ml/kg/hr to compensate for fluid loss. Femoral vessels were cannulated for infusion of E. coli and antibiotics. Temperature-controlled heating pads were used to support body temperature. The monkeys were continuously monitored during the E. coli challenge and for the six-hour period following E. coli administration. After 7 hours, two animals (the control animal and one treated with NMPF) were sacrificed to compare the direct effect of the compound at the level of histology. The third animal, treated with NMPF, was allowed to recover from anesthesia and was intensively observed during the first 12 hours after recovery followed by frequent daily observation. The decision to allow the third animal to recover was made after consulting with the veterinarian.
[0287] Induction of septic shock. Before the infusion of E. coli, a one-hour pre-infusion monitoring of heart-rate and blood pressure was performed. All three animals received an i.v. injection of E. coli 086 (k61 serotype; ATCC 33985) at a lethal dose of 10×10 9 CFU/kg body weight. In a dose titration study with this batch performed in 1991, this bacterial dose induced lethal shock within 8 hours after the start of the infusion. The infusion period was 2 hours.
[0288] Antibiotics. BAYTRIL® antibiotic was administered intravenously immediately after completion of the two-hour E. coli infusion (i.v.; dose 9 mg/kg).
[0289] Treatment with NMPF. 30 minutes post-onset of E. coli infusion, the animals were administered a single intravenous bolus injection of a mixer of NMPF oligopeptides. The oligopeptide mixer contained the following NMPF peptides: LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) (5 mg/kg), AQGV (SEQ ID NO:2) (5 mg/kg) and VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3) (5 mg/kg). These NMPF peptides were dissolved in 0.9% sodium chloride for injection (N.P.B.I., Emmer Compascuum, The Netherlands).
Results
Preliminary Monkey Results
[0290] An anti-shock effect of the test compound on sepsis in the monkey treated with the oligopeptide mixture, namely the inhibition of the effect of the sepsis in this early seven-hour trajectory of this primate model, was observed. Immunomodulatory effects with these peptides have been observed in vitro/ex vivo such as in T-cell assays, the inhibition of pathological Th1 immune responses, suppression of inflammatory cytokines (MIF), increase in production of anti-inflammatory cytokines (IL-10, TGF-beta) and immunomodulatory effects on antigen-presenting cells (APC) like dendritic cells and macrophages.
[0291] The following organs were weighed and a bacterial count was performed:
kidneys liver lungs lymph nodes gross lesions
[0297] Tissues of all organs were preserved in neutral aqueous phosphate buffered 4% solution of formaldehyde. Lymphoid organs were cryopreserved. All tissues will be processed for histopathological examination.
Further Results Obtained in the Three-Monkey Experiment
[0298] Monkey 429(control). Female monkey (5.66 kg) received an i.v. injection of E. coli 086 (10E10 CFU/kg). In a dose titration study with this batch performed in 1991, this bacterial dose induced lethal shock within 8 hours after the start of the infusion. The infusion period was 2 hours. BAYTRIL® antibiotic was administered intravenously immediately after completion of the two-hour E. coli infusion (i.v.; dose 9 mg/kg). After the E. coli injection, the monkey was observed by the authorized veterinarian without knowing which of the monkeys received NMPF treatment. The clinical observations were as follows: vomiting, undetectable pulse, heart arrhythmia, abnormalities in ECG: signs of ventricle dilatation/heart decompensation (prolonged QRS complex, extra systoles), decreased blood clotting and forced respiration. In addition, there was a big fluctuation in heart rate (30-150 beats per minute), collapse of both systolic and diastolic blood pressure (35/20 mmHg), and decrease in blood oxygen concentration (80-70%). Seven hours after the start of the E. coli infusion, monkey began to vomit blood and feces, and have convulsions. After final examination, the veterinarian did not give permission to let this monkey awake. At this time point, the control monkey was euthanized. Hereafter, post-mortem examination was conducted and internal organs were examined in situ. A number of internal bleedings were found by the pathologist.
[0299] Monkey 459(NMPF). Female monkey (5.44 kg) received an i.v. injection of E. coli 086 (10E10 CFU/kg). In a dose titration study with this batch performed in 1991, this bacterial dose induced lethal shock within 8 hours after the start of the infusion. The infusion period was 2 hours. Thirty minutes after the initiation of E. coli infusion, NMPF was i.v. injected in a single bolus injection. BAYTRIL® antibiotic was administered intravenously immediately after completion of the two-hour E. coli infusion (i.v.; dose 9 mg/kg). After the E. coli injection, this monkey was also observed by the authorized veterinarian without knowing which of the monkeys received NMPF treatment. The clinical observations were as follows: normal pulse, heart sounds normal, normal ECG, higher heart-rate but otherwise stable (180 beats per minute), no hypotension (75/30 mmHg), normal blood oxygen concentration (95-85%), lungs sound normal, and normal turgor. Seven hours after the start of the E. coli infusion, the clinical condition of the monkey was stable. After final examination, the veterinarian did give permission to let this monkey awake due to her stable condition. In order to compare the hematological and immunological parameters between the control and NMPF-treated monkey, at this time point the NMPF-treated monkey 459 was euthanized. Hereafter, post-mortem examination was conducted and internal organs were examined in situ. No macroscopic internal bleedings were found by the pathologist.
[0300] Monkey 427(NMPF). Female monkey (4.84 kg) received an i.v. injection of E. coli 086 (10E10 CFU/kg). In a dose titration study with this batch performed in 1991, this bacterial dose induced lethal shock within 8 hours after the start of the infusion. The infusion period was 2 hours. Thirty minutes after the initiation of E. coli infusion, NMPF was i.v. injected. BAYTRIL® antibiotic was administered intravenously immediately after completion of the two-hour E. coli infusion (i.v.; dose 9 mg/kg). After the E. coli injection, this monkey was also observed by the authorized veterinarian without knowing which of the monkeys received NMPF treatment. The clinical observations were as follows: normal pulse, heart sounds normal, normal ECG, moderately higher heart-rate but otherwise stable (160 beats per minute), no hypotension (70/30 mmHg), normal blood oxygen concentration (95-90%), lungs sound normal, and normal turgor. Seven hours after the start of the E. coli infusion, the clinical condition of the monkey was stable. After final examination, the veterinarian did give permission to let this monkey wake up due to her stable condition. Monkey woke up quickly, she was alert and there was a slow disappearance of edema.
Genomic Experiment
[0301] PM1 T-cell line was obtained from American Type Culture Collection (Manassas, Va.) and was cultured at 37° C. in 5% CO 2 . These cells were maintained and cultured in RPMI 1640, 10% fetal bovine serum, 2 mM L-glutamine, and antibiotics penicillin and streptomycin. For genomic experiments, cells (2×10 6 /ml) were incubated with phytohemagglutinin (PHA, 10 μg/ml) and IL-2 (200 IU/ml) or PHA, IL-2 and peptide LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) (10 mg/ml) in a volume of 2 ml in six-well plates. After 4 hours of cultures, 10×10 6 cells were washed and prepared for GENECHIP® probe arrays experiment. The GENECHIP® array expression analysis was performed according to the manufacturer's instructions (Expression Analysis, Technical Manual, Affymetrix GENECHIP®). The following major steps outline GENECHIP® Expression Analysis: 1) Target preparation 2) Target hybridization 3) Experiment and fluidics station setup 4) Probe Array washing and staining 5) Probe array scan and 6) Data analysis.
Results
Genomic Experiment
[0302] The GENECHIP® array expression analysis revealed that the LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) treatment of PM1 (T-cell line) cells for 4 hours in the presence of PHA/IL-2, down-regulated at least 120 genes, more than two-fold as compared to control PM1 cells (stimulated with PHA/IL-2) only. Moreover, at least six genes were up-regulated more than two-fold in peptide-treated cells as compared to control cells.
[0303] Down-regulated genes due to treatment with LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) in genomics experiment
[0304] Fold Change/Descriptions
[0305] 21.2 M11507 Human transferrin receptor mRNA, complete cds ( — 5, _M, — 3 represent transcript regions 5 prime, Middle, and 3 prime respectively)
[0306] 10.1 Human (c-myb) gene, complete primary cds, and five complete alternatively spliced cds (U22376/FEATURE=cds #5/DEFINITION=HSU22376)
[0307] 9.7 Cluster Incl. X68836: H. sapiens mRNA for S-adenosylmethionine synthetase (cds=(65,1252)/gb=X68836/gi=36326/ug=Hs.77502/len=1283)
[0308] 9.3 M97935 Homo sapiens transcription factor ISGF-3 mRNA, complete cds ( — 5, _MA, MB, — 3 represent transcript regions 5 prime, MiddleA, MiddleB, and 3 prime respectively)
[0309] 8.7 Human mRNA for phosphatidylinositol transfer protein (PI-TPbeta), complete cds (D30037/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HUMPITPB)
[0310] 7.5 Cluster Incl. U28964: Homo sapiens 14-3-3 protein mRNA, complete cds (cds=(126,863)/gb=U28964/gi=899458/ug=Hs.75103/len=1030)
[0311] 6.7 Human CDK tyrosine 15-kinase WEE1Hu (Wee1Hu) mRNA, complete cds (U10564/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HSU10564)
[0312] 6.7 Homo sapiens E2F-related transcription factor (DP-1) mRNA, complete cds (L23959/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HUMDP1A)
[0313] 6.5 Cluster Incl. W29030:55c4 Homo sapiens cDNA (gb=W29030/gi=1308987/ug=Hs.4963/len=758)
[0314] 6.1 Cluster Incl. U08997:Human glutamate dehydrogenase gene, complete cds (cds=(0,1676)/gb=U08997/gi=478987/ug=Hs.239377/len=1677)
[0315] 5.7 M97935 Homo sapiens transcription factor ISGF-3 mRNA, complete cds ( — 5, _MA, MB, — 3 represent transcript regions 5 prime, MiddleA, MiddleB, and 3 prime respectively)
[0316] 5.6 Cluster Incl. Y00638:Human mRNA for leukocyte common antigen (T200) (cds=(86,4000)/gb=Y00638/gi=34280/ug=Hs.170121/len=4315)
[0317] 5.3 Ras-Like Protein Tc21
[0318] 5.3 H. sapiens mRNA for Fas/Apo-1 (clone pCRTM11-Fasdelta(4,7)) (X83492/FEATURE=exons #1-2/DEFINITION=HSFAS47)
[0319] 4.8 Cluster Incl. AJ002428: Homo sapiens VDAC1 pseudogene (cds=(0,853)/gb=AJ002428/gi=3183956/ug=Hs.201553/len=854)
[0320] 4.7 Ras-Related Protein Rap1b
[0321] 4.6 Cluster Incl. AL080119: Homo sapiens mRNA; cDNA DKFZp564M2423 (from clone DKFZp564M2423) (cds=(85,1248)/gb=AL080119/gi=5262550/ug=Hs.165998/len=2183)
[0322] 4.5 Cluster Incl. AF047448: Homo sapiens TLS-associated protein TASR mRNA, complete cds (cds=(29,580)/gb=AF047448/gi=2961148/ug=Hs.239041/len=620)
[0323] 4.5 Cluster Incl. D14710:Human mRNA for ATP synthase alpha subunit, complete cds (cds=(63,1724)/gb=D14710/gi=559324/ug=Hs.155101/len=1857)
[0324] 4.5 Cluster Incl. X59618: H. sapiens RR2 mRNA for small subunit ribonucleotide reductase (cds=(194,1363)/gb=X59618/gi=36154/ug=hs.75319/len=2475)
[0325] 4.5 Human mRNA for annexin II, 5 UTR (sequence from the 5 cap to the start codon) (D28364/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HUMAI23)
[0326] 4.5 Cluster Incl. AA477898:zu34f08.r1 Homo sapiens cDNA, 5 end/clone=IMAGE-739911/clone_end=5 (gb=AA477898/gi=2206532/ug=Hs.239414/len=449)
[0327] 4.4 Cluster Incl. L19161:Human translation initiation factor eIF-2 gamma subunit mRNA, complete cds (cds=(0,1418)/gb=L19161/gi=306899/ug=Hs.211539/len=1440gb=AA477898/gi=2206532/ug=Hs.239414/len=449)
[0328] 4.4 Human serine/threonine-protein kinase PRP4h (PRP4h) mRNA, complete cds (U48736/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HSU48736)
[0329] 4.4 Cluster Incl. L43821: Homo sapiens enhancer of filamentation (HEF1) mRNA, complete cds (cds=(163,2667)/gb=L43821/gi=1294780/ug=Hs.80261/len=3817)
[0330] 4.4 Ras-Like Protein Tc21
[0331] 4.4 Human (c-myb) gene, complete primary cds, and five complete alternatively spliced cds (U22376/FEATURE=cds #3/DEFINITION=HSU22376)
[0332] 4.3 Cluster Incl. U18271:Human thymopoietin (TMPO) gene (cds=(313,2397)/gb=U18271/gi=2182141/ug=Hs.170225/len=2796)
[0333] 4.2 Fk506-Binding Protein, Alt. Splice 2
[0334] 4.2 Human proliferating cell nuclear antigen (PCNA) gene, promoter region (J05614/FEATURE=mRNA/DEFINITION=HUMPCNAPRM)
[0335] 4.1 Human insulin-stimulated protein kinase 1 (ISPK-1) mRNA, complete cds (U08316/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HSU08316)
[0336] 4.1 Cluster Incl. W28732:50h7 Homo sapiens cDNA (gb=W28732/gi=1308680/ug=Hs.177496/len=818)
[0337] 4.1 Cluster Incl. Y00638:Human mRNA for leukocyte common antigen T200) (cds=(86,4000)/gb=Y00638/gi=34280/ug=Hs.170121/len=4315)
[0338] 4 Homo sapiens putative purinergic receptor P2Y10 gene, complete cds (AF000545/FEATURE=cds/DEFINITION=HSAF000545)
[0339] 3.8 Cluster Incl. U08997:Human glutamate dehydrogenase gene, complete cds (cds=(0,1676)/gb=U08997/gi=478987/ug=Hs.239377/len=1677)
[0340] 3.6 Human mRNA for raf oncogene (X03484/FEATURE=cds/DEFINITION=HSRAFR)
[0341] 3.6 Cluster Incl. M32886:Human sorcin CP-22 mRNA, complete cds (cds=(12,608)/gb=M32886/gi=338481/ug=Hs.117816/len=952)
[0342] 3.6 Homo sapiens GTP-binding protein (RAB1) mRNA, complete cds (M28209/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HUMRAB1A)
[0343] 3.5 Human FKBP-rapamycin associated protein (FRAP) mRNA, complete cds (L34075/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HUMFRAPX)
[0344] 3.5 Human DNA topoisomerase II (top2) mRNA, complete cds (J04088/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HUMTOPII)
[0345] 3.4 Human translation initiation factor eIF-2 gamma subunit mRNA, complete cds (L19161/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HUMIEF2G)
[0346] 3.4 Human mRNA for pre-mRNA splicing factor SRp20, 5 UTR (sequence from the 5 cap to the start codon) (D28423/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HUMPSF82)
[0347] 3.4 Cluster Incl. AA442560:zv75g07.r1 Homo sapiens cDNA, 5 end/clone=IMAGE-759516/clone end=5 (gb=AA442560/gi=2154438/ug=Hs.135198/len=566)
[0348] 3.4 Cluster Incl. X98248: H. sapiens mRNA for sortilin/cds=(21,2522) (gb=X98248/gi=1834494/ug=Hs.104247/len=3723)
[0349] 3.3 Cluster Incl. AB020670: Homo sapiens mRNA for KIAA0863 protein, complete cds (cds=(185,3580)/gb=AB020670/gi=4240214/ug=Hs.131915/len=4313)
[0350] 3.3 Cluster Incl. W28869:53h2 Homo sapiens cDNA (gb=W28869/gi=1308880/ug=Hs.74637/len=975)
[0351] 3.3 Cluster Incl. Z12830: H. sapiens mRNA for SSR alpha subunit/cds=(29,889) (gb=Z12830/gi=551637/ug=Hs.76152/len=974).
[0352] 3.3 Cluster Incl. AL021546:Human DNA sequence from BAC 15E1 on chromosome 12. Contains Cytochrome C Oxidase Polypeptide VIa-liver precursor gene, 60S ribosomal protein L31 pseudogene, pre-mRNA splicing factor SRp30c gene, two putative genes, ESTs, STSs and putative CpG islands (cds=(0,230)/gb=AL021546/gi=2826890/ug=Hs.234768/len=547)
[0353] 3.2 Cluster Incl. U78082:Human RNA polymerase transcriptional regulation mediator (h-MED6) mRNA, complete cds (cds=(50,523)/gb=U78082/gi=2618737/ug=Hs.167738/len=885)
[0354] 3.2 H. sapiens RbAp48 mRNA encoding retinoblastoma binding protein (X74262/FEATURE=cds/DEFINITION=HSRBAP48)
[0355] 3.1 Cluster Incl. M64174:Human protein-tyrosine kinase (JAK1) mRNA, complete cds (cds=(75,3503)/gb=M64174/gi=190734/ug=Hs.50651/len=3541)
[0356] 3.1 Cluster Incl. AI862521:wj15a06.x1 Homo sapiens cDNA, 3 end/clone=IMAGE-2402866/clone_end=3 (gb=AI862521/gi=5526628/ug=Hs.146861/len=606)
[0357] 3.1 Cluster Incl. W27517:31h6 Homo sapiens cDNA (gb=W27517/gi=1307321/ug=Hs.13662/len=732)
[0358] 3 Human rab GDI mRNA, complete cds (D13988/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HUMRABGDI)
[0359] 3 Cluster Incl. AL080119: Homo sapiens mRNA; cDNA DKFZp564M2423 (from clone DKFZp564M2423) (cds=(85,1248)/gb=AL080119/gi=5262550/ug=Hs.165998/len=2183)
[0360] 3 Human cAMP-dependent protein kinase type I-alpha subunit (PRKAR1A) mRNA, complete cds (M33336/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HUMCAMPPK)
[0361] 3 Cluster Incl. L75847:Human zinc finger protein 45 (ZNF45) mRNA, complete cds (cds=(103,2151)/gb=L75847/gi=1480436/ug=Hs.41728/len=2409)
[0362] 3 Cluster Incl. M21154:Human S-adenosylmethionine decarboxylase mRNA, complete cds (cds=(248,1252)/gb=M21154/gi=178517/ug=Hs.75744/len=1805)
[0363] 3 Cluster Incl. AA675900:g02504r Homo sapiens cDNA, 5 end/clone=g02504/clone_end=5 (gb=AA675900/gi=2775247/ug=Hs.119325/len=647)
[0364] 3 Cluster Incl. M97936:Human transcription factor ISGF-3 mRNA sequence(cds=UNKNOWN/gb=M97936/gi=475254/ug=Hs.21486/len=2607)
[0365] 2 M33336/DEFINITION=HUMCAMPPK Human cAMP-dependent protein kinase type I-alpha subunit (PRKAR1A) mRNA, complete cds
[0366] 2 U16720/FEATURE=mRNA/DEFINITION=HSU16720 Human interleukin 10 (IL10) gene, complete cds
[0367] 2 M33336 HUMCAMPPK Human cAMP-dependent protein kinase type I-alpha subunit (PRKAR1A) mRNA
[0368] 2 U50079/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HSU50079 Human histone deacetylase HD1 mRNA, complete cds
[0369] 2 U16720/FEATURE=mRNA/DEFINITION=HSU16720 Human interleukin 10 (IL10) gene, complete cds
[0370] 2 X87212/FEATURE=cds/DEFINITION=HSCATHCGE H. sapiens mRNA for cathepsin C
[0371] 2 Cluster Incl. AI740522:wg16b07.x1 Homo sapiens cDNA, 3 end/clone=IMAGE-2365237/clone_end=3/gb=AI740522
[0372] 2 M21154/FEATURE=mRNA/DEFINITION=HUMAMD Human S-adenosylmethionine decarboxylase mRNA, complete cds
[0373] 2 X00737/FEATURE=cds/DEFINITION=HSPNP Human mRNA for purine nucleoside phosphorylase (PNP; EC 2.4.2.1)
[0374] 2.1 Cluster Incl. AF034956: Homo sapiens RAD51D mRNA, complete cds/cds=(124,993)/gb=AF034956/gi=2920581
[0375] 2.1 Ras Inhibitor Inf
[0376] 2.1 Cluster Incl. M27749:Human immunoglobulin-related 14.1 protein mRNA, complete cds/cds=(118,759)/gb=M27749
[0377] 2.1 Ras-Like Protein Tc4
[0378] 2.1 X92106/FEATURE=cds/DEFINITION=HSBLEO H. sapiens mRNA for bleomycin hydrolase
[0379] 2.1 D88674/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=D88674 Homo sapiens mRNA for antizyme inhibitor, complete cds
[0380] 2.1 Cluster Incl. H15872:ym22b12.r1 Homo sapiens cDNA, 5 end/clone=IMAGE-48838/clone_end=5/gb=H15872
[0381] 2.1 Cluster Incl. L07541:Human replication factor C, 38-kDa subunit mRNA, complete cds/cds=(9,1079)/gb=L07541
[0382] 2.1 V01512/FEATURE=mRNA #1/DEFINITION=HSCFOS Human cellular oncogene c-fos (complete sequence)
[0383] 2.1 Cluster Incl. L23959: Homo sapiens E2F-related transcription factor (DP-1) mRNA, complete cds/cds=(37,1269)
[0384] 2.1 Stimulatory Gdp/Gtp Exchange Protein For C-Ki-Ras P21 And Smg P21
[0385] 2.1 Cluster Incl. L13943:Human glycerol kinase (GK) mRNA exons 1-4, complete cds/cds=(66,1640)/gb=L13943/gi=348166
[0386] 2.1 Cluster Incl. X78925: H. sapiens HZF2 mRNA for zinc finger protein/cds=(0,2198)/gb=X78925/gi=498722/ug=Hs.2480
[0387] 2.1 X74794/FEATURE=cds/DEFINITION=HSP1CDC21 H. sapiens P1-Cdc21 mRNA
[0388] 2.1 U78733/FEATURE=mRNA #1/DEFINITION=HSSMAD2S8 Homo sapiens mad protein homolog Smad2 gene, exon 11
[0389] 2.2 Cluster Incl. L07540:Human replication factor C, 36-kDa subunit mRNA, complete cds/cds=(9,1031)/gb=L07540
[0390] 2.2 Cluster Incl. AF040958: Homo sapiens lysosomal neuraminidase precursor, mRNA, complete cds/cds=(129,1376)
[0391] 2.2 D00596/FEATURE=cds/DEFINITION=HUMTS1 Homo sapiens gene for thymidylate synthase, exons 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7
[0392] 2.2 Cluster Incl. AI659108:tu08c09.x1 Homo sapiens cDNA, 3 end/clone=IMAGE-2250448/clone_end=3/gb=AI659108
[0393] 2.2 Cluster Incl. AF042083: Homo sapiens BH3 interacting domain death agonist (BID) mRNA, complete cds/cds=(140,727)
[0394] 2.2 Cluster Incl. W28907:53e12 Homo sapiens cDNA/gb=W28907/gi=1308855/ug=Hs.111429/len=989
[0395] 2.3 Cluster Incl. AF073362: Homo sapiens endo/exonuclease Mre11 (MRE11A) mRNA, complete cds/cds=(0,2126)
[0396] 2.3 Escherichia coli /REF=J04423/DEF= E coli bioD gene dethiobiotin synthetase/LEN=676 (−5 and −3 represent transcript)
[0397] 2.3 Cluster Incl. D59253:Human mRNA for NCBP interacting protein 1, complete cds/cds=(36,506)/gb=D59253
[0398] 2.3 M21154/FEATURE=mRNA/DEFINITION=HUMAMD Human S-adenosylmethionine decarboxylase mRNA, complete cds
[0399] 2.3 Proto-Oncogene C-Myc, Alt. Splice 3, Orf 114
[0400] 2.3 Cluster Incl. W26787:15d8 Homo sapiens cDNA/gb=W26787/gi=1306078/ug=Hs.195188/len=768
[0401] 2.4 L12002/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HUMITGA4A Human integrin alpha 4 subunit mRNA, complete cds
[0402] 2.4 Cluster Incl. M55536:Human glucose transporter pseudogene/cds=UNKNOWN/gb=M55536/gi=183299/ug=Hs.121583 2.4 X98743/FEATURE=cds/DEFINITION=HSRNAHELC H. sapiens mRNA for RNA helicase (Myc-regulated dead box protein)
[0403] 2.4 575881/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=S75881 A-myb=DNA-binding transactivator {3 region} [human, CCRF-CEM T leukemia line, mRNA Partial, 831 nt]
[0404] 2.4 Cluster Incl. AF050110: Homo sapiens TGFb inducible early protein and early growth response protein alpha genes, complete cds/cds=(123,1565)/gb=AF050110/gi=3523144/ug=Hs.82173/len=2899
[0405] 2.5 Cluster Incl. M86667: H. sapiens NAP (nucleosome assembly protein) mRNA, complete cds/cds=(75,1250)/gb=M86667/gi=189066/ug=Hs.179662/len=1560
[0406] 2.5 U17743/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HSU17743 Human JNK activating kinase (JNKK1) mRNA, complete cds
[0407] 2.5 Cluster Incl. U90549:Human non-histone chromosomal protein (NHC) mRNA, complete cds/cds=(691,963)/gb=U90549/gi=2062699/ug=Hs.63272/len=1981
[0408] 2.5 Cluster Incl. U31382:Human G protein gamma-4 subunit mRNA, complete cds/cds=(98,325)/gb=U31382/gi=995916/ug=Hs.32976/len=670
[0409] 2.5 Cluster Incl. 581916:phosphoglycerate kinase {alternatively spliced} [human, phosphoglycerate kinase deficient patient with episodes of muscl, mRNA Partial Mutant, 307 nt]/cds=(0,143)/gb=S81916/gi=1470308/ug=Hs.169313/len=307
[0410] 2.5 Cluster Incl. M64595:Human small G protein (Gx) mRNA, 3 end/cds=(0,542)/gb=M64595/gi=183708/ug=Hs.173466/len=757
[0411] 2.5 Serine Hydroxymethyltransferase, Cytosolic, Alt. Splice 3
[0412] 2.5 U88629/FEATURE=cds/DEFINITION=HSU88629 Human RNA polymerase II elongation factor ELL2, complete cds
[0413] 2.5 Cluster Incl. U72518:Human destrin-2 pseudogene mRNA, complete cds/cds=(268,798)/gb=U72518/gi=1673523/ug=Hs.199299/len=1057
[0414] 2.5 Cluster Incl. L14595:Human alanine/serine/cysteine/threonine transporter (ASCT1) mRNA, complete cds
[0415] 2.5 Cluster Incl. AB014584: Homo sapiens mRNA for KIAA0684 protein, partial cds/cds=(0,2711)/gb=AB014584/gi=3327181/ug=Hs.24594/len=4124
[0416] 2.5 Cluster Incl. AI924594:wn57a11.x1 Homo sapiens cDNA, 3 end/clone=IMAGE-2449532/clone_end=3/gb=AI924594/gi=5660558/ug=Hs.122540/len=685
[0417] 2.5 U68111/FEATURE=mRNA/DEFINITION=HSPPP1R2E6 Human protein phosphatase inhibitor 2 (PPP 1 R2) gene, exon 6
[0418] 2.5 Cluster Incl. AL009179:dJ97D16.4 (Histone H2B)/cds=(25,405)/gb=AL009179/gi=3217024/ug=Hs.137594/len=488
[0419] 2.6 Cluster Incl. AF091077: Homo sapiens clone 558 unknown mRNA, complete sequence/cds=(1,300)/gb=AF091077/gi=3859991/ug=Hs.40368/len=947
[0420] 2.7 Cluster Incl. M28211: Homo sapiens GTP-binding protein (RAB4) mRNA, complete cds/cds=(70,711)/gb=M28211/gi=550067/ug=Hs.234038/len=735
[0421] 2.6 X69549/FEATURE=cds/DEFINITION=HSRHO2 H. sapiens mRNA for rho GDP-dissociation Inhibitor 2
[0422] 2.6 Cluster Incl. Z85986:Human DNA sequence from clone 108K11 on chromosome 6p21 Contains SRP20 (SR protein family member), Ndr protein kinase gene similar to yeast suppressor protein SRP40, EST and GSS/cds=(0,932)/gb=Z85986 gi=4034056/ug=Hs.152400/len=933
[0423] 2.6 Zinc Finger Protein, Kruppel-Like
[0424] 2.7 D10656/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HUMCRK Human mRNA for CRK-II, complete cds
[0425] 2.7 M28211/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HUMRAB4A Homo sapiens GTP-binding protein (RAB4) mRNA, complete cds
[0426] 2.7 Cluster Incl. AB019435: Homo sapiens mRNA for putative phospholipase, complete cds/cds=(72,3074)/gb=AB019435/gi=4760646/ug=Hs.125670/len=3088
[0427] 2.8 U39318/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HSU39318 Human E2 ubiquitin conjugating enzyme UbcH5C (UBCH5C) mRNA, complete cds
[0428] 2.9 Cluster Incl. X78711: H. sapiens mRNA for glycerol kinase testis specific 1/cds=(26,1687)/gb=X78711/gi=515028/ug=Hs.1466/len=1838
[0429] 2.8 Cluster Incl. W27594:34h4 Homo sapiens cDNA/gb=W27594/gi=1307542/ug=Hs.8258/len=702
[0430] 2.8 X05360/FEATURE=cds/DEFINITION=HSCDC2 Human CDC2 gene involved in cell cycle control
[0431] 2.8 V00568/FEATURE=cds/DEFINITION=HSMYC1 Human mRNA encoding the c-myc oncogene
[0432] 2.8 Cluster Incl. L24804:Human (p23) mRNA, complete cds/cds=(232,714)/gb=L24804/gi=438651/ug=Hs.75839/len=782
[0433] 2.10 Cluster Incl. Y09443: H. sapiens mRNA for alkyl-dihydroxyacetonephosphate synthase precursor/cds=(15,1991)/gb=Y09443/gi=1922284/ug=Hs.22580/len=2074
[0434] 2.8 Cluster Incl. Z82200:Human DNA sequence from clone 333E23 on chromosome Xq21.1 Contains putative purinergic receptor P2Y10/cds=(0,1019)/gb=Z82200/gi=2370075/ug=Hs.166137/len=1020
[0435] 2.9 L05624/FEATURE=/DEFINITION=HUMMKK Homo sapiens MAP kinase kinase mRNA, complete cds
[0436] 2.9 Cluster Incl. D88357: Homo sapiens mRNA for CDC2 delta T, complete cds/cds=(27,749)/gb=D88357/gi=3126638/ug=Hs.184572/len=780
[0437] Up-regulated genes due to LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1) treatment
Fold Change/Descriptions
[0439] 4.9 Cluster Incl. AF043324: Homo sapiens N-myristoyltransferase 1 mRNA, complete cds (cds=(10,1500)/gb=AF043324/gi=3005062/ug=Hs.111039/len=4378)
[0440] 3.3 Cluster Incl. L08096:Human CD27 ligand mRNA, complete cds/cds=(150,731) (gb=L08096/gi=307127/ug=Hs.99899/len=926)
[0441] Cluster Incl. AF043325: Homo sapiens N-myristoyltransferase 2 mRNA, complete cds/cds=(46,1542)/gb=AF043325/gi=3005064/ug=Hs.122647/len=2838
[0442] 2.1 Cluster Incl. AL031681:dJ862K6.2.2 (splicing factor, arginine/serine-rich 6 (SRP55-2)(isoform 2))/cds=(106,513)
[0443] 2.1 Cluster Incl. X87838: H. sapiens mRNA for beta-catenin/cds=(214,2559)/gb=X87838/gi=1154853/ug=Hs.171271
[0444] 2.2 Cluster Incl. AW024285:wt69d06.x1 Homo sapiens cDNA, 3 end/clone=IMAGE-2512715/clone_end=3/gb=AW024285
[0445] 2.2 Cluster Incl. D38524:Human mRNA for 5-nucleotidase/cds=(83,1768)/gb=D38524/gi=633070/ug=Hs.138593
[0446] 2.2 Cluster Incl. L38935: Homo sapiens GT212 mRNA/cds=UNKNOWN/gb=L38935/gi=1008845/ug=Hs.83086/len=1165
[0447] 2.5 Cluster Incl. L12711: Homo sapiens transketolase (tk) mRNA, complete cds/cds=(98,1969)/gb=L12711/gi=388890
[0448] 2.6 Cluster Incl. AF026029: Homo sapiens poly(A) binding protein II (PABP2) gene, complete cds/cds=(1282,2202)
[0449] 2.8 Cluster Incl. X70683: H. sapiens mRNA for SOX-4 protein/cds=(350,1774)/gb=X70683/gi=36552/ug=Hs.83484
Further Examples of Use
[0450] Examples of different receptor-intracellular signalling pathways involved in different disease pathogenesis where signalling molecules according to the invention find their use are:
[0451] LPS stimulation of antigen-presenting cells (like DC, macrophages, monocytes) through different Toll-like receptors activates different signalling pathways including MAPK pathways, ERK, JNK and p38 pathways. These pathways directly or indirectly phosphorylate and activate various transcription factors, including Elk-1, c-Jun, c-Fos, ATF-1, ATF-2, SRF, and CREB. In addition, LPS activates the IKK pathway of MyD88, IRAK, and TRAF6. TAK1-TAB2 and MEKK1-ECSIT complexes phosphorylate IKKb, which in turn phosphorylates IkBs. Subsequent degradation of IkBs permits nuclear translocation of NF-kB/Rel complexes, such as p50/p65. Moreover, the P13K-Akt pathway phosphorylates and activates p65 via an unknown kinase. Some of these pathways could also be regulated by other receptor signalling molecules such as hormones/growth factor receptor tyrosine kinases (PKC/Ras/IRS pathway) and cytokine receptors (JAK/STAT pathway). In the genomic experiment with the T-cell line, several of these genes appeared to be down-regulated or up-regulated by the peptide used (LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1)). It is now clear that other peptides in T cells and the same and other peptides in other cell types similarly down-regulate or up-regulate several of these transcription factors and signalling molecules. In DC and fertilized eggs experiments, NMPF had the ability to modulate growth factor (GM-CSF, VEGF) and LPS signalling. Some diseases associated with dysregulation of NF-kB and related transcription factors are: Atherosclerosis, asthma, arthritis, anthrax, cachexia, cancer, diabetes, euthyroid sick syndrome, AIDS, inflammatory bowel disease, stroke, (sepsis) septic shock, inflammation, neuropathological diseases, autoimmunity, thrombosis, cardiovascular disease, psychological disease, post-surgical depression, wound healing, burn-wounds healing and neurodegenerative disorders.
[0452] PKC plays an essential role in T cell activation via stimulation of for example AP-1 and NF-kB that selectively translocate to the T cell synapse via the Vav/Rac pathway. PKC is involved in a variety of immunological and non-immunological diseases as is clear from standard text books of internal medicine (examples are metabolic diseases, cancer, angiogenesis, immune mediated disorders, diabetes, etc.).
[0453] LPS and ceramide induce differential multimeric receptor complexes, including CD14, CD11b, Fc-gRIII, CD36, TAPA, DAF and TLR4. This signal transduction pathway explains the altered function of monocytes in hypercholesterolemia and lipid disorders.
[0454] Oxidized low-density lipoproteins contribute to stages of the atherogenic process and certain concentrations of oxidized low-density lipoproteins induce apoptosis in macrophages through signal transduction pathways. These pathways are involved in various vascular diseases such as atherosclerosis, thrombosis, etc.
[0455] Bacterial DNA is recognized by cells of the innate immune system. This recognition requires endosomal maturation and leads to activation of NF-kB and the MAPK pathway. Recently it has been shown that signalling requires the Toll-like receptor 9 (TLR9) and the signalling adaptor protein MyD88. Recognition of dsRNA during viral infection seems to be dependent on intracellular recognition by the dsRNA-dependent protein kinase PKR. TLRs play an essential role in the immune system and they are important in bridging and balancing innate immunity and adaptive immunity. Modulation of these receptors or their downstream signalling pathways are important for the treatment of various immunological conditions such as infections, cancer, immune-mediated diseases, autoimmunity, certain metabolic diseases with immunological component, vascular diseases, inflammatory diseases, etc.
[0456] Effect of growth factor PDGF-AA on NF-kB and proinflammatory cytokine expression in rheumatoid synoviocytes; PDGF-AA augmented NF-kB activity and mRNA expression of IL-1b, IL-8 and MIP-1a. Therefore, PDGF-AA may play an important role in progression of inflammation as well as proliferation of synoviocytes in RA.
[0457] Dendritic cell (DC) activation is a critical event for the induction of immune responses. DC activation induced by LPS can be separated into two distinct processes: first, maturation, leading to up-regulation of MHC and costimulatory molecules, and second, rescue from immediate apoptosis after withdrawal of growth factors (survival). LPS induces NF-kB transcription factor. Inhibition of NF-kB activation blocked maturation of DCs in terms of up-regulation of MHC and costimulatory molecules. In addition, LPS activates the extracellular signal-regulated kinases (ERK), and specific inhibition of MEK1, the kinase which activates ERK, abrogates the ability of LPS to prevent apoptosis but does not inhibit DC maturation or NF-kB nuclear translocation. This shows that ERK and NF-kB regulate different aspects of LPS-induced DC activation. Our DC data and NF-kB data also show the various effects of NMPF peptide on DC maturation and proliferation in the presence or absence of LPS. NMPF peptides modulate these pathways and are novel tools for the regulation of DC function and immunoregulation. This opens new ways for the treatment of immune diseases, particularly those in which the immune system is in disbalance (DC1-DC2, Th1-Th2, regulatory cell, etc.).
[0458] DC mediate NK cell activation which can result in tumor growth inhibition. DC cells and other antigen-presenting cells (like macrophages, B-cells) play an essential role in the immune system and they are also important in bridging and balancing innate immunity and adaptive immunity. Modulation of these cells or their downstream signalling pathways are important for the treatment of various immunological conditions such as infections, cancer, immune-mediated diseases, autoimmunity, certain metabolic diseases with immunological component, vascular diseases, inflammatory diseases, etc. There is also evidence in the literature that mast cells play important roles in exerting the innate immunity by releasing inflammatory cytokines and recruitment of neutrophils after recognition of infectious agents through TLRs on mast cells.
[0459] Murine macrophages infected with Mycobacterium tuberculosis through the JAK pathway activate STAT1 and activation of STAT1 may be the main transcription factor involved in IFN-g-induced MHC class II inhibition.
[0460] It is recognized that mannose-binding lectin (MBL) through TLRs influences multiple immune mechanisms in response to infection and is involved in innate immunity. Balance between innate and adoptive immunity is crucial for a balanced immune system, and dysregulation in immune system leads to a different spectrum of diseases such as inflammatory diseases, autoimmunity, infectious diseases, pregnancy-associated diseases (like miscarriage and pre-eclampsia), diabetes, atherosclerosis and other metabolic diseases.
[0461] Nuclear factor-kappaB (NF-kappaB) is critical for the transcription of multiple genes involved in myocardial ischemia-reperfusion injury. Clinical and experimental studies have shown that myocardial ischemia-reperfusion injury results in activation of the TLRs and the complement system through both the classical and the alternative pathway in myocardial infarction, atherosclerosis, intestinal ischemia, hemorrhagic shock pulmonary injury, and cerebral infarction, etc.
[0462] Peroxisome proliferator-activated receptors (PPARs) are ligand-activated transcription factors which function as regulators of lipid and lipoprotein metabolism, glucose homeostasis, differentiation and apoptosis and modulation of inflammatory responses and influences cellular proliferation. PPAR alpha is highly expressed in liver, muscle, kidney and heart, where it stimulates the beta-oxidative degradation of fatty acids. PPAR gamma is predominantly expressed in intestine and adipose tissue, where it triggers adipocyte differentiation and promotes lipid storage. Recently, the expression of PPAR alpha and PPAR gamma was also reported in cells of the vascular wall, such as monocyte/macrophages, endothelial and smooth muscle cells. The hypolipidemic fibrates and the antidiabetic glitazones are synthetic ligands for PPAR alpha and PPAR gamma, respectively. Furthermore, fatty acid-derivatives and eicosanoids are natural PPAR ligands: PPAR alpha is activated by leukotriene B4, whereas prostaglandin J2 is a PPAR gamma ligand, as well as of some components of oxidized LDL, such as 9- and 13-HODE. These observations suggested a potential role for PPARs not only in metabolic but also in inflammation control and, by consequence, in related diseases such as atherosclerosis. More recently, PPAR activators were shown to inhibit the activation of inflammatory response genes (such as IL-2, IL-6, IL-8, TNF alpha and metalloproteases) by negatively interfering with the NF-kappaB, STAT and AP-1 signalling pathways in cells of the vascular wall. Furthermore, PPARs may also control lipid metabolism in the cells of the atherosclerotic plaque. PPARs are also involved in a variety of immunological and non-immunological diseases as is clear from standard text books of internal medicine (examples are metabolic diseases, cancer, angiogenesis, immune mediated disorders, diabetes, etc.).
[0463] As mentioned above the nuclear receptor PPARg is important in adipogenesis and lipid storage and is involved in atherosclerosis. While expressed in adipose tissue, this receptor is also expressed in macrophages and in the colon. In addition, PPARg is implicated in a number of processes such as cancer and inflammation. Moreover, microbes, via their cognate receptors, typified by the TLRs, possess the capacity to regulate PPARg-dependent metabolic functions and as such illustrate the intricate interplay between the microbial flora and metabolic control in the alimentary tract.
[0464] Cyclo-oxygenase 2 (COX2), an inducible isoform of prostaglandin H synthase, which mediates prostaglandin synthesis during inflammation, and which is selectively overexpressed in colon tumors, is thought to play an important role in colon carcinogenesis. Induction of COX2 by inflammatory cytokines or hypoxia-induced oxidative stress can be mediated by nuclear factor kappa B (NF-kappaB). So, inhibition of NF-kB modulates the COX pathway and this inhibition of NF-kB can be therapeutically useful in diseases in which COXs are involved, such as inflammation, pain, cancer (especially colorectal cancer), inflammatory bowel disease and others.
[0465] Neuronal subsets in normal brains constitutively express functionally competent C5a receptors. The functional role of C5a receptors revealed that C5a triggered rapid activation of protein kinase C and activation and nuclear translocation of the NF-kappaB transcription factor. In addition, C5a was found to be mitogenic for undifferentiated human neuroblastoma cells, a novel action for the C5aR. In contrast, C5a protects terminally differentiated human neuroblastoma cells from toxicity mediated by the amyloid A beta peptide. This shows that normal hippocampal neurons as well as undifferentiated and differentiated human neuroblastoma cells express functional C5a receptors. These results show the role of neuronal C5aR receptors in normal neuronal development, neuronal homeostasis, and neuroinflammatory conditions such as Alzheimer's disease.
[0466] Activation of the complement system also plays an important role in the pathogenesis of atherosclerosis. The proinflammatory cytokine interleukin (IL)-6 is potentially involved in the progression of the disease. Here the complement system induces IL-6 release from human vascular smooth-muscle cells (VSMC) by a Gi-dependent pathway involving the generation of oxidative stress and the activation of the redox sensitive transcription factors NF-kB and AP-1. Modulation of complement system is important for broad ranges of disorders such as blood disorders, infections, some metabolic diseases (diabetes), vascular diseases, transplant rejection and related disorders, autoimmune diseases, and other immunological diseases.
[0467] Different transcription factors like NF-kB and intracellular signalling molecules such as different kinases are also involved in multiple drug resistance. So, it is reasonable to believe that NMPF peptides will be effective against multiple drug resistance. Moreover, our genomic data shows that a number of genes and signalling molecules involved in tumorogenesis and metastasis are modulated. In addition, since oligopeptides also have effect on angiogenesis, these peptides will also be used for the treatment of cancer and related diseases whereby angiogenesis requires modulation.
[0468] Proliferative diabetic retinopathy (PDR) is one of the major causes of acquired blindness. The hallmark of PDR is neovascularization (NV), abnormal angiogenesis that may ultimately cause severe vitreous cavity bleeding and/or retinal detachment. Since NMPF peptides have angiogenesis stimulatory as well as inhibitory effects and have the ability to modulate intracellular signalling involved in growth factors (like insulin), pharmacologic therapy with certain NMPF peptides can improve metabolic control (like glucose) or blunt the biochemical consequences of hyperglycemia through mechanisms such as in which aldose reductase, protein kinase C (PKC), and PPARs are involved). For this metabolic control or diabetes (type 2) NMPF (LQGV (SEQ ID NO:1), VLPALP (SEQ ID NO:3), VLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:29), GVLPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:33), AQG, LAG, LQA, AQGV (SEQ ID NO:2), VAPALP (SEQ ID NO:22), VAPALPQ (SEQ ID NO:173), VLPALPA (SEQ ID NO:31), LPGC (SEQ ID NO:41), MTR, MTRV (SEQ ID NO:42), LQG, CRGVNPVVS (SEQ ID NO:175)) are recommended. The angiogenesis in PDR could be also treated with the above-mentioned oligopeptides.
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The invention relates to the modulation of gene expression in a cell, also called gene control, in particular in relation to the treatment of a variety of diseases. The invention provides a method for modulating expression of a gene in a cell comprising providing the cell with a signalling molecule comprising a peptide or functional analogue thereof. Furthermore, the invention provides a method for identifying or obtaining a signalling molecule comprising a peptide or functional derivative or analogue thereof capable of modulating expression of a gene in a cell comprising providing the cell with a peptide or derivative or analogue thereof and determining the activity and/or nuclear translocation of a gene transcription factor.
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This is a continuation of application Ser. No. 235,263, filed Aug. 23, 1988, now abandoned.
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The invention relates to a high efficiency switched mode power supply (SMPS) of the type designed for AC to DC power conversion as used for example in CATV systems.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Switched mode power supplies are widely used in industry for example in amplifiers used in CATV systems. Such amplifiers are required to perform under extreme environmental conditions such as power brown-outs, over voltage and lightening storms which can cause short term power interruption. The design of a power supply which can operate successfully under these conditions and at the same time be more efficient in its conversion of AC to DC would be most desirable by industries such as the cable television industry.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PRIOR ART
Switched mode power supplies are well known in the art, see for example U.S. Pat. No. 3,798,531 and SIGNETICS application note AN120, p. 8-62 to 8-67, "1987 LINEAR DATA MANUAL Volume 2 : Industrial", Signetics Corporation. AC voltage is converted to a regulated DC voltage in an SMPS by first rectifying the AC into an unregulated DC, then "chopping" the unregulated DC using an electronic switch, i.e. a transistor, which is controlled by a switching signal. The "chopped" DC is then filtered and provides the regulated DC output. Regulation is provided by a control circuit which applies the switching signal via a driver circuit to the switch.
The control circuit can be an integrated circuit such as the pulse width modulator (PWM) controller, Unitrode No. UC2842N. This circuit compares the unregulated DC with the DC output and modifies the duty cycle of the switching signal to keep the DC output voltage constant irrespective of load and line voltage changes.
Switched mode power supplies have heretofore approached efficiencies from about 70 to 82%. Although these supplies can use single ended driver circuits capable of high duty cycles, these circuits have avoided the use of pulse transformers at duty cycles over 50%, due to stability problems. In addition, these power supply designs which used only a thermistor as an in-rush surge limiter did not function properly during short power interruptions such as those caused by lightening or power brown-outs.
It is therefore an object of the instant invention to provide a switched mode power supply which demonstrates a higher conversion efficiency than that previously available resulting in lower power costs and higher profits for the industrial user.
It is a further object of the instant invention to provide a power supply with superior performance in the face of over voltage and short power interruptions such as those caused by electrical storms and power brown-outs.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The instant invention provides a switched mode power supply which provides AC to DC conversion efficiency of from about 85% to about 90%. As used in trunk amplifiers in the cable television (CATV) industry this could translate into a reduction in power costs by up to 30% over power supplies currently available.
One embodiment of the instant invention comprises an input control means, a driver means, and an output filter means comprising a bifilar wound inductor not previously used in switched mode power supplies.
The input control means comprises a surge limiting resistor which limits current flow during initial power application and this resistor is shunted by a sensitive relay during normal operation which reduces power dissipation thereby increasing efficiency. The resistor can be a negative temperature coefficient thermistor having a resistance which drops to reduce dissipation in the event of the failure of the relay. The input control means also comprises a bleeder resistor which is disconnected by the relay during normal operation of the supply also reducing power dissipation and increasing efficiency. A third resistor and a diode which supplies start-up power to the current mode PWM controller IC can also be disconnected by the relay during normal operation of the supply.
The driver means can comprise a driver circuit with a pulse transformer which provides isolation and very high switching rates at pulse duty cycles from 0 to over about 95% with excellent stability and very low power dissipation. The transformer features a low leakage inductance and a high saturation flux density and provides stable operation over a wide duty cycle range which is required for applications such as CATV power supplies which must function over a five-to-one input voltage range.
The output filter means uses an inductor which is bifilar wound. The two windings are connected in parallel to minimize DC resistance and to maximize efficiency. Although this goal could be achieved using a single winding of heavier wire, a larger toroid core would be required resulting in a higher cost of winding. In addition, the bifilar winding method reduces interwinding capacitance which simplifies the design of the output filter.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 describes a block diagram of one embodiment of the instant invention.
FIG. 2 describes a schematic diagram of the embodiment described in FIG. 1.
FIG. 3 are graphs showing conversion efficiency for embodiments of the instant invention with different A.C. inputs.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
The instant invention is a high efficiency switched mode power supply of the type generally used under conditions requiring a maximum power conversion efficiency together with maximum tolerance for short term power interruption and stability under the most rugged conditions.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an embodiment of the instant invention and describes a high efficiency AC to DC switched mode power supply with a high frequency switching rate, for example 24 kilohertz, and superior tolerance for operation under severe AC line surge and transient and overload conditions across a wide temperature range. Such a supply would be ideal for use in a CATV amplifier, for example.
AC power (for example 40 to 60 volts rms) is applied to the power supply through a fused input and passes through an input filter circuit 1 which prevents line transients from entering the power supply and prevents switching noise from leaking from the power supply into the system line. AC then passes to the input control circuit 3 which operates as described below to reduce power dissipation and increase efficiency of the power supply as described below. AC passes from the input control circuit 3 to the rectifier circuit 4 which rectifies the AC to unregulated DC. The unregulated DC is then applied to current sensor circuit 5 which sends a voltage to the output control circuit 7 which is proportional to the current flowing through current sensor circuit 5. The output control circuit 7 acts to keep the DC output of the power supply constant irrespective of load and line voltage variations, as described in more detail below.
The output control circuit 7 monitors and compares the voltage sent from the current sensor circuit 5 and the DC output voltage provided by output filter circuit 13 and provides switching pulses through driver circuit 9 to switch circuit 11 thereby controlling the flow of DC to the output filter circuit 13. The duty cycle of these pulses is inversely proportional to the difference between the DC output voltage provided by output filter circuit 13 and the unregulated DC at the output of rectifier circuit 4. The resulting high voltage pulse waveform output from switch circuit 11 is converted to a low ripple DC by output filter circuit 13 which also prevents switching noise from reaching the output of the supply.
The output filter circuit 13 can comprise a bifilar wound inductor, as described further below.
The power supply can also include crowbar circuit 15 protecting it against damage by clamping the output to ground if it exceeds a particular voltage.
FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of one embodiment of the instant invention which can exhibit a conversion efficiency of up to about 90%. AC is input at input terminal 17. Gas tube GT1 is an optional gas discharge tube which may be used for additional protection in severe surge environments. Gas tube GT1 and fuse F1 can be placed on a separate board to enable the user to access them since the main board must be well shielded against RFI on the main chassis. AC passes through fuse F1 into input filter circuit 1.
Input filter circuit 1 is comprised of varistor R2 and capacitors C1 and C17 and inductors L1 and L3 which filter the AC and substantially reduce RF noise from the input 17. The filtered AC passes from inductor L3 to the input control circuit 3 which comprises thermistor R1, which limits the in-rush surge current during initial power up; relay K1 which disconnects thermistor R1 during normal supply operation for maximum efficiency; and resistor R6 which is also disconnected by relay K1 during normal operation of the supply and which serves to discharge large electrolytic capacitors C2 and C3 of the rectifier circuit 4, if the circuit is interrupted while the AC power is still applied at the input.
Current travels from thermistor R1 of the input control circuit 3 to the rectifier circuit 4, which can be an AC/DC voltage doubler circuit comprised of C2, C3, C4, C5, D1 and D2 which converts the input AC voltage to filtered, unregulated DC voltage which is approximately equal to the peak-to-peak voltage of the AC.
Current flows from rectifier circuit 4 to current sensor circuit 5 which comprises a low loss current transformer T1 which provides isolation between the high voltage unregulated DC coming from the rectifier circuit 4 and the sensitive control circuitry of output control circuit 7. Current sensor circuit 5 also comprises diode D7 which rectifies current from the output of transformer T1 which is converted to a voltage by resistor R11. Resistor R4 terminates transformer T1 in order to prevent core saturation. In the event of a malfunction in control circuitry fuse F2 prevents severe damage to the unit due to the potentially high discharge current from C4 and C5.
Output control circuit 7 comprises a current mode pulse width modulator (PWM) controller integrated circuit (U1). In this embodiment an integrated circuit manufactured by Unitrode, No. UC2842N, is used. U1 is a state of the art integrated circuit which incorporates a precision voltage reference, a high gain error voltage amplifier, a current sense comparator, a system clock, a pulse width modulator, an undervoltage shut-down circuit, and a high current driver circuit all in an eight pin package. Operation of integrated circuit U1 is described fully in a specification sheet published February, 1986 by the Unitrode Corporation, Lexington, Mass. 02173, incorporated herein by reference. Output control circuit 7 also comprises resistor R1O and capacitor C13 which filter the voltage supplied by resistor R11 of current sensor circuit 5; resistor R8 and capacitor C14 which set a high clock frequency, for example 24 khz.; resistor R9 and transistor Q2 which provide "slope compensation" which appears as a voltage across resistor R1O in order to stabilize operation of output control circuit 7 during pulse duty cycles greater than 50%; and resistor R12 and capacitor C15 which limit the gain and frequency response of the integrated circuit U1 error amplifier. Resistors R13, R14 and R18, also comprised by output control circuit 7, form an adjustable voltage divider which lowers voltage output from output filter circuit 13 to a value compatible with the internal reference of integrated circuit U1. C1O and C12 of output control circuit 7 filter the main supply voltage and the reference voltage and R7 and D6 of output control circuit 7 supply initial start up power to integrated circuit U1. Output control circuit 7 also comprises diode D5 which supplies current to integrated circuit U1 from the DC output of the power supply during normal operation; resistor R20 which prevents peak output current from integrated circuit U1 from exceeding one amp; Schottky diode D1O which keeps negative transients from affecting integrated circuit U1; and capacitor C11 which keeps the non-symmetrical unipolar output of integrated circuit U1 from saturating pulse transformer T2 of driver circuit 9.
Driver circuit 9 receives pulses from the output control circuit 7 and comprises in addition to pulse transformer T2, resistor R19 which terminates the secondary of transformer T2 preventing core saturation; capacitor C6 and diode D3 which limit the pulse waveform which appears at the gate of transistor Q1 of switch circuit 11 to between -1 and +10 volts relative to its source leads; and resistor R3 which loads the gate of transistor Q1 of switch circuit 11 keeping gate leakage current from turning it on unintentionally when no drive pulses are present. Switch circuit 11 also comprises ultrafast switching diode D4. During normal operation, whenever transistor Q1 is not turned on, diode D4 supplies current to inductor L2 of output filter circuit 13 which has sufficient inductance to maintain its current within about 300 milliamps of the output load current of the output filter circuit 13.
Output filter circuit 13 comprises resistor R5 and capacitor C7 which form a "snubber" network to limit RFI due to the high switching rate of transistor Q1 and diode D4 of switch circuit 11 and it also comprises inductors L2 and L6 and capacitors C8 and C9 which filter the high frequency pulse waveform to low ripple DC. Inductor L5 and capacitor C18 of output filter circuit 13 filter RF noise from the output.
Inductor L2 is bifilar wound. Its two windings are connected in parallel to minimize DC resistance, thereby reducing power dissipation and increasing the AC to DC conversion efficiency of the power supply.
The crowbar circuit 15 is comprised of zener diode D9, resistor R17, capacitor C16 and SCR Q4. zener diode D9 begins conducting when the output voltage reaches a set level, causing SCR Q4 to turn on. Resistor R17 negates the effect of leakage currents in SCR Q4 and zener diode D9 and capacitor C16 keep noise from triggering the crowbar circuit 15. Since transistor Q4 will remain on as long as current flows through it, integrated circuit U1 senses the output voltage through diode D5 of control circuit 7 and shuts down operation of the supply when the voltage drops below a set level causing the output current to cease and SCR Q4 to reset. Note the shut-down operation will take place anytime the output voltage drops below a set level whether because of crowbar operation, a short circuited output or insufficient input voltage. Once integrated circuit U1 has shut down operation, its current consumption drops from about 15 milliamps to less than 1 milliamp and capacitor C1O can then begin charging through resistor R7 and diode D6 as in a normal start up. Depending on input voltage this can take anywhere from a tenth of a second to a few seconds. Whenever integrated circuit U1 is in operation, current through transistor Q1 is limited to about 3.5 amps by current sensor circuit 5. However, if the DC load is excessive, for instance if the output is short circuited, integrated circuit U1 will only operate in short pulses. This is a desirable characteristic as it limits power dissipation during overload conditions, simplifies design of the crowbar means 15 and can assist in overcoming the overload condition.
FIG. 3(a)-3(c) are graphs showing examples of efficiencies obtained with the instant invention having 60 Hz. Quasi-squareware, 60 Hz sinewave and 50 Hz sinewave inputs respectively at different current levels.
Component values are not critical to the invention and are selected based upon the desired input and output ratings of the power supply. Transformer T2 should possess a low leakage inductance and a high saturation flux density. Its turns ratio is a function of power supply output voltage and the value of diode D3.
Lower performance embodiments of the invention can be constructed which still exceed 85% efficiency, for example, relay K1 can be substituted or deleted, and inductor L2 can be replaced with a non-bifilar wound component. The invention includes embodiments which can be constructed without the unique drive circuit or input control circuit, however efficiency is lower as a result. Other switched mode PWM controllers may also be used.
Although specific embodiments of the invention have been shown and described herein it will be understood that various modifications may be made without departing from the spirit of this invention.
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A direct coupled switched mode power supply designed for the AC to DC power conversion in for example CAT TV systems and equipment. The power supply is constructed to have a conversion efficiency of between 85 and 90%. It achieves these efficiencies by utilizing a pulse transformer having a duty cycle of greater than 50% in conjunction with an output control circuit, a driver circuit and an output filter circuit all designed to work together to effect increased efficiency.
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RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] This application claims benefit to German Patent Application No. 10 2008 011 472.3, filed Feb. 27, 2008, which is incorporated herein by reference in its entirety for all useful purposes.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0002] The invention relates to novel prepolymers which are accessible from the formamides of oligomeric di- or polyamines (formamide-terminated oligomers) and di- or polyisocyanates.
[0003] Isocyanate-functional prepolymers of polyols and polyisocyanates have been known for a long time and are the basis of many existing commercial products.
[0004] For many uses, in particular in the fields of lacquers and adhesives, prepolymers having a low viscosity are desirable.
[0005] Prepolymers of diisocyanates and formamide-terminated oligomers are novel and are not known in the literature.
[0006] It has now been found that acylurea prepolymers which are distinguished by a low viscosity are accessible from formamide-terminated oligomers and polyisocyanates.
EMBODIMENTS OF THE INVENTION
[0007] An embodiment of the present invention is a prepolymer of diisocyanates and formamide-terminated oligomers.
[0008] Another embodiment of the present invention is the above prepolymer, wherein said prepolymer is of formula (I)
[0000] X-[—N(CHO)—CO—NH—R 1 —NCO] n (1)
[0009] wherein
X is an n-valent organic radical.
[0011] Another embodiment of the present invention is the above prepolymer, wherein X is a radical of formula (II)
[0000] Y-[-(CH 2 —CHR 3 —(CH 2 ) p —O) m —CH 2 —CHR 4 —(CH 2 ) 0 —] n — (II)
[0012] wherein
Y is an n-functional saturated C2-C6 radical; R 1 is a C6-C13-arylalkyl radical or a C4-C 13-alkylene radical; R 3 is hydrogen or methyl; R 4 represents hydrogen or methyl; m is a natural number from 2 to 30; n is a natural number from 2 to 4; o is 0 or 1; and p is 0, 1, or 2.
[0021] Another embodiment of the present invention is the above prepolymer, wherein,
R 4 is methyl; o is 0; and p is 0.
[0025] Yet another embodiment of the present invention is a process for preparing the above prepolymer, comprising reacting a diisocyanate with a formamide-terminated oligomer and separating any excess of said diisocyanate off by distillation.
[0026] Yet another embodiment of the present invention is a process for preparing the above prepolymer, comprising reacting
n to (n×10) moles of a diisocyanate of formula (III)
[0000] OCN—R 1 —NCO (III),
[0028] wherein
R 1 is a C6-C13-arylalkyl radical or a C4-C13-alkylene radical; and n is a natural number from 2 to 4;
[0031] with one mole of formamide-terminated oligomer of formula (IV)
[0000] X-[—NH(CHO)] n (IV),
[0032] wherein
X is a radical of formula (II)
[0000] Y-[—(CH 2 —CHR 3 —(CH 2 —O) p —O) m —CH 2 —CHR 4 —(CH 2 ) 0 —] n — (II) wherein Y is an n-functional saturated C2-C6 radical; R 1 is a C6-C13-arylalkyl radical or a C4-C13-alkylene radical; R 3 is hydrogen or methyl; R 4 represents hydrogen or methyl; m is a natural number from 2 to 30; n is a natural number from 2 to 4; o is 0 or 1; and p is 0, 1, or 2; and n is a natural number from 2 to 4;
[0044] and separating any excess of said diisocyanate off by distillation.
[0045] Yet another embodiment of the present invention is a PU shaped or foamed article comprising the prepolymer of claim 1 .
[0046] Yet another embodiment of the present invention is an adhesive comprising any of the above prepolymers.
[0047] Yet another embodiment of the present invention is a sealant comprising any of the above prepolymers.
[0048] Yet another embodiment of the present invention is a lacquer comprising any of the above prepolymers.
DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
[0049] The invention therefore provides prepolymers of diisocyanates and formamide-terminated oligomers.
[0050] These are preferably prepolymers of the general formula I
[0000] X-[—N(CHO)—CO—NH—R 1 —NCO] n (I)
[0051] wherein
[0052] X represents an n-valent organic radical, preferably a radical of the formula II
[0000] Y-[—(CH 2 —CHR 3 —(CH 2 ) p —O) m —CH 2 —CHR 4 —(CH 2 ) 0 —] n — (II)
[0053] wherein
[0054] Y represents an n-functional saturated C2-C6 radical,
[0055] R 1 represents a C6-C13-arylalkyl radical or a C4-C13-alkylene radical,
[0056] R 3 represents hydrogen or methyl,
[0057] R 4 represents hydrogen or methyl, preferably methyl,
[0058] m represents a natural number from 2 to 30,
[0059] n represents a natural number from 2 to 4,
[0060] o represents 0 or 1, preferably 0, and
[0061] p represents 1 or 2, preferably 0.
[0062] The invention also provides a process for the preparation of the prepolymers according to the invention, characterized in that diisocyanates are reacted with a formamide-terminated oligomer and the excess of diisocyanate which may be present is separated off by distillation.
[0063] Preferably, according to the invention n to (n×10) moles of diisocyanates of the formula (III)
[0000] OCN—R 1 —NCO (III),
[0064] wherein R 1 and n have the abovementioned meaning, are reacted with one mole of formamide-terminated oligomer of the formula (IV)
[0000] X-[—NH(CHO)] n (IV),
[0000] wherein X and n have the abovementioned meaning,
and the excess of diisocyanate which may be present is separated off by distillation.
[0065] Formamide-terminated oligomers, in particular the formamide-terminated oligomers of the formula (IV), are accessible, for example, by reaction of formic acid C1-C4-alkyl esters with amines of the formula (V)
[0000] X—[NH 2 ] n (V),
[0000] wherein X and n have the abovementioned meaning.
[0066] The reaction is preferably carried out in an excess of formic acid C1-C4-allyl ester, preferably methyl formate or ethyl formate, at the boiling temperature of the formic acid esters, and after the reaction of the amino group to give the formamide group has taken place, the excess and the alkanol likewise formed, preferably methanol or ethanol, is distilled off. The reaction of the polyamines V to give the formamide-terminated oligomers IV with formic acid or other formic acid derivatives, such as carbon monoxide, mixed formic acid-carboxylic acid anhydrides, low molecular weight amides or active esters of formic acid or precursor reaction products of formic acid with amide coupling reagents, such as carbodiimides or condensed phosphoric acid derivatives, is possible, but not preferred. The reaction of formamide, or the anion of formamide generated with a strong base, with alkylating reagents of the formula (VI)
[0000] X—[A] n ,
[0000] wherein X and n have the abovementioned meaning and A represents a leaving group, such as chloride, bromide, iodide, mesylate, tosylate or triflate, is likewise possible, but not preferred.
[0067] Amines of the formula (V) which are employed are, preferably, polyether-amines from BASE or Jeffamines from Huntsman. These are polyethylene glycols, polyethylene glycols or polytetrahydrofurans which are preferably amino-functionalized with a group of the structure
[0000] —CH 2 —CH(CH 3 )—NH 2
[0000] or
[0000] —CH 2 —CH 2 —CH 2 —NH 2 .
[0068] The reaction of the formamide-terminated oligomers with the isocyanates is carried out at temperatures of from 40 to 120° C. in the presence or absence, preferably in the absence, of catalysts, such as compounds of zinc or of tin. The diisocyanate is preferably employed in 3-8 times the molar amount, based on the formamide-terminated oligomer, and the excess is removed by thin film distillation in vacuo after the reaction to give the acylurea prepolymer.
[0069] Diisocyanates which are used according to the invention are e.g. 2,4-TDI, 2,6-TDI, 2,4′-MDI, 4,4′-MDI, 1,3-diisocyanatobenzene, 1,4-diisocyanatobenzene, HDI, IPDI, 4,4-diisocyanatocyclohexylmethane, bisisocyanatomethylnorbornane, bisisocyanatomethylbenzene or bisisocyanatomethylcyclohexane.
[0070] The prepolymers according to the invention can be used in all fields where the prepolymers corresponding to the prior art are also employed, such as adhesives, lacquers, PU shaped or foamed articles or sealants. In this context, they have the advantage in particular of a relatively low viscosity.
[0071] Low viscosities are particularly advantageous e.g. in the uses of “flexible packaging” or “reactive polyurethane hot-melt adhesives” (hotmelts). Flexible packaging is understood here as meaning the production of composite films by gluing with an adhesive based on polyurethane. In this case, the adhesive is typically applied in liquid form to a film and directly thereafter joined with a second film. Reactive polyurethane hot-melt adhesives are understood as meaning adhesive systems which are in the form of a melt at elevated temperatures and are applied in liquid form at these temperatures. After application and joining, the still reactive adhesive cools and thereby builds up a rapid initial strength. The final strength is achieved after complete curing with moisture from the atmosphere.
[0072] All the references described above are incorporated by reference in its entirety for all useful purposes.
[0073] While there is shown and described certain specific structures embodying the invention, it will be manifest to those skilled in the art that various modifications and rearrangements of the parts may be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the underlying inventive concept and that the same is not limited to the particular forms herein shown and described.
EXAMPLES
[0074] Starting substances used:
[0075] Desmodur® T80 (Bayer MaterialScience AG, Leverkusen, DE), an 80:20 mixture of 2,4- and 2,6-TDI,
[0076] Desmophen® 1262 BD (Bayer MaterialScience AG, Leverkusen, DE), a difunctional polypropylene oxide of molar mass M n =400,
[0077] Jeffamine® ED600 (Huntsman, UK), a difunctional amino-terminated poly-ethylene-co-propylene glycol of molar mass M n =600,
[0078] Jeffamine® D400 (Huntsman, UK), a difunctional amino-terminated polypropylene glycol of molar mass M n =400 and
[0079] Irganox® 1076 (Ciba, CH), a sterically hindered phenol.
Example 1
[0080] 400 g of formic acid ethyl ester are added dropwise to 400 g of Jeffamine® ED600 at 25° C. in the course of 4 h and the mixture is subsequently stirred for 4 h. The excess formic acid ethyl ester and the ethanol formed are then distilled off. The formamide-terminated oligomer formed is added dropwise to 2,088 g of Desmodur® T80, 1 g of Irganox® 1076 and 2 g of benzoyl chloride at 80° C. in the course of 2 h and the mixture is subsequently stirred at 80° C. for 8 h. The excess Desmodur® T80 is then separated off in a thin film distillation at 130° C.
[0081] An acylurea prepolymer having an NCO content of 9.2% and viscosities as shown in Table 1 is obtained.
Example 2
[0082] 400 g of formic acid ethyl ester are added dropwise to 400 g of Jeffamine® D400 at 25° C. in the course of 4 h and the mixture is subsequently stirred for 4 h. The excess formic acid ethyl ester and the ethanol formed are then distilled off The formamide-terminated oligomer formed is added dropwise to 2,088 g of Desmodur® T80 and 2 g of benzoyl chloride at 80° C. in the course of 2 h and the mixture is subsequently stirred at 80° C. for 8 h. The excess Desmodur® T80 is then separated off in a thin film distillation at 130° C.
[0083] An acylurea prepolymer having an NCO content of 10.4% and viscosities as shown in Table 1 is obtained.
Comparison Example
[0084] 265.98 g of Desmophen° 1262 BD are added dropwise to 535.02 g of Desmodur® T80 at 80° C. in the course of 2 h and the mixture is subsequently stirred for 8 h. The excess Desmodur® T80 is then separated off by thin film distillation at 130° C.
[0085] An acylurea prepolymer having an NCO content of 10.4% and viscosities as shown in Table 1 is obtained.
[0000]
TABLE 1
Viscosities of Examples 1 and 2 and of the
comparison example at various temperatures
Viscosity in mPas
at ° C.
Example 1
Example 2
Comparison example
25
17,357
206,280
cannot be measured
50
1,378
5,403
16800
75
275
571
1410
100
92
132
898
|
The invention relates to novel prepolymers which are accessible from the formamides of oligomeric di- or polyamines (formamide-terminated oligomers) and di- or polyisocyanates.
| 2
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FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a bi-directional prediction method for video coding at the coding/decoding end, and more particularly to a bi-directional prediction method for compressing the video, which belongs to the field of video coding/decoding.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Generic Technology of these flourishing high technology industries such as digital television, new generation mobile communications, broadband communications network and family consuming electronics focuses on multimedia of which the main content is video and audio processing technology, particularly on the data compressing technology. High-efficient video coding/decoding technology is the key of realizing high quality and low cost for storing and transmitting multimedia data. At present, the conventional coding methods include predictive coding, orthogonal transform coding, vector quantization coding, etc. All these methods are based on the signal processing theory, usually called first generation coding technology. The popular international coding standards for images are based on this coding theory which adopts coding method combined of motion compensation based on block matching, discrete cosine transform and quantization. Typically, the first joint technology committee of International Standardization Organization/International Electro-technical Commission (ISO/IEC JTC1) proposes motion picture experts group (namely to MPEG)-1, MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 and such international standards; and the International Telecom Union(ITU-T) proposes the H.26x series. These video coding standards are widely used in the industries.
All these standards for video coding adopt Hybrid Video Coding strategy normally including four main modules such as predicting, transforming, quantizing and information entropy coding. wherein, the function of predicting module is to predict the current image to be coded by using the coded and reconstructed image (inter prediction), or to predict the current image block to be coded by using the coded and reconstructed image block in images (intra prediction); the function of the transforming module is to convert the image block inputted into another space so as to converge the energy of inputted signals at transform coefficient of low frequency for lowering relativity among the elements within the image block, and being useful for compressing; the main function of quantizing module is to map the transformed coefficients into a limited element aggregate advantageous to coding; and the main function of information entropy coding module is to represent the quantized transform coefficient with variable length code according to the statistical principle. The video decoding system has similar modules, of which to reconstruct the decoded image through the procedures of entropy decoding, inverse quantizing, inverse transforming etc. Besides the above modules, the video coding/decoding system usually also includes some assistant coding tools, which dedicate to coding performance (compression ratio) of the whole system.
Most coding efficiency of video coding is from prediction based on motion compensation. The main function of the prediction based on motion compensation is to eliminate redundancy of video series on time. The procedure of the video coding. is to code each frame image of video series which is realized by the prediction module. The conventional video coding system which codes each frame image is based on. image block as a basic unit. When coding each frame image, there are intra coding (I frame), prediction coding (P frame), bi-directional prediction (B frame) coding, etc. Generally, when coding, I frame, P frame and B frame coding are interlarded, for example based on IBBPBBP sequence.
The introduction of B frame may effectively solve occlusion problem caused by different motion directions and motion rate between motion objects or between objects and their background. B frame coding may achieve a bit rate of over 200:1 for coding and compression efficiency. Coding. the image block of B frame includes four modes: direct, forward prediction, backward prediction and bi-directional prediction. Since the B frame technology needs to process forward and backward motion estimation simultaneously, higher computation complexity is needed. At the same time, in order to discriminate forward and backward motion vectors, the extra identification information is needed to introduce into.
In conventional video coding system, B frame usually possesses the motion mode of bi-directional prediction, for which can effectively eliminate inaccuracy of inter prediction caused by the rotation of images, variation of luminance, noise, etc. However, more motion vectors are needed to be coded at same time. Hence, the bit number for coding motion vector in proportion to the whole process of coding is usually more than 30%.
Therefore, if there is a method which can lower coding for motion vectors under the precondition of keeping nice bi-directional prediction performance, it will effectively improve compression ratio of coding especially meaningful for the application of video transmitting at low bit rate and lowering bit number to be needed in coding motion vectors.
SUMMARY OF INVENTION
The technical problem solved by the present invention is focused on a bi-directional prediction method for video coding at the coding end, which can lower the quantity of the motion vectors to be coded effectively without enhancing the complexity of searching for a matching block for coding in substance.
The technical solution of the present invention is as follows:
A bi-directional prediction method for video coding at the coding end comprises the steps of:
10) obtaining a forward candidate motion vector of a current image block from a forward reference image for every image block of a current B-frame by using a forward prediction mode; 20) calculating to obtain a backward candidate motion vector, a forward candidate motion vector and a backward candidate motion vector needed by a bi-directional prediction by using the forward candidate motion vector of the current image block obtained from step 10); 30) obtaining a candidate bi-directional prediction reference block by a bi-directional prediction method using the forward candidate motion vector and the backward candidate motion vector of the current image block obtained from step 20); 40) continuously setting a new reference block within a given searching scope and/or before the matching value is less than or equal to a pre-given matching threshold, repeating steps 10)-30) to select an optimal reference block; 50) coding a forward motion vector, a backward motion vector and a block residual of the image block determined by the optimal reference block into a code stream.
A bi-directional prediction method for video coding at the decoding end, comprising the steps of:
21) decoding a code stream to obtain a forward motion vector; 31) calculating to obtain a backward motion vector by using the forward motion vector obtained from step 21), therefore obtaining the forward motion vector and the backward motion vector needed for bi-directional prediction; 41) obtaining a final bi-directional prediction reference block by a bi-directional prediction method using the forward motion vector and the backward motion vector of the current image block obtained from step 31); 51) combining the prediction reference block obtained from step 41) with the corresponding block residua obtained from decoding the code stream to form a current image block.
The bi-directional predicting method for video coding of the present invention, which is also called single motion vector bi-directional prediction method, realizes the object of the bi-directional prediction by coding a single motion vector and obtaining another motion vector by computation. The method of the present invention will not enhance the complexity of searching for a matching block for coding in substance, furthermore, the method of the present invention may represent the motion of object in video more actually to obtain more accurate motion vector prediction. A new prediction coding is realized by combining the forward prediction coding and the backward prediction coding
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is a sketch drawing showing the deducing procedure of the backward motion vector in the frame coding;
FIG. 2 is a sketch drawing showing the deducing procedure of the backward-motion vector in the field coding when the motion vector of the corresponding block of the backward reference field points to some field prior to the current field in the time domain in the odd field or the even field;
FIG. 3 is a sketch drawing showing the deducing procedure of the backward motion vector in the field coding when the motion vector of the corresponding block of the backward reference field points to the odd field which belongs to the same frame as the even field;
FIG. 4 is a flowchart of the bi-directional prediction of realizing motion estimation for coding and gaining the forward motion vector to calculate the backward motion vector and finally find out the optimal matching block;
FIG. 5 shows the procedure of how to gain the forward motion vector to deduce the backward motion vector from the code stream for decoding and reconstruct some image block by the bi-directional prediction compensation finally.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
The solution provided by the present invention will be further described in details with reference to the accompanying drawings and the preferred embodiments in the following.
In the embodiments of the present invention, assuming that only a forward reference picture and a backward reference picture perform motion estimation to the image block of the current B frame at the forward and backward reference frames.
In the embodiment of the bidirectional prediction method for video coding at the coding end of the present invention, said bi-directional prediction method for coding as shown in FIG. 4 , comprises the steps of:
10) obtaining a forward candidate motion vector of a current image block from a forward reference image for every image block of a current B-frame by-using a forward prediction mode;
Said forward prediction mode particularly includes:
101) if the forward reference picture includes the given reference block, proceeding to 102), or else proceed to 103); 102) subtracting the position of the given reference block in the forward reference picture from the position of the current image block of the B frame in the current picture to obtain a motion vector as the forward candidate motion vector; ending 10); 103) selecting an image block in a forward reference picture with the same position as the image block of the current B frame to be a given reference block in the forward reference picture, and proceeding to step 102).
Because the image time interval between two Because the interval of two adjacent forward and backward frames is short without much difference, firstly select the point with the same position as that of the reference picture to be a reference point, and the forward motion vector candidate here is 0, there is no position changed between the both; if changing the reference point by the following step 40), the forward motion vector candidate would not be 0.
20) calculating to obtain a backward candidate motion vector by using the forward candidate motion vector of the current image block. obtained from step 10), therefore obtaining the forward candidate motion vector and the backward candidate motion vector needed for bidirectional prediction; the detailed procedure is as follows:
Frame Coding Mode:
In this mode, the forward candidate motion vector and the backward candidate motion vector of the current block can be calculated by the following formula:
CMV
B
=
-
(
TD
D
-
TD
B
TD
B
)
×
CMV
F
Here, TD B represents a distance in a time domain between the current frame and the forward reference frame, TD D representing a distance in a time domain between the backward reference frame and the forward reference frame, CMV F and CMV B respectively representing the forward candidate motion vector and the backward candidate motion vector corresponding to the current block of the B-frame, as shown in FIG. 1 .
Field Coding Mode:
In the odd field mode, the forward candidate motion vector and the backward candidate motion vector of the current block can be calculated by the following formula:
CMV
B
,
i
=
-
(
TD
D
,
i
-
TD
B
,
i
TD
B
,
i
)
×
CMV
F
,
i
TD B represents a distance between in a time domain the current picture and the forward reference picture, TD D represents a distance in a time domain between the forward reference picture and the backward reference picture, CMV F and CMV B respectively represents the deduced forward candidate motion vector and the backward motion vector candidate corresponding to the current block of the B-frame; the value of suffix i is determined by the odd field or even field mode, and the value of suffix i is 0 while it is the odd field mode, or the value of suffix I is 1 while it is the even field mode, as shown in FIG. 2 .
In the even field mode, if a motion vector of a corresponding block of a backward reference field points to a field prior to the current field in the time domain, the backward motion vector's deduction is consistent with that in the odd field.
When a motion vector of a corresponding block of a backward reference field points to a corresponding odd field belonging to the same frame as the even field, the a forward candidate motion vector and a backward candidate motion vector of the current block are deducted by the following formula:
CMV
B
,
1
=
(
TD
D
,
1
+
TD
B
,
1
TD
B
,
1
)
×
CMV
F
,
1
TD B represents a distance in a time domain between the current picture and the forward reference picture, TD D representing a distance in a time domain between the forward reference picture and the backward reference picture, CMV F and CMV B respectively represents the deduced forward candidate motion vector and the backward candidate motion vector corresponding to the current block of the B-frame, as shown in FIG. 3 .
30) obtaining a candidate bi-directional prediction reference block by a bi-directional prediction method using the forward candidate motion vector and the backward candidate motion vector of the current image block obtained from step 20); that is to say, averaging pixels corresponding to two prediction reference blocks pointed by the forward candidate motion vector and the backward candidate motion vector to obtain a final bidirectional prediction reference block. 40) continuously setting a new reference block within a given searching scope and/or before the matching value is less than or equal to a pre-given match threshold, repeating former three steps and finally selecting an optimal reference block; In step 40), the searching scope is a certain area centered round a reference block with the same position as the image block of the current B frame in the reference picture, the size of the searching scope is different due to the different image quality required, and the larger the searching area is, the more accurate the gained reference block is. The searching scope can be maximumly covered the whole reference picture. A sum of absolute differences (denoted by SAD) between the bi-directional prediction reference block calculated by the reference block in the entire searching scope and corresponding pixels of the block of the current B frame is the optimal reference block.
Said matching value in step 40) is a sum of absolute differences (SAD) between the bi-directional prediction reference block and corresponding pixels of the current block of the B-frame. The matching threshold is a pre-given matching value, and if the matching value is less than or equal to the matching threshold, the current reference block is the optimal reference block. Generally, compute the matching value of the reference block by taking the current reference block as the basis point from the near to the far according to some certain sequence. It has high efficiency of using the method of setting the matching threshold, which can find out the reference block fitting for the requirement to end the searching procedure of the optimal reference block without the necessity to cover all the reference points.
In the above two methods, the method of computing SAD is used to represent the difference between the bi-directional prediction reference block and the current block of the B-frame while other methods can also be adopted, for example calculating the variance of the corresponding pixel, but they are not as visual and efficient as the SAD method.
Certainly, the method of combining searching area and setting matching threshold can be adopted, as shown in FIG. 4 to compute the matching value from the near to the far in the given area so as to determine the searching scope by requirement, which is high efficient without the necessity to cover all the searching scope with high efficiency.
50) Coding the forward motion vector, the backward motion vector and block residual of the image block determined by an optimal matching block into a code stream. Said block residual includes a difference of corresponding pixels between the bi-directional reference block determined by the optimal reference block and the current block of the B frame, a difference sequence of corresponding pixels between the optimal reference block and the block of the current B frame can be directly coded or compressed conveniently for transmitting.
As shown in FIG. 5 , said bidirectional prediction decoding method of a bidirectional prediction method for video decoding of the embodiment in the present invention comprises the steps of:
21) decoding a code stream to obtain a forward motion vector; 31) calculating to obtain a backward motion vector by using the forward motion vector obtained from step 21), therefore obtaining the forward motion vector and the backward motion vector needed for bi -directional prediction; 41) obtaining a final bidirectional prediction reference block by a bi-directional prediction method using the forward motion vector and the backward motion vector of the current image block obtained from step 31); 51) combining the prediction reference block obtained from step 41) with the corresponding block residua obtained from decoding the code stream to form a current image block.
The procedure of said calculating a backward motion vector in step 31) includes:
310) discriminating a current image mode, and if it is the frame coding mode, proceeding to step 311); if it is the field coding mode, discriminating whether it is the odd field or even field, if it is the odd field, proceeding to step 312), if it is the even field, proceeding to step 313); 311) calculating to obtain a backward motion vector by the following formula:
MV
B
=
-
(
TD
D
-
TD
B
TD
B
)
×
MV
F
TD B representing a distance in a time domain between the current picture and the forward reference picture, TD D representing a distance in a time domain between the forward reference picture and the backward reference picture, MV F and MV B respectively representing the forward motion vector and the backward motion vector corresponding to the block of current B-frame; ending step 31);
312) calculating to obtain a backward motion vector by the following formula:
MV
B
,
i
=
-
(
TD
D
,
i
-
TD
B
,
i
TD
B
,
i
)
×
MV
F
,
i
TD B representing a distance in a time domain between the current picture and the forward reference picture, TD D representing a distance in a time domain between the forward reference picture and the backward reference picture, MV F and MV B respectively representing the forward and the backward motion vector corresponding to the block of current B-frame; ending step 31);
313) when a motion vector of a corresponding block of a backward reference field pointing to a field prior to the current field in the time domain, proceeding to step 312); when a motion vector of a corresponding block of a backward reference field pointing to a corresponding odd field belonging to the same frame as the even field, calculating to obtain a backward motion vector by the following formula:
MV
B
,
1
=
(
TD
D
,
1
+
TD
B
,
1
TD
B
,
1
)
×
MV
F
,
1
TD B representing a distance in a time domain between the current picture and the forward reference picture, TD D representing a distance in a time domain between the forward reference picture and the backward reference picture, MV F and MV B respectively representing the deduced forward motion vector and the backward motion vector corresponding to the block of current B-frame; ending step 31).
The procedure of said bi-directional prediction method in step 41) includes:
Averaging pixels corresponding to two prediction reference blocks pointed by the forward motion vector and the backward motion vector to obtain a final bi-directional prediction reference block.
The decoding procedure is very simple, after obtaining the forward motion vector from a code stream, calculating to obtain a backward motion vector directly, combining the bi-directional prediction reference block and the block residual into the image before coding.
The procedure can be deemed as the inverse procedure of the coding procedure.
It should be understood that the above embodiments are used only to explain, but not to limit the present invention. In despite of the detailed description of the present invention with referring to above preferred embodiments, it should be understood that various modifications, changes or equivalent replacements can be made by those skilled in the art without departing from the spirit and scope of the present invention and covered in the claims of the present invention.
|
The invention discloses a bi-directional prediction method for video coding/decoding. When bi-directional prediction coding at the coding end, firstly the given forward candidate motion vector of the current image block is obtained for every image block of the current B-frame; the backward candidate motion vector is obtained through calculation, and the candidate bi-directional prediction reference block is obtained through bi-directional prediction method; the match is computed within the given searching scope and/or the given matching threshold; finally the optimal matching block is selected to determine the final forward motion vector, and the backward motion vector and the block residual. The present invention achieves the object of bi-directional prediction by coding a single motion vector, furthermore, it will not enhance the complexity of searching for a matching block at the coding end, and may save amount of coding the motion vector and represent the motion of the objects in video more actually. The present invention realizes a new prediction coding type by combining the forward prediction coding with the backward.
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[0001] This application is entitled to the benefit of and incorporates by reference essential subject matter disclosed in Swiss Patent Application No. 2000 2009/00 having a filing date of Oct. 12, 2000.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0002] 1. Technical Field
[0003] This invention relates to an apparatus and method for forming sheet products in general and to apparatus and method for forming sheet products that utilize rolls in particular.
[0004] 2. Background Information
[0005] Two-roll rounding machines are known. In these, the sheet-metal blank to be rounded is passed between a rounding roll made of metal and a guide roll with a compressively elastic coating of a plastic material (e.g. Neoprene) with the rolls pressed against each other so that an indented region is formed in the compressively elastic coating, in which deformation of the blank around the rounding roll takes place.
[0006] Generally speaking, rounding machines should achieve the best possible rounding of the leading and trailing edge regions of the sheet-metal blank, even in small-diameter rounded sheet-metal tubes with diameters of e.g. 30-80 mm. For this reason, on three-roll rounding machines (e.g., European Patent Applications EP-A 0368686 or EP-A 0096643) the distance between the two working rolls is kept as small as possible. On two-roll rounding machines, flat zone formation is in any event slight owing to the effect of the plastic coating of the guide roll, yet an improvement is desirable here also, particularly when the rounding roll diameter is very small, in the said range of 30 to 80 mm.
[0007] Therefore one fundamental problem of the invention is to provide an improved two-roll rounding machine.
DISCLOSURE OF THE INVENTION
[0008] According to the present invention, a two-roll rounding machine is provided that includes a first compressively elastic guide roll, a compressively rigid rounding roll, and a second compressively elastic roll. The second compressively elastic roll acts on the compressively rigid rounding roll.
[0009] By the provision of an additional roll with a compressively elastic coating (hereinafter called compressively elastic roll for simplicity), further rounding can take place, and this improves the end result. Moreover this additional roll stabilizes the rounding roll by preventing deflection, which is particularly desirable when the diameter of the rounding roll is small.
[0010] Preferably, two such additional compressively elastic rolls are provided, yielding, in particular, good rounding and stabilization of the rounding roll against deflection.
[0011] Preferably also, one or more back-up rolls are provided which in turn support the compressively elastic rolls, these back-up rolls not normally being rolls with a compressively elastic coating (they may therefore be called compressively rigid rolls).
[0012] Preferably also, at least one guide is provided which leads the blank emerging from the first roll pair (guide roll, rounding roll) to the second roll pair (rounding roll, additional roll).
[0013] A further fundamental task of the invention is to provide a rounding method which does not possess the said drawbacks.
[0014] According further to the present invention, a method for rounding sheet-metal blanks is provided that utilizes a two-roll rounding machine, and wherein the sheet-metal to be rounded is passed between the first compressively elastic guide roll and the compressively rigid rounding roll at least twice. It has been found that particularly good rounding is obtained if the blank makes two passes through the rounding machine according to the invention.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0015] Embodiments of the invention will now be described in detail by way of example and with reference to the drawings.
[0016] [0016]FIG. 1 shows schematically a two-roll rounding machine in a first position.
[0017] [0017]FIG. 2 shows the rounding machine of FIG. 1 in a second position.
[0018] [0018]FIG. 3 shows a further embodiment of a rounding machine according to the invention.
[0019] [0019]FIG. 4 shows an embodiment with a guide.
[0020] [0020]FIG. 5 shows a further embodiment of the present invention rounding machine.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
[0021] [0021]FIG. 1 shows highly schematically a first embodiment of a two-roll rounding machine 1 . This machine has a machine frame, represented simply as a box 2 , in which the journals of the machine's rolls and rollers are mounted, their axes in this schematic representation being assumed perpendicular to the plane of the drawing. A drive represented simply as a box 17 for the live rolls, and an electronic control 16 which controls the drive, are also provided in or on the machine frame. In FIG. 1 the guide roll 3 of the rounding machine is shown with its coating 5 which is elastically deformable in compression. This coating is a plastic coating known in the context of such machines, and will not be described in detail here. Because of this coating, the roll 3 will hereinafter be referred to as the compressively elastic guide roll. The roll is mounted in the machine frame 2 rotatably about its axis 4 . 6 denotes the rounding roll of the rounding machine; this roll does not carry a compressively elastic coating, and will therefore be referred to as the compressively rigid rounding roll. FIG. 1 shows this roll parted from the guide roll 3 so that the sheet-metal blank 20 to be rounded can be pushed between the rolls.
[0022] [0022]FIG. 2, in which the same reference numbers denote the same elements as in FIG. 1, shows the actual rounding position, in which the rounding roll 6 is pressed against the guide roll 3 and makes an indentation in the compressively elastic coating 5 of the guide roll, the effect of which is that the blank is pressed on to the rounding roll. The blank is rounded in the conventional way by means of these two rolls 3 and 6 , by driving the rounding roll 6 by means of the drive 17 , which turns the rolls as shown by arrows in FIG. 2 and causes the blank 20 to be drawn between the rolls 3 and 6 and rounded around the roll 6 .
[0023] In the embodiment of the invention shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, two additional compressively elastic rolls, i.e. rolls which likewise have a plastic coating, are provided, which bear on the compressively rigid rounding roll 6 . In the illustrated example, these two rolls 8 and 11 , with their coatings 10 and 13 and axes 9 and 12 , which extend parallel with the axes 4 and 7 of the rolls 3 and 6 , are arranged on either side of the rounding roll 6 , in the region facing away from the guide roll 3 . The rolls 8 and 11 are symmetrically arranged with respect to the plane E passing through the axes 4 and 7 . One effect of the compressively elastic rolls 8 and 11 is to produce further rounding of the blank 20 around the compressively rigid rounding roll 6 . Another effect of these rolls is to support the rounding roll 6 , which is particularly advantageous in the case of rounding rolls 6 of small diameter, particularly in the diameter range of 30-80 mm.
[0024] With the configuration shown, the blank 20 , which peels away again from the rounding roll 6 after the initial rounding between it and the guide roll 3 , can impinge more or less obtusely on the roll 8 , or on the coating 10 of the roll 8 . This may result in an undesired bowing or buckling of the blank, which, however, is subsequently removed in the re-forming as the blank passes between the rolls 8 and 6 and also between the rolls 11 and 6 . Particularly good rounding results if the blank 20 makes two passes through the said rolls, that is to say, after the first rounding operation by means of the roll pairs 3 and 6 , 8 and 6 , and 11 and 6 , it is passed one more time through the rolls 3 and 6 followed again by the rolls 8 and 6 and 11 and 6 . This reliably eliminates any unrounded, or incorrectly rounded, portions. The control 16 of the machine is suitably configured to effect a double pass of each blank.
[0025] In order that the rounded blank 20 can be removed, the rounding roll 6 is parted again from the guide roll 3 as shown in FIG. 1, and the rolls 8 and 11 are also parted from the rounding roll 6 , in order that the rounded blank can be withdrawn from the rounding machine in a direction perpendicular to the plane of the drawing. The rolls 8 and 11 may be moved with a translational motion downwards in the drawing, or each of their axes 9 and 12 may be swung outwards about a pivotal axis so that the rolls 8 and 11 release the rounding roll 6 . The rolls 8 and 11 are then brought back into the position shown in FIGS. 1 and 2 for the next rounding operation.
[0026] Instead of being continuous, the rolls 8 and 11 may be designed and constructed as a series of coaxial rolls spaced apart from one another.
[0027] Preferably, a back-up roll 14 is also provided to support the compressively elastic rolls 8 and 11 in their turn. In the example shown the back-up roll 14 is mounted rotatably about an axis 15 and is a compressively rigid back-up roll; i.e. it does not have an elastic coating.
[0028] [0028]FIG. 3 shows a further embodiment, with the same reference numbers as used hitherto designating the same elements. Here also, rounding of the blank 20 takes place between the compressively elastic guide roll 3 and the compressively rigid rounding roll 6 . Underneath the latter, only a single compressively elastic roll 21 , with coating 23 , is provided in this embodiment, and is arranged rotatably about an axis 22 . Again, the roll may be made up of a plurality of individual rollers. Underneath this roll, a compressively rigid back-up roll 24 is, again, mounted on an axis 25 , to provide support for the roll 21 . The roll 21 serves to round the blank and support the rounding roll 6 in the manner which has already been described.
[0029] [0029]FIG. 4 shows a further embodiment, again with the same reference numbers used to denote the same elements. Here again an embodiment with two compressively elastic rolls 8 and 11 is shown, to which is added a guide 30 which by its guide face 31 receives and guides the rounded blank emerging between the rolls 3 and 6 , so that the rounded blank is introduced between the rolls 8 and 6 in a suitable position. The guide 30 reliably prevents upsetting or buckling of the blank 20 upon initial contact with the roll 8 . In this case a single pass of the blank through the roll pairs 3 and 6 , 8 and 6 , and 11 and 6 is usually sufficient.
[0030] [0030]FIG. 5 shows a further embodiment, with the same reference numbers again designating the same elements. This embodiment differs from that of FIGS. 1 and 2 (and 4 ) in that, besides the back-up roll 14 common to the rolls 8 and 11 , individual back-up rolls 32 and 33 are additionally provided for the rolls 8 and 11 respectively. The rolls 32 and 33 are rotatable about axes 34 and 35 respectively. Of course, the cycle of insertion and offloading that has been described, and the corresponding drive and control, and the building-up of individual rolls from separate coaxial rollers as already described, apply to this example also.
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On a two-roll rounding machine, in addition to a compressively elastic guide roll and a compressively rigid rounding roll, one or more compressively elastic rolls are provided which have both a rounding function and a supporting function for the rounding roll. These additional rolls may also be supported by a back-up roll. The result is a rounding machine that has very good rounding characteristics even at small rounding diameters.
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[0001] This is a Continuation-In-Part of application Serial No. U.S. Ser. No. 11/704,754, Filed Feb. 9, 2007 for “Hollow Reamer For Medical Applications”, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated in its entirety by reference thereto.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0002] 1. Field of the Invention
[0003] The present invention relates to a modular easily assembled tapered or spherical hollow reamer for medical applications having a disposable cutter that includes one or more bone debris capturing cavities; and more particularly, to a hollow tapered or spherical reamer having a disposable reamer assembly, which can be attached or detached to a reusable shaft portion using a special tool, wherein the assembly is aided by a guide pin.
[0004] 2. Description of the Prior Art
[0005] Reaming of the internal canal of bones is required in many surgical procedures of orthopedic surgery. Such procedures include hip replacement, knee replacement and shoulder replacement. Reamers are also used in procedures that involve the internal fixation of fractures. Prior art reamers for reaming internal canal in bones typically use a rigid or a flexible shaft. Typically, reaming of the internal bone canal is achieved through utilization of a solid cylindrical or tapered reamer. Solid cylindrical or tapered reamers currently utilized are required to cut both cancellous bone (spongy bone) and cortical bone (hard bone). Cortical bone is generally denser and stronger, requiring an efficient cutter to machine the canal for a proper fit of the implant. Conventional reamers can cut cortical bone initially but can quickly dull after a single use, or at best a few uses. Once the reamer has dull cutting edges, it reduces the efficiency of bone cutting and in addition generates sufficient friction/heat to damage or kill the surrounding bone. These prior art solid cylindrical or tapered reamers are intended for multiple uses and therefore become less efficient after each surgery, resulting in poor cutting performance and bone necrosis. Dull blades also incorporate bone debris or bone cement debris into the living bone tissue, creating bone healing problems. Similar problems are also encountered in reaming a spherical cavity for the attachment of an acetabular cup.
[0006] U.S. Pat. No. 4,116,200 to Braun et al. discloses a milling tool for surgical purposes. The surgical milling tool is a hand-operated milling machine for milling the heads or sockets of bone joints and has a spherical shape. The tool is formed of a hemispherical cup integrally formed with a cylindrical skirt and flange and is provided with a plurality of openings of semi-oval shape, each having a cutting edge arranged at the minor axis of the oval shape. The openings are situated such that, upon rotation of the cup, the cutting edges thereof overlap to provide a continuous cutting edge surface conforming generally to the shape of the cup. The hemispherical shape of the cup provides the ability to hollow out the arcuate shape of the bone joints. Bone and cartilage shavings are formed during the milling process and are collected in a border area inside of the hemispherical cup. The surgical milling tool is provided for multiple uses and therefore the tool tends to become less efficient after each surgery, resulting in poor cutting performance and bone necrosis. Moreover, the spherically shaped reaming tool is not tapered.
[0007] U.S. Pat. No. 5,190,548 to Davis discloses a surgical reamer. This surgical bone reamer includes a rotatable, elongated shank having a proximal end, a distal end and a longitudinal axis. A reaming head mounted on the distal end. A plurality of equally spaced walls is radially disposed on the reaming head around the longitudinal axis. Tip edges for penetrating bone are defined on the radial walls to be disposed angularly with the longitudinal axis. Reaming edges joined to the tip edges extend longitudinally from the tip edges in the proximal direction parallel to and an equal radial distance from the longitudinal axis for reaming a cylindrical tunnel when the reaming head is rotated in bone. Tapered flutes disposed angularly between the tip edges and the radial walls permit bone to be evacuated through the reaming head when forming a tunnel in bone. The reaming head is provided with angular tips and edges for penetrating the bone and is thus not a single use disposable cutter. The debris created is not stored away from the cutting edge and thus previously cut material may be included in the bone.
[0008] U.S. Pat. No. 5,549,613 to Goble et al. discloses a modular surgical drill. This modular surgical drill is in the form of a rigid drill shaft and a drill bit, which are connected together by a tongue-and-groove arrangement attaching the rear end of the drill bit to the forward end of the drill shaft. Each of the shaft and drill bit are provided with through bores extending centrally through their entire length. These bores become aligned upon assembly of the drill bit and shaft. The modular drill is intended to be employed with a guidewire for drilling holes into bone. The assembled drill bit and shaft are placed on the guidewire and moved down such guidewire into contact with the bone, whereupon a tunnel may be formed into the bone by rotating and advancing the drill bit along the guidewire. The dimensions of the bore and guidewire are so selected as to prevent the drill bit and drill shaft from moving relative to one another once they are assembled and mounted on the guidewire. Debris created during drilling is not removed and collected away from the cutting location. The central bore is solid and as such does not receive cut bone debris. The cutter used is not disposable.
[0009] U.S. Pat. No. 5,556,399 to Huebner discloses a bone-harvesting drill apparatus and method for its use. A coring drill harvests bone from a donor area of the human body. The drill bit is formed with a cylindrical, hollow shaft and a half-conical tip or cutting head. The cutting head is provided with a sharpened edge, which meets at an apex with a non-sharpened edge, forming an obtuse angle of approximately 120 degrees. The sharpened edge is configured to cut into bone when the drill bit is rotated in a clockwise direction. With the apex directed against a section of bone, the cutting edge sheers off fragments of bone, which are then drawn upwardly through the hollow shank of the drill bit. As the drill bit is forced downwardly, continuous cutting action occurs and the morselized bone can then be removed from the shank and used to build-up bone in other areas to which it is transplanted. The drill bit fittingly mates on the distal end a fitting that renders the drill bit physically compatible with a conventional chuck. The bit includes a pair of diametrically opposed, oppositely inclined recesses that cooperate with a crossbar member within a bit-receiving bore of the fitting. When the aligned drill bit is pressed into the fitting, the crossbar member cams along the inclined recesses causing the bit to rotate relative to the fitting. The resulting frictional engagement between the recesses and the crossbar member, along with a detent assembly between the bit and the fitting, securely lock the bit onto the distal end of the fitting, yet render removal possible by the use of a removal tool. The bone harvesting tool provides a non-disposable cutter. Reuse of the cutter dulls the beveled lip edges. Moreover, the harvested bone collection central bore requires a thorough cleaning prior to each use, creating contamination possibilities.
[0010] U.S. Pat. No. 5,690,634 to Muller et al. discloses a medullary drill head. This drill head for intramedullary drilling has a front part, a middle part and a rear part and is shaped as a hollow body of revolution. The front and rear parts have spiral slots formed with cutting edges. The rear part has an attachment for coupling to a drilling shaft. The drill head is not disposable, and as a result, the drill head is continuously reused, resulting in dulling of the cutting edges. Moreover, the drill head includes three openings in the form of spirally shaped slots configured to have cutting edges similar to a grater; and has no place to collect bone debris.
[0011] U.S. Pat. No. 5,954,671 to O′Neill discloses a bone harvesting method and apparatus. This apparatus and method harvests bone using a manual, cylindrical, multi-directional coring device with a guided delivery system that can be inserted through a percutaneous or closed approach to extract precisely measured amounts of bone or bone marrow. A series of guide wires, obturators, dilators and cannulas are used as the exposure and delivery instrumentation for a cutting tool. The cutting tool has a tip with six cutting edges for cutting in all directions. This apparatus is a manual, cylindrical, multi-directional coring device with a guided delivery system to extract precisely measured amounts of bone or bone marrow. The cutter portion of the device is not disposable and is subject to wear and dull edges. This coring device does not suggest a tapered reamer.
[0012] U.S. Pat. No. 5,976,144 to Fishbein et al. discloses a hollow dome reamer with removable teeth. This surgical reamer has a hollow dome with apertures spaced apart arranged in arcs extending from an apex of the dome to the base portion of the dome, and removable teeth positioned in the apertures. Each cutting tooth has (i) a flange that is aligned flush with the external surface of the dome, (ii) a raised cutting edge extending above the flange and the external surface of the dome, and (iii) an interior passageway communicating between the outside and inside of the dome. A base plate may be removably secured on the base portion of the dome to provide closure for the central cavity of the dome. Although the teeth are removable, they are not disposable in nature; the teeth are removed for replacement or for re-sharpening and are used again. Removal of the small teeth may be cumbersome and difficult, and may even pose a danger during removal as the person removing the teeth may be cut by the sharp edges; replacement of the teeth into the apertures of the reamer will likely pose the same problems. The bone debris is not collected away from the cutting edges of the teeth. This hollow domed reamer has a spherical shape; does not suggest a tapered reamer.
[0013] U.S. Pat. No. 5,980,170 to Salyer discloses a tool driver. This tool driver has a shaft with a longitudinal axis and opposite ends. A boss is secured at one of the shaft ends by which the tool driver is connected to a rotary tool. A tool collate is secured at the other of the shaft ends by which the tool driver may be driven by a surgical hand piece having a chuck in which the collate may be positioned. The boss has a distal end surface with a groove therein. Both the groove and the distal end surface extend transversely of the axis. A pin is positioned in the groove on the axis. A latch mechanism is provided to hold a mounting bar of a rotary tool in the groove on the pin, whereby the rotary tool is held exactly coaxially of the driver during use. The rotary tool, which is used with the driver has a bar containing the same dimensions as the groove in the boss of the tool driver. The bar thus fills and is complementary to the slot. The bar has a hole therein which is complementary to the pin. The pin extends coaxially of the shaft and the boss. The bar hole in which the pin of the tool driver is positioned is precisely coaxial of the axis of the tool about which the cutting edges are precisely positioned. The cutters are connected to the tip of the shaft and are spherical in nature for joint and patella reaming. In addition, the reamer cups are not disposable in nature. The bone fragments are not collected and kept away from the cutting edge. This spherically shaped reamer is not tapered.
[0014] U.S. Pat. No. 6,193,722 to Zech et al. discloses a hollow milling tool. The hollow milling tool produces substantially hollow cylindrical depressions in human or animal tissue. It also produces tissue pillars, which are removed at a harvest location, transported to a defect location and implanted. The hollow milling tool has teeth for the ablation of tissue which are arranged at the distal end of the milling tool at the end side. Furthermore, the milling tool has passages for transporting a cooling fluid to a cooling region of the milling tool lying near the distal end during the ablation of tissue. Teeth are constructed within the milling tool for accomplishing the depressions. These teeth will eventually need sharpening as the tool is used over time. No structure is contained within the '722 patent that discloses or suggests a tapered reamer.
[0015] U.S. Pat. No. 6,332,886 to Green et al. discloses a surgical reamer and method of using same. This device is used for expedited reaming of a medullary canal. The device includes a reamer head connected at the distal end of a rotatable drive shaft. The reamer head has a cutting head with five blades and flutes therebetween. Each blade has a front cutting portion. The blades can also include a side cutting portion. The method for removing material from the medullary canal of a bone includes the steps of reaming an area of the medullary canal to remove material; irrigating the material to be removed while reaming to reduce generation of heat and move removed material from the reaming area; and aspirating the removed material while reaming to create a negative intramedullary canal pressure to assist in the removal of the material. The blades and flutes at the reamer are reused and are subject to dulling. The bone chips are to be removed by the irrigating fluid, which means they are always present adjacent to the cutting portions and may be forced into the bone tissue. No disclosure in the '886 patent suggests a tapered reamer.
[0016] U.S. Pat. No. 6,451,023 to Salazar et al. discloses a guide bushing for a coring reamer, storage package for reamer assembly, and method of use. This guide bushing for a coring reamer has a tapered member with its largest diameter at its first end so that the guide bushing frictionally engages an internal surface of the reamer with a line contact. The guide bushing has a passage sized to slidably receive a guide pin. In use, the bushing advances in the proximal direction within the coring reamer along a guide pin while the excavated bone enters the passageway through the reamer. A storage package specifically designed for the reamer assembly is employed to remove the excavated bone from within the reamer. The package has a closed distal end and an open proximal end closeable with a cap. With the coring reamer received in cantilevered fashion through a central opening of the cap of the tube, and with an adapter that couples the coring reamer to a handpiece installed, a wrench is placed over the adapter and turned while the user grips peripheral surfaces of the cap to prevent rotation of the coring reamer. A plunger is inserted through the opening and through the coring reamer from the proximal end. The plunger is pushed through the reamer until the bone core and bushing fall out of the distal end of the coring reamer. The guide bushing for a coring reamer is appointed with an open end surrounded by peripheral teeth. The teeth are arranged peripheral to the body of the tube of the reamer. The tube is hollow and therefore excavated bone accumulates therewithin. The reamer, bushing and packaging are disposed of after use. The '023 patent discloses a bone excavating tool that does not prepare the bone canal for implantation of femoral implants. No structure is disclosed therein that suggests a tapered reamer.
[0017] U.S. Pat. No. 7,074,224 to Daniels et al. discloses a modular tapered reamer for bone preparation and associated method. This kit is for use in performing joint arthroplasty and includes a trial and a reamer. The reamer is said to be useful when preparing a cavity in the intramedullary canal of a long bone with the use of a driver, and to assist in performing a trial reduction. The reamer includes a first portion for placement at least partially in the cavity of the long bone and a second portion operably connected to the first portion. The reamer is removably connected to the driver to rotate the reamer. The trial is removably attachable to the reamer. This tapered reamer is not disposable and does not have provision for accumulating bone debris away from the cutting portion of the bone.
[0018] U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2005/0113836 to Lozier et al. discloses an expandable reamer. This expandable reamer includes a cannulated shaft and a plurality of straight cutting blades having deformable points. The blades are hingably outwardly rotatable at the deformation points between a contracted position and an expanded position. In the contracted position, the blades are substantially parallel to the longitudinal axis of the cannulated shaft and, in the expanded position, the blades have at least a portion oriented radially outward from the longitudinal axis, thereby forming a larger diameter cutting surface in the expanded position and in the contracted position. The blades are formed from a portion of the cannulated shaft by, e.g. milling longitudinally extending slots through the wall of the cannulated shaft. The slots serve as flutes dividing the cutting edge and trailing edge of each adjacent blade. Each blade may also include more than one segment arranged along its length, the segments being coupled by deformation points. The expandable reamer may be used for cutting a cavity in a bone or other structure that is larger than the diameter of the entry point into the bone and greater than the diameter of the contracted reamer. The expandable reamer is not disposable. Since the expandable blades are deformably attached to the cannulated shaft, the cut bone debris is not collected away from the bone cutting region. As a result, fragments of cut bone debris may be pushed into the bone tissue by the deformable rotating blades.
[0019] U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2006/0004371 to Williams et al. discloses an orthopedic reamer. This orthopedic reamer is for use in creating and sizing canals in a bone. The orthopedic reamer includes a non-polymeric cutting portion having at least one cutting surface thereon and a polymeric body portion covering at least a portion of the cutting portion. The at least one cutting surface is not covered by the polymeric body portion. The orthopedic reamer provides cutting components including a blade or saw like construction, rather than the plurality of teeth. Although the orthopedic reamer is appointed for disposability, the publication requires that the entire reamer, and not just the cutting portion, be disposed of. That is to say, the entire reamer, including the non-polymeric cutting portion and the polymeric body portion of the device are all disposed of; not just the cutter.
[0020] There remains a need in the art for a low cost modular easily assembled hollow tapered or spherical reamer for medical applications having a disposable hollow cutter assembly. Also needed in the art is a disposable hollow cutter assembly of the type described, which can be attached to a reusable shaft portion that provides means for reaming of the internal canal of bones or hemi-spherical bone cavities. Further needed in the art is a cutter assembly having means for collecting bone debris, thereby reducing heat build up by friction effects at the bone-cutter interface and keeping the collected debris displaced from the cutting edges, so that after one use of the reamer a new hollow cutter assembly can be utilized and the old hollow cutter assembly can be discarded.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0021] The present invention provides a low cost, modular, easily assembled hollow tapered or spherical reamer that has a space for bone debris collection for medical applications and has a disposable cutter assembly. The cutter assembly is attached to a reusable shaft portion assisted by a guide pin using a special attachment tool.
[0022] The first group of embodiments of the invention relates to the attachment of a tapered hollow reamer to a reusable shaft using a special tool to precisely align the centerline of the shaft with that of the tapered hollow reamer assisted by a guide pin. The hollow reamer has its distal end permanently connected to a pilot provided with a central aperture for the insertion of guide pin during assembly. This central aperture may also be used to guide the reamer in a desired reaming direction by using a guide pin that is inserted into a bone cavity. The proximal other end of the reamer has a tapered interior that matches the taper provided on a external surface of a tapered body element provided on the distal end of the reusable shaft. Thus, when the reusable shaft is inserted and advanced into the reamer during assembly aided by the guide pin, the guide pin centers the reamer with respect to the center line of the shaft while the taper on the external surface of the tapered body element of the shaft engages the interior taper of the reamer, further assuring concentricity of alignment between the shaft and the reamer.
[0023] In a first variant of the first embodiment, the guide pin is barbell shaped. It connects the tapered hollow reamer pilot to the reusable shaft and is left within the reamer assembly, providing additional strength to the assembled hollow tapered reamer. This left-behind guide pin provides additional flexural strength to the reamer and thus is ideally suited for use in reaming the bone canal in a previously undrilled bone or a non-cannulated application. The torque transmission between the shaft and the reamer is accomplished through one or more torque transmission tabs in the tapered interior of the proximal end of the reamer, engaging with one or more slots present in the tapered body element of the shaft.
[0024] In a second variant of the first embodiment, a cylindrical guide pin is used to connect the tapered hollow reamer pilot to the reusable shaft during assembly. The cylindrical guide pin is then removed leaving behind a central hole in the assembled reamer, which may be advantageously used to guide the reamer in the bone cavity when a guide pin is inserted into the bone at a selected location This second variant of the tapered hollow assembled reamer with a removable cylindrical guide pin is most suited for cannulated application, wherein a bone cavity is already present and is commonly used for enlarging a bone cavity or removing previously used adhesive cements in a bone cavity prior to insertion of a fresh bone stem. The torque transmission between the shaft and the reamer is accomplished through one or more torque transmission tabs in the tapered end of the tapered hollow reamer engaging with one or more slots present in the tapered body element of the shaft similar to the first variant of the first embodiment discussed above.
[0025] A third variant of the first embodiment uses a guide pin with threading attachment means provided both on the distal end and on the proximal end. The guide pin distal end has a threaded male end that engages with a threaded aperture provided in the pilot potion of the tapered hollow reamer, assuring concentricity of the reamer with respect to the centerline of the shaft. The guide pin also has a threaded male member at its proximal end, which engages with corresponding threaded aperture in the tapered body element of the reusable shaft. The threads in the proximal and distal end are similar in thread orientation in that they both tighten when the shaft or guide pin is turned in the same direction. This assembly may be conveniently accomplished by turning the guide pin, first using a socket inserted through the aperture in the pilot securing the pilot of the reamer to the guide pin. Next, the shaft is turned about its axis to engage the threads of the proximal end of the guide pin with the threads within the central aperture of the shaft tapered body element until the tapered body element snugly contacts the proximal end taper of the reamer further assuring concentricity of the reamer with respect to the centerline of the shaft. Torque transmission between the shaft and the reamer is accomplished by the threaded connections between the shaft and the guide pin and between the guide pin and the reamer. This assembled reamer has the guide pin present within the reamer and thus provides additional flexural strength to the reamer and thus is useful both for non-cannulated and cannulated applications. A cannulated application requires the guide pin to have a central aperture allowing a guide pin inserted in the bone cavity or bone surface to guide the reaming direction.
[0026] The second embodiment of the invention relates to attaching a spherical hollow reamer to a reusable shaft using a special tool precisely aligning the centerline of the shaft with that of the spherical hollow reamer assisted by a guide pin. This guide pin has both distal and proximal ends threaded similar to the third variant of the first embodiment and is used to assemble a spherical hollow reamer with a reusable shaft. The shaft has a tapered body element that engages a taper present in the interior of the hollow tapered reamer during assembly ensuring concentricity of the spherical hollow reamer with respect to the centerline of the reusable shaft providing wobble-free reaming of a spherical cavity. The guide pin is not removed and provided additional rigidity to the spherical hollow reamer assembly. The threads in the distal and proximal ends are similar in thread orientation in that they both tighten when the shaft or the guide pin is turned in the same direction. This assembly may be conveniently accomplished by first turning the guide pin using a socket inserted through a central aperture of the spherical hollow reamer for engagement of the spherical hollow spherical reamer with guide pin followed by turning the shaft to engage the proximal end of the guide pin with the shaft. Torque transmission between the shaft and the reamer is accomplished by the threaded connections between the shaft and the guide pin and between the guide pin and the reamer.
[0027] The tool for assembling the first embodiment comprises a tool member with a fixed jaw in the distal end and an adjustable jaw in the proximal end, which may be moved by hand pressure application similar to a glue gun. The hollow tapered reamer with the inserted guide pin of the first and second variant of the first embodiment is placed on the fixed end of the tool member. The tapered body element central aperture of the shaft is next aligned with the protruding guide pin and one or more torque transmitting tabs are aligned with the corresponding one or more slots of the shaft tapered body element. The shaft is first pushed in manually followed by forceful displacement of the shaft into reamer until the conical taper of the interior of the reamer engages the conical taper of the tapered body element on the distal end of the shaft. At this stage, the barbell of the guide pin of the first variant of the first embodiment is seated against the pilot of the reamer. Now, the adjustable end of the tool bends the outer proximal edge of the reamer against the proximal end of the tapered body element of the shaft thereby securing the shaft against the reamer while maintaining the concentricity. In the case of the second variant of the first embodiment, the guide pin is withdrawn from the pilot exposing the central aperture within the reamer which may be used to accept a bone inserted guide pin that guides the reaming direction precisely along a pre-selected path. The assembly procedure according to third variant of the first embodiment and the second embodiment which attaches a spherical hollow reamer to a reusable shaft using a threaded connection is similar in that the guide pin is turned first using a hex nut in order to bring the guide pin within the threaded aperture of the pilot or the central aperture of the spherical reamer. Next, the shaft is turned on its axis to engage the threads of the proximal end of the guide pin with the threads in the distal end of the central aperture of the tapered body element of the shaft. At the same time, the conical taper of the tapered body element of the shaft engages the conical taper of the external surface of the tapered hollow reamer proximal of the third variant of the first embodiment or the spherical reamer of the second embodiment. In both cases, the concentricity of the reamer is maintained by the guide pin and is further assisted by the engagement of the conical taper of the reamer with the tapered body element of the shaft. The torque from the shaft is transmitted to the reamer through the two tightened threaded connections since the direction of rotation of the reamer is in the same direction as that is required for tightening the two threaded attachments.
[0028] The disassembly of the reamer is accomplished by reversing the assembly procedure using the hand tool and the used reamer is discarded since it is intended for one-time use only assuring sharp cutting teeth minimizing heat build up in the one that is being reamed.
[0029] Generally stated, the low cost easy-to-assemble reamer for medical applications comprises: (a) a disposable tapered hollow reamer or a spherical hollow reamer with a pilot permanently attached at its distal end; (b) the pilot having a central aperture for accepting a guide pin; (c) the proximal end of the tapered hollow reamer or a spherical hollow reamer provided with a tapered central aperture for accepting external taper of a tapered body element of a shaft; (d) a reusable reamer shaft having an elongated body with a distal end and a proximal end; (e) said distal end of reusable reamer shaft having a tapered body element and a central aperture for accepting a guide pin; (f) a coupling portion appointed for attachment of said reamer shaft proximal end to a drilling device; (g) a guide pin aligning the centerline of the reusable shaft and the disposable tapered or spherical hollow reamer during assembly; (h) the tapered external surface of tapered body member of reamer shaft matching a correspond taper provided in a disposable tapered hollow reamer or a disposable spherical hollow reamer, further precisely aligning the centerline of the reamer with the center line of the shaft during assembly; (i) torque transmission capability between said shaft and reamer provided by one or more tapered hollow reamer tabs engaging with matching one or more slots provided on the said tapered body element of the shaft or by having threaded attachment of the distal end of the guide pin with threads in the central aperture of the pilot and threaded attachment of proximal end of guide pin with the threads in the central aperture of the tapered body element of the shaft; (j) the bone cement debris or bone shaving produced during reaming collected within the central accumulation space of the tapered or spherical hollow reamer thereby rapidly removing bone cement debris or bone shavings from the cutting surface preventing heat build up at the bone-reamer interface.
[0030] The present invention of easily assembled modular low cost tapered or spherical hollow reamer solves the problems associated with the prior art reamers. In accordance with the present invention, the low-cost, modular tapered or spherical hollow reamer for medical applications is easily assembled and disassembled using a tool that precisely aligns the centerline of the reamer with that of the shaft during assembly, whereby the hollow reamer is attached to a reusable shaft assisted by a guide pin. Once assembled, the low cost modular tapered or spherical hollow reamer of the present invention transfers shaft torque reliably to the reamer while at the same time maintains the centerline of the reamer, preventing wobbliness thereof during cutting. Bone and bone cement fragments are collected and stored away from the bone cutting area thereby reducing the possibility of bone fragment incorporation into living bone tissue. The low cost modular tapered or spherical hollow reamer gradually crates the bone cavity due to the taper or spherical contour provided, thereby reducing heat during its surgical usage. Owing to the presence of these features, the low cost modular tapered or spherical hollow reamer of this invention is safer to use and operates more efficiently than prior art reamers.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS
[0031] The invention will be more fully understood and further advantages will become apparent when reference is had to the following detailed description of the preferred embodiments and the accompanying drawings, in which:
[0032] FIG. 1 is a perspective view depicting a medical tapered reamer found in the prior art;
[0033] FIG. 2A shows three views, FIGS. 2A.1 , 2 A. 2 and 2 A. 3 , depicting assembly of a tapered hollow reamer of the subject invention according to the first variant of the first embodiment assembled on a reusable shaft;
[0034] FIG. 2B shows three views, FIGS. 2B.1 , 2 B. 2 and 2 B. 3 , depicting details of individual components of a tapered hollow reamer of the subject invention according to the first variant of the first embodiment;
[0035] FIG. 3A shows three views, FIGS. 3A.1 , 3 A. 2 and 3 A. 3 depicting assembly of a tapered hollow reamer of the subject invention according to the second variant of the first embodiment assembled on a reusable shaft;
[0036] FIG. 3B shows three views FIGS. 3B.1 , 3 B. 2 and 3 B. 3 depicting details of individual components of a tapered hollow reamer of the subject invention according to the second variant of the first embodiment;
[0037] FIG. 4A shows three views FIGS. 4A.1 , 4 A. 2 and 4 A. 3 depicting assembly of a tapered hollow reamer of the subject invention according to the third variant of the first embodiment assembled on a reusable shaft;
[0038] FIG. 4B shows three views FIGS. 4B.1 , 4 B. 2 and 4 B. 3 depicting details of individual components of a tapered hollow reamer of the subject invention according to the third variant of the first embodiment;
[0039] FIG. 5A shows two views FIGS. 5A.1 and 5 A. 2 depicting assembly of a spherical hollow reamer of the subject invention according to the second embodiment assembled on a reusable shaft;
[0040] FIG. 5B shows three views FIGS. 5B.1 , 5 B. 2 and 5 B. 3 depicting details of individual components of a spherical hollow reamer of the subject invention according to the second embodiment; and
[0041] FIG. 6 depicts in four views FIGS. 6A , 6 B, 6 C and 6 D a perspective view of the assembly of a tapered hollow reamer according to the second variant of the first embodiment of the invention using a hand tool.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
[0042] Reaming of the internal canal of bones is required in many surgical procedures of orthopedic surgery. These procedures include hip replacement, knee replacement and shoulder replacement. Reamers are also used in procedures that involve the internal fixation of fractures. Prior art reamers typically fall into two major classes: rigid and flexible shaft. Typically, reaming of the internal bone canal is achieved through utilization of a solid cylindrical or tapered reamer. Solid cylindrical or tapered reamers currently utilized are required to cut both cancellous bone (spongy bone) and cortical bone (hard bone). Cortical bone is generally denser and stronger, requiring an efficient cutter to machine the canal for a proper fit of the implant. Conventional reamers can cut cortical bone initially but can quickly dull after a single use, or at best a few uses. Once the reamer has dull cutting edges, it reduces the efficiency of bone cutting and in addition generates sufficient friction/heat to damage or kill the surrounding bone. These prior art solid cylindrical or tapered reamers are intended for multiple uses and therefore become less efficient after each surgery, resulting in poor cutting performance and bone necrosis. These dull blades also incorporate bone debris or bone cement debris into the living bone tissue, creating bone healing problems.
[0043] If the clinical application requires a guide pin to provide a controlled path for the cutter, it requires that the design provide a complete through hole, which passes through the assembled disposable reamer and the reusable reamer shaft. The current design provides both options through the use of a guide pin. A cannulated reamer assembly uses a guide pin first to accurately align the reamer concentric with the shaft axis and is removed provided a central hole, which may be used for accepting a bone inserted guide pin that accurately sets the reaming direction. In another version of the disposable tapered hollow reamer with a reusable shaft uses a guide pin which is left behind within the assembly thereby providing additional rigidity for the tapered hollow reamer and is extremely desirable in non-cannulated application wherein a bone cavity is drilled on a fresh bone with no previously drilled cavity.
[0044] Reaming of the internal canal of bones is required during many orthopedic surgical procedures. These procedures include hip replacement, knee replacement and shoulder replacement. Other surgical procedures that see the use of reamers include internal fixation procedures for fractures. Typically, reaming of the internal bone canal is achieved through utilization of a solid cylindrical or tapered reamer, illustrated in FIG. 1 at 100 . Prior art reamers typically include a driver coupling 101 (shown as a Jacob chuck connector), a size designation 102 , a pilot tip 103 , a shaft 104 , and cutting flutes 105 . FIG. 1 shows a tapered reamer, however cylindrical reamers of similar design also exist in the prior art. Those solid cylindrical or tapered reamers currently utilized are required to cut both cancellous bone (spongy bone) and cortical bone (hard bone). Cortical bone is generally denser and stronger, requiring an efficient cutter to machine the canal for a proper fit of the implant. Conventional reamers can cut cortical bone initially but can quickly dull after a single use, or at best a few uses. Once the reamer has dull cutting edges, it reduces the efficiency of bone cutting and in addition generates sufficient friction/heat to damage or kill the surrounding bone. The bone or bone cement debris collected is pushed against the living bone tissue and may be incorporated into the bone. Currently utilized solid cylindrical or tapered reamers are intended for multiple uses and therefore become less efficient after each surgery, resulting in poor cutting performance and bone necrosis.
[0045] FIG. 2A depicts at 200 the low cost modular disposable tapered hollow reamer assembly of the present invention according to the first variant of the first embodiment in three views FIGS. 2A.1 , 2 A. 2 and 2 A. 3 . The tapered hollow reamer 10 shown at FIG. 2A.1 has a reaming portion 14 , which is attached at the distal end to a pilot 13 . The pilot has a central aperture 16 , which accepts a guide pin that typically has a diameter of 3 mm as shown by the arrow. The proximal end of the reamer is conical in shape with an interior taper which carries a torque-transmitting tab 15 . The barbell shaped guide pin 12 has a central cylindrical rod 21 typically 3.2 mm in diameter with two bar bells 22 as shown. The shaft 11 has a tapered body element 18 which has an external taper that matches the internal taper of the reamer and has a slot 19 that has the same dimension as that of the torque transmitting tab in the interior surface of the reamer. The shaft distal end tapered body element has a central aperture 20 , which is also typically 3.5 mm in diameter and accepts the proximal end of the guide pin as shown by the arrow. The first stage of the assembly of the low cost disposable tapered hollow reamer according to the first variant of the first embodiment is shown at FIG. 2A.2 . The distal end of the guide pin is inserted into the aperture of the pilot and the proximal end of the guide pin engages the central aperture in the tapered body element of the shaft while the conical interior surface of the reamer contacts the external taper of the tapered body element of the shaft, aligning the centerline of the reamer with that of the shaft. The torque-transmitting tab of the reamer engages the slot within the tapered body element of the shaft allowing the shaft torque to be transmitted to the reamer. The proximal end of the reamer is folded over the tapered body element of the shaft as shown at FIG. 2A.3 thereby securing the shaft within the reamer preventing its movement. While FIG. 2A illustrates one torque-transmitting tab for clarity while in practice, several torque transmitting tabs may be used. Since the guide pin 12 is captured within the reamer it provides flexural rigidity and this rigid reamer is most suited for reaming a non-cannulated bone cavity wherein no previously reamed bone cavity is present. It may also be used for connulated application. Optionally, the guide pin may be provided with a central aperture (not shown) creating a central aperture through the entire length of the assembled reamer for use in guiding reaming direction with a bone inserted guide pin. FIG. 2B shows at 200 the details of each of the components of the tapered hollow reamer in three views FIGS. 2B.1 , 2 B. 2 and 2 B. 3 , according to the first variant of the first embodiment of the invention illustrating both front view and side view. The cutters are shown at 23 and the aperture 24 through which the debris enters the free space F is shown.
[0046] FIG. 3A illustrates the second variant of the first embodiment in three views FIGS. 3A.1 , 3 A. 2 and 3 A. 3 , wherein the structure is similar to the first variant of the first embodiment, except that the guide pin 12 is a cylindrical guide pin but with no barbells. Identical numbering scheme is used for clarity. FIG. 3A depicts at 300 the low cost modular disposable tapered hollow reamer assembly of the present invention according to the second variant of the first embodiment. The tapered hollow reamer 10 shown at FIG. 3 .A. 1 has a reaming portion 14 , which is attached at the distal end to a pilot 13 . The pilot has a central aperture 16 , which accepts a guide pin that typically has a diameter of 3 mm as shown by the arrow. The proximal end of the reamer is conical in shape with an interior taper which carries a torque-transmitting tab 15 . The cylindrical guide pin 12 has a central cylindrical rod 21 typically 3 mm in diameter as shown. The shaft 11 has a tapered body element 18 which has an external taper that matches the internal taper of the reamer and has a slot 19 that has the same dimension as that of the torque transmitting tab in the interior surface of the reamer. The shaft distal end tapered body element has a central aperture 20 , which is also typically 3 mm in diameter and accepts the proximal end of the guide pin as shown by the arrow. The first stage of the assembly of the low cost disposable tapered hollow reamer according to the second variant of the first embodiment is shown at FIG. 3A.2 . The distal end of the guide pin is inserted into the aperture of the pilot and the proximal end of the guide pin engages the central aperture in the tapered body element of the shaft while the conical interior surface of the reamer contacts the external taper of the tapered body element of the shaft, aligning the centerline of the reamer with that of the shaft. The torque-transmitting tab of the reamer engages the slot within the tapered body element of the shaft allowing the shaft torque to be transmitted to the reamer. The proximal end of the reamer is folded over the tapered body element of the shaft as shown at FIG. 3A.3 thereby securing the shaft within the reamer preventing its movement. While FIG. 3A illustrates one torque-transmitting tab for clarity while in practice, several torque transmitting tabs may be used. The guide pin 12 is pulled away from the assembled reamer providing a central aperture in the reamer for accepting a bone inserted guide pin that sets the reaming direction precisely. This reamer is most suited for reaming a cannulated bone cavity wherein a previously reamed bone cavity is present. FIG. 3B shows the details of each of the components of the tapered hollow reamer in three views FIGS. 3B.1 , 3 B. 2 ands 3 B. 3 according to the second variant of the first embodiment of the invention illustrating both front view and side views. The cutters are shown at 23 and the aperture 24 through which the debris enters into the free space F is shown.
[0047] FIG. 4A illustrates the third variant of the first embodiment in three views FIGS. 4A.1 , 4 A. 2 and 4 A. 3 wherein the structure is similar to the first and second variants of the first embodiment, except that the guide pin 12 is a cylindrical guide pin with threads on its proximal and distal ends engaging with the pilot and tapered body element at the distal end of the shaft. Identical numbering system is used for clarity. FIG. 4A depicts at 400 the low cost modular disposable tapered hollow reamer assembly of the present invention according to the third variant of the first embodiment. The tapered hollow reamer 10 shown at FIG. 4A.1 has a reaming portion 14 , which is attached at the distal end to a pilot 13 . The pilot has a threaded central aperture 16 , which accepts a guide pin threaded distal end that typically has a diameter of 3 mm as shown by the arrow. The proximal end of the reamer is conical in shape with an interior taper. The cylindrical shaped guide pin 12 has a central cylindrical rod 21 typically 3 mm in diameter with a threaded distal end 25 and a threaded proximal end 26 as shown. The shaft 11 has a tapered body element 18 , which has an external taper that matches the internal taper of the reamer. The shaft distal end tapered body element has a threaded central aperture 20 , which is also typically 3 mm in diameter and accepts the proximal end threads of the guide pin as shown by the arrow. The first stage of the assembly of the low cost disposable tapered hollow reamer according to the third variant of the first embodiment is shown at FIG. 4A.2 . The distal end threads 23 of the guide pin is inserted into the aperture of the pilot and the guide pin is turned using a hex socket 25 to secure the guide pin 12 to the pilot 13 . Next, the shaft 11 is turned to engage the proximal end threads 24 of the guide pin with the threads 20 of the central aperture in the tapered body element of the shaft while the conical interior surface of the reamer contacts the external taper of the tapered body element of the shaft, aligning the centerline of the reamer with that of the shaft. The threaded attachment allows the shaft torque to be transmitted to the reamer. The proximal end of the reamer is folded over the tapered body element of the shaft as shown at FIG. 4A.3 thereby securing the shaft within the reamer preventing its movement. Since the guide pin 12 is captured within the reamer it provides flexural rigidity and this rigid reamer is most suited for reaming a non-cannulated bone cavity wherein no previously reamed bone cavity is present. It may also be used for connulated application. Optionally, the guide pin may be provided with a central aperture (not shown) creating a central aperture through the entire length of the assembled reamer for use in guiding reaming direction with a bone inserted guide pin. FIG. 4B shows the details of each of the components of the tapered hollow reamer in three views FIGS. 4B.1 , 43 B. 2 and 4 B. 3 according to the third variant of the first embodiment of the invention illustrating both front view and side view. The root diameter of the threads in the pilot 13 and tapered body element 18 is typically 3.2 mm. The cutters are shown at 23 and the aperture through which the debris enters the free space F is shown at 24 .
[0048] A number of sizes of tapered hollow reamers are available along with their shafts and modular pilots so that the surgeon can choose progressively larger hollow tapered reamers for a fresh bone canal or a reworked bone canal. Since the low cost tapered hollow reamer 10 is disposable, the cutting performance of the hollow reamer is not compromised through repeated use. Several limitations of the prior art reamers and consequent clinical problems seen are overcome through utilization of the disposable modular tapered hollow reamers herein. Novel design features of the hollow reamers of the present invention and improvements to prior art reamers are multifaceted. Moreover, when dealing with revision hip surgery, the hollow reamers have also been designed to cut bone cement (PMMA) in a more efficient manner by providing internal space within the low cost tapered hollow reamer to capture the debris. This feature reduces both the cutting temperature and time required to remove the remnant cement mantle. The bone debris collected may be used for bone grafting or other specific surgical procedures. A further advantage of the hollow design is that by allowing the removal of the bone debris from the outer surface of the reamer to the inside of the reamer, the reamer is less likely to raise the intramedulary pressure in the long bone being reamed, thereby lessening the chance of fat embolism during these procedures.
[0049] FIG. 5A illustrates in two views FIGS. 5A.1 and 5 A. 2 the second embodiment of the invention wherein a disposable spherical reamer is attached to a reusable shaft using a threaded connection similar to the third variant of the first embodiment. The guide pin 12 is a cylindrical guide pin with threads 23 distal end and threads 24 on its proximal end engaging with threads 16 in the central aperture of the spherical hollow reamer and threads 20 in the central aperture of the tapered body element at the distal end of the shaft. Identical numbering system is used for clarity. FIG. 5A depicts at 500 the low cost modular disposable spherical hollow reamer assembly of the present invention according to the second embodiment. The spherical hollow reamer 10 shown at FIG. 5A.1 has a reaming portion 29 . The central portion of the spherical reamer has central aperture large enough to accept a hex nut for tightening the guide pin and has a threaded central aperture 16 . The threaded aperture 16 accepts threaded distal end 23 of a guide pin as shown by the arrow. The threads typically have a root diameter of 3.2 mm. The proximal end of the spherical reamer has a conical interior taper. The cylindrical shaped guide pin 12 has a central cylindrical rod 21 a threaded distal end 23 and a threaded proximal end 24 as shown. The shaft 11 has a tapered body element 18 , which has an external taper that matches the internal taper of the proximal end of the spherical reamer. The shaft distal end tapered body element has a threaded central aperture 20 , which is also typically 3 mm in diameter and accepts the proximal end threads 24 of the guide pin as shown by the arrow. The assembly of the low cost disposable spherical hollow reamer according to the second embodiment is shown at FIG. 5A.2 . The distal end of the guide pin is inserted into the aperture of the central aperture of the spherical hollow reamer and the guide pin is turned using a hex socket similar to FIG. 4A.2 (not shown) to secure the guide pin 12 to the pilot 13 . Next, the shaft is turned to engage the proximal end threads 24 of the guide pin with the threads 20 of the central aperture in the tapered body element of the shaft while the conical interior surface of the spherical hollow reamer contacts the external taper of the tapered body element of the shaft, aligning the centerline of the reamer with that of the shaft. The threaded attachment allows the shaft torque to be transmitted to the reamer. Since the guide pin 12 is captured within the reamer it provides flexural rigidity and this rigid reamer is most suited for reaming a non-cannulated bone cavity wherein no previously reamed bone cavity is present. It may also be used for cannulated application. FIG. 5B shows in three views FIGS. 5B.1 , 5 B. 2 and 5 B. 3 , the details of each of the components of the spherical hollow reamer according to the second embodiment of the invention illustrating both the front view and the side view. The root diameter of the central threads 16 of the spherical hollow reamer and threads 20 of the tapered body element 18 are typically 3.2 mm. The cutters are shown at 23 and the aperture through which the debris enters the free space F is shown at 24 .
[0050] A number of sizes of spherical hollow reamers are available along with their shafts so that the surgeon can choose progressively larger spherical hollow reamers for a fresh bone acetabular cavity or a reworked bone acetabular cavity. Since the low cost spherical hollow reamer 10 is disposable, the cutting performance of the spherical hollow reamer is not compromised through repeated use. Several limitations of the prior art reamers and consequent clinical problems seen are overcome through utilization of the disposable modular tapered hollow reamers herein. Novel design features of the spherical hollow reamers of the present invention and improvements to prior art reamers are multifaceted. Moreover, when dealing with revision surgery, the spherical hollow reamers have also been designed to cut bone cement (PMMA) in a more efficient manner by providing internal space within the low cost tapered hollow reamer to capture the debris. This feature reduces both the cutting temperature and time required to remove the remnant cement mantle. The bone debris collected may be used for bone grafting or other specific surgical procedures. A further advantage of the hollow design is that by allowing the removal of the bone debris from the outer surface of the reamer to the inside of the reamer, the reamer is less likely to raise the intramedulary pressure in the long bone being reamed, thereby lessening the chance of fat embolism during these procedures.
[0051] FIG. 6 depicts at 600 four views FIGS. 6A , 6 B, 6 C and 6 D of a perspective view of the assembly of a tapered hollow reamer according to the second variant of the first embodiment of the invention using a hand tool. The hand tool 28 is similar to a glue gun and has a fixed portion 29 and an adjustable portion 30 . The reamer 10 of the second variant of the first embodiment with the cylindrical guide pin placed within the central aperture of the pilot is placed on the fixed portion 29 of the hand tool 28 as shown in FIG. 6A . Now the shaft 11 is brought in and inserted within the taper of the proximal end of the reamer engaging the protruding guide pin, torque transmitting tab and hand pushed along the direction of the arrow as shown in FIG. 6B . The adjustable portion 30 of the hand tool 28 is then brought to apply pressure to the tapered body element of the shaft 11 and deform or bend the proximal ends of the reamer 10 as shown in FIG. 6C . The assembled reamer is removed from the hand tool and the guide pin 12 is slid off from the pilot portion of the assembled reamer as shown in FIG. 6D exposing a central hole within the assembled reamer which may be used to guide the reamer in a direction set by a bone inserted guide pin.
[0052] Having thus described the invention in rather full detail, it will be understood that such detail need not be strictly adhered to, but that additional changes and modifications may suggest themselves to one skilled in the art, all falling within the scope of the invention as defined by the subjoined claims.
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An easy-to-assemble modular tapered or spherical reamer for medical applications includes a shaft portion, a disposable tapered or spherical hollow reamer and a guide pin. The shaft proximal end attaches to a drill and the distal end has a tapered body element with a tapered external surface and a central aperture. The disposable tapered or spherical hollow reamer has a central aperture that accepts the guide pin and an interior taper that matches the taper of the tapered body element. The guide pin has attachment means to attach its distal end to the central aperture in the reamer, and the proximal end to the central aperture of the tapered body element of the shaft, assuring reamer/shaft concentricity. Contact between the reamer taper and the taper of the tapered body element aids this concentricity. Torque transmission between the shaft and the reamer is accomplished by torque transmitting tabs or a threaded connection.
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FIELD OF THE INVENTION
This invention is concerned with a method for the control of fouling by marine and fresh water mollusks through the use of the chemical compound, 2-(thiocyanomethylthio)benzothiazole.
particularly, this invention relates to the control of mollusks which foul underground irrigation systems; municipal water treatment facilities; river sand and gravel operations and industrial facilities utilizing raw water, particularly for cooling and fire protection systems. More particularly, this invention relates to the control of fouling by fresh water mollusks in fresh water systems, especially by species of Asiatic clams of the genus Corbicula, the most common of which is Corbicula fluminea (hereafter, "C. fluminea").
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Problems of fouling are caused by the attachment and growth of juvenile mollusks in service and cooling water systems, and the settlement of young adults in condenser tubes of condenser water systems, causing deleterious effects to the operation and safety of these systems. In fossil-fueled systems, problems have been related to plugging of condenser tubes, surface water heat exchangers, and fire protection systems. In nuclear power plants, additional problems of blockage may occur, including the shutdown of service water and emergency reactor cooling systems.
Among the most serious threats posed by C. fluminea is its macrofouling of nuclear and fossil-fueled power generating stations. In power plants, the shells of living and dead clams foul steam condensers and service water systems. Clams enter these systems as juveniles or adults carried on water currents and settle, grow, reproduce and accumulate in numbers that reduce water flow to levels that seriously compromise or prevent operation. (Goss et al., Control studies on Corbicula for steam electric qeneratinq plants, J. C. Britton (Ed.), Proceedings, First International Corbicula Symposium, Texas Christian University Research Foundation, Fort Worth, Tex., pp. 139-151 (1977)).
C. fluminea is a particularly dangerous macrofouling species in nuclear power plants because it simultaneously fouls primary and secondary (backup) systems, thus compromising fail-safe operation Henagar et al., Bivalve Fouling of Nuclear Power Plant Service-Water Systems. Factors That May Intensify the Safety Consequences of Biofouling, NRC FIN B2463, NUREG/CR-4070, PNL-5300, Vol. 3 Div. Radiation Programs and Earth Sciences, Office of Nuclear Regulatory Research, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, D.C., 51 pp. (1985)). Major biofouling incidents have been reported at nuclear power stations in Arkansas (Arkansas Nuclear I), Brown's Ferry, Alabama, and Baldwin, Ill. (Henegar et al., above). Such incidents have led to the issuance of a bulletin by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Agency (United States Nuclear Regulatory Agency (USNRC), Flow Blockaqe of Cooling Water to System by Corbicula sp. (Asiatic Clam) and Mytilus sp. (Mussel), Bulletin No. 81-03, Office of Inspection and Enforcement, United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, D.C. 6 pp. (1981)) requiring all nuclear power stations in the U.S. to inspect for and report the presence of this species in their operations and raw water sources. Analysis of this and other data has indicated that of the 32 nuclear power stations within the known geographic range of C. fluminea in the U.S., 19 already report infestations of varying severity and 11 others are in close proximity to known populations (Counts, Distribution of Corbicula fluminea at Nuclear Facilities, NRC FIN B8675, NUREG/CR-4233, Div. Engineering, Office of Nuclear Reactor Regulation, U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission, Washington, D.C. 79 pp. (1985)). Thus, macrofouling by C. fluminea presently poses a dangerous and costly problem in the nuclear industry.
Within the known geographic range of C. fluminea in the United States lie hundreds of fossil-fueled electric power stations whose raw water systems are also subject to macrofouling by this species. As in nuclear plants, such macrofouling requires expensive shut-downs for repair and replacement of damaged equipment, as well as expensive and often futile retrofitting of anti-fouling equipment that has generally proved ineffective in controlling clam impingement.
While a number of control methodologies have been developed to reduce the macrofouling of industrial and power station service water systems by C. fluminea, none has proved completely effective.
Control of C. fluminea macrofouling in power station and industrial service and auxilliary water systems has primarily been through chlorination. Recommended residuals of chlorine are 0.5-1.0 μg per liter for continuous application or 500 μg per liter for periods of 100-500 hrs. to kill juvenile clams borne on intake currents into these systems (Cherry et al., Corbicula fouling and control measures at the Celco Plant, Virginia, Am. Malacol. Bull. Special Ed. No. 2, pp. 69-81 (1986); Mattice, Freshwater macrofoulinq and control with emphasis on Corbicula, Symposium on Condenser Macrofouling Control Technologies: The State of the Art, Electric Power Research Institute, Palo Alto, Calif., pp. 4-1-4-30 (1983); Sinclair et al., Further Studies on the Introduced Asiatic Clam (Corbicula) in Tennessee, Tennessee Stream Pollution Control Board, Tennessee Department of Public Health, Nashville, 76 pp. (1963)).
As chlorination is generally only allowed by U.S. Environmental Protection Agency regulations for 2 of every 24 hrs. in systems returning service water to source (United States Environmental Protection Agency (USEPA), Effluent limitations guidelines, pretreatment standards and new source performance standards under Clean Water Act; steam electric power generating point source category, 40 CFR, Parts 125 and 423, Fed. Regist. 45(200):68328-68337 (1980)), it has proved to be generally ineffective in controlling C. fluminea macrofouling (Page et al., Biofoulinq of power plant service water systems by Corbicula, Am. Malacol. Bull. Special Edition No. 2: 41-45 (1986)). Heavier chlorination may also exacerbate corrosion of pipes, and when C. fluminea burrows into accumulations of corrosion products and silt in the low flow areas of these systems it effectively becomes insulated from the toxic effects of chlorination (Johnson et al., Engineering factors influencing Corbicula fouling in nuclear service water systems, Am. Malacol. Bull. Special Ed. No. 2:47-52 (1986)).
A number of molluscicides other than chlorine have been tested for efficacy in control of C. fluminea, but have proved ineffective or impractical (Mattice, above). Antifouling paints, coverings and slow release toxic pellets appear effective in killing clams (Mattice, above), but their relatively short half-lives, and difficulties in application, make their utilization in existing service water systems neither feasible nor cost effective.
Therefore, there is a major incentive for the development of an environmentally safe, cost effective, highly potent molluscicide to control macrofouling by C. fluminea in industrial and power generation raw water systems. To date no such molluscicide has proven to be completely satisfactory for the control of C. fluminea macrofouling in the raw water systems of power stations or other industrial operations.
The biology of bivalve mollusks, including such species as C. fluminea (Asiatic clam), is especially suited for their establishment and growth in the water systems of power plants. The Asiatic clam occurs in great abundance in fresh water systems. McMahon and Williams (McMahon et al., A reassessment of growth rate, life span, life cycles and population dynamics in a natural population and field caged individuals of Corbicula fluminea (Muller) (Bivalvia: Corbiculacea), Am. Malacol. Bull. Special Ed. No. 2, pp. 151-166((1986)) measured a population of 1000 clams per square meter in the Trinity River and Benbrook Lake area in Texas. Since power generating stations require a large quantity of service water, they are located on major streams or lakes. The water is drawn from the supply source through a canal. Clams find these canals to be favorable for the production of their larval offspring which may be many thousands per clam. The larval stages and small adults are small enough to pass through the screens used to retard the passage of detritus into the plant. The larvae will then attach themselves to surfaces by their suctorial foot and the elaboration of mucilaginous byssal attachment threads.
Once attached, the juveniles mature into adults. In one to three months the juveniles and small adults can grow in size so that when carried by currents into the condenser tubes, they can lodge in the tubes and cause the accumulation of small particles of material behind them, thereby completely plugging the tube. If enough tubes become plugged in this manner, the flow of water through the condenser is reduced to levels which seriously affect its efficiency, thereby forcing unit shut-down and manual removal of accumulated shells and other debris.
Clams do not grow in the condenser tubes, but are carried there by the currents from the water supply, particularly the embayment following screening. Juvenile clams carried into service water systems will mature in situ, and such systems will be plugged both by the adults produced in place and by those which are brought in by currents. Therefore, the control of fouling may be accomplished by killing the adult clams, the juvenile clams, or by preventing the attachment of the juveniles to surfaces.
DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
The chemical compound of this invention, 2-(thiocyanomethylthio)benzothiazole (TCMTB), has surprisingly been found to be molluscicidal to both adults and juveniles, and to prevent the attachment of the larvae to surfaces. TCMTB has a long history of use for the control of simple microorganisms, such as bacteria, fungi and algae (U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,463,785 and 3,520,976), which unlike mollusks, are not complex macroinvertebrates.
The present inventors have discovered that the use of 2-(thiocyanomethylthio)benzothiazole will particularly reduce the survival of juvenile and adult mollusks of the genus Corbicula. In addition, it was discovered that the ability of the larval stages of the mollusks to anchor themselves to surfaces in the presence of the chemical was impaired.
The effective amount of TCMTB needed to control fouling by mollusks may readily be determined by one skilled in the art. Amounts ranging from 0.5 to 500 parts of the compound to one million parts of water are especially preferred.
The addition of 2-(thiocyanomethylthio)benzothiazole in an effective amount to the incoming canal or embayment water will kill the larval forms before they settle and mature into adult mollusks, thereby providing inhibition of mollusk infestation with its subsequent blockage of the structural parts of internal water systems. By extension of the treatment rate, the destruction of adult mollusks is accomplished, eradicating problems of fouling by the adults. An added feature is the reduction in the number of larvae which become attached to the internal surfaces of the water system, avoiding their consequent growth into adults.
TCMTB is suited for treatment of aqueous systems, such as those found in power generating facilities, because it may be used in low concentrations, and may be dissipated in the treatment process. It is therefore unlikely to contaminate water returning to the receiving body of water.
The following example illustrates certain embodiments of the invention and should not be regarded as limiting the scope and spirit of the invention.
EXAMPLE
Discussion
The efficacy of 2-(thiocyanomethylthio)benzothiazole (TCMTB) was documented in laboratory experiments using juvenile and adult forms of the Asiatic clam, C. fluminea. TCMTB was tested as a 30% solution of the active ingredient in suitable solvents.
Juveniles: Materials and Methods
For static tests of toxicity of TCMTB to juvenile C. fluminea, gravid adults were collected from the Clear Fork of the Trinity River near Arlington, Tex., and returned immediately to the laboratory. On return, selected adults were placed in one liter of dechlorinated tap water in glass culture dishes and held overnight in an incubator adjusted to field water temperature. The following morning, adults were removed from the culture dishes, and all spawned, viable juvenile clams (shell length approximately 2 mm) were collected individually and transferred to glass petri dishes containing 20 mL of dechlorinated city of Arlington tap water. Twenty-five juveniles were placed in each of three replicate dishes for each concentration of the product tested. Three control dishes containing twenty-five juveniles, and no molluscicide, were also set up. For test purposes, TCMTB was diluted with dechlorinated tap water so that when 20 mL of the dilution were added to the petri dishes containing the juveniles, final concentrations of 1, 2 and 4 ppm of TCMTB were achieved in the 40 mL of fluid. The control dishes received another 20 mL aliquot of Lake Arlington tap water. All the dishes were adjusted to pH 7 when necessary. The dishes were covered and held at 24° C. in a constant temperature room. Observations were made on the viability of the juveniles every two hours during the first 24 hours, at 6 hour intervals during the next 48 hours, and every 12 hours thereafter until either 100% mortality had been achieved, or for 7 days. Viability was determined under a 30X microscope by observation of heartbeat, gill ciliary activity, and by the maintenance of high levels of foot activity. Juveniles not displaying these characteristics, and which were unresponsive to touch by a fine camel hair brush, were removed from the dishes and counted as dead. Mortality figures were recorded at intervals based on seventy-five exposed juveniles.
Adults: Materials and Methods
Adult clams were collected from the Clear Fork of the Trinity River in Texas and transported immediately to the laboratory. The adults were habituated to dechlorinated city of Arlington, Tex. tap water for 2 days before experimentation. For each concentration of TCMTB tested, and for the controls with no TCMTB, three sets of twenty-five adults each were placed in 18 liters of solution in plastic holding tanks and held at 24° C. The experimental adults were selected to provide the size range of C. fluminea found in their natural habitat (5-35 mm in shell length). The tanks were maintained under constant aeration for the duration of the experiment and the solutions were changed every 4 days. Periodically all clams were checked for viability by noting the resistance to the entry of a blunted needle between the valves and, if needed, by examinatoon of heartbeat after forcing the valves open. In the cases where adults closed their valves tightly when exposed to the several concentrations of the test chemicals, provision was made to artificially keep their valves open by inserting a plastic tab between the valves to insure continuous contact of the mollusk body with the products. Such organisms were termed "gaping adults". A total of seventy-five adults were exposed to each of the concentrations of TCMTB, and to the untreated control tanks.
Experimental Results
The following is a summary of the results obtained from toxicity test of TCMTB to the Asia claim, C. fluminea.
__________________________________________________________________________Treatment Mean Time Mean PercentGrouplevel (ppm) to Death (hr) LT50 LT100 Not Attached__________________________________________________________________________Juveniles1 36.6 30.0 96 92.02 20.0 13.2 35 99.34 13.4 7.5 24 98.7Control (4% dead after 96 hr exposure)Normal1 102.1 96.1 160 --Adults2 97.2 90.8 160 --4 89.9 103.5 120 --Control (3.1% dead after 160 hr exposure)Gaping1 108.7 91.4 190Adults2 91.7 67.8 1424 61.5 61.5 118Control (30.7% dead after 181 hr exposure)__________________________________________________________________________
Discussion of Results
The juveniles exhibited more of a response to increased levels of treatment than did the adult clams. The data clearly demonstrate that TCMTB will kill the Asiatic clam Corbicula in a reasonable time in both the larval and adult stages. In addition, the similar times to death of the normal as compared to the gaping adults indicates that TCMTB is not an irritant which causes the clam to tightly close its valves to avoid exposure to the treatment chemical. Over 90% of the juveniles were prevented from attaching to the surface of the dishes in which the experiments were performed.
While this invention has been described with respect to particular embodiments thereof, other forms or modifications of this invention will be evident to those skilled in the art. The appended claims, as well as the invention generally, should be construed to cover all such forms or modifications which are within the scope of the present invention.
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A method for the control of fouling by marine and fresh water mollusks through the use of the chemical compound, 2-(thiocyanomethylthio)benzothiazole. The disclosed method is particularly useful in controlling fouling by species of fresh water Asiatic clams of the genus Corbicula, the most common of which is C. fluminea.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
In general, the present invention relates to counterbalance systems for windows that prevent open window sashes from closing under the force of their own weight. More particularly, the present invention system relates to counterbalance systems for tilt-in windows that use curl springs to create a counterbalancing force.
2. Description of the Prior Art
There are many types and styles of windows. One of the most common types of window is the double-hung window. A double-hung window is the most common window found in traditional home construction. A double-hung window consists of an upper window sash and a lower window sash. Either the upper window sash or the lower window sash can be selectively opened and closed by a person sliding the sash up and down within the window frame.
A popular variation of the double-hung window is the tilt-in double-hung window. Tilt-in double-hung windows have sashes that can be selectively moved up and down. Additionally, the sashes can be selectively tilted into the home so that the exterior of the sashes can be cleaned from within the home.
The sash of a double-hung window has a weight that depends upon the materials used to make that window sash and the size of the window sash. Since the sashes of a double-hung window are free to move up and down in the frame of a window, some counterbalancing system must be used to prevent the window sashes from always moving to the bottom of the window frame under the force of their own weight.
For many years counterbalance weights were hung next to the window frame in weight wells. The weights were attached to the window sash using a string or chain that passed over a pulley at the top of the window frame. The weights counterbalanced the weight of the window sashes. As such, when the sashes were moved in the window frame, they had a neutral weight and friction would hold them in place.
The use of weight wells, however, prevents insulation from being packed tightly around a window frame. Furthermore, the use of counterbalance weights on chains or strings cannot be adapted well to tilt-in double-hung windows. Accordingly, as tilt-in windows were being developed, alternative counterbalance systems were developed that were contained within the confines of the window frame and did not interfere with the tilt action of the tilt-in windows.
Modern tilt-in double-hung windows are primarily manufactured in one of two ways. There are vinyl frame windows and wooden frame windows. In the window manufacturing industry, different types of counterbalance systems are traditionally used for vinyl frame windows and for wooden frame windows. The present invention is mainly concerned with the structure of vinyl frame windows. As such, the prior art concerning vinyl frame windows is herein addressed.
Vinyl frame, tilt-in, double-hung windows are typically manufactured with tracks along the inside of the window frame. Brake shoe mechanisms, commonly known as “shoes” in the window industry, are placed in the tracks and ride up and down within the tracks. Each sash of the window has two tilt pins or tilt posts that extend into the shoes and cause the shoes to ride up and down in the tracks as the window sashes are opened or closed.
The shoes serve two purposes. First, the shoes contain a brake mechanism that is activated by the tilt post of the window sash when the window sash is tilted inwardly away from the window frame. The shoe therefore locks the tilt post in place and prevents the base of the sash from moving up or down in the window frame once the sash is tilted open. Second, the shoes either support or engage curl springs. Curl springs are constant force coil springs that supply a constant retraction force when unwound.
Single curl springs are used on windows with light sashes. Multiple curl springs are used on windows with heavy sashes. The curl springs provide the counterbalance force to the window sashes needed to maintain the sashes in place. The counterbalance force of the curl springs is transferred to the window sashes through the structure of the shoes and the tilt posts that extend from the window sash into the shoes.
The curl springs are utilized within the structure of a tilt-in window in two distinct operating systems. In the first operating system, the curl spring moves with the window sash as the window sash moves up and down in the window frame. In the second operating system, the curl spring is fixed and does not move with the window sash.
In the first operating system, where the curl spring moves, the end of the curl spring is anchored to the fixed part of the window frame. The remaining coils of the curl spring are supported by the shoe and move in unison with the shoe. As each shoe moves away from the anchor point, the curl spring unwinds. Conversely, as each brake shoe moves toward the anchor point, the curl spring rewinds. Such an operating system requires that the anchor mounts be set into the tracks of the windows so that the free ends of the curl springs can be anchored to the window frame. However, the presence of the anchor mount in the window track presents a problem to the free movement of the sashes. Often the movement of a window sash must be limited so that it does not contact the anchor mounts that are present. This often prevents a window sash from being able to open as fully as would otherwise be expected.
Another problem that is inherent to many window counterbalance systems is the complexity of the shoes that retain the springs and move with the springs in the tracks of the window frame. Of the various components that create a counterbalance system, one of the most expensive components is the shoe. The shoes must contain a brake mechanism strong enough to lock a window sash in place. In addition, the shoes must engage and retain at least one strong curl spring. Furthermore, the shoe must remain reliable for years of operation. Accordingly, prior art shoes are built with large, wear resistant components that tend to make the prior art shoes expensive and complex to manufacture.
A need therefore exists in the field of vinyl, tilt-in, double-hung windows, for a counterbalance system that has an improved spring anchor mounting assembly that does not limit the movement of window sashes. A need also exists in the field of vinyl, tilt-in double-hung windows for a counterbalance system that provides inexpensive shoe assemblies. As such, window assemblies can be made to be more reliable, less expensive and easier to manufacture. These needs are met by the present invention as described and claimed below.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is a counterbalance system for a tilt-in window. The counterbalance system includes brake shoes, curl springs and spring anchor mounts. The brake shoe assembly of the counterbalance system has a unique, low cost locking mechanism that uses a looped wire. The brake shoe assembly may also be configured with external rib projections that reduce the friction of the brake shoe assemblies as they move through the tracks of the window.
The spring anchor mount is formed with a recess in its body that enables the tilt latch of a window sash to pass the spring anchor mount within the track of the window frame. As a result, the spring anchor mounts can be placed within the window frame without concern of contact interference with the tilt latch. The result is a lower cost, more reliable counterbalance system for a window that provides a greater degree of movement in the window sashes so that the window sashes can be opened wider than previously possible.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
For a better understanding of the present invention, reference is made to the following description of exemplary embodiments thereof, considered in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which:
FIG. 1 is a partially fragmented view of a window assembly in accordance with the present invention;
FIG. 2 is an exploded perspective view of the components of the present invention counterbalance system;
FIG. 3 is a cross-sectional view of an exemplary embodiment of a shoe assembly component of the counterbalance system;
FIG. 4 is a cross-sectional view of an exemplary embodiment of the shoe assembly component of FIG. 3 , shown engaging the pivot post of an untilted window sash;
FIG. 5 is a cross-sectional view of an exemplary embodiment of the shoe assembly component of FIG. 3 , shown engaging the pivot post of a tilted window sash;
FIG. 6 is a perspective view of a first exemplary embodiment of a spring anchor mount in accordance with the present invention;
FIG. 7 is a side view of a second exemplary embodiment of a spring anchor mount in accordance with the present invention;
FIG. 8 is a front view of a third exemplary embodiment of a spring anchor mount containing a locking mechanism; and
FIG. 9 is a front view of a counterbalance system having a single moving curl spring.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
Referring to FIG. 1 , there is shown an exemplary embodiment of a vinyl, tilt-in, double-hung window assembly 10 . The window assembly 10 has an upper sash 11 and a lower sash 12 . Each of the sashes 11 , 12 has two side elements 17 . The upper sash 11 and the lower sash 12 are contained within a window frame 14 . The window frame 14 has two vertical sides 16 that extend along the side elements 17 of both sashes 11 , 12 . Within each of the vertical sides 16 of the window frame 14 is formed a track 18 .
At the top of each sash 11 , 12 are two tilt latches 19 that extend a predetermined distance into the tracks 18 on the side of each sash 11 , 12 . The tilt latches 19 are used to disengage the top of a window sash 11 , 12 from the track 18 so that the top of a window sash 11 , 12 can be tilted inwardly for cleaning.
At the bottom of each of the sashes 11 , 12 is a tilt pivot post 21 that also extends into the track 18 . When a sash 11 , 12 is tilted inwardly, the sash 11 , 12 tilts about its tilt pivot posts 21 . The tilt pivot posts 21 are received by shoe assemblies 20 that ride up and down within the tracks 18 . The shoe assemblies 20 support at least one curl spring 22 . The free end of each curl spring 22 is attached to the track 18 via a spring anchor mount 24 .
In the prior art, an anchor mount of a curl spring for a particular sash would often have to be mounted below the tilt latch for that sash. In that way, the tilt latch would not have to pass the anchor mount as the window sash moved up and down in the track.
In the shown embodiment, the spring anchor mount 24 is attached to the track 18 above the tilt latch 19 . As such, the tilt latch 19 passes the spring anchor mount 24 as the window sash 12 is moved up and down. However, as will later be described, the structure of the spring anchor mount 24 allows the tilt latch 19 to travel past the spring anchor mount 24 without interference. The window sash 12 is therefore capable of opening wider than many prior art window configurations.
Referring to FIG. 2 , it can be seen that the present invention counterbalance system 25 is comprised of a plurality of interconnecting components. These components include a shoe assembly 20 , a spring anchor mount 24 and at least one curl spring 22 . The shoe assembly 20 contains a brake mechanism that locks the shoe assembly 20 in place in the window track whenever the window sash is tilted. The functionality of the brake mechanism will later be explained. One shoe assembly 20 is provided for each side of a window sash.
At least one curl spring 22 is also provided for each side of a window sash. The curl springs 22 provide the tension force that is used to counterbalance the weight of a window sash as it is moved in a window frame. Each curl spring 22 is a length of ribbon steel 23 that is wound in a circular coil. The curl spring 22 applies a generally constant retraction force when the free end 26 of the ribbon steel is pulled away from the coil. The number of curl springs 22 used depends upon the size and weight of the window sash that is to be counterbalanced. Small window sashes may require only a single curl spring 22 . Larger window sashes require multiple curl springs 22 . In most standard windows, between one and four curl springs 22 are used.
The free end 26 of each curl spring 22 contains a mounting feature, such as a mount hole 27 or a barb that enables the free end 26 of the curl spring 22 to be readily mounted to the spring anchor mount 24 .
Each spring anchor mount 24 has at least one side surface that contains a retaining structure 32 for receiving and engaging the free end 26 of the steel ribbon 23 of the curl spring 22 . In the shown embodiment, each curl spring 22 is terminated with a mount hole 27 . Accordingly, the side surface of the spring anchor 24 includes a retaining structure 32 in the form of a protrusion that is sized to pass into and engage the mount hole 27 . Such a configuration is only one of many ways to interconnect the curl spring 22 to the spring anchor mount 24 . It will be understood that if the free end 26 of the curl spring 22 were terminated with a screw hole, threaded bores would be present in the spring anchor mount that would enable the free end 26 of the curl spring 22 to be connected to the spring anchor mount 24 with a screw.
In the shown embodiment, each spring anchor mount 24 is capable of engaging and retaining the free end 26 of up to four curl springs 22 . Most vinyl window counterbalance systems use between one and four curl springs. As such, a single spring anchor mount 24 is capable of engaging the curl springs of the most common counterbalance configurations.
Each spring anchor mount 24 has an attachment structure that enables the spring anchor mount to be attached to the track in the window frame. In the shown embodiment, the spring anchor mount 24 defines mounting holes 34 that enable the spring anchor mount 24 to be directly mounted to the window frame with screws. As will be later described, alternate attachment structures can be used to lock the spring anchor mount 24 into a set position. The details of the configuration of the spring anchor mount 24 is later described when referencing FIG. 6 and FIG. 7 .
In FIG. 2 , it can be seen that the shoe assembly 20 has a body that has a face surface 40 and a rear surface 42 disposed between two opposing side surfaces 44 . When the shoe assembly 20 is connected to a curl spring 22 within a window frame track, the curl spring 22 commonly applies a slight torque to the shoe assembly 20 . This causes the side surfaces 44 of the shoe assembly 20 to contact the track as the shoe assembly 20 moves within the confines of the track. To reduce the amount of friction caused by this contact, at least one rib protrusion 46 is optionally formed on the side surfaces 44 . The rib protrusions 46 contact the window frame track and reduce the amount of surface area on the shoe assembly 20 that is in contact with the track. By reducing the surface area in contact, the amount of friction is also reduced.
The rib protrusions 46 can be molded of wear resistant material and added to the side surfaces 44 of the shoe assembly 20 . However, in a preferred method of manufacturing, the rib protrusions 46 are molded as part of the shoe assembly 20 .
Referring to FIG. 3 , a cross-section of the shoe assembly 20 is shown. From FIG. 3 , it can be seen that on the side surfaces 44 of the shoe assembly 20 are two side openings 48 . The side openings 48 interconnect with an internal chamber 50 . A post access hole 53 ( FIG. 2 ) is formed in the face surface of the shoe assembly 20 that extends into the center of the internal chamber 50 . Disposed within the internal chamber 50 and side openings 48 is a single loop torsion spring 52 . The single loop torsion spring 52 is made of a spring wire that travels in one direction, is looped around and continues in that same general direction. The loop 54 in the center of the torsion spring 52 lays in the internal chamber 50 of the shoe assembly 20 , while the arms 56 of the torsion spring 52 extend into the side openings 48 . The loop 54 of the torsion spring 52 defines a central open area that is aligned with the post access hole 53 ( FIG. 2 ) in the face surface of the shoe assembly 20 .
The central open area defined by loop 54 of the torsion spring 52 is elongated, where the loop 54 is taller than it is wide. When the shoe assembly 20 is assembled into a window, the pivot arm of a window sash passes into the post access hole 53 ( FIG. 2 ) in the shoe assembly 20 and then passes into the central open area defined by the loop 54 of the torsion spring 52 .
It is well known in the art of tilt-in windows, that the pivot arms that extend from window sashes typically have non-round cross-sectional profiles. Most commonly, such pivot arms have a rectangular or otherwise oblong configuration. Referring to FIG. 4 , it can be seen that when the pivot arm 21 of a window sash is disposed in the loop 54 of the torsion spring 52 , the presence of the pivot arm 21 deforms the loop 54 and expands the loop 54 . Due to the configuration of the torsion spring 52 , as the loop 54 is expanded, the arms 56 of the torsion spring 52 retract into the body of the shoe assembly 20 . Accordingly, the ends 64 of the torsion spring 52 do not extend out of the body of the shoe assembly 20 .
Since the ends 64 of the torsion spring 52 do not extend out beyond the side surfaces 44 of the shoe assembly 20 , the shoe assembly 20 is free to move up and down in the track defined by the vinyl window frame. The pivot arm 21 expands the torsion spring 52 and retracts the arms of the torsion spring 52 when the window sash is flush in the window frame. Thus, when the window sash is moved up and down in the window's track, the shoe assembly 20 provides little resistance to the movement.
However, when the window sash is tilted inwardly out of the plane of the window frame, the pivot arm 21 in the torsion spring 52 rotates with the window sash. Referring to FIG. 5 , it can be seen that when the window sash is tilted, the pivot arm 21 turns and no longer expands the loop 54 in the center of the torsion spring 52 . With the pivot arm 21 no longer a barrier, the loop 54 contracts. As the loop 54 contracts, the arms 56 of the torsion spring 52 extend outwardly from the side surfaces 44 of the shoe assembly 20 . The ends 64 of the arms 56 extend past the rib protrusions 46 and directly engage the walls of the track in which the shoe assembly 20 moves. The ends 64 of the arms 56 bite into the vinyl and lock the shoe assembly 20 into a fixed position within the track. It will, therefore, be understood that the torsion spring 52 is a brake mechanism. When the sash of a window is in the plane of the window frame, the arms 56 of the torsion spring 52 are retracted and the shoe assembly 20 can travel freely up and down the window frame. However, as soon as the window sash is tilted, the arms 56 of the torsion spring 52 extend and the arms 56 engage the surrounding track of the window frame, thereby locking the shoe assembly 20 into a set position within the track.
From the description of the function of the brake mechanism created by the torsion spring 52 , it will be understood that the torsion spring 52 itself is a single, inexpensive component with no secondary moving parts. As such, the torsion spring 52 is a highly reliable brake mechanism that resists wear much better than prior art shoe assemblies that contain complex brake mechanisms with multiple moving parts.
Referring to FIG. 6 , a first embodiment of the spring anchor mount 24 is shown. The spring anchor mount 24 is preferably molded or machined as a single piece. The spring anchor mount 24 has a head section 72 that is sized to just fit within the track of a window. A body section 74 extends below the head section 72 . The body section 74 is recessed and has a cross-sectional area smaller than that of the head section 72 . Accordingly, the side walls 76 of the body section 74 of the spring anchor mount 24 do not contact the side walls of the window track when the spring anchor mount 24 is placed in the window track.
A recess 78 is formed in the face surface of the spring anchor mount 24 . The recess 78 extends from the top to the bottom of the spring anchor mount 24 passing through both the head section 72 and the body section 74 of the spring anchor mount 24 . The recess thins the center of the spring anchor mount 24 . Preferably, the recess 78 in the head section 72 reduces the thickness of the head section 72 by at least thirty percent and may be as much as seventy percent.
At least one countersunk screw hole 34 is formed through the spring anchor mount 24 in the area of the recess 78 . Mounting screws 79 are provided to attach the spring anchor mount 24 to a surface of the window track through the screw holes 34 . Due to the countersunk screw holes 34 and shape of the mounting screws 79 , it will be understood that the screws lay flush in the recess 78 and do not protrude into the area of the recess 78 .
Referring back briefly to FIG. 1 in conjunction with FIG. 6 , it will be understood that the recess 78 formed in the spring anchor mount 24 allows the tilt latch 19 that protrudes from the top of the sash 12 to pass the spring anchor mount 24 without contacting the spring anchor mount 24 . On different model windows, the tilt latch 19 extends into the window track 18 by varying amounts. The recess 78 formed in the spring anchor mount 24 is larger than the protrusion of the tilt latch 19 by at least 1/32 nd of an inch so as to prevent any inadvertent contact.
Referring to FIG. 7 , an embodiment of a spring anchor mount 31 is shown having an alternate attachment means. The spring anchor mount 31 of FIG. 7 has the same structure as that previously described in FIG. 6 , except the embodiment of FIG. 7 does not have mounting holes. Rather, a locking protrusion 33 extends from the rear surface of the spring anchor mount 31 . The locking protrusion passes into a hole preformed in the frame of the window, thereby setting the spring anchor mount 31 in a fixed position.
Referring now to FIG. 8 , another alternate embodiment of the spring anchor mount 80 is shown. In this embodiment, the spring anchor mount 80 still has a recess 82 that enables a window sash tilt latch to pass the spring anchor mount 80 without contacting the spring anchor mount 80 . However, in the shown embodiment, the spring anchor mount 80 is not attached to the window track with mounting screws. Rather, the spring anchor mount 80 is provided with a looped wire locking system very similar to that already described with reference to the brake mechanism of FIGS. 3 , 4 and 5 .
In the spring anchor mount 80 is a looped wire 84 . The ends 86 of the looped wire 84 extend out of the sides of the spring anchor mount 80 unless the loop 85 in the center of the looped wire 84 is internally expanded. A key or screwdriver head is inserted into the loop 85 of the looped wire 84 . Once a key or screwdriver head is inserted into the loop 85 , the key or screwdriver head is turned. When the key or screwdriver head is turned, the loop 85 expands and the ends 86 of the looped wire 84 retract into the spring anchor mount 80 .
To install the spring anchor mount 80 , a screwdriver head or other key is placed in the loop 85 of the looped wire 84 and turned. This retracts the ends 86 of the looped wire 84 . Once the ends 86 of the looped wire 84 are retracted, the spring anchor mount 80 can be moved to any desired position in the window track. Once in a desired position, the key or screwdriver head is removed and the ends of the looped wire 84 extend and engage the sides of the window track, thereby locking the spring anchor mount 80 in place.
Referring to FIG. 9 , a counterbalance system 25 is illustrated in accordance with the present invention. The counterbalance system 25 is being applied to a window assembly having a counterbalance operating system where the curl springs 22 used to create the counterbalance force move with the sash of the window.
From FIG. 9 , it can be seen that the curl spring 22 is attached to the shoe assembly 20 so that the curl spring 22 moves with the shoe assembly 20 in the track 18 of the window. The free end 26 of the curl spring 22 is drawn away from the curl spring 22 and is attached to a spring anchor mount 24 . The spring anchor mount 24 is mounted in a fixed location to the window frame using one of the mounting systems previously described. The curl spring 22 and the shoe assembly 20 glide up and down in the track 18 with the movement of a window sash. The shoe assembly 20 locks in place when the window sash is tilted, as has previously been explained.
It will be understood that the embodiments of the present invention counterbalance system and its components that are described and illustrated herein are merely exemplary and a person skilled in the art can make many variations to the embodiments shown without departing from the scope of the present invention. All such variations, modifications and alternate embodiments are intended to be included within the scope of the present invention as defined by the appended claims.
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A counterbalance system for a tilt-in window having novel components. The counterbalance system includes brake shoes, curl springs and spring anchor mounts. The brake shoe assembly of the counterbalance system has a unique, low cost locking mechanism that uses a looped wire. The brake shoe assembly may also be configured with external rib projections that reduce the friction of the brake shoe assemblies as they move through the tracks of the window. The spring anchor mount is formed with a recess in its body that enables the tilt latch of a window sash to pass the spring anchor mount within the track of the window frame. As a result, the spring anchor mounts can be placed within the window frame at points previously not available.
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FIELD OF THE INVENTION
[0001] The invention relates to a paper for packaging of food. In particular it relates to a paper which, by means of a coating of primarily biological origin, has a sufficient resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water and is still easily recyclable and toxicologically harmless.
BACKGROUND AND PRIOR ART
[0002] A packaging paper for food has to fulfill many different and partially contradicting requirements. A first function of the packaging paper is to protect the packaged food from environmental influences. This requires at least a certain mechanical strength and a chemical stability against typical environmental influences. A second function consists in that the packaging paper should also protect the environment from influences by the packaged food, with which it might come into contact. Above all, for food this requires a sufficient resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water through the packaging paper. Additionally, the packaging paper for food should have a defined resistance against the penetration of water vapor, on the one hand to prevent the food from drying out too quickly and on the other hand, particularly for warm food, to prevent water vapor from condensing inside the packaging and moistening the food.
[0003] A further important property is a good printability of the packaging paper, at least on one side, as many packaging papers for food are printed, in order to be able to identify the packaged food and its origin and in order to provide an attractive appearance to the packaged food. This can be done, for example, by flexographic printing, offset printing or roto-gravure printing. It is also important that the packaging paper does not stick to the packaged food and in addition, the packaging paper should lie flat and have pleasant haptics, a high opacity and a good foldability.
[0004] As packaging paper for food is often used only once, it is sensible for ecological reasons that the packaging paper can be recycled as easily as possible, or if it is not disposed of properly that at least it can be degraded biologically.
[0005] Typically, the requirements of a high or defined resistance against the penetration of grease, oil, water and water vapor and good recyclability or biodegradability contradict each other.
[0006] A process known from the prior art for packaging papers to achieve a good resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water or water vapor, respectively, consists of coating a base paper on one side with polyethylene, for example, in an extrusion process. Because of this coating, such a paper cannot be recycled as waste paper or it can only be recycled with a great deal of effort. Thus, this process does not entirely satisfy the requirement of recyclability or biodegradability.
[0007] Another process known from the prior art for packaging papers in order to achieve a very good resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water consists of coating the paper with specific fluorine-containing substances. In particular polyfluorinated surfactants, and above all fluorotelomer alcohols, CF 3 (CF 2 )CH 2 CH 2 OH with n being uneven, have been proved to be suitable for this application. The use of these substances, however, can cause a contamination with perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA, C 8 HF 15 O 2 ), which accumulates in the human organism and is classified in the REACH (Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation of Chemicals) regulation in force in the EU as a reproductive toxicant, carcinogenic and toxic. For this reason alone, polyfluorinated surfactants are not desirable as a component of a packaging paper and in particular not as component of a packaging paper for food. Additionally, such papers are almost incapable of being recycled.
[0008] Many attempts to coat a packaging paper for food with substances of primarily biological origin, so that in addition to good recyclability or biodegradability, a high resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water could also be achieved, were not successful, because the high resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water, which coatings with poly-ethylene or the use of polyfluorinated surfactants offer, could not be even approximately obtained.
[0009] In other attempts to coat the packaging paper with petroleum-based waxes, a high resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water could be achieved, but again, the requirement for good recyclability or biodegradability was not fulfilled to a sufficient extent. Furthermore, these waxes are often based on petroleum products and are for this reason alone ecologically disadvantageous.
[0010] Therefore, there is still a great need in the industry for an even better combination of these two essential requirements for a packaging paper for food.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0011] The objective of the present invention is to provide a packaging paper for food which on the one hand offers a sufficiently high resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water and on the other hand can easily be recycled or biologically degraded.
[0012] This objective is fulfilled by a packaging paper according to claim 1 and by its use according to claim 35 . Advantageous embodiments are provided in the dependent claims.
[0013] The packaging paper according to the invention has a basis weight from 20 g/m 2 to 40 g/m 2 , comprises filler at a content of less than 20% by weight, with respect to the weight of the uncoated paper, and on at least one side has a coating which comprises a vegetable oil encapsulated in a polymer, as well as talc and at least one binder, wherein both sides of the finished packaging paper have a Cobb 60 value from 14 g/m 2 to 22 g/m 2 .
[0014] Surprisingly, the inventor has found that in spite of the low basis weight of the packaging paper, a coating with a vegetable oil encapsulated in a polymer, as well as talc and at least one binder is sufficient to achieve the required high resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water, as long as this coating is combined with a base paper with said comparably low filler content and a suitable sizing agent, which manifests itself in said Cobb 60 value. In the paper according to the invention, the low filler content provides a low porosity or dense paper structure, respectively, which is of decisive importance for the desired effect of the packaging paper. The given degree of sizing ensures, among others, that the coating penetrates only to a negligible extent into the pore structure of the paper, but instead is located primarily on the surface of the paper and provides the desired effect there. In addition, this reduces the amount of coating material required.
[0015] The packaging paper according to the invention thus uses a coating which consists predominantly of materials of biological origin and facilitates the biodegradation of the used packaging paper. In addition, the packaging paper according to the invention has a comparably low basis weight and this alone reduces the potential amount of waste. At the same time, the packaging paper provides a sufficiently high resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water and a suitable resistance against water vapor, which is sufficiently high to keep the food “fresh”, i.e. avoids an excessively quick drying out, but which is at the same time sufficiently low to partially or completely prevent moistening of the food, above all of warm food. This is facilitated in the context of the invention by designing the base paper in the described manner, especially with respect to the interaction with the coating.
[0016] The sizing and the encapsulated vegetable oil thus essentially create a barrier against water and water vapor, while the dense paper structure due to the low filler content and the use of talc as a component of the coating form a sufficient barrier against grease and oil. It is only by means of a combination of all these properties that a sufficient resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water can be achieved. The coating alone, i.e. on any base paper, is not sufficient to achieve the desired properties.
[0017] The basis weight of the packaging paper according to the invention should be at least 20 g/m 2 and preferably at least 22 g/m 2 . Such basis weights for the packaging paper have been shown to be sufficiently high to ensure a sufficient resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water. Preferably, the basis weight is at least 25 g/m 2 , particularly preferably at least 27 g/m 2 .
[0018] To limit the use of materials for the packaging paper according to the invention, the basis weight should be at most 40 g/m 2 , preferably at most 37 g/m 2 and particularly preferably at most 35 g/m 2 . The basis weight of the packaging paper can be determined in accordance with ISO 536.
[0019] The water absorption of the packaging paper plays an important role and in order to form a sufficient resistance against liquid water on the one hand, but on the other hand, to form a defined resistance against water vapor, it may not exceed or fall below certain values.
[0020] The water absorption is determined by the Cobb 60 value and for the packaging paper according to the invention has to be at least 14 g/m 2 for the coated side, preferably at least 16 g/m 2 and at most 22 g/m 2 , preferably at most 20 g/m 2 . Similarly for the uncoated side of the packaging paper, if present, the Cobb 60 value should be at least 14 g/m 2 , preferably at least 16 g/m 2 and at most 22 g/m 2 , preferably at most 20 g/m 2 .
[0021] The Cobb 60 value of both sides of the packaging paper can be determined in accordance with ISO 535.
[0022] Apart from forming the shell of the capsule itself, the polymer for the encapsulation of the vegetable oil should, provide a suitable physical structure to the shell, so that the water-repellent effect of the oil can also develop through the shell of the capsule. Polymers which contain maleimide groups are preferred, and copolymers with maleimide groups and copolymers of styrene and maleic anhydride derivatives are most particularly preferred.
[0023] The packaging paper can be further optimized by suitable selection of the thickness. The importance of the thickness in the context of the invention results from the fact that, at the same porosity of the packaging paper, a high thickness increases the resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water. Preferably, the thickness of the packaging paper is thus at least 23 μm, preferably at least 25 μm and particularly preferably at least 28 μm.
[0024] On the other hand, with a limited amount of material the thickness of the packaging paper cannot be increased indefinitely without the resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water becoming insufficient due to the increasing porosity. Furthermore, the printability is reduced with a porous paper structure. Thus the thickness of the packaging paper according to the invention should be at most 50 μum, preferably at most 45 μm, particularly preferably at most 40 μm and most particularly preferably at most 35 μm.
[0025] The thickness of the packaging paper can be determined for a single sheet in accordance with ISO 534.
[0026] To estimate the resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water, the air permeability of the packaging can be used. The air permeability provides information regarding the pores in the paper and thus should be as low as possible. For the packaging paper according to the invention, the Bendtsen air permeability is selected to be at most 20 ml/min, preferably at most 17 ml/min and particularly preferably at most 15 ml/min.
[0027] Although an absolute impermeability to air according to Bendtsen, i.e. a value of 0 ml/min, is advantageous for a high resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water, in the occasional event that permeability to water vapor is desired, it might be better if the packaging paper were not completely impervious. In preferred embodiments, the Bendtsen air permeability is thus at least 3 ml/min, preferably at least 5 ml/min and particularly preferably at least 7 ml/min.
[0028] The Bendtsen air permeability can be determined in accordance with ISO 5636-3.
[0029] Apart from the air permeability, the permeability of the paper as regards water vapor could be of importance. On the one hand it should not be too high, to prevent quick drying out of the packaged food, but on the other hand, it should not be too low so that, especially for warm food, moisture condenses inside the packaging and moistens the food. The permeability for water vapor is thus preferably at least 200 g/(m 2 ×24 h), and particularly preferably at least 300 g/(m 2 ×24 h) and most particularly preferably 400 g/(m 2 ×24 h) and/or preferably at most 800 g/(m 2 ×24 h) and particularly preferably at most 700 g/(m 2 ×24 h).
[0030] The permeability for water vapor can be determined in accordance with ISO 2528:1995, wherein for the direction of the permeability for water vapor, the value for the transport of water vapor from the side facing the food to the outside of the packaging paper is considered.
[0031] The optical properties of the packaging paper according to the invention, particularly the opacity and whiteness are of importance for use as packaging paper for food, as the end consumer also buys food according to optical aspects and, for example, a brownish color of the packaging paper, grease stains on the packaging or increased transparency of the packaging paper could be interpreted as an indication of old or spoilt food.
[0032] Thus, the opacity of the packaging paper should in principle be as high as possible, but this is hard to achieve due to the low basis weight and the low filler content and, for example, requires the use of special fillers such as titanium dioxide. The opacity of the packaging paper according to the invention should be at least 50% and preferably at least 60%.
[0033] On the other hand, the opacity of the paper can be comparably easily increased by printing onto the paper, for which reason it might be more efficient not to spend much effort on increasing opacity. In preferred embodiments of the packaging paper, the opacity is thus at most 90%, preferably at most 80% and particularly preferably at most 70%.
[0034] The opacity can be determined in accordance with ISO 2471:2008.
[0035] In many applications, apart from the opacity, the whiteness is also of importance for the packaging paper, in order to reproduce colors with high quality during printing of the packaging paper. The whiteness of the packaging paper should thus in principle be as high as possible, but as is the case with opacity, this is hard to achieve with a paper with a low basis weight and a low filler content according to the invention. In preferred embodiments the whiteness of the packaging paper is at least 70% and preferably at least 80%.
[0036] The upper limit for the whiteness also arises from economic considerations as, for example, a lack of whiteness of the packaging paper can be corrected by a full-surface printing in a white color. The whiteness of the packaging paper is thus preferably at most 95%, particularly preferably at most 90% and in particular at most 85%.
[0037] The whiteness can be determined in accordance with ISO 2470-1:2009. The values refer to that side of the packaging paper which is to be printed or, if the packaging paper is not to be printed or is printed on both sides, to that side which is on the outside when the food is wrapped in the packaging paper.
[0038] Preferably, the packaging paper has a tensile strength of at least 1 kN/m, preferably at least 1.3 kN/m and in particular at least 1.5 kN/m. Such a mechanical strength is advantageous both as regards further use and for printing on conventional printing machines.
[0039] The tensile strength can be increased by refining the pulp from which the packaging paper according to the invention is produced more intensely. But this also means a considerable consumption of energy, for which reason the tensile strength in preferred embodiments should be at most 5 kN/m, preferably at most 4 kN/m and particularly preferably at most 3 kN/m. The term tensile strength as used here means the tensile strength in the machine direction of the packaging paper and it can be determined in accordance with ISO 1924-2.
[0040] The packaging paper according to the invention comprises a base paper and a coating, which is applied to at least one side of the packaging paper.
[0041] The base paper comprises pulp, preferably wood pulp, which accounts for at least 60% by weight with respect to the weight of the base paper. Preferably, the proportion of pulp is selected so as to be high, i.e. at least 80% by weight, particularly preferably at least 90% by weight and preferably at most 100% by weight and particularly preferably at most 95% by weight, each with respect to the weight of the base paper.
[0042] Wood pulp can be a long fiber pulp, preferably from spruce, pine or larch wood or a short fiber pulp, preferably from beech wood, birch wood or eucalyptus wood.
[0043] While long fiber pulp primarily provides tensile strength to the base paper, short fiber pulp serves to increase the volume of the base paper. Refining the pulp, as is known from the prior art, before paper production on the paper machine, requires more energy for long fiber pulp than for short fiber pulp.
[0044] For these reasons preferably a mixture of long fiber pulp and short fiber pulp is used as the wood pulp for the base paper of the packaging paper according to the invention. A mixture of long fiber pulp and short fiber pulp in a mass ratio from 2:1 to 1:2 is particularly preferred.
[0045] Alternative pulps, for example, pulp from flax, hemp, sisal or aback can partially or completely replace the wood pulp if the packaging paper according to the invention is to have special properties, in particular an especially high tensile strength.
[0046] In some embodiments the pulp is bleached to provide sufficient whiteness to the paper. For ecological reasons, it is advantageous to replace part or all of the pulp with unbleached pulp. This further increases the already extraordinary environmental friendliness of the packaging paper according to the invention. In this case, the base paper has a light-brown to dark-brown color.
[0047] Pure pulp (“virgin pulp”) is in general preferred in order to achieve sufficient tensile strength and to avoid the danger of contamination of the packaging paper by foreign substances. Such substances can be present in recycled fibers, for example , which are therefore not preferred. In addition, because it comes into contact with food, the use of waste paper generally has to be advised against.
[0048] Preferably, the Schopper-Riegler degree of refining of the pulp is at least 50°, preferably at least 55° and particularly preferably at least 60°. Such a high degree of refining is beneficial to the density of the paper structure and thus also to the resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water, and also for other properties such as the tensile strength. However, because refining is associated with a high energy consumption , the degree of refining is preferably at most 80°, particularly preferably at most 75° and in particular at most 70°.
[0049] The Schopper-Riegler degree of refining can be measured in accordance with ISO 5267.
[0050] The base paper can contain fillers. The fillers serve to increase the whiteness and opacity, improve the printability of the paper and reduce the costs for the base paper. While for these reasons a filler content that is as high as possible is generally sought, the filler content should be rather lower for the base paper of the packaging paper according to the invention. According to the invention, the high resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water is only obtained for the coating according to the invention because the base paper is sufficiently dense, i.e. of low porosity. Because a higher filler content regularly leads to an increased porosity, the filler content of the base paper should in all cases be less than 20% by weight, preferably less than 15% by weight and particularly preferably less than 10% by weight, each with respect to the weight of the base paper.
[0051] In principle, the base paper can be produced without filler. Having regard to a sufficient opacity of the packaging paper, however, the filler content is preferably selected to be at least 2% by weight and particularly preferably to be at least 5% by weight with respect to the weight of the base paper.
[0052] In principle, any of the fillers known in the prior art for paper production can be used. The fillers can comprise silicates, carbonates and oxides, particularly carbonates and oxides of metals. For the purposes of the invention, calcium carbonate, particularly precipitated calcium carbonate, aluminum hydroxide, talc, kaolin and titanium dioxide are suitable.
[0053] Titanium dioxide is preferred for the base paper of the packaging paper according to the invention because it contributes to a particularly high whiteness and opacity of the base paper and is effective even in low amounts. This is important, because there are also high optical requirements for packaging papers for food, but for the aforementioned reasons, the filler content has to be comparably low.
[0054] Talc is also a preferred filler for the base paper of the packaging paper according to the invention because it has grease-repellent properties and this enhances the effect of the applied coating.
[0055] A further preferred filler for the base paper is kaolin because its flaky shape increases the length of the pores in the paper and hence the pathway for grease, oil and water through the paper and increases the resistance against penetration of the paper.
[0056] In order to obtain the degree of sizing of the finished packaging paper, the base paper can contain sizing agents. In this regard, sizes, resins or polymers such as copolymers of styrene and acrylic esters or alkyl-ketene dimers (AKD) or alkylated succinic anhydride (ASA) can in particular be considered. Alkyl-ketene dimers are most particularly preferably.
[0057] The sizing can be carried out in the bulk or on the surface, preferably in the bulk.
[0058] Based on his knowledge the skilled person can easily select further substances and process aids known from the prior art, for example starch, retention aids, de-foaming agents, dispersing agents and other substances that are useful or required for the production of the base paper. Generally, it has to be considered that the base paper comes into contact with food and thus legal requirements usually have to be complied with.
[0059] The use of pigments such as red, yellow or black iron oxides, or carbon, is also possible in order to provide a specific color to the base paper. Similarly, organic dyes can be used, as long as they are approved for contact with food. White base papers, however, are preferred.
[0060] Furthermore, the use of flavoring in the base paper is possible. Frequently, however, they are not desired in connection with use as packaging paper for food, because they can influence the smell and the taste of the packaged food and they are in any case not preferred for the packaging paper according to the invention.
[0061] Coating the base paper is of essential importance, because, together with the dense structure of the base paper, it serves to achieve a sufficient resistance against penetration of grease, oil and water through the packaging paper.
[0062] In preferred embodiments, the coating applied to the base paper amounts to at least 0.5 g/m 2 , preferably to at least 1 g/m 2 and particularly preferably to at least 2 g/m 2 of the basis weight of the packaging paper according to the invention, in order to achieve a sufficient resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water.
[0063] In preferred embodiments, the coating applied to the base paper amounts to at most 12 g/m 2 , preferably to at most 8 g/m 2 , particularly preferably to at most 6 g/m 2 and most particularly preferably to at most 5 g/m 2 of the basis weight of the packaging paper according to the invention. Applying too large a quantity of material improves the resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water only marginally, but increases the cost of the packaging paper. In addition, applying large amounts of a coating composition onto relatively thin papers is generally difficult, in particular with aqueous coating solutions.
[0064] The coating can be applied to the base paper on one side or on both sides. Although applying to both sides results in a higher resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water, it is often not required, and so it can be avoided for economic reasons. In addition, the coating according to the invention can substantially deteriorate the printability on the coated side. Thus, the packaging paper according to the invention is preferably only coated on one side.
[0065] In general for a one-sided coating, each of the two sides of the base paper can be coated with the coating according to the invention, but preferably, the side of the paper which faces the food wrapped in the packaging paper is the coated side.
[0066] Because the felt side of the base paper is generally smoother and because a greater smoothness results in a uniform coating and thus a greater resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water, in a preferred embodiment, the felt side of the base paper is coated.
[0067] On the other hand, packaging papers are often printed on one side. As the felt side of the packaging paper is more suitable for printing because of the higher print quality, as an alternative, the wire side of the packaging paper can be coated with the coating according to the invention, if this means that a sufficient resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water can be achieved.
[0068] The terms “felt side” and “wire side” should be understood from the viewpoint of paper production. The wire side is that side of the paper that is in contact with the wire during paper production on a paper machine and thus often has a lower smoothness and lower content of filler. The felt side is the side opposite to the wire side and is often smoother and therefore more suitable for printing.
[0069] The coating can be applied in one step or in several steps. Application in several steps is preferred, if the amount of applied coating material exceeds about 8 g/m 2 , depending on the basis weight of the base paper. After each application step, the packaging paper can be dried.
[0070] In a preferred embodiment, the base paper is coated with the coating according to the invention on only one side and the other side is coated with starch. This starch coating improves the printability and prevents the paper from curling after drying, which is desirable for further processing of the packaging paper. When coating with starch, starch solutions and processes from the prior art can be used. In the context of the invention, application in a film press is particularly advantageous.
[0071] The amount of starch that can be applied to the side of the packaging paper that is not coated according to the invention can preferably be at least 0.5 g/m 2 , particularly preferably at least 1 g/m 2 and preferably at most 4 g/m 2 , particularly preferably at most 3 g/m 2 .
[0072] The coating solution that is applied to the base paper in accordance with the invention comprises a solvent and the coating material.
[0073] The term “solvent” or “coating solution” as used here does not mean that the coating solution has to be a solution in the chemical sense. The coating solution may also be a solution, dispersion, suspension, emulsion or any other form of mixture.
[0074] Water is preferred as a solvent over all other solvents or mixtures of solvents and in particular over organic solvents, as it is toxicologically harmless and can be used on the paper machine without further measures, in particular without protection against explosion. It is inevitable that small residues of solvent remain in the paper and can influence the smell and the taste of the packaged food. For this reason too, organic solvents are not preferred.
[0075] However, since other solvents or mixtures of solvents apart from water can in principle be used with appropriate measures, they are also encompassed by the invention. In particular, the use of a mixture of water and ethanol as solvent could be considered.
[0076] The coating material should be at least 30% by weight, preferably at least 40% by weight, particularly preferably at least 50% by weight and most particularly preferably at least 60% by weight, with respect to the weight of the coating solution. This ensures that the amount of coating solution that needs to be applied in order to apply a pre-defined amount of coating material is not too large, which can in general be difficult for thin papers, in particular for aqueous coating solutions.
[0077] The coating material should make up at most 80% by weight, preferably at most 75% by weight and particularly preferably at most 70% by weight, with respect to the weight of the coating solution. This avoids having too little solvent in the coating solution with a correspondingly high viscosity of the coating solution, and the coating solution can thus be applied efficiently to the base paper.
[0078] The coating material used in the context of the invention contains a vegetable oil, wherein various vegetable oils, such as sunflower oil, soybean oil, palm oil or rapeseed oil, are preferably considered.
[0079] Sunflower oil and soybean oil or a mixture thereof are preferred, and a mixture of sunflower oil and soybean oil in a mass ratio of 1:1 is most particularly preferred.
[0080] The sum of the vegetable oils in the coating material should preferably be at least 20%, particularly preferably at least 25% and most particularly preferably at least 30% of the mass of the coating material. The sum of the vegetable oils in the coating materials should preferably be at most 60%, particularly preferably at most 55% and most particularly preferably at most 50% of the mass of the coating material.
[0081] As mentioned above, the vegetable oil is encapsulated in a polymer, for example in a copolymer of styrene and maleic anhydride derivatives. These capsules can be produced, for example, according to the process described in WO 2008/014903.
[0082] The binder in the coating material can be a starch, a starch derivative, a cellulose derivative or a polymer, in particular polyvinyl alcohol or polystyrene acrylate. Starch, polyvinyl alcohol or a mixture thereof is preferred as the binder, and a mixture of starch, polyvinyl alcohol and polystyrene acrylate in a mass ratio of about 4:3:8 is most particularly preferred as the binder.
[0083] The sum of the binders in the coating material should preferably be at least 15%, particularly preferably at least 20% and most particularly preferably at least 25% of the mass of the coating material. The sum of the binders in the coating material should preferably be at most 75%, particularly preferably at most 60% and in particular at most 50% of the mass of the coating material.
[0084] The coating material contains at least talc as a filler because of its grease-repellent properties, but it can contain further fillers. These further fillers can primarily serve to increase the opacity and whiteness of the packaging paper. In principle, all fillers can be considered as further fillers, which can also be used for the production of the base paper, in particular silicates, carbonates and oxides, especially calcium carbonate, in particular precipitated calcium carbonate, aluminum hydroxide, kaolin and titanium dioxide. Titanium dioxide is preferred because it results in a high whiteness and opacity, and kaolin is preferred because its flaky shape extends the diffusion pathways through the coating. A mixture of talc, titanium dioxide and kaolin is particularly preferred, most particularly preferably in a mass ratio of talc:titanium dioxide:kaolin of about 16:2:7.
[0085] The proportion of talc in the coating material is preferably at least 5%, particularly preferably at least 10% and/or preferably at most 30% and particularly preferably at most 25% with respect to the mass of coating material.
[0086] The sum of fillers, including talc, in the coating material is preferably at least 5% by weight, particularly preferably at least 10% by weight and most particularly preferably at least 20% by weight of the mass of the coating material. The sum of fillers in the coating material should be at most 60% by weight, preferably at most 50% by weight and particularly preferably at most 45% by weight with respect to the mass of the coating material.
[0087] The coating material can contain waxes. Waxes improve the resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water, but deteriorate the biodegradability, for which reason their content in the coating material should be less than 5% by weight and preferably less than 2% by weight with respect to the weight of the coating material. The waxes can, for example, be paraffin waxes.
[0088] The coating material can comprise further substances which, for example, contribute to the processability of the coating material, or which influence the viscosity or storage life, as long as they do not significantly deteriorate the resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water and the biodegradability. These substances can be polymer salts.
[0089] The sum of further substances in the coating material is preferably less than 15%, particularly preferably less than 10% and most particularly preferably less than 7% of the mass of the coating material.
[0090] Preferably, the coating material consists of at least 50% by weight, preferably at least 60% by weight and particularly preferably at least 70% by weight of materials of biological origin. The group of materials of biological origin comprises, for example, vegetable oils, starch and fillers, while petroleum-based waxes and petroleum-based polymers are not included therein.
[0091] The production of the base paper can be carried out in accordance with processes known from the prior art. In particular, a paper machine can be used for the production of the base paper, which in accordance with the prior art comprises a head box, a wire section, a press section, a drying section and a winding roll.
[0092] At the head box an aqueous suspension of pulp and optionally of filler and other substances, such as process aids, is applied to the wire of the paper machine and at first de-watered by gravity and low pressure in the wire section. Then the press section follows, in which the paper web is further de-watered by mechanical pressure. The remaining water is then evaporated in the drying section, so that the packaging paper reaches its equilibrium moisture content under normal conditions (23° C., 50% rH) of about 4-7% by weight. Winding is carried out at the end of the paper machine.
[0093] Frequently, in a paper machine a film or size press is incorporated into the drying section, in which the paper is impregnated or a coating is applied. In particular, a film press offers the possibility of applying two different coating solutions on each side of the paper in a single step. The coating solution according to the invention can preferably be applied in such a film press and is easily possible for a skilled person.
[0094] Apart from the film or size press, which allows application directly in the paper machine, applying the coating solution on a separate application device can be considered. The application device can be, for example, a printing machine, in particular a roto-gravure printing machine or flexographic printing machine. Such an application device can also be incorporated into the paper machine instead of or as complement to the film or size press.
[0095] Clearly, the paper has to be dried after applying the coating according to the invention in order to obtain the packaging paper according to the invention.
[0096] It has been shown that the packaging paper according to one of the preceding embodiments can combine a high resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water with an excellent biodegradability in a manner not known before. The inventor's experiments have shown that packaging papers according to an embodiment of the invention are comparable to a packaging paper that is coated with polyethylene having regard to the resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water in particular for comparably short time periods of a few minutes up to half an hour, but at the same time avoid its disadvantages. In that respect, the packaging paper according to the invention is extraordinarily well suited particularly for fast-food articles, which are usually consumed shortly after being packaged.
[0097] The packaging paper according to the invention is most particularly advantageous for hot fast food, for example, hamburgers, as it delays the penetration of grease, oil and water not only for a sufficiently long time, but at the same time is sufficiently permeable for water vapor, so that the fast food article is not moistened and does not become “soggy”. In this respect, the packaging paper according to the invention is in fact superior to conventional packaging papers, which are coated with polyethylene. In the present disclosure, the term “hamburger” should be understood to mean all related types of sandwiches, in particular cheeseburgers, hot chicken sandwiches, hot fish sandwiches, meat loaf rolls and meat ball rolls.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
[0098] The advantages of the invention will be demonstrated by an exemplary packaging paper for food according to the invention.
[0099] The base paper for the packaging paper according to the invention was produced from the following components.
[0100] As long fiber pulp 48% by weight was used consisting of a mixture of pulps from spruce wood, pine wood and larch wood, and as short fiber pulp 44% by weight consisting of a mixture of pulps from birch wood and eucalyptus wood was used, so that the proportion of pulp in the base paper was 92% by weight. Only titanium dioxide was used as the filler, in a proportion of 7.5% by weight. The rest was attributable to other substances and process aids, in particular a small amount of an alkyl-ketene dimer in the bulk to achieve the desired degree of sizing.
[0101] All values above given as a % by weight refer to the base paper without coating.
[0102] Before the paper production, the pulp was refined to a Schopper-Riegler degree of refining of 60° to 70°, measured in accordance with ISO 5267.
[0103] The base paper was produced on a Fourdrinier paper machine using processes known from the prior art. In the film press of the paper machine, the coating solution was applied to the felt side of the base paper and a starch solution was applied to the wire side, and the paper was then dried to a moisture content of 5% by weight with respect to the weight of the finished packaging paper.
[0104] The coating solution consisted of 36% by weight of water and 64% by weight of coating material, each with respect to the weight of the coating solution.
[0105] The coating material itself contained about 18% sunflower oil, 18% soybean oil, encapsulated in a copolymer of styrene and maleic anhydride derivatives, as well as 7% polyvinyl alcohol, 5% starch and 14% polystyrene acrylate. The fillers were 20% talc, 2.5% titanium dioxide and 9% kaolin. Furthermore, the coating material contained 2% of waxes and about 4.5% of process aids such as dispersing agents. Thus, the coating solution contained more than 70% of materials of biological origin.
[0106] All values are with respect to the mass of the coating material.
[0107] The basis weight of the finished packaging paper (29.5 g/m 2 ) and of the uncoated base paper (25 g/m 2 ) were determined in accordance with ISO 536, and by difference from the basis weight, the applied amount of the coatings was 4.5 g/m 2 , wherein it is known from experience that the amount of starch applied to the wire side is about 1 g/m 2 . Thus, the amount of coating material applied to the felt side was about 3.5 g/m 2 .
[0108] The water absorption was determined by the Cobb 60 value in accordance with ISO 535 for both sides of the packaging paper. For the side coated according to the invention, a value of 17 g/m 2 was found, while for the side coated with starch the value was 18 g/m 2 .
[0109] The thickness of the packaging paper was measured on a single sheet in accordance with ISO 534 and a value of 31 μm was obtained.
[0110] The Bendtsen air permeability of the packaging paper was measured in accordance with ISO 5636-3 and a value of 9 ml/min was obtained.
[0111] The permeability for water vapor was measured in accordance with ISO 2528:1995 in the direction from the side coated according to the invention to the side coated with starch and a value of about 500 g/(m 2 ×24 h) was obtained.
[0112] The opacity of the packaging paper was measured in accordance with ISO 2471:2008 and a value of 65% was obtained.
[0113] The whiteness of the packaging paper was measured on the wire side in accordance with ISO 2470-1:2009 and a value of 83% was obtained.
[0114] The tensile strength of the packaging paper was measured in accordance with ISO 1924-2 and a value of 2.0 kN/m was obtained.
[0115] Finally the biodegradability was measured in accordance with EN 13432 “Requirements for packaging recoverable through composting and biodegradation—Test scheme and evaluation criteria for the final acceptance of packaging”. In this test the packaging is stored in a defined compost and a sample is taken at regular intervals. For this sample in the proportion as a % by weight is determined which is retained by a sieve with a mesh size of 2 mm. The packaging fulfills the requirements of the standard if less than 10% by weight of the sample mass is retained in the sieve after 12 weeks.
[0116] For the packaging paper according to the invention it was shown, that even after two weeks less than 0.1% by weight of the sample mass was retained in a sieve with a mesh size of 2 mm, so that it has an excellent biodegradability.
[0117] In order to test the resistance against the penetration of grease, oil and water in an experiment, various foodstuffs were wrapped in the packaging paper according to the invention and in a paper coated with polyethylene. After a defined time period, stains and discoloration of the packaging paper according to the invention were subjectively compared with those on the paper coated with polyethylene. It was shown that over a period of a few minutes up to half an hour, both papers provided an approximately similarly effective barrier against the penetration of grease, oil and water. Over longer periods of time, typically of more than an hour, the paper coated with polyethylene was superior with respect to its barrier effect. The packaging paper according to the invention is therefore preferred for packaging food intended for quick consumption, preferably for food in the area of fast food and most particularly preferred for hamburgers, cheeseburgers or sandwiches.
[0118] The paper according to the invention thus at least in the short term forms a good barrier against the penetration of grease, oil and water and has an excellent biodegradability and can thus combine these two contradicting requirements very well.
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Discloses is a packaging paper for food having a grammage between 20 g/m 2 and 40 g/m 2 , and having a filler content of less than 20 wt. % relative to the weight of the uncoated paper. On at least one side the packaging paper has a coating that contains a vegetable oil encapsulated in a polymer, and also talc and a binder. Both sides of the finished packaging paper have a Cobb 60 value of 14 g/m 2 to 22 g/m 2 .
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FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to polypeptides having a β-adrenergic receptor activity in man, and more particularly implicated in the lipolytic response of the adipose tissues, and the genes coding for these polypeptides.
The invention also relates:
to vectors containing the genes coding for polypeptides having a β-adrenergic activity,
to cell hosts transformed by genes coding for the above-mentioned polypeptides,
to nucleotide probes capable of hybridizing with the genes coding for the above-mentioned polypeptides,
to polyclonal and monoclonal antibodies directed against the above-mentioned polypeptides and which can be used for the purpose of in vitro diagnosis,
to kits for studying the degree of affinity of certain substances for the above-mentioned polypeptides,
to medicines containing substances active on the above-mentioned polypeptides having a β-adrenergic receptor activity, and more particularly designed for the treatment of obesity, diabetes and hyperlipidemia.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The catecholamines such as adrenalin and noradrenalin, the synthetic agonists of these catecholamines which mimic their biological function and the antagonists which block these functions exert their effects by binding to specific recognition sites (adrenergic receptors) situated on cell membranes.
Two main classes of adrenergic receptors have been defined, the α adrenergic receptors and the β adrenergic receptors.
Within the set of these two classes, four sub-types of these receptors for catecholamines are distinguished (α1, α2, β1 and β2-AR). Their genes have recently been isolated and identified (5-8). The analysis of these genes has made it possible to recognize that they belong to a family of integral membrane receptors exhibiting certain homologies (9-10), in particular at the level of the 7 transmembrane regions. These latter are coupled to regulatory proteins, called G proteins, capable of binding molecules of guanosine triphosphate (GTP).
More precisely, the G proteins are proteins having the capacity to intervene structurally and functionally between receptors and enzymes catalysing the production of intracellular mediators (such as adenylate cyclase, guanylate cyclase, the phospholipases, the kinases) or between receptors and ion channels, the controlled opening of which brings about a flux of ions (such as calcium, potassium, sodium, hydrogen ions) into the cell.
These proteins have transduction and coupling functions.
The above-mentioned family of receptors is designated as the "R 7 G family" (10). It comprises, in particular, acetylcholine muscarinic receptors, serotonin receptors, receptors for neuropeptides, substance K and angiotensin II and the visual receptors for the family of the opsins (9-10).
Up until very recently, the definition of the sub-types of receptors was based mainly on the analysis of the physiological properties and binding of different ligands in heterogenous systems. In the R 7 G family, several genes coding for sub-types of receptors defined by their pharmacological properties have been cloned and characterized. Probes obtained from these genes have made it possible to identify additional receptor sub-types (11-12).
The precise nature of the β-adrenergic receptor, which is capable of modulating physiological functions such as thermogenesis in adipose cells as well as intestinal relaxation has remained obscure. In connection with this latter property, it has been found that isoproterenol still inhibits the contractions of the guinea pig ileum induced by the cholinergic pathway (3), in spite of the total blockage of the known adrenergic receptors of the α and β types with pentholamine and propanolol.
By undertaking a detailed study of the physiological effects of the agonists and of the inhibition by the antagonists of the polypeptides having a β-adrenergic receptor activity (1-3), the hypothesis has been put forward of the existence of a novel sub-type of β-adrenergic receptor.
This hypothesis has been challenged by a conflicting hypothesis, resulting from the analysis of the β-receptor content of an adipose tissue by means of binding studies. This analysis has led to the conclusion--which constitutes the most recent state of the art--that the lipolytic β-adrenergic receptors are uniquely of the β1 sub-type (13).
Moreover, among the compounds used in the modern pharmacopeia, a dominant position is occupied by the β-adrenergic agonists or antagonists (β1 or β2-AR). In spite of their remarkable efficacy, the available medicines can produce side effects, due potentially to the interaction with other homologous receptors.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The invention raises an uncertainty with regard to the hypothesis, previously formulated but subsequently ruled out, of the existence of polypeptides having a β-adrenergic receptor activity other than that of the β1 and β2 receptors. In fact, it provides access to novel polypeptides having a β-adrenergic receptor activity which does not have similarities to that of the β1-adrenergic receptors or that of the β2-adrenergic receptors.
The object of the invention is also screening procedures for new medicines acting on the novel polypeptides having a β-adrenergic receptor action and designed, among other things, for the treatment of obesity, fatty diabetes and diabetes in non insulin-dependent subjects, as well as for the treatment of hyperlipidemias.
In particular, the novel polypeptide of the invention having a β-adrenergic activity:
contains the sequence of 402 amino acids of FIG. 12 or a fragment of this sequence, this fragment being such that
either it contains nonetheless the sites contained in this sequence, whose presence is necessary so that, when this fragment is exposed to the surface of a cell, it is capable of participating in the activation of the adenylate cyclase in the presence of an agonist, this activation increasing in the order of the following agonists: salbutamol, BRL 28410, BRL 37344 and (1)-isoproterenol,
or it is capable of being recognized by antibodies which also recognize the above-mentioned sequence of 402 amino acids, but which do not recognize either the β1 adrenergic receptor or the β2 adrenergic receptor
or it is capable of generating antibodies which recognize the above-mentioned sequence of 402 amino acids but which do not recognize the β1 receptor or the β2 adrenergic receptor.
The recognition of the above-mentioned sequence of 402 amino acids by the above-mentioned antibodies--or of the above-mentioned fragment by the above-mentioned antibodies--means that the above-mentioned sequence forms a complex with one of the above-mentioned antibodies.
The formation of the antigen (i.e. sequence of 402 amino acids or the above-mentioned fragment)--antibody complex and the detection of the existence of a complex formed can be done in the following manner:
the antigen and antibody are allowed to incubate for 1 h at room temperature, then overnight at 4° C. in PLT buffer;
the PLT buffer has the following composition: 10 mM of sodium phosphate, 145 mM of NaCl, 5% of lyophilized skimmed milk (wt/v), 0.1% of Tween 20 (v/v), the pH being 7.4,
four 5 min. washings with the PLT buffer are then carried out,
a second biotinylated antibody is allowed to incubate for 1 h at room temperature in PLT buffer,
four 5 min. washings with PLT buffer are carried out,
streptavidin peroxidase is allowed to incubate for 1 h at room temperature in PLT buffer,
four washing with PLT buffer are undertaken, then
a washing is carried out with the medium constituted by: 10 mM sodium phosphate, 145 mM of NaCl, 0.1% of Triton X 100, the pH being 7.4,
a further washing is carried out with the medium having the composition indicated above but not containing Triton X 100, then
the antigen-antibody complex formed is revealed by standard procedures.
As for the definition of the "fragments containing the sites" and complying with the above-mentioned definition, reference should be made to the description given hereinafter.
The novel β-adrenergic receptors of the invention are thus characterized by properties different from those of the β1 and β2 receptors in that they behave differently towards substances respectively antagonists and agonists of β1 and β2.
The determination of the order in which the polypeptides of the invention participate in the activation of the adenylate cyclase in the presence of the agonists present: salbutamol, BRL 28410, BRL 37344 and (1)-isoproterenol, is described in the comment relating to FIG. 2C, which follows the present description.
The order indicated above is totally different from that obtained with the same agonists when the responses are mediated by the intermediary of the β1 or β2 adrenergic receptors.
In the case of ".sub.β3-CHO " cells defined below, this order is similar to that determined for the stimulation of lipolysis in rat adipose cells (1). The only difference is constituted by the relative order of isoproterenol and BRL 37344. However, the isoproterenol referred to in the invention is the levo-rotatory isomer of isoproterenol whereas that of reference (1) is the racemic mixture (d1).
BRL 28410 is defined in reference (1) and has the following structure: ##STR1##
BRL 37344 is defined in reference (1) and has the following structure: ##STR2##
The invention also relates to chimeric proteins in which the polypeptide as defined above or parts of the latter are joined to a chain of amino acids which is heterologous with respect to this polypeptide.
Advantageous chimeric proteins of the invention are constituted by those in which the heterologous chain of amino acids is selected from the sequence of the β1 adrenergic receptor or a fragment of this receptor or the sequence of the β2-adrenergic receptor or a fragment of this receptor.
The chimeric polypeptides and proteins of the invention may be glycosylated and may or may not contain disulfide bridges.
For the purposes of simplification, the polypeptides of the invention will be designated by "β3 receptors" in the remainder of the description.
The β3 receptors of the invention are also such that the capacity to stimulate the adenylate cyclase and/or the accumulation of cyclic AMP induced by isoproterenol and are not inhibited by the following compounds:
practolol,
nadolol,
CGP 12,177 ##STR3## butoxamine, alprenolol,
propanolol,
pindolol,
oxprenolol,
used at concentrations lower than or equal to 10 -4 M under the following conditions:
as far as the accumulation of cyclic AMP is concerned, cells are cultivated and harvested after treatment with Versene/EDTA (Eurobio, Paris), washed and resuspended in a Hank medium containing 20 mM of Hepes buffered at pH 7.4, 1 mM ascorbic acid and 0.1 mM isobutyl-methyl-zanthine; aliquots of 10 6 cells are incubated for 30 minutes with the inhibitors at 10 -4 M before the addition of 5.10 -9 M of isoproterenol; the incubation is continued for a further 30 minutes and the cyclic AMP levels are measured according, for example, to the specifications of the Amersham assay kit.
The stimulation of the adenylate cyclase by the β3 receptors of the invention as well as the measurement of the accumulation of cAMP may be carried out according to standard methods.
The CGP12,177 is a compound manufactured by the CIBA-GEIGY company.
The conditions used are similar to those under which the above-mentioned compounds behave as antagonists towards β1 and β2 adrenergic receptors.
The β3 receptors of the invention are also such that pindolol and oxprenolol stimulate the accumulation of cyclic AMP in CHO cells transfected with the above-mentioned β3 receptor under the following conditions:
as far as the accumulation of cyclic AMP is concerned, cells are cultivated and harvested after treatment with Versene/EDTA (Eurobio, Paris), washed and resuspended in a Hank medium containing 20 mM of Hepes buffered at pH 7.4, 1 mM ascorbic acid and 0.1 mM isobutyl-methyl-xanthine; aliquots of 10 6 cells are incubated for 30 minutes in a total volume of 1 ml with concentrations of pindolol or oxprenolol higher than 10 -11 M and the cAMP levels are measured according, for example, to the specifications of the Amersham assay kit.
An advantageous β3 receptor of the invention is constituted by the chain of amino acids 1 to 402 shown in FIG. 1a.
This β3 receptor is considered to contain seven hydrophobic transmembrane regions separated by intra- and extra-cellular hydrophilic loops.
The invention also relates to the variant polypeptides which correspond to the polypeptides defined above bearing certain localized mutations without the polypeptides losing the properties of the β3-adrenergic receptor. Among these peptides, mention may be made of those which are recognized by antibodies recognizing the transmembrane regions as well as those which are recognized by antibodies recognizing the regions other than the transmembrane regions.
The invention also relates to nucleic acids which comprise or which are constituted by a chain of nucleotides coding for any one of the previously defined β3 receptors.
More particularly, the invention relates to the nucleic acid which comprises the chain of nucleotides shown in FIG. 1b, extending from the end constituted by the nucleotide at position 1 to that constituted by the nucleotide at position 2022.
The invention also relates to the nucleic acid shown in FIG. 1b comprising or being constituted by the chain extending from the end constituted by the nucleotide at position 638 to that constituted by the nucleotide at position 1843.
The nucleic acid defined above corresponds to the part coding for the gene corresponding to that polypeptide shown in FIG. 1a.
Also included in the invention are the nucleic acids which vary with respect to those defined above and which bear certain localized mutations to the extent that these variant nucleic acids hybridize with the nucleic acids previously defined or with the nucleic acid probes defined hereafter under the conditions of hybridization defined hereafter in the description.
The nucleic acids of the invention may be prepared either by a chemical process or by other processes.
A suitable method of preparation of the nucleic acids (containing a maximum of 200 nucleotides--or bp, when double-stranded nucleic acids are concerned) of the invention by the chemical route comprises the following steps:
the synthesis of DNA using the automated β-cyanoethyl phosphoramidite method described in Bioorganic Chemistry 4; 274-325, 1986,
the cloning of the DNAs thus obtained in a suitable plasmid vector and the recovery of the DNAs by hybridization with a suitable probe.
A chemical method of preparation of nucleic acids longer than 200 nucleotides--or bp (when double-stranded nucleic acids are concerned) comprises the following steps:
the assembly of chemically synthesized oligonucleotides provided at their ends with various restriction sites, the sequences of which are compatible with the chain of amino acids of the natural polypeptide according to the principle described in Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 80; 7461-7465, 1983,
the cloning of the DNAs thus obtained into a suitable plasmid vector and the recovery of the desired nucleic acid by hybridization with a suitable probe.
Another process for the preparation of the nucleic acids of the invention from mRNA comprises the following steps:
preparation of cellular RNA from any tissue expressing the β3-adrenergic receptor, in particular adipose, muscular, hepatic and intestinal tissues, according to the procedures described by Maniatis et al. in "Molecular cloning", Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, 1982, and Ausubel F. M., Brent T., Kingston R. E., Moore D. D., Smith J. A., Seidman J. G. and Struhl K. (1989) Current Protocols in Molecular Biology, chapter 4, Greene Publishing Associates and Wiley-Interscience, New York,
recovery and purification of the mRNAs by passage of the total cellular RNAs through chromatography column containing immobilized oligo dT,
synthesis of a cDNA strand starting from the purified mRNAs according to the procedure described in Gene 25:263, 1983,
cloning of the nucleic thus obtained in a suitable plasmid vector and recovery of the desired nucleotide sequence using a suitable hybridization probe.
In order to prepare the nucleic acids of the invention, the chemically synthesized oligonucleotide hybridization probes are the following:
that defined by the nucleic acid sequence shown in FIG. 1b, extending from the end constituted by the nucleotide at position 1 to that constituted by the nucleotide at position 637
that defined by the nucleic acid sequence shown in FIG. 1b, extending from the end constituted by the nucleotide at position 638 to that constituted by the nucleotide at position 745,
that defined by the nucleic acid sequence shown in FIG. 1b, extending from the end constituted by the nucleotide at position 1313 to that constituted by the nucleotide at position 1513,
that defined by the nucleic acid sequence shown in FIG. 1b, extending from the end constituted by the nucleotide at position 1679 to that constituted by the nucleotide at position 1843,
that defined by the nucleic acid sequence shown in FIG. 1b, extending from the end constituted by the nucleotide at position 1844 to that constituted by the nucleotide at position 2022,
that defined by the nucleic acid sequence shown in FIG. 1b, extending from the end constituted by the nucleotide at position 638 to that constituted by the nucleotide at position 1843. or their complementary nucleotide sequence;
these are sequences which have been derived from those of FIG. 1b and they may be used under the hybridization conditions described by Maniatis et al. in "Molecular cloning", Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, 1982.
The synthesis of the cDNA strand and its subsequent in vitro amplification may also be carried out by using the PCR (Polymerase Chain Reaction) method, as described for example by Goblet et al. in Nucleic Acid Research, 17, 2144, 1989 "One step amplification of transcripts in total RNA using Polymerase Chain Reaction", by using two chemically synthesized amplimers defined from the sequence of FIG. 1b. Suitable amplimers are for example: that defined in FIG. 1b from nucleotide 638 to nucleotide 667 and that defined in FIG. 1b from nucleotide 1815 to nucleotide 1843.
The amplified fragment of nucleic acids may then be cloned according to the procedures described in Ausubel F. M., Brent R., Kingston R. E., Moore D. D., Smith J. A., Seidman J. G. and Struhl K. (1989) Current Protocols in Molecular Biology, chapter 3, Greene Publishing Associates and Wiley-Interscience, New York.
The invention also relates to recombinant vectors in particular for cloning and/or expression, in particular of the plasmid, cosmid or phage type, containing a nucleic acid of the invention at one of its sites not essential for its replication.
The invention also relates to the vector M13mp18-Huβ3, (No. 1085), constituted by a bacteriophage deposited under the No. I-833 on Jan. 20, 1989 with the CNCM, 25 rue du Docteur Roux, Paris.
A suitable vector of the invention contains at one of its sites not essential for its replication elements necessary to promote the expression of a polypeptide according to the invention in a cell host and possibly a promoter recognized by the polymerases of the cell host, in particular an inducible promoter and possibly a signal sequence and an anchoring sequence.
The invention also relates to a cell host transformed by a recombinant vector previously defined comprising the elements of regulation making possible the expression of the nucleotide sequence coding for one of the polypeptides according to the invention in this host.
By cell host is meant any organism capable of being maintained in culture.
One of the microorganisms used may be constituted by a bacterium, in particular Eschericia coli.
An organism of choice is constituted by an eucaryotic organism such as CHO (Chinese Hamster Ovary) cells.
However, other organisms may be used just as readily, naturally provided that there are available for each of them vectors, in particular plasmid vectors, capable of replicating in them and nucleotide sequences which can be inserted into these vectors and which are capable, when they are followed in these vectors by an insert coding for a polypeptide of the invention, of ensuring the expression of this insert in the selected organisms and their transport into the membrane of the cell hosts.
The invention also relates to the antibodies directed specifically against one of the polypeptides of the invention, these antibodies being such that they recognize neither the β1 adrenergic receptor nor the β2 adrenergic receptor. In particular, these antibodies recognize the following amino acid sequences:
______________________________________ 1 to 36 178 to 201 64 to 74 223 to 291 101 to 108 314 to 325 133 to 135 345 to 402______________________________________
In order to produce the antibodies, one of the above-mentioned polypeptides may be injected into an animal.
Monoclonal antibodies are prepared by cell fusion between myeloma cells and spleen cells of immunized mice according to standard procedures.
The invention also relates to the synthetic or non-synthetic nucleotide probes which hybridize with one of the nucleic acids defined above or with their complementary sequences or their corresponding RNA, these probes being such that they hybridize neither with the gene nor the messenger RNA of the β1 and β2 adrenergic receptors.
The probes of the invention contain a minimum of 10 and advantageously 15 nucleotides and may contain maximally the entire nucleotide sequence shown in FIG. 1b.
In the case of the shortest probes, i.e. those of about 10 to about 100 nucleotides, suitable hybridization conditions are the following: 750 mM of NaCl, 75 mM of tri-sodium citrate, 50 μg/ml of salmon sperm DNA, 50 mM of sodium phosphate, 1 mM of sodium pyrophosphate, 100 μM of ATP, 10 to 25% of formamide, 1% Ficoll (Pharmacia, mean molecular weight of 400,000), 1% polyvinylpyrrolidone, 1% bovine serum albumin--for 14 to 16 h at 42° C.
In the case of the longest probes, i.e. possessing more than about 100 nucleotides, suitable hybridization conditions are those previously indicated for the shortest probes but in which the medium defined above contains 40% of formamide instead of 10 to 25% of formamide and contains, in addition, 10% of dextran sulfate.
The invention relates in particular to the following nucleotide probes:
that defined by the nucleic acid sequence shown in FIG. 1b, extending from the end constituted by the nucleotide at position 1 to that constituted by the nucleotide at position 637
that defined by the nucleic acid sequence shown in FIG. 1b, extending from the end constituted by the nucleotide at position 638 to that constituted by the nucleotide at position 745
that defined by the nucleic acid sequence shown in FIG. 1b, extending from the end constituted by the nucleotide at position 1313 to that constituted by the nucleotide at position 1513,
that defined by the nucleic acid sequence shown in FIG. 1b, extending from the end constituted by the nucleotide at position 1679 to that constituted by the nucleotide at position 1843,
that defined by the nucleic acid sequence shown in FIG. 1b, extending from the end constituted by the nucleotide at position 1844 to that constituted by the nucleotide at position 2022,
that defined by the nucleic acid sequence shown in FIG. 1b, extending from the end constituted by the nucleotide at position 638 to that constituted by the nucleotide at position 1843.
The polypeptides of the invention may be prepared by culture in a suitable medium of a cell host previously transformed by a recombinant vector containing one of the nucleic acids previously defined and by recovery from the above-mentioned culture of the polypeptide produced by the said transformed cell host.
Another process for the preparation of the polypeptides of the invention is characterized in that, starting preferably from the C-terminal amino acid, successive amino acids are condensed stepwise in the required order or amino acids are condensed with previously formed fragments which already contain several amino acid residues in the required order or also several fragments previously so prepared are condensed, it being understood that it will be necessary to protect beforehand all of the reactive functions borne by these amino acids or peptide fragments with the exception of the amine function of the one and the carboxyl function of the other, or vice versa, which are normally required to participate in the formation of the peptide bonds, in particular after activation of the carboxyl function, according to the known methods in peptide synthesis and so on stepwise until the N-terminal amino acid is reached.
When the expression of the β3 adrenergic receptors is to be produced in a bacterium, such as E. coli or in a eucaryotic cell such as a CHO cell, the following steps are performed:
the transformation of a competent cell host with a vector, in particular a plasmid or a phage, in which a sequence of nucleotides coding for the β3 receptor (insert) has previously been inserted under the control of regulatory elements, in particular a promoter recognized by the polymerases of the cell host and making possible the expression in the cell host used of the said sequence of nucleotides,
the culture of the transformed cell host under conditions allowing the expression of the said insert, and the transport of the β3 receptor expressed toward the membrane such that the transmembrane sequences of the β3 receptor are exposed at the surface of the transformed cell host.
When expression is to be obtained in eucaryotic cells, the regulatory elements may include the endogenous promoter for the adrenergic receptors or viral promoters such as those of SV40 virus or the Rous sarcoma virus (RSV).
When expression is to be obtained in E. coli, the regulatory elements may include the promoter of the lactose operon or the tryptophan operon.
The invention also relates to a process for the detection of the capacity of a molecule to behave as a ligand towards a peptide of the invention, such a procedure comprises:
the placing in contact of the molecule with a cell host previously transformed by a vector, itself modified by an insert coding for the above-mentioned polypeptide, this host bearing at its surface one or more specific sites for this polypeptide, where appropriate, after induction of the expression of this insert, this placing in contact being performed under conditions allowing the formation of a bond between at least one of these specific sites and the said molecule once it has been proved effectively to possess an affinity for this polypeptide,
the detection of the possible formation of a complex of the ligand-polypeptide type.
The invention also relates to a process for the study of the affinity of a polypeptide of the invention for one or more specific ligands, with this process comprising:
the transformation of a competent cell host with a vector, in particular a plasmid or a phage, in which a nucleotide sequence coding for the β3 receptor (insert) has previously been inserted, under the control of regulatory elements, in particular a promoter recognized by the polymerases of the cell host and which allow the expression in the cell host used of the said sequence of nucleotides,
the culture of the transformed cell host under conditions allowing the expression of the said insert, and the transport of the β3 receptor expressed towards the membrane such that the transmembrane sequences of the β3 receptor are exposed at the surface of the transformed cell host,
the placing in contact of this cell host with specific ligands,
the detection of an affinity reaction between the said transformed cell host and the said specific ligands.
The procedure described above also makes possible the identification of the "fragments containing the sites" referred to previously and which contain only a part of the sequence of 402 amino acids of FIG. 12.
This identification consists of using inserts shorter than the nucleic acid coding for the above-mentioned sequence, of implementing the steps relating to the expression, the transport of the expression product and the exposure referred to above. When the expression, the transport of the expression product and its exposure on the membrane are obtained, as well as the reaction with the ligands as previously defined, it is then possible to determine the fragments containing the essential sites. Consequently, the absence of reaction with the ligands, as previously defined, by using fragments shorter than the complete sequence, would tend to show that some essential sites have been eliminated.
The invention also relates to a kit for the detection of the possibly affinity of a ligand for a polypeptide of the invention, with said kit comprising:
a culture of cell hosts transformed by a modified vector such as previously defined or a culture of cell hosts previously defined,
physical or chemical agents to induce the expression of the nucleotide sequence contained in the modified vector when the promoter placed upstream from this sequence is a promoter inducible by the said chemical or physical agents, and to produce a protein,
one or more control ligands having specific affinities for the above-mentioned polypeptide,
physical or chemical agents for the characterization of the biological activity of the protein expressed.
The invention also relates to a screening process for medicines intended for the treatment of obesity, fatty diabetes, as well as hyperlipidemias.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES
FIGS. 1A and 1B represent the protein and DNA sequences of a novel β-adrenergic receptor, in which FIG. 1A is a comparison of β1, β2 and β3-adrenergic receptor protein sequences and FIGS. 1B-1, 1B-2 and 1B-3 show the DNA sequences of a novel β-adrenergic receptor.
FIGS. 2A, 2B, 2C, 2D and 2E represent, graphically, the accumulation of cyclic AMP in CHO-β3 cells after exposure to various agents.
FIG. 3 represents, graphically, the inhibition by the β-adrenergic antagonists of the accumulation of cyclic AMP induced by isoproterenol in β1-CHO, β2-CHO and β3-CHO cells.
FIG. 4 is schematic expression of the β3-adrenergic receptor gene demonstrated by hybridization of the RNA with a specific probe for the β3-adrenergic receptor.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
Other characteristics and advantages of the invention will become apparent in the remainder of the description and the examples, in particular in relation to the drawings and figures in which:
FIG. 12 represents the amino acid sequences of the human β1 adrenergic receptor (second line), the human β2 adrenergic receptor (third line), aligned with those of the human β3 adrenergic receptor (first line). In the sequences of the β1 and β2 adrenergic receptors the positions bearing amino acid residues identical with those of the β3 adrenergic receptor are indicated by dashes.
In order to demonstrate the homologies, deletions have been made in the three sequences and these deletions are represented by the spaces between square brackets.
The seven hydrophobic regions of 21 to 27 residues which are considered to form the Δ-helical transmembrane domains are indicated by thick lines and delimit extra-cellular and intra-cellular loops, the extra-cellular loops being represented by 01-04 in the Figure and the intra-cellular loops by i1 to i4.
In the N-terminal extra-cellular regions of the three receptors, the consensus sequences for the glycosylation sites linked to asparagine (NXS/T) are underlined, it being recalled that in the representation of the amino acids according to DAYHOFF, N represents asparagine, S represents serine, T represents threonine, X represents any amino acid.
In the third intra-cellular loop and in the C-terminal region, triangles show the Ser and Thr residues which are probably implicated in the desensitization of the receptor.
FIGS. 2A and 2B represents the accumulation of cyclic AMP in CHO-β3 cells cells after exposure to (FIG. 2A), (1)-isoproterenol (), (1)-noradrenalin (∘), (1)-adrenalin () or (d)-isoproterenol (∇) and (FIG. 2B); BRL 37344 (), oxprenolol (□), pindolol (∘) or salbutamol (). The K act (nM) values are: 3.86±0.43 for (1)-isoproterenol, 5.65±1.32 for BRL 37344, 6.28±0.80 for noradrenalin, 47.4±6.9 for adrenalin, 76.3±1.57 for oxprenolol, 108±3 for (d)-isoproterenol, 167±10 for pindolol and 273±25 for salbutamol.
In these experiments, the accumulation of cyclic AMP varies from 300% to 400% compared with base levels and the results are expressed as % of the maximal response (mean±standard deviation /n=4 to n=6/) induced by each of the ligands. In the CHO cells, neither noradrenalin, nor adrenalin, nor isoproterenol activates the adenylate cyclase.
The agonist procaterol, specific for β2, stimulates the adnylate cyclase at concentrations higher than 10 -5 M (not shown).
FIGS. 2C, 2D, and 2E shown stimulation of cyclase by isoproterenol, BRL 37344, BRL 28140 and salbutamol in CHO cells expressing β1, β2 or β3 genes. For each of the panels, the results are the means of two or three experiments done twice. Half of the standard deviation is shown for each by vertical bars. Three concentrations of ligands were used: 5× -9 (1), 5×10 -7 (2) and 10 -4 (3).
The results represent the % mean ± standard deviation (n=4 to 6)/ of the response induced by 10 -4 M isoproterenol.
The method used is the following: the coding region of the gene for the β3 adrenergic receptor was inserted under the control of a SV40 promoter in an expression vector (20) which also contains the gene for murine dihydrofolate reductase (DHFR) used for the selection of the transfected cells. This construction was introduced into CHO cells (21) deficient in DHFR, giving rise to resistant colonies on selective media from which stable sub-clones are obtained. The expression of the β3 adrenergic receptor gene is demonstrated by hybridization of the RNA with a specific probe for the β3 adrenergic receptor (FIG. 4). For the cyclic AMP assay, cells are cultivated and harvested after treatment with ethylenediamme tetracatic acid (Eurobio, Paris), washed and resuspended in a Hank medium containing 20 mM of Hepes buffered at pH 7.4, 1 mM ascorbic acid and 0.1 mM isobutyl-methyl-xanthine. Aliquots of 10 6 cells are incubated for 30 min. in a total volume of 1 ml with the indicated concentrations of agonists and the cAMP levels are measured according to the specifications of the Amersham assay kit.
FIG. 3 represents the inhibition by the β-adrenergic antagonists of the accumulation of cyclic AMP induced by isoproterenol in β1-CHO, β2-CHO and β3-CHO cells. The results are expressed in %/mean±SD (n=4 to 6) of the accumulation of cyclic AMP induced by isoproterenol alone. The compounds ICI, 118551 (manufactured by the IMPERIAL CHEMICAL INDUSTRY company) and CGP 20712A (manufactured by the CIBA-GEIGY company) block the accumulation of cyclic AMP with calculated Ki of 0.77±0.08 μM and 6.70±0.87 μM, respectively. Metropol has no effect at concentrations lower than 10 -5 M.
The method used is the following: the cells, as in FIG. 2, are incubated for 30 min. with the inhibitors at 10 -4 M before the addition of 5.10 -9 M of isoproterenol. The incubation is continued for a further 30 min. and the levels of cyclic AMP are measured.
FIG. 4 represents the Northern Blot analyses of RNA from tissues and line cells. The RNA to be analysed is obtained from rat tissues (2 μg of RNA polyA + from: total brain, cortex, hippocampus, hypothalamus, hypophysis, olfactory bulb, striatum, cerebellum, ileum, liver, heart, lung, kidney, skin and muscle) and human cell lines (5 μg of RNA polyA+ of: neuroblastomas, lung and fibroblasts of lung and epidermis, B and T lymphocytes, erythroblasts and myeloblasts). None of these RNAs give any detectable signal (the results are shown for the ileum). A specific messenger is detected in the RNA (15 μg of total RNA) from adipose cell lines 3T3-F442A or from transfected β3-CHO cells. The S values for the molecular weight markers of RNA are shown in the lefthand margin.
The method used is the following: the RNA is subjected to electrophoresis on a 0.7% agarose gel, transferred to nylon membranes and hybridized with probes specific for the β3 adrenergic receptors radioactively labelled by the random initiation method. This probe is derived from the third intracytoplasmic loop of the β3 adrenergic receptor, the sequence of which is weakly conserved between the three receptors (positions 1313 to 1513 of FIG. 1b). Following hybridization, the filters are washed in 0.1×SSC (i.e. 0.015M NaCl and 0.0015M sodium citrate, pH 7.0)+0.05% SDS at 55° C. Under these conditions, no signal is obtained with the RNA prepared from CHO cells expressing the β1 or β2 adrenergic receptor.
EXAMPLE
Determination and expression of the human β3 adrenergic receptor in CHO cells
A human genomic library was investigated with the entire coding regions of the gene for the β1 adrenergic receptor of the turkey (14) and of the human gene for the β2 adrenergic receptor (8). The genes coding respectively for the human β1 and β2 adrenergic receptors were identified among the positive clones. The homology between their coding regions is 48.9%. Other clones were obtained containing a gene without an intron, the coding region of which shows 50.7% and 45.5% of homology with the coding regions of β1 and β2, respectively (FIG. 1a). This gene was designated as the gene for the β3 adrenergic receptor. More precisely, in FIG. 1a, each group of three lines corresponds to β3 in the case of the first line, to β1 in the case of the second line and to β2 in the case of the third line.
The gene for the β3 adrenergic receptor codes for a polypeptide of 402 amino acid residues (molecular weight 42881D) which possesses the main characteristics common to the other membrane receptors of the R 7 G family (FIG. 1a). It possesses seven groups of 21 to 27 essentially hydrophobic amino acids, likely to constitute α-helical transmembrane domains. These transmembrane domains play an important role in the formation of the recognition sites of the catecholamines by the β-adrenergic receptors (15-18) and are certainly the most homologous regions between the three proteins β1, β2 and β3 (FIG. 1a). In particular, the Asp residues at positions 79 and 113 of the β2 adrenergic receptor, which may act as counter-ions to the positively charged amine of the adrenergic ligands (18), are conserved at similar positions of the β3 adrenergic receptor. Other functionally important residues such as the Cys residues at positions 106 and 184, Asn at position 318 and Pro at position 323 of the sequence of the β2 adrenergic receptor are present at the corresponding positions in the β3 adrenergic receptor.
Like the other R 7 G proteins, the β3 adrenergic receptor contains in its amino terminal region consensus sequences for the glycosylation sites associated with Asn. In its third intra-cytoplasmic loop and in its C-terminal region, the β3 adrenergic receptor possesses several Ser and Thr residues surrounded by basic residues (Arg and Lys) and residues which break up the α-helical structure (Pro and Gly), which may serve as substrates for the kinases possibly involved in the desensitization of the receptor (19).
In order to better characterize the β3 adrenergic receptor, its gene was transfected into CHO cells and several clones producing the corresponding RNA were stabilized. These cells are designated as "β3-CHO" cells. CHO cells expressing either the gene for the β1 adrenergic receptor or the gene for the β2 adrenergic receptor were also prepared in order to compare the pharmacological properties of the three receptors in an identical environment. These cells are designated as β1-CHO and β2-CHO cells. The β3-CHO cells synthesize a protein of an apparent molecular weight of about 65000D, which may be visualized by affinity labelling with 125 I-iodocyanopindololdiazirine. The post-transcriptional addition of sugar residues to one or two glycosylation sites at the amino-terminus of the β3 adrenergic receptor is certainly responsible for this molecular weight being higher than that deduced from the amino acid sequence.
The exposure of the β3-CHO cells to β-adrenergic agonists (FIG. 2) such as adrenalin, noradrenalin, isoproterenol, salbutamol, BRL 28410 or BRL 37344 increases the intracellular concentration of cyclic AMP between 300% and 400% compared with basal levels, whereas there is no effect on non-transfected CHO cells. This affect is stereospecific, in view of the fact that (1)-isoproterenol is almost 30 times more potent than (d) isoproterenol in the activation of the cyclase. Other β-agonists such as procaterol and CGP 361A lead to a stimulation of the cyclase only when they are used at concentrations higher than 10 -5 M.
The order in which the following compounds: (1)-isoproterenol, BRL 37344, BRL 28410 and salbutamol activate the adenylate cyclase in the β3-CHO cells is clearly different from that obtained for the responses mediated by the β1 or β2 adrenergic receptors (FIG. 2C). In the case of the β3-CHO cells, this order is similar to that determined for the stimulation of lipolysis in rat adipose cells. The only difference is the relative order of isoproterenol compared with BRL 37344. However, in the reference cited, it was racemic (d1)-isoproterenol which was used whereas in the invention, the levo-rotatory (1)-isoproterenol was used.
The analysis of the capacity of several classical β-antagonists to block the activation of the adenylate cylase stimulated by isoproterenol was carried out in β3-CHO cells (FIG. 3). Apart from ICI 118,551, CGP 20,712A and metoprolol, none of these compounds used at 10 -4 M is capable of inhibiting this effect. At concentrations lower than 10 -5 M, metoprolol no longer has an effect and ICI 118,551 and CGP 20,712A block the accumulation of cyclic AMP with Ki of 0.77±0.08 μM and 6.70±0.87 μM, respectively. In agreement with these results, neither the intact β3-CHO cells nor their membrane fractions display specific and saturable binding of alprenolol or CGP 12,177 labelled with 3 H. Furthermore, the K D of 125 I-iodocyanopindolol for the β3-adrenergic receptor (488±90 pM) is about 10 times higher than that for the β1 or β2 adrenergic receptors.
According to in vitro studies, pindolol and oxprenolol are considered to be β-adrenergic antagonists. However, they are also considered to be partial agonists because in vivo they may exhibit a slight sympathomimetic activity (22). In the CHO cells transfected with a single type of receptor, these compounds are complete agonists towards the β3-adrenergic receptor (FIG. 2), whereas they totally block the accumulation of cyclic AMP mediated by the β1 and β2 adrenergic receptors (FIG. 3).
This new subtype of β-adrenergic receptor might be able to modulate various functions such as lipolysis, the secretion of insulin or intestinal relaxation. The contractions of the guinea pig ileum induced by the cholinergic pathway are modulated by adrenergic agonists. However, in spite of the total blockage of the α and β-adrenergic receptors with phentolamine and propanolol, isoproterenol can always inhibit the occurrence of contractions. The β3 receptor exhibits a low affinity for propanolol and other classic β blockers, but shows a marked response toward the agonist BRL 37344, which is a powerful stimulant of lipolysis in adipose tissue (1).
The hypothesis, according to which the β3 receptor is present in adipose tissues was confirmed by the analysis of the capacity of the RNA derived from tissues of various origins to hybridize with probes specific for the β3-adrenergic receptor (FIG. 4): a hybridization signal with the probes used was observed only with the RNA of the adipocyte line 3T3-F442A (23),
This β3-adrenergic receptor might also be implicated in the regulation by the catecholamines of the action of insulin on the metabolism of glucose and fatty acids.
REFERENCES
1. Arch, J. R. S., Ainsworth, A. T., Cawthorne, M. A., Piercy, V., Sennitt, M. V., Thody, V. E., Wilson, C. and Wilson, S. (1984), Nature 309, 163-165.
2. Jacobson, B., Vauquelin, G., Wesslau, C., Smith, U. and Strosberg, A. D. (1981), Eur. J. Biochem. 114, 349-354.
3. Bond, R. A. and Clarke, D. E. (1987), Br. J. Pharmac. 91, 683-686.
5. Cotecchia, S., Schwinn, D. A., Randall, R. R., Lefkowitz, R. J., Caron, M. G. and Kobilka, B. K. (1988), Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 85, 7159-7163
6. Kobika, B. K., Matsui, H., Kobika, T. L., Yang-Feng, T. L., Francke, U., Caron, M. G., Lefkowitz, R. J. and Regan, J. W. (1987), Science 238, 650-656.
7. Frielle, T., Collins, S., Daniel, K. W., Caron, M. G., Lefkowitz, R. J. and Kobilka, B. K. (1987), Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 84, 7920-7924.
8. Emorine, L. J., Marullo, S., Delavier-Klutchko, C., Kaveri, S. V., Durieu-Trautman, O. and Strosberg, A. D. (1987), Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 84, 6995-6999.
9. Dixon, R. A. F., Strader, C. D. and Sigal, I. S. (1988), Annual Reports in Medicinal chemistry, 221-233. Ed. Seamon, K. B., Food and Drug Administration, Bethesda, Md 20892.
10. Emorine, L. J., Marullo, S., Sutren, M., Delavier, C., Eshdat, Y., Raposo, G. and Strosberg, A. D. (1988), Proc. NATO Adv. Res. Workshop: "Molecular biology of neuroreceptors and ion channels", Santorini, Ed. by A. Maelicke (in the press).
11. Bonner, T. I., Young, A. C., Brann, M. R. and Buckley, N. J. (1988), Neuron 1, 403-410.
12. Regan, J. W., Kobilka, T. S., Yang-Feng, T. L., Caron, M. G., Lefkowitz, R. J. and Kobilka, B. K. (1988), Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 85, 6301-6305.
13. Bahouth, S. W. and Malbon, C. C. (1988), Molec. Pharmacol. 34, 318-328.
14. Yarden, Y., Rodriguez, H., Wong, S. K. F., Brandt, D. R., May, D. C., Burnier, J., Harkins, R. N., Chen, E. Y., Ramachandran, J., Ullrich, A. and Ross, E. M. (1986), Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 83, 6795-6799.
15. Dixon, R. A. F., Sigal, I., Candelore, M. R., Register, R. B., Scattergood, W., Rands, E. and Strader, C. D. (1987), EMBO J. 6, 3269-3275.
16. Dohlman, H. G., Caron, M. G., Strader, C. D., Amlaiky, N. and Lefkowitz, R. J. (1988), Biochem. 27, 1813-1817.
17. Kobilka, B. K., Kobilka, T. S., Daniel, K., Regan, J. W., Caron, M. G. and Lefkowitz, R. J. (1988), Science 240, 1310-1316.
18. Strader, C. D., Sigal, I. S., Candelore, M. R., Rands, E., Hill, W. S. and Dixon, R. A. F. (1988), J. Biol. Chem. 263 10267-10271.
19. Bouvier, M., Hausdorff, P., De Blasi, A., O'Dowd, B. F., Kobilka, B. K., Caron, M. G. and Lefkowitz, R. J. (1988), Nature 333, 370-373.
20. Larsky, L. A., Dowbenko, D., Simonsen, C. C. and Berman, P. W. (1984), Biotechnology 2, 527-532.
21. Uriaub, G. and Chasin, L. A. (1980), Proc. Natl. Sci. U.S.A. 77, 4216-4220.
22. Goodman and Gilman's (1980), The pharmacological basis of therapeutics 6 th ed., Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc.
23. Green, H. and Kehinde, O. (1976), Cell 7, 105-113.
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Novel polypeptides having a β-adrenergic receptor activity containing the sequence of 402 amino acids, or a fragment of this sequence, said fragment being such that, in particular, either it nonetheless includes the sites contained in said sequence and whose presence is necessary so that, when the fragment is exposed to the surface of a cell, it is capable of participating in the activation of the cyclase adenylate in the presence of an agonist, or it is likely to be recognized by antibodies which also recognize the above succession of 402 amino acids, but fail to recognize the β1 adrenergic receptor and the β2 adrenergic receptor. These polypeptides are useful for screening drugs which act on said polypeptides and for treating obesity, fat diabetes and hyperlipidemias.
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CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
Not Applicable
STATEMENT REGARDING FEDERALLY SPONSORED RESEARCH OR DEVELOPMENT
Not Applicable
INCORPORATION-BY-REFERENCE OF MATERIAL SUBMITTED ON A COMPACT DISC
Not Applicable
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates to an apparatus and method for fastening cementitious structural components, e.g., autoclaved aerated concrete or other cementitious components, together and for fastening other components to such cementitious structural components. In particular, the invention relates to a fastener for use in autoclaved aerated concrete and its use.
The background art is characterized by U.S. Pat. Nos. 86,935; 2,351,449; 2,603,319; 3,202,035; 3,361,481; 3,494,133; 4,092,814; 4,247,223; 4,696,354; 4,765,778; 5,002,435; 5,044,832; 5,085,026; 5,143,498; 5,531,553; 6,048,343; and 6,296,433; U.S. Patent Application No. 2002/0174606; 2004/0109738; and 2004/0161316; the disclosures of which patents and application are incorporated by reference as if fully set forth herein. The background art is also characterized by Japan Patent No. JP 2000-297588, German Patent No. DE 44 08 159, United Kingdom Patent No. GB 2 256 666 and Williamson, IBM Technical Disclosure Bulletin, February, 1962.
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
One purpose of preferred embodiments of the invention is to allow the fastening of together of cementitious (e.g., autoclaved aerated concrete) structural components. Another purpose of preferred embodiments of the invention is to allow fastening other components to such cementitious structural components. One advantage of preferred embodiments of the invention is that it creates a void between the shaft of the screw and the wall of hole in the cementitious material into which it is being installed. Another advantage of preferred embodiments of the invention is that it allows the head of the screw to be countersunk. Another advantage of preferred embodiments of the invention is that it allows quick release of the component being fastened by the crane being used to lift the component into place.
One object of preferred embodiments of the invention is facilitate the fastening together of autoclaved aerated concrete components. Another object of preferred embodiments of the invention is to fasten together two separate, distinct pieces of cementitious material to produce a monolithic, reinforced piece. Another object of preferred embodiments of the invention is to allow an adhesive to be used to hold the fastener in the hole it creates during the screwing step of the installation process.
The invention is an apparatus and method for fastening cementitious components together or for fastening a cementitious component to a non-cementitious component to form a structure. In a preferred embodiment, the apparatus comprises a screw having a hollow shaft from which screw threads protrude, a screw tip comprising spiral tip threads and a head. In use, the invention is operated by screwing it into the cementitious components and then injecting an adhesive into the void created by the screwing step.
In a preferred embodiment, the invention is a fastener for use in a cementitious material (e.g., autoclaved aerated concrete), said fastener comprising: a shaft comprising a first portion having a (preferably cylindrical) first shaft outer surface, a (preferably cylindrical) first shaft inner surface and a first shaft outside diameter and a second portion having a second shaft outer surface (preferably having a truncated conical shape), a second shaft inner surface (preferably having a truncated conical shape) and a second shaft outside diameter, said shaft having a longitudinal void therein, a longitudinal axis and two ends; a shaft thread that is attached to said first shaft outer surface and said second shaft outer surface, said shaft thread having a variable shaft thread outer diameter with a maximum extent; a tip that is attached to one end of said shaft, said tip having an upper tip outside diameter that is greater than said second shaft outside diameter, said tip comprising tip threads that are self-centering and self-setting, said tip threads comprising a plurality of thread members that are substantially triangular in cross section and that surround a substantially conical space that is in communication with said longitudinal void; and a head that is attached to the other end of said shaft. Preferably, said second shaft inner surface is rifled. Preferably, said head comprises grinding teeth and has a head outer diameter that is less than or equal to the maximum extent of said shaft thread outer diameter. Preferably, said shaft thread has holes therein that are aligned parallel with said longitudinal axis. Preferably, second shaft inner surface is provided with a plurality of spiraling ridges that extend from said second end to said first shaft inner surface. Preferably, said first portion has radial holes therein. Preferably, said first portion has radial holes therein. Preferably said head has a receiver for a bit, said receiver being in communication with said longitudinal void, said receiver having slots therein.
In yet another preferred embodiment, the invention is a fastener for use in a cementitious material (e.g., autoclaved aerated concrete), said fastener comprising: a shaft comprising a first portion having a first shaft outer surface and a first shaft inner surface and a second portion having a second shaft outer surface and a second shaft inner surface, said shaft having a longitudinal void therein and two ends; a shaft thread that is attached to said first shaft outer surface and said second shaft outer surface; a tip that is attached to one end of said shaft, said tip comprising tip threads, said tip threads comprising a plurality of thread members that surround a space that is in communication with said longitudinal void; and a head that is attached to the other end of said shaft.
In a further embodiment, the invention is a fastener comprising: a shaft having two ends, an outer surface and a longitudinal bore; a screw thread having a base that is attached to said outer surface along a curve traced on surface outer surface by its rotation past a point crossing a right section of said shaft at an oblique angle; a tip that is attached to one end of said shaft, said tip having a central space that is in communication with said longitudinal bore, said tip comprising a plurality of thread members that surround said central space, each of said thread members forming a two-dimensional spiral having a maximum outer diameter. Preferably, the fastener further comprises a head that is attached to the other end of said shaft. Preferably, said screw thread is perforated by a plurality of aligned holes. Preferably, said shaft comprises a first portion and a second portion, said first portion being cylindrical in shape and having a cylinder diameter and said second portion having the shape of a truncated cone with a base having a base diameter, and wherein said base diameter is greater than said cylinder diameter and approximately equal to said maximum outer diameter. Preferably, said longitudinal bore is rifled. Preferably, a plurality of holes extend from said longitudinal bore to said outer surface.
Preferably, said head has a receiver that is capable of accepting a screwdriver or drill bit of polygonal cross section. Preferably, said head has a hole through which an adhesive is injectable.
In another preferred embodiment, the invention is a method for attaching a fastener to a cementitious material body (e.g., an autoclaved aerated concrete body), said method comprising: screwing the fastener into the body, the fastener being operative to penetrate a portion of the body and create a void therein by crushing the portion of the body into which it penetrates to produce crushed cementitious product, and moving said crushed cementitious product into a longitudinal void in the fastener; and when the fastener is seated in the autoclaved aerated concrete body, injecting a thermosetting plastic (e.g., epoxy) into said void through holes in the threads and head of the fastener.
In another preferred embodiment, the invention is a fastener comprising: a shaft having two ends, an outer surface and a longitudinal bore; a screw thread having a base that is attached to said outer surface along a curve traced on said outer surface by its rotation past a point crossing a right section of said shaft at an oblique angle; a tip that is attached to one end of said shaft, said tip having a central space that is in communication with said longitudinal bore, said tip having a plurality of drilling teeth protruding from it that surround said central space, said tip having a maximum outer diameter.
In yet another preferred embodiment, the invention is a fastener for joining two separate cementitious items without pre-drilling of a hole into the two separate cementitious items in which to insert the fastener, said fastener comprising: a shaft having two ends, an outer surface and a longitudinal bore; a screw thread having a base that is attached to said outer surface along a curve traced on said outer surface by its rotation past a point crossing a right section of said shaft at an oblique angle; and a tip that is attached to one end of said shaft, said tip having a central space that is in communication with said longitudinal bore, said tip comprising a plurality of thread members that surround said central space, each of said thread members forming a two-dimensional spiral having a maximum outer diameter; wherein said tip, said screw thread and said tip constitute a single component and said fastener is operative to join the two separate cementitious items to produce an adhered and reinforced single object.
In a further preferred embodiment, the invention is a method for fastening and adhering two cementitious material bodies to become one reinforced object without pre-drilling either of the cementitious material bodies, said method comprising: placing the cementitious material bodies adjacent to one another so that one of their surfaces abut; screwing a fastener having threads and a head into the cementitious material bodies, the fastener being operative to penetrate all of one of the cementitious material bodies and at least a portion of the other of the cementitious material bodies and create a void therein by crushing the portion of the cementitious material bodies into which it penetrates to produce crushed cementitious product, and moving said crushed cementitious product into a longitudinal void in the fastener; and when the fastener is seated in the cementitious material bodies, injecting a thermosetting plastic adhesive or a grout adhesive into said void through holes in the threads and head of the fastener; thereby fastening and adhering the two cementitious material bodies to become one reinforced object without pre-drilling by using only the fastener and said adhesive.
Further aspects of the invention will become apparent from consideration of the drawings and the ensuing description of preferred embodiments of the invention. A person skilled in the art will realize that other embodiments of the invention are possible and that the details of the invention can be modified in a number of respects, all without departing from the concept. Thus, the following drawings and description are to be regarded as illustrative in nature and not restrictive.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS
The features of the invention will be better understood by reference to the accompanying drawings which illustrate presently preferred embodiments of the invention. In the drawings:
FIG. 1 is a side view of a preferred embodiment of the invention.
FIG. 2 is a bottom plan view (looking up) of a preferred embodiment of the invention.
FIG. 3 is a bottom cross-sectional view (looking up) through section 3 - 3 on FIG. 1 .
FIG. 4 is a top plan view of a preferred embodiment of the invention.
FIG. 5 is a cross-sectional view (looking up) through section 5 - 5 on FIG. 1 .
FIG. 6 is side view of a preferred embodiment of the invention installed in cementitious material. In this view, the thread members are shown penetrating the cementitious material and the front half of the cementitious material (the half in front of a plane through the centerline of the invention) is removed for clarity.
FIG. 7 is a perspective view of a preferred embodiment of the invention of FIG. 6 with a thermoset plastic being injected into the hole created by the invention.
FIG. 8 is a perspective view of an alternate embodiment of the invention having teeth along the bottom surface of the second portion.
FIG. 9 is a plan view (looking up) at the bottom of the alternate embodiment of FIG. 7 .
The following reference numerals are used to indicate the parts and environment of the invention on the drawings:
10 fastener, screw 12 shaft 14 helical rib, screw thread 16 tip 18 head 20 first portion 22 second portion 24 longitudinal void, longitudinal bore 26 first shaft outer surface 28 first shaft inner surface 32 second shaft outer surface 34 second shaft inner surface 38 spiraling ridges 40 thread members 42 space, central space 46 grinding teeth 48 longitudinal holes 50 radial holes 54 receiver 56 slots 60 cementitious body, autoclaved aerated concrete body 62 parallel void 64 terminal slot 66 wall 70 rifling, spiral grooves 72 opening 76 drilling teeth 78 thermoset plastic, thermosetting plastic or grout 78 escaping air 80 bottom surface
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
The disclosures of the following patent applications are incorporated by reference as if fully set forth herein: U.S. patent application Ser. No. 11/123,635, filed May 6, 2005, now pending; U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/210,035, filed Jul. 23, 2003, now pending; U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/784,848, filed Feb. 16, 2001, now abandoned; U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/741,787, filed Dec. 21, 2000, now abandoned; and U.S. Provisional Patent Application No. 60/183,472, filed Feb. 18, 2000, now expired; the disclosures of which patent applications are incorporated by reference as if fully set forth herein.
Referring to FIG. 1 , a preferred embodiment of fastener 10 is presented. In this embodiment, fastener 10 comprises shaft 12 , helical rib or screw thread 14 that projects from shaft 12 , tip 16 that is attached to a first end of shaft 12 and head 18 that is attached to a second end of shaft 12 . Shaft 12 preferably comprises first portion 20 and second portion 22 through which longitudinal void 24 extends, a shaft longitudinal axis and two ends. First portion 20 preferably has first shaft outer surface 26 , first shaft inner surface 28 and a first shaft outside diameter.
In a preferred embodiment, first portion 20 is cylindrical and screw thread 14 is attached at its base to outer surface 26 along a curve traced on outer surface 26 by its rotation past a point crossing a right section of first portion 20 at a (preferably constant) oblique angle. Preferably, screw thread 14 is self-starting and self-tapping in that the lower end of screw thread 14 extends outward from shaft 12 less far than the upper end of screw thread 14 does. In this embodiment, a line along the base of screw thread 14 forms a right-handed helix. Preferably, first shaft inner surface 28 is rifled (a plurality of spiral grooves 70 are provided) so that rotation of screw 10 urges cementation material crushed by the installation of screw 10 to move upward through longitudinal void 24 .
In a preferred embodiment, second portion 22 has a second shaft outer surface 32 , second shaft inner surface 34 (both of which preferably have the shape of a truncated cone) and a second shaft outside diameter. In a preferred embodiment, second shaft inner surface 34 is provided with a plurality of spiraling ridges 38 that extend from said second end to first shaft inner surface 28 . In a preferred embodiment, second portion 22 has radial holes 50 therein. In an alternative embodiment, first portion 20 has radial holes 50 therein. Radial holes 50 allow air to escape from longitudinal void 24 as it is filled with crushed cementitious material.
Screw thread 14 is attached to first shaft outer surface 26 and said second shaft outer surface. Preferably, screw thread 14 has a shaft thread outer diameter. In a preferred embodiment, shaft thread 14 is provided with holes 48 therein that are preferably aligned parallel with the shaft longitudinal axis.
Tip 16 has a tip upper outside diameter that is greater than the second shaft outside diameter. Tip 16 comprises tip threads 38 that are self-centering and self-setting, the tip threads 38 comprising a plurality of thread members 40 that are preferably substantially triangular in cross section and that surround space 42 that is in communication with longitudinal void 24 . In a preferred embodiment, space 42 is conical in shape and the bases of thread members 40 follow along a curve traced on the outer extent of space 42 by its rotation past a point crossing a right section of space 42 at a (preferably constant) oblique angle. In this embodiment, each of thread members 40 forms a conical helix, that is, a two-dimensional spiral on a conical surface, with the distance to the apex of the spiral an exponential function of the angle indicating direction from the axis of the spiral. In this embodiment, thread members 40 follow a curve which turns around a central axis, getting progressively closer to or farther from it, depending on which way one follows the curve.
Head 18 is preferably attached to the other end of shaft 12 . Head 18 preferably comprises grinding teeth 46 and has a head outer diameter that is less than or equal to the shaft thread outer diameter. Grinding teeth 46 are configured so that rotation of screw 10 during its installation grins away the cementitious material beneath head 18 , thereby allowing head 18 to be countersunk.
Referring to FIG. 2 , a bottom view of screw 10 is presented. Tip 16 is shown to comprise four tip threads 38 . One of the tip threads 38 preferably matches up with shaft thread 14 .
Referring to FIG. 3 , a cross-sectional view through second portion 22 is presented at the section indicated on FIG. 1 . In this view, the plurality of thread members 40 is visible. The plurality of thread members 40 move ACC material up and into longitudinal void 24 . In this preferred embodiment, the plurality of thread members 40 are closer together and narrower as they approach the mouth of longitudinal void 24 , thereby causing the pieces of ACC material created by screwing fastener 10 into ACC body 60 to be broken up into smaller pieces.
Referring to FIG. 4 , a top view of a preferred embodiment of fastener 10 is presented. In this embodiment, head 18 has receiver 54 for accepting a bit (not shown). Preferably, receiver 54 is in communication with longitudinal void 24 and receiver 54 has slots 56 in its sides. Slots 56 allows air present in longitudinal void 24 to escape as crushed ACC material enters longitudinal void 24 during the screwing step of the installation process.
Referring to FIG. 5 , a cross-sectional view through a preferred embodiment of head 18 is presented at the section indicated on FIG. 1 . In this view, receiver 54 is shown in the center of head 18 . In this embodiment, longitudinal holes 48 are shown having a circular cross-sectional different shape. Opening 72 is also preferably provided in head 18 . Grinding teeth 46 are shown attached to head 18 .
Referring to FIG. 6 , fastener 10 is shown installed in two cementitious material bodies 60 , preferably autoclaved aerated concrete (AAC) bodies 60 , that have been placed adjacent to one another so that one of their surfaces abut. Fastener 10 is screwed into AAC bodies 60 using a screw driver having a bit that fits in receiver 54 . Fastener 10 is operative to penetrate all of the first ACC body 60 and a portion of the other AAC body 60 and create parallel void 62 therein by crushing the portion of the AAC into which it penetrates to produce crushed cementitious product, and moving said crushed cementitious product into longitudinal void 24 in fastener 10 . When fastener 10 is seated in AAC bodies 60 , a thermosetting plastic (e.g., epoxy) or grout 76 is injected into parallel void 24 through longitudinal holes 48 in screw threads 14 and in head 18 of fastener 10 as illustrated in FIG. 7 . During this operation, escaping air 78 discharges from opening 72 .
Injectors for thermoplastics and/or grouts having tubular nozzles that are capable of being inserted into holes, such as longitudinal holes 48 , are well known in the art. In this embodiment, excess thermosetting plastic or grout 76 discharges from opening 72 when parallel void 24 is full. In a preferred embodiment, after parallel void is full, the thermosetting plastic or grout is injected into parallel void during the removal of the tubular nozzles, thereby causing the excess thermosetting plastic or grout 76 that discharges from opening 72 to cover countersunk head 18 . The result is that, when installed, fastener 10 is hidden and a smooth finish is produced at the surface of ACC body 60 .
Parallel void 62 is created as fastener 10 is screwed into AAC body 60 because the outside diameter of second portion 22 is larger than the outer diameter of first portion 20 . Fastener 10 is preferably countersunk into ACC body 60 . This is preferably facilitated by providing grinding teeth 46 on the underside of head 18 . In preferred embodiments, head 18 is provided with terminal slot 64 , one surface of which is bound by screw thread 14 . In this embodiment, screw thread 14 terminates in head 18 by becoming horizontal, thereby rendering fastener 10 self stopping during the screwing step of the installation process.
Screw threads 14 protrude into wall 66 of parallel void 62 , gripping ACC body 60 and holding fastener 10 in place until a thermosetting plastic or grout can be injected into parallel void 62 . This allows components of cementitious structures, such as AAC body 60 , to be held in place by a crane while fastener is screwed into AAC body 60 , and then released after the screwing step, because screw threads are configured to hold the components together until the thermosetting plastic or grout is injected at a later time, e.g., at the end of the day. In a preferred embodiment, thermosetting plastic or grout that has been injected into parallel void 62 hardens in longitudinal holes 48 , further anchoring fastener 10 in ACC body 60 .
Referring to FIGS. 8 and 9 , an alternate embodiment of the invention is illustrated. In this embodiment, thread members 40 are not provided. Instead, drilling teeth 74 are provided along and protrude from bottom surface 80 of second portion 22 . Drilling teeth 74 serve to grind a hole in aerated autoclaved concrete body 60 .
Many variations of the invention will occur to those skilled in the art. Some variations do not include providing rifling 70 and radial holes 50 . Other variations do not call for providing thread members 40 . All such variations are intended to be within the scope and spirit of the invention.
Although some embodiments are shown to include certain features, the applicant specifically contemplate that any feature disclosed herein may be used together or in combination with any other feature on any embodiment of the invention. It is also contemplated that any feature may be specifically excluded from any embodiment of the invention.
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An apparatus and method for fastening cementitious components together or for fastening a cementitious component to a non-cementitious component to form a structure. In a preferred embodiment, the apparatus is a screw having a hollow shaft from which threads protrude and a tip comprising a plurality of drilling teeth or a plurality of thread members that surround said central space, each of said thread members forming a two-dimensional spiral. In use, the invention is operated by screwing it into the cementitious components and then injecting an adhesive into the void created by the screwing step.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed to an improved process for carpet reclamation and more particularly, the process is directed to the use of an agent for chemically softening or dissolving binder material conventionally associated with carpet in order to expedite and simplify the reclamation process.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Carpet reclamation processes have been previously proposed in the art and are exemplified by the process disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,230,473, issued to Hagguist et al., Jul. 27, 1993.
In the Hagguist et al. method, apart from introductory steps which involve screening the carpet, and preliminary loop cutting and other processing, the removal of the secondary backing involves a whole series of steps. This additionally is the situation when the binder material is to be removed from the primary backing.
In greater detail and with respect to the removal of the secondary backing from the carpet, the carpet must be initially exposed to fluids under pressure for loosening and debonding the latex binder from the secondary backing. The next step includes passing the remaining material onto a further processing stage where the secondary backing is mechanically treated with rotating mechanical impingement devices on both sides of the carpet. It is the mechanical arrangement that results in the removal of the secondary backing. At this time, the binder system is still substantially intact.
In order to remove the binder material, the remaining carpet structure must be passed to yet another stage where there is included a plurality of rotating brushes as well as rotating high pressure nozzle heads. This, as indicated by the patentees, results in the gradual loosening and removal of the binder system from the primary backing.
In view of the teachings of this reference, it is clear that the method is dependent on the use of mechanical means for the removal of not only the secondary backing, but further the removal of the latex binder conventionally positioned between the secondary backing and the primary backing.
The Hagguist et al. process also suffers the drawbacks common to all multiple step processes, including increased production time and cost, the use of a greater number of moving parts, the potential requirement for a larger labor force and difficulty in efficiently operating at a commercial level wherein, for example, millions of square meters of carpet may be processed.
In view of what has been proposed in the prior art set forth above, there clearly exists a need for a high efficiency method of reclaiming base components of a carpet quickly and without the use of toxic contaminants or multiple stage processes.
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention satisfies the above needs and achieves the results and benefits set forth below by providing a process for reclaiming carpet components, the carpet including backing material, binder material and carpet pile, the process comprising the steps of: contacting the carpet with a composition including a chemical softening agent (as defined below) for the binder and separating the pile from the backing.
The amount of chemical softening agent in the composition and the conditions for the contacting step, for example temperature and time, may be selected to either substantially dissolve the binder or soften the binder.
The process and device of the present invention permits the reuse and recycle of the pile material into critical end uses requiring a high degree of product purity such as, for example, carpet fibers, plastic pellets and other materials. Once the contacting step is complete, the backings may be separated from each other by making use of mechanical means, fluid means including air and liquid flow, vacuum means or by manual means.
According to yet another aspect of one embodiment of the present invention there is provided a system for reclaiming carpet components, the carpet including backing material, binding material and carpet pile, the system including: advancing means for advancing the carpet to a solvent application means; solvent application means for applying solvent to the carpet to dissolve the binder material; and collection means for collecting separated backing material and carpet pile.
It will be readily appreciated that the process as set forth herein is clearly applicable to all carpet types including, for example, standard carpet with styrene butadiene rubber latex binders and primary and secondary backings, and those with foam layers, including urethanes.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
Having thus generally described the invention, reference will be made below to the accompanying drawings illustrating preferred embodiments and in which:
FIGS. 1 and 2 illustrate various types of carpeting in cross-section; and
FIG. 3 is a schematic illustration of the process according to one embodiment of the present invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
Referring now to the drawings, FIGS. 1 and 2 illustrate cross-sectional views of typical carpet varieties which are processable according to the present invention. In FIG. 1, the carpet 10 includes a primary backing 12 within which is disposed carpet pile 14. The carpet pile 14 is fixedly secured to backing 12 with binder 16, typically a latex binder. Preferably, a secondary backing 18 is additionally provided and is secured to primary backing 12 by binder 16.
FIG. 2 illustrates a second carpet type wherein the binder material 16 comprises a foam material 20 and the carpet 10 does not include a secondary backing.
While these carpet types are shown as exemplary of carpets processable according to the present invention, it will be appreciated by those skilled in the art that other types of carpeting may also be processed according to the present invention.
Prior to the performance of the process of the present invention, the carpet may be screened for processing suitability. The use of visual inspection, metal detectors, etc., may be employed to this end. Further, the carpet may be cleaned or preconditioned with, for example, a surface active agent or other compound(s) to enhance the processing thereof.
The process of the present invention includes contacting the carpet with a composition which includes a chemical softening agent for the binder. The term "chemical softening agent", as utilized herein, is defined as any agent capable under specified conditions of softening or dissolving a material, for example a binder material, via chemical reaction or interaction therewith. The specific chemical softening agent will therefore be selected based on the type and nature of the binder used in the carpet. The term "composition" is defined herein to include, without limitation, mixtures, solutions, emulsions, dispersions and the like.
The chemical softening agent preferably is non-toxic and environmentally friendly. A preferred chemical softening agent includes at least one dimethyl ester. Dimethyl adipate, dimethyl glutamate, dimethyl succinate and mixtures thereof are especially preferred. Particularly preferred chemical softening agents are dimethyl succinate and a mixture of dimethyl adipate and dimethyl glutarate. Suitable dimethyl esters are commercially available from Monsanto Company under the trade name SANTOSOL®.
Suitable compositions include aqueous or non-aqueous compositions of the chemical softening agent. In order to further enhance the dissolution or softening of the binder, additional chemicals may be added to the composition including, for example, surface active agents to enhance the wettability of the backing material of the carpet. In addition, thickeners may be added to control the flow and adhesive properties of the composition. A particularly useful thickener is commercially available from B. F. Goodrich under the trade name CARBOPOL®.
A preferred composition includes at least one dimethyl ester and water, most preferably in a weight ratio of about 1:1.
The concentration of chemical softening agent in the composition will vary greatly depending on the type of carpet and the conditions utilized in the contacting steps such as, for example, time and temperature. Preferred chemical softening agent amounts are from at least about 10% by weight based on the total weight of the composition.
The contacting step may be performed by any method, including, for example, immersing the carpet in the composition, applying the composition to the pile or applying the composition to the backing. Preferably, the contacting step is performed in the presence of a surface active agent. The surface active agent may be added to the composition which contacts the carpet or it may be pre-applied to the carpet prior to the contacting step. Suitable surface active agents include, for example, anionic and nonionic surfactants.
The condition for the contacting step will vary greatly depending on, for example, the carpet type, type and concentration of chemical softening agent, and the like. Contact time will generally extend at least 5 seconds while the contact temperature may range from ambient temperatures to just below the boiling point of the composition. In a preferred embodiment wherein at least one dimethyl ester is utilized as the chemical softening agent, the contacting step is performed at a temperature of at least 20° C., more preferably at least 35° C.
Preferably, the concentration of solvent is selected and the contacting step is performed under conditions sufficient to reduce the amount of force required to remove a tuft from the carpet by at least 50% according to the test set forth in the examples below.
In a first particularly preferred embodiment, the concentration of chemical softening agent is selected and the contacting step is performed under conditions sufficient to substantially dissolve the binder in the agent. Most preferably, the pile removed after the contacting step will therefore be substantially free from binder as the binder is dissolved in the agent. The process may further include removing the dissolved binder from the composition and recovery of the chemical softening agent.
In a second preferred embodiment, the concentration of chemical softening agent is selected and the contacting step is performed under conditions sufficient to soften the binder. In this embodiment, the process of the present invention optionally includes removing binder from the pile after pile is separated from the backing.
Any residual composition present on the individual base components (pile and/or backing s!) of the carpet may be removed by simply washing the components and this may additionally include pressurized washing making use of a suitable washing agent.
Turning to FIG. 3, which illustrates a schematic illustration of a device suitable for practicing the process of the invention for processing the carpet of FIG. 1, a first roller 30 advances the carpet material to a first pair of liquid nip rollers 32 and 34. First set of rollers 32 and 34 include the composition for application onto the secondary backing 18 of the carpet 10. The composition is preferably heated such that the contacting step is conducted at a temperature of at least 35° C. A second set of rollers 36 and 38 further apply additional amount of the composition through the secondary backing into the binder material of the carpet.
The carpet is then passed between two star wheels 40 and 42 which mechanically loosen the secondary backing from the carpet passing therethrough. At this point, the secondary backing is effectively removed from the carpet and to this end, an abrasive roll 44 is provided and further acts on a smooth roll 46 to remove the secondary backing from the carpet. The removed secondary backing may be passed on through rollers 48 and 50 to a high pressure wash, globally denoted by numeral 52, optionally dried by pressure rollers 54 and 56 and collected on a spool 58 for subsequent usage.
Once the secondary backing 18 has been completely removed, the primary backing 12, together with the pile 14 and binder 16, are further treated with the solvent using a nip roller arrangement 60 and 62 in a similar manner as set forth with respect to nips 32 and 34. After a suitable dwell time, the remaining material is subjected to a high pressure water wash at 64 in order to remove any residual binder from the primary backing along with any remaining solvent. After entering the washing cycle 64, the primary backing and carpet pile is then dried in a drying cycle at 66 using any suitable means for effectively drying, e.g. forced hot air.
In order to remove the carpet pile 14 from the primary backing 12, once dried, the primary backing and carpet pile are passed into contact over a source of vacuum. In the embodiment shown, this is an inverted vacuum plate 68 which pulls the carpet pile 14 of the primary backing 12 for subsequent collection as generally indicated by the arrow 70 in FIG. 3. Any remaining particles of binder 16 are then dropped into a collection unit (not shown). The separated primary backing 12 is then optionally washed and passed on to a collection spool, the latter steps not being schematically illustrated in FIG. 3.
As further steps, the solvent may be applied pressurably to the carpet. Further, the carpet may be passed through the system a second time, when required.
In addition to the above, the spent solvent may be reused by recycling the same subsequent to filtering the spent solution. Further, the solvent may be purified by distillation or other well known chemical purification techniques.
Other solvents may be combined with the dissolving solvent to enhance dissolution or softening of the binder.
The following examples, while not intended to limit the scope of the present invention, serve to further illustrate and describe its benefits.
EXAMPLES 1-9
I. Composition Preparation
Compositions for use in the process of the present invention were formulated according to the specifications set forth in Table 1 below.
TABLE 1______________________________________CompositionsItem Chemical Softening Agent WaterNo. Wt % of Composition Wt % of Composition______________________________________1 dimethyl adipate, 100% 0%2 dimethyl adipate, 50% 50%3 dimethyl succinate, 100% 0%4 dimethyl succinate, 50% 50%5 dimethyl glutarate, 100% 0%6 dimethyl glutarate, 50% 50%7 dimethyl adipate, 23-27% 0% dimethyl glutarate, 72-76%8 dimethyl adipate, 12-14% 50% dimethyl glutamate, 36-38%______________________________________
II. Carpet Treatment Procedure
2-inch (5.08 cm) by 2-inch (5.08 cm) samples of a conventional carpet construction having tufts, a primary backing, a styrene-butadiene rubber latex adhesive and a secondary backing were partially immersed in one of the composition items in Table 1 at ambient temperature. For each composition item, the composition amounts tested were 5 ml, 7 ml and 10 ml. For each amount tested, the immersion times tested were 5 minutes, 60 minutes and 18 hours. Control samples were left untreated.
III. Tuft Removal Test
The samples, including the controls, were then tested to determine the force required to remove a tuft from the sample. Each sample was immobilized and any excess composition removed. The tip of an individual tuft was then grasped with a clamp and pulled on until it was removed from the carpet sample without breaking. The clamp was connected to a conventional INSTRON® testing device which measured the maximum pulling force exerted on the tuft by the clamp during its removal from the carpet sample. Three individual tufts from each sample were tested in this manner and an arithmetic average force (F) for each sample was calculated. A force reduction percentage versus the control was also calculated as
%ΔF= (F.sub.control -F)/F.sub.control !×100%
The results are set forth below in Table 2, with item numbers corresponding to those provided in Table 1.
TABLE 2______________________________________ Force Reduction %Item No. (% ΔF from Control)______________________________________1 67.82 75.03 57.14 78.65 57.16 78.67 71.48 78.6Control 0(Untreated Samples)______________________________________
As shown above, the process of the present invention reduced the force required for tuft removal at least 50% and for some items as much as 75% or more.
EXAMPLES 10-14
For examples 10-14, compositional items 2, 4, 6, and 8 from Table 1 were utilized in test procedures identical to those set forth in Examples 1-9 except that the treatment of the carpet sample was conducted at a temperature of 50° C. The results are set forth below in Table 3.
TABLE 3______________________________________Test Item Composition % ΔF fromNo. Item No. Control______________________________________10 2 82.111 4 89.312 6 85.713 8 78.614 Control 0 (Untreated Samples)______________________________________
As shown above, the presence of heat in the contacting step of the process of the present invention further reduces the force required for tuft removal.
Although embodiments of the invention have been described in detail herein, it will be appreciated by those skilled in the art that numerous modifications may be made to the invention without departing from the intended scope of the invention.
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A process for the reclamation of base materials from carpet is disclosed. The process includes contacting the carpet with a composition which contains a chemical softening agent for the binder material in the carpet and separating the carpet pile from the carpet backing(s).
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[0001] Priority is claimed to German Patent Application No. DE 103 58 113.8, filed on Dec. 12, 2003, the entire disclosure of which is incorporated by reference herein.
[0002] The present invention is directed to a damping device for damping the speed irregularities of a rotating shaft, having an armature, which has at least one armature part made of a non-ferromagnetic, electrically conductive material, and having an exciter for permeating the armature part in some regions with a magnetic flux, the armature having at least one armature part being movably supported relative to the exciter, transversely to the direction of the magnetic flux.
BACKGROUND
[0003] A damping device of this kind having an armature, which is designed as a disk-shaped rotor and which has an annular disk-shaped armature part of aluminum, is known in the field. The armature part is mounted on a rotating shaft which, under certain operating conditions, exhibits speed fluctuations caused by spurious oscillations. In response to the occurrence of such speed fluctuations, a direct current is fed with the aid of a control device into a winding of the exciter in order to induce a magnetic flux in a soft magnetic core of the exciter that permeates a partial region of the armature part which is radially spaced apart from the shaft's axis of rotation and is located between the teeth of the soft magnetic core. In this context, the direction of rotation of the armature part is oriented transversely to the magnetic flux that permeates it, so that electric currents are induced in the partial region of the armature part permeated by the magnetic flux. These electric currents produce heat losses in the armature part which damp the spurious oscillations. The damping device still has the disadvantage, however, of having sizable dimensions and only a relatively negligible damping moment. Therefore, for all intents and purposes, the damping device is not well suited for damping spurious oscillations occurring on the drive shaft of an automotive combustion engine.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0004] An object of the present invention is to provide a damping device of the type mentioned at the outset which will render possible a substantial damping moment while working with compact dimensions.
[0005] The present invention provide a damping device having an armature part having an opening in at least in one region permeated by a magnetic flux in a position of normal use, a ferromagnetic flux-guide member being disposed in the opening.
[0006] The magnetic resistance between the teeth of the soft magnetic member is advantageously substantially reduced by the at least one flux-guide member as compared to the damping device known from the related art in which the conductor part is made exclusively of an electrically highly conductive, non-ferromagnetic material. As a result, given equivalent dimensions of the damping device, it is possible to produce a substantially greater magnetic flux in the magnetic circuit made up of the soft magnetic core, at least one air gap situated between this core and the armature, the at least one flux-guide member, and the armature part, so that a correspondingly high electrical voltage is also induced in the armature part. Since this voltage is virtually short-circuited across the conductor material, which, in comparison to the material of the at least one ferromagnetic flux-guide member, may have a substantially greater electrical conductivity, the damping device makes possible a correspondingly high damping moment. This makes it advantageously possible to install the damping device in a clutch bell of a manually operated transmission, for example, in order to actively damp spurious oscillations occurring on the drive shaft of an automotive combustion engine. In the process, the intensity of the current used to energize the winding of the exciter may be adjusted by a control device as a function of the operating state of the combustion engine. The amplitude of the spurious oscillations, the speed of the drive shaft, and/or the torque of the combustion engine may be ascertained, for example, as state variables for the operating state.
[0007] The armature of the damping device is similar in construction to the armature of an induction machine, the armature not having any yoke, however.
[0008] It is beneficial when the armature part has a plurality of openings which are spaced apart from one another in the circumferential direction and in each of which a ferromagnetic flux-guide member is located. An even greater damping moment may then be produced by the damping device.
[0009] In one useful embodiment of the present invention, the exciter has a soft magnetic core, which has at least two teeth that are joined to one another by a yoke and that cooperate via at least one air gap with the armature part, at least one winding for inducing a magnetic flux in the core being situated on the core, the armature part having at least one annular disk-shaped region having at least one flat side and facing the teeth, and the openings being disposed in the annular disk-shaped region. The eddy currents are then induced in the armature part at the location that is spaced apart from the armature's axis of rotation, so that a correspondingly high damping moment is obtained. The relatively expensive conductor material is preferably accommodated only in the annular disk-shaped region, thereby making possible a cost-effective design of the damping device. Copper and/or aluminum are preferably used as a conductor material.
[0010] It is advantageous for the teeth to be positioned on both sides of the armature part in the axial direction thereof, and for the openings to be formed as wall cutouts. The result, on the one hand, is that an especially low magnetic resistance is produced in the magnetic circuit and, on the other hand, that the armature part and the flux-guide members may be advantageously fabricated as stamped parts or as combination bent and stamped parts.
[0011] One practical specific embodiment of the present invention provides for the ferromagnetic flux-guide members to preferably protrude from the openings on both sides of the armature part, at least two of the flux-guide members being expediently formed by teeth of a soft magnetic element which preferably has an annular or annular sectional form. The armature may then be fabricated inexpensively from a few easily assembled individual parts.
[0012] It is beneficial when the openings are spaced apart from the radially inner and/or outer periphery of the annular disk-shaped region. The currents induced by the magnetic flux in the rotating armature may then flow around the individual flux-guide members in the plane of extension of the disk-shaped armature, thereby making possible high ring currents and thus substantial damping.
[0013] The openings preferably have an elongated cross-sectional form, which is disposed with its longitudinal axis transversely to the circumferential direction of the armature part and preferably more or less radially to its axis of rotation. Thus, a multiplicity of flux-guide members may be configured side-by-side in the circumferential direction of the armature part, thereby making possible a uniform damping moment. The teeth of the soft magnetic core preferably extend in each case over a plurality of flux-guide members at the same time. At their ends facing the armature part, the teeth are formed in such a way that the flux enters in a highly concentrated manner into the air gap, without any significant cross-sectional narrowing in the soft magnetic member.
[0014] In one preferred specific embodiment of the present invention, the radially inner and/or outer peripheral region of the armature part is preferably bent or angled in a collar shape relative to the plane of extension of the annular disk-shaped region. This enables the region of the armature part that produces the damping torque to be situated at a relatively substantial distance, which renders possible a higher performance density. In addition, the ratio of damping moment to moment of inertia is improved in that the conductor material is accommodated on a small radius. Nevertheless, a substantially uniform current density results in the conductor material.
[0015] It is especially beneficial for the armature to have at least two of the annular disk-shaped regions, which are joined to one another, disposed in preferably mutually parallel surfaces, and spaced apart from one another in the direction of the magnetic flux in the air gap; for the soft magnetic core to have at least three teeth; and preferably for at least one of the teeth to engage in an interspace formed between the annular disk-shaped regions in order to permeate both annular disk-shaped regions with the magnetic flux. This makes it possible for the damping device to produce an even greater damping moment. Since the tooth of the soft magnetic core located in the interspace between the annular disk-shaped regions may be used for magnetically permeating both annular disk-shaped regions, the damping device has exceptionally compact dimensions. The length per turn of the coil producing the magnetic field is small, so that few unwanted losses occur in the stator.
[0016] In one particularly advantageous specific embodiment of the present invention, the soft magnetic core has at least one claw-pole segment, which has a plurality of teeth that are spaced apart in the circumferential direction of the armature part. As a result of this measure as well, a very substantial damping moment may be achieved. Teeth having different magnetic polarity preferably alternate with one another in the circumferential direction of the armature, so that the individual regions of the armature part are alternately magnetized in mutually opposing directions in response to a relative motion between the armature part and the exciter. The change in flux in the flux-guide elements takes place at twice the rate and at a high frequency and induces substantial circulating currents in the armature, the armature losses being proportional to the braking force.
[0017] Preferably at least two of the exciters are staggered relative to each other in the circumferential direction of the armature part. In this specific embodiment as well, the teeth are preferably configured in such a way that magnetic north and south poles alternate with one another in the circumferential direction of the armature part.
[0018] Depending on the available space, the winding may be placed on the yoke and/or at least on one tooth.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0019] Exemplary embodiments of the present invention are explained in greater detail in the following with reference to the drawing, whose figures show:
[0020] FIG. 1 : a partial cross-section through a damping device having an armature, an exciter including a soft magnetic U-shaped core, and a winding, the winding being accommodated on a yoke region of the soft magnetic core;
[0021] FIG. 2 : a representation similar to that of FIG. 1 , the winding being accommodated, however, on a tooth of the soft magnetic core;
[0022] FIG. 3 : a partial cross-section through a damping device which has an E-shaped soft magnetic core, the winding being accommodated on the middle tooth of the core;
[0023] FIG. 4 : a partial longitudinal section through a damping device;
[0024] FIG. 5 : a partial cross-section along a radial plane of the damping device illustrated in FIG. 4 ;
[0025] FIG. 6 : a partial longitudinal section through a damping device having two exciters which are spaced apart in the circumferential direction of the armature;
[0026] FIG. 7 : a partial cross-section through a radial plane of the damping device illustrated in FIG. 6 ; and
[0027] FIG. 8 : a longitudinal section through a damping device whose soft magnetic core has claw-pole bodies.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
[0028] A damping device designated as a whole by 1 , for damping the speed irregularities of a shaft that rotates around an axis of rotation 2 , has an armature 3 that is operatively connected to the shaft, and at least one stationary exciter 4 . Exciter 4 has a soft magnetic core 5 and a winding 6 accommodated thereon and set with a resin. To induce a magnetic flux in core 5 , winding 6 is connected to a control device 7 , which is used for feeding a direct current into winding 6 .
[0029] In the exemplary embodiments shown in FIGS. 1 and 2 , soft magnetic core 5 has two teeth 8 which are joined to one another approximately in a U-shape by a yoke 9 . Winding 6 is wound around yoke 9 in the exemplary embodiment according to FIG. 1 and around one of teeth 8 in the exemplary embodiment according to FIG. 2 . In the exemplary embodiment shown in FIG. 3 , soft magnetic core 5 has three teeth 8 which are joined to one another approximately in an E-shape by yoke 9 . Winding 6 is wound around middle tooth 8 in this exemplary embodiment.
[0030] In the exemplary embodiments according to FIGS. 1 and 2 , armature 3 is formed more or less in a circular disk shape having a supporting part 10 connected to the shaft and an annular disk-shaped armature part 11 accommodated thereon concentrically to axis of rotation 2 . Supporting part 10 is preferably made of a non-magnetic metal and/or plastic, and armature part 11 of a non-ferromagnetic, electrically conductive material, for example copper and/or aluminum. In the exemplary embodiments according to FIGS. 3 through 7 , two annular armature parts 11 , which run concentrically to axis of rotation 2 and each have an annular disk-shaped region, are accommodated on supporting part 10 . The annular disk-shaped regions of armature parts 11 run in parallel with one another, as well as concentrically to axis of rotation 2 , and are axially spaced apart from one another by an interspace 12 .
[0031] It is discernible in FIGS. 1 through 4 and 6 that armature parts 11 each engage between teeth 8 and that a narrow air gap 13 is formed between armature parts 11 and teeth 8 facing each of them. In FIGS. 4 through 7 , it is discernible that teeth 8 become axially narrower and tangentially wider at each of their ends facing armature parts 11 . When winding 6 carries an electric current, the tooth ends located on both sides of armature parts 11 form magnetic poles of different polarity. In a position of normal use, the annular disk-shaped regions of armature parts 11 are situated between the ends of teeth 8 . In the exemplary embodiments illustrated in FIGS. 4 through 7 , the end of middle tooth 8 is located in the interspace 12 between the two armature parts 11 .
[0032] Teeth 8 cooperate via air gaps 13 with armature parts 11 in such a way that their annular disk-shaped regions are permeated in some regions by the magnetic flux of soft magnetic core 5 . In this context, the magnetic flux is aligned in the air gaps more or less in parallel with axis of rotation 2 of armature 3 . Thus, the rotational motion of armature parts 11 is such that they move more or less at right angles to the direction of the magnetic flux.
[0033] As is especially evident in FIGS. 5 through 7 , armature parts 11 in the annular regions have a multiplicity of openings, which are spaced apart from one another, arranged one behind the other in the circumferential direction of armature part 11 , and formed as wall cutouts. A ferromagnetic flux-guide member 14 extends through each of the wall cutouts more or less in parallel with the magnetic flux direction in air gaps 13 . The cross section of flux-guide members 14 corresponds approximately to the cross section of the openings. It is discernible in FIGS. 5 and 7 that the openings and flux-guide members 14 each have an elongated, more or less rectangular or trapezoidal form and are arranged with their longitudinal axis approximately radially with respect to axis of rotation 2 .
[0034] It is discernible in FIGS. 4 and 5 that flux-guide members 14 project out of the openings and protrude with their ends somewhat beyond the adjacent flat-side surface planes of armature parts 11 in the direction of teeth 8 . In this context, flux-guide members 14 are formed by teeth of two annular, toothed, soft magnetic elements accommodated on both sides of armature part 11 . The soft magnetic elements have identical designs and are arranged in such a way that the teeth of the one soft magnetic element are offset and spaced apart from the teeth of the other soft magnetic element. The magnetic resistance of armature 3 is reduced in the area of armature part 11 by flux-guide members 14 , with the result that the magnetic flux in the soft magnetic core and armature part 11 increases accordingly. Flux-guide members 14 are preferably made of iron or nickel.
[0035] As is especially evident in FIGS. 5 through 7 , the openings are each spaced apart both from the radially inner as well as from the radially outer periphery of the annular disk-shaped region of armature part 11 . This enables the electric currents induced by the magnetic flux in armature part 11 to flow in the plane of extension of the annular disk-shaped region and thus in each case over the shortest path around flux-guide members 14 .
[0036] In FIGS. 4 and 6 , it is discernible that the radially outer peripheral region of each armature part 11 is angled in a collar shape relative to the plane of extension of its annular disk-shaped region by about 90° with respect to the outer teeth 8 of soft magnetic core 5 . In this context, the pole shoe of outer tooth 8 assigned in each case to armature part 11 in question grips behind the collar-shaped peripheral region of armature part 11 on the inside. The diameter of armature parts 11 is thereby reduced accordingly. Nevertheless, an adequate conductor cross section for the current flow is provided on the periphery of armature part 11 . The cross section of the annular region of armature part 11 located between the radially inner periphery of armature part 11 and the radially inner ends of flux-guide members 14 corresponds approximately to the cross section of the ring region of armature part 11 located between the radially outer ends of flux-guide members 14 and the outer periphery of armature part 11 .
[0037] In the exemplary embodiment according to FIG. 4 , middle tooth 8 of soft magnetic core 5 is formed asymmetrically with respect to a center plane that runs normally to axis of rotation 2 and that is positioned in the middle between the planes of extension of the annular disk-shaped regions of both armature parts 11 . It is clearly evident that the part of middle tooth 8 located on the one side of this center plane is larger in width in the axial direction of armature 3 than is the part of tooth 8 located on the other side of the center plane. The two outer teeth 8 of soft magnetic core 5 are also designed to be asymmetrical with respect to this center plane. This measure makes it possible for the dimensions of the damping device to be adapted to an existing space which may be located in a clutch bell of a clutch for a manually operated transmission. Of course, soft magnetic core 5 may also be designed to be symmetrical with respect to the mentioned center plane, as shown in the exemplary embodiment according to FIG. 6 .
[0038] In the exemplary embodiment according to FIGS. 6 and 7 , damping device 1 has two exciters 4 , whose soft magnetic cores 5 are arranged one behind the other in the circumferential direction of armature 3 and are spaced apart from one another by an interspace. Windings 6 of exciters 4 are energized by the control device in such a way that pole shoes having different magnetic polarity alternate with one another in the circumferential direction of armature 3 . As a result, when one segment of armature 3 moves past the pole shoes, a greatest possible change in the magnetic flux is achieved in the segment and thus a correspondingly large damping moment.
[0039] In the exemplary embodiment shown in FIG. 8 , soft magnetic core 5 has claw-pole bodies 15 , which each have a plurality of teeth 8 that are spaced apart in the circumferential direction of armature part 11 . Claw-pole bodies 15 are each composed of two magneto-conductively interconnected combination bent and stamped parts, of which one is positioned radially to the inside and the other radially to the outside.
[0040] Assigned to each claw-pole body 15 is a winding 6 , which is accommodated in an annular receptacle of claw-pole body 15 in question more or less coaxially to axis of rotation 2 . The magnetic flux around windings 6 is directed in each case through both combination bent and stamped parts of claw-pole bodies 15 embracing winding 6 . Teeth 8 of individual claw-pole bodies 15 that follow one another mutually adjacently in the circumferential direction alternately form magnetic north and south poles. The assemblies accommodated on both sides of armature part 11 and composed of claw-pole body 15 and winding 6 are identical in design. The design of armature 3 corresponds substantially to the design of armature 3 shown in FIGS. 1 and 2 .
[0041] Windings 6 are energized in mutually opposing directions in such a way that, axially opposing each tooth 8 having a magnetic north pole of the one claw-pole body 15 is a tooth 8 having a magentic south pole of the other claw-pole body 15 . Flux-guide members 14 are positioned in the interspaces between the conjugate teeth 8 of the two claw-pole members. An air gap 13 is formed in each case between teeth 8 and flux-guide members 14 opposing the same.
[0042] A direct current, which is regulated or controlled as a function of the particular desired damping moment, is fed into windings 6 .
[0043] It suffices for the functioning of the damping element when only one claw-pole member having one excitation coil is arranged on one side of the armature disk; on the opposite side, merely one magnetic return yoke of soft magnetic material is required. Alternatively to the axial flux guidance in the air gaps, designs which provide for radial flux direction in the air gaps may also be implemented in accordance with the design approach of the present invention. In addition, the armature may also be moved linearly, since the change in flux and thus the damping effect are independent of the direction of motion.
[0044] In the exemplary embodiments illustrated in the drawing, the magnetic flux permeates air gaps 13 axially with respect to armature 3 . It is also conceivable, however, that the magnetic flux permeates air gap 13 radially.
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A damping device for damping speed irregularities of a rotating shaft includes an armature having at least one armature part made of a non-ferromagnetic, electrically conductive material. An exciter configured to permeate the armature part in at least some regions with a magnetic flux. The armature, together with the at least one armature part, is movably supported relative to the exciter, transversely to the direction of the magnetic flux. In one region permeated by the magnetic flux in a position of normal use, the armature part has at least one opening in which a ferromagnetic flux-guide member is located.
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CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application Ser. No. 61/598,558, filed Feb. 14, 2012 and herein incorporated by reference.
TECHNICAL FIELD
The present invention relates to improvements for golf course bunkers and, more particularly, to the creation and utilization of modular, porous bunker paver blocks to improve the longevity and appearance of sand bunkers.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The golf course bunker originated in Scotland and Ireland as a hazard on the golf course (other hazards including rough areas, water, mounds, trees and the like), where these hazards are included in a golf course design as obstacles for strategy and direction, as well as for aesthetic purposes. In its earliest form, the bunker was more of a natural sand pit and was not formally maintained. In time, design styles changed and the bunker became a formalized tool that was utilized by course designers to create unique challenges for golfers. Indeed, most of the great, well-known golf courses include dramatic bunkers, where their styles vary from steep slopes with sand or turf to expansive areas with relatively flat contours.
Contemporary bunker maintenance is a major part of a golf course superintendent's responsibilities. Indeed, the time required to maintain bunkers at their expected high degree of quality can be challenging, particularly on courses that include upwards of a hundred bunkers or more. While maintenance crews spend a certain amount of time repairing bunker damage resulting from golf play, the majority of bunker maintenance is associated with repair from rain events and other environmental causes. Indeed, when a rainstorm occurs, the required repair work on bunkers may be extreme. For example, when a storm event occurs, the sand can be washed from the high spots on bunker slopes to lower regions in the bunker, exposing the subsoil on the slopes. The sand can be contaminated by subsoil color or even become mixed with stone particles that form the lower drainage area of a bunker. Inasmuch as this contamination is almost impossible to remove from the sand, the old sand is usually removed and replaced with fresh sand, increasing bunker maintenance costs.
There have been some attempts in the past to address these problems associated with golf course bunker maintenance. In some cases, fabric liners have been installed as a barrier between the subsoil and the bunker sand. However, these liners tend to degrade over time, and are known to have a limited holding capacity, particularly on slopes. Liners are also held in place by metal stakes that may become exposed (especially in northern climates) due to ground freeze/heaving, etc.
Instead of a liner formed as a sheet of material, other solutions have used spray coatings of a material over the subsoil. In some cases, a concrete spray is used. Again, this material tends to degrade over time and is especially sensitive to the temperature variations associated with northern climates (particularly ground freeze). These coatings are also difficult to repair and minimize the ability of the course to modify the bunker design without totally demolishing the concrete material.
Various types of aggregate materials have also been used as a thin boundary layer between the subsoil and the sand, creating an area with improved drainage and defining a physical boundary between the sand and the subsoil. Aggregates such as a bituminous layer with stone aggregate, polymer spray stone aggregate and rubber-polymer layers with stone aggregate have all been used. Regardless of the material selection, these aggregate structures have been found to have limited holding capacity against steep bunker slopes and tend to move downward over time, thus causing the covering sand to move as well. Again, these aggregate arrangements are difficult to repair and require a total bunker reconstruction if a design change is desired.
Thus, a need remains in the art for an arrangement that provides the drainage characteristics necessary to maintain the longevity and appearance of a golf course bunker, while providing the necessary protection of steep slopes and allowing for bunker design modifications to be accommodated.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The needs remaining in the prior art are addressed by the present invention, which relates to improvements for golf course bunkers and, more particularly, to the creation and utilization of modular, porous bunker paver blocks to improve the longevity and appearance of sand bunkers.
In accordance with one embodiment of the present invention, golf course bunker drainage system has been developed that is a modular structure taking the form of a plurality of porous bunker paver blocks formed of material exhibiting vertical and horizontal infiltration rates similar to bunker sand. The plurality of porous bunker paver blocks is disposed as a boundary layer between a bunker subsoil bottom surface and overlying bunker sand, allowing rainwater to efficiently drain away from the bunker sand while also maintaining the integrity of the bunker shape and preventing movement of sand and other materials along steeply sloping bunker sidewalls.
The bunker paver blocks are preferably formed to have side and end faces of a form that allows for the blocks to interlock as they are placed next to each other. The top surface of the bunker paver blocks can be textured to promote adherence of the bunker sand to the block, and the bottom surface of the blocks can be textured to help anchor the blocks in place along the bottom surface of a bunker.
Other and further aspects and embodiments of the present invention will become apparent during the course of the following discussion and by reference to the accompanying drawings.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
Referring now to the drawings, where like numerals represent like parts in several views:
FIG. 1 is a top view of an exemplary bunker paver block 10 formed in accordance with the present invention;
FIG. 2 is a top view of a plurality of bunker paver blocks, as disposed in an interlocking arrangement, as may be used within a golf course sand bunker;
FIG. 3 is a cut-away side view of an exemplary golf course sand bunker, illustrating the placement of the bunker paver blocks of the present invention with respect to the other components of a typical bunker;
FIG. 4 is a cut-away side view of a set of three bunker paver blocks, illustrating different types of textured top surfaces useful for binding bunker sand thereto; and
FIG. 5 is a close-up, cut-away side view of a portion of a sand bunker, formed to include modular paver bunkers with a serrated surface, formed in accordance with the present invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
FIG. 1 is a top view of an exemplary bunker paver block 10 formed in accordance with the present invention. Importantly, bunker paver block 10 comprises a pervious or porous material, such vulcanized rubber, plastic or crumb rubber with a binding agent. Acceptable binding agents include polymer adhesives, bituminous asphalt, epoxy-based materials, or the like. New or recycled materials (or a combination thereof) may be used to form the bunker paver blocks, as long as the created bunker paver block exhibits the desired pervious/porous properties. Moreover, any suitable manufacturing process may be used to form the paver blocks and is not considered to be germane to the present invention.
In accordance with the present invention, bunker paver 10 is formed as a pervious or porous structure such that its infiltration rate (both horizontal and vertical) are at least similar to the infiltration rate of the bunker sand overlying the bunker paver. With this property, bunker paver blocks 10 create the drainage properties required for a golf course sand bunker, while the modular nature of the interlocking paver blocks permits them to be arranged and re-arranged as necessary as bunker designs are modified.
Continuing with reference to FIG. 1 , bunker paver 10 is illustrated as including a pair of opposing end faces 12 , 14 and a pair of opposing side faces 16 , 18 . In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, the topology of bunker 10 as defined by faces 12 , 14 , 16 and 18 is designed to allow for adjacent bunker paver blocks to interlock in a manner that allows for the overall plurality of bunker paver blocks to hold each other in place.
FIG. 2 is a top view of a plurality of bunker paver blocks, as disposed in an interlocking arrangement, as may be used within a golf course bunker. As shown, a top “row” of bunker paver blocks 10 - 1 , 10 - 2 and 10 - 3 are disposed adjacent to one another, with end face 12 - 1 of bunker paver block 10 - 1 positioned adjacent to end face 14 - 2 of bunker paver block 10 - 2 . Similarly, end face 12 - 2 of bunker paver block 10 - 2 is positioned adjacent to end face 14 - 3 of bunker paver block 10 - 3 . For the sake of example, it is presumed that end face 14 - 1 of bunker paver block 10 - 1 is disposed towards the center C of an associated bunker (not shown), with the paver blocks then positioned against an upwardly sloping wall of a bunker, with bunker paver block 10 - 3 positioned towards an upper edge E of the bunker.
A second row of bunker paver blocks is shown as interlocking with the first row as described above. In particular, side face 18 - 4 of bunker paver block 10 - 4 is shown as positioned to mate with a right-hand half of side face 16 - 1 of bunker paver block 10 - 1 and a Ieft-hand half of side face 16 - 2 of bunker paver block 10 - 2 , similar to a brick laying pattern. A second bunker paver block 10 - 5 of the second row is shown as interlocking in a similar fashion with bunker paver blocks 10 - 2 and 10 - 3 . A third row of bunker paver blocks 10 - 6 , 10 - 7 and 10 - 8 is also shown in FIG. 2 as interlocking with the pair of bunker paver blocks 10 - 4 and 10 - 5 of the second row.
The topology of the side faces of bunker paver blocks 10 is shown to provide this interlocking to provide mechanical stability to the combination paver blocks forming the bunker drainage system. This mechanical stability will allow for the bunker paver blocks to remain in place, particularly along steep sloping sidewalls, overcoming a major problem associated with various prior art arrangements. When bunker sand is then placed over the plurality of bunker paver blocks, the additional weight will further provide mechanical stability, with some of the sand working into the interfaces between adjacent paver blocks and provide further rigidity to the interlocking structure.
An added benefit of the arrangement of the present invention is that by virtue of utilizing a plurality of modular bunker paver blocks, a natural microdrain channel 20 will be formed at the edges where paver blocks abut one another. Microdrain channels 20 provide additional paths for drainage of rain from the bunker. These additional microdrain channels are not found in prior art, unitary bunker liners.
FIG. 3 is a cut-away side view of an exemplary golf course sand bunker, illustrating the placement of the bunker paver blocks of the present invention with respect to the other components of a typical sand bunker. As shown, a sand bunker is formed by creating a hollowed region of a desired contour in a portion of native soil (or subsoil) 30 . A drainage area 32 is formed at the lowest natural portion of the contour, and a drainage pipe 34 is disposed in drainage area 32 . While not always used, an additional drainage layer 36 of aggregate stone (or other suitable material) may be disposed across an area of the exposed bunker in the region of drainage area 32 .
In accordance with the present invention, a plurality of bunker paver blocks 10 is then positioned over subsoil 30 (or drainage layer 36 , if used), where the individual, modular bunker paver blocks are placed within the bunker in the interlocking pattern as shown in FIG. 2 . Beyond the porous nature of the block material itself, microchannel drains 20 at the interface between adjacent blocks 10 also assist in quickly and efficiently draining water from the bunker sand. Bunker sand 40 is then placed over the positioned bunker paver blocks 10 . Clearly, the inclusion of modular bunker paver blocks 10 provides a boundary between bunker sand 40 and subsoil 30 , preventing the sand from being contaminated by the subsoil. This same protection as provided by modular bunker paver blocks 10 prevents any aggregate material of layer 36 from infiltrating the bunker sand.
In one exemplary embodiment, a bunker paver of the present invention may be formed to include a rough or corrugated top surface. This feature has been found to stabilize the sand overlying the paver and hold the sand in place, particularly on bunker slopes. FIG. 4 is a cut-away side view of a set of three bunker paver blocks 10 -A, 10 -B and 10 -C, each exhibiting a different textured top surface 40 useful for adhering sand to the paver blocks. It is to be understood that the forms shown in FIG. 4 are exemplary only and various other roughened topologies may be formed on a bunker paver top surface in accordance with the teachings of the present invention.
Referring to FIG. 4 , bunker paver 10 -A is shown as having a top surface 42 -A which illustrates a squared-off corrugation. The accumulation of sand within trenches 44 -A will assist in helping the sand particles to remain in contact with each other and minimize the movement of sand on bunker slopes.
Bunker paver 10 -B is shown as including a serrated top surface 42 -B. In this case, the placement of bunker paver blocks 10 -B in a bunker such that edges 44 -B point upward (towards the edge of the bunker) so as to allow for sand to naturally collect in each section. Again, this particular arrangement include a serrated top surface of a bunker paver, prevents movement of bunker sand (particularly on slopes). Bunker paver 10 -C is shown as having a top surface 42 -C of a scalloped design, creating indented areas for sand accumulation.
FIG. 5 is a close-up, cut-away side view of a portion of a sand bunker, formed to include modular paver bunkers with a serrated surface, formed in accordance with the present invention. As shown, a set of modular bunker paver blocks 10 is positioned across the bottom surface of the bunker, covering both subsoil 30 and drainage aggregate 36 . Adjacent bunker paver blocks 10 are disposed in an interlocking pattern (as shown in FIG. 2 , for example), with an exemplary end edge 12 of a first bunker paver positioned against an end edge 14 of an adjacent bunker. Microdrain channels 20 are evident in this view.
As described above, the plurality of modular bunker paver blocks 10 shown in FIG. 5 are formed to include serrated top surface 42 -B. Bunker paver blocks 10 are positioned with edges 44 -B pointing upwards, allowing for bunker sand to accumulate in regions 46 -B. By accumulating sand in this manner, the possibility of sand releasing from sloping bunker sidewalls is greatly reduced. In the particular embodiment as shown in FIG. 5 , bottom surface 48 of bunker paver blocks 10 is also roughened, where this additional texture on bottom surface 48 assists in fixing blocks 10 in place against the subsoil (and/or aggregate material) on the bottom of an associated bunker.
By virtue of using modular bunker paver blocks in accordance with the present invention, the limitations of the prior art solutions are overcome and various advantages become apparent. In particular, the interlocking arrangement of modular paver blocks creates a mechanical force that holds the arrangement in place, minimizing the possibility of bunker damage along sloping sidewalls (as well as the release of sand from these sidewalls).
The modular paver blocks are preferably sized so that an individual may perform their placement arrangement without needing other assistance. If necessary, the bunker paver blocks may be cut to properly fit along the edges of a sand bunker or modify internal paver block angles. Moreover, if an individual bunker paver becomes somehow damaged or breaks, the maintenance personnel need only remove the damaged paver block and replace it, leaving the rest of the bunker paver blocks undisturbed.
In situations where it is desired to modify the design of a bunker, the uncovered bunker paver blocks can be removed, realigned, etc. in order to change the particular bunker design. The modularity also allows for the various paver blocks to slightly move as the ground underneath the bunker heaves during freezing and warming conditions, absorbing this movement without causing the overall bunker integrity to be compromised.
Although only some preferred embodiments of the invention have been described in detail above, those skilled in the art will readily appreciate that many modifications are possible in the preferred embodiments without departing from the advantages of the present invention. Accordingly, all such modifications are intended to be included within the scope of the present invention.
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A golf course bunker drainage system has been developed that is a modular structure taking the form of a plurality of porous bunker paver blocks formed of material exhibiting vertical and horizontal infiltration rates at least the same as bunker sand. The plurality of porous bunker paver blocks is disposed as a boundary layer between a bunker subsoil bottom surface and overlying bunker sand, allowing rainwater to drain into the subsoil, with excess rainwater directed away from the bunker sand. The use of bunker paver blocks also maintains the integrity of the bunker shape and prevents movement of sand and other materials along steeply sloping bunker sidewalls.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The invention relates to valve assemblies, and in particular, to a washerless-type assembly adapted for dispensing service water and other similar duties.
PRIOR ART
In residential plumbing and like applications, water faucets commonly employ so-called washer-type valves in which a rubber or plastic washer is compressed against an annular seat in the manner of a poppet to control flow of fluid. While relatively simple and economical in construction, this washer-type design is often characterized by operational limitations and relatively short service life. Many problems have been identified with the function and limitations of the washer itself. Even when in good order, such valves ordinarily require an increase in operating torque to adequately close them over that required to initially restrict them from a fully open condition. Unintentional, but commonly experienced, overtightening of the washer leads to premature failure. Where the seat is a permanent part of the valve body and the washer is allowed to deteriorate or disintegrate to a significant degree, consequent mechanical damage or erosion of the seat can necessitate replacement of the entire valve.
These recognized disadvantages of the conventional washer-type valve have lead to the development of washerless valves. In many cases, however, washerless valves when compared to the compression or washer-type have been relatively expensive to manufacture. Higher costs have resulted because of increases in the number of valve parts and complexities in individual parts and their assembly. In most cases, proposed washerless valve designs have required special valve bodies and have, therefore, necessitated new tooling, inventory, and related costs.
U.S. Pat. No. 2,967,042 to H. M. Richter discloses a stop valve having a relatively resilient plastic stem with a cupped valve structure.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The invention provides a valve assembly having a sheartype operation developed by the rotation of a stem and resulting movement of its associated porting means across a plane of stationary cooperating discharge porting in a surrounding body. Manipulation of a stem selectively effects on/off and modulated flow control as a function of the degree of registration of the ports at the plane of shear.
In accordance with the invention, the stem includes a resilient cupped valving element which is responsive to fluid pressures supplied to the valve to provide positive shutoff action in direct relation to the supply pressure. The stem cup valve element is arranged to positively seal against stem leakage, as well as for its primary function of controlling discharge flow.
As disclosed, the valve unit is adapted to take the form of a removable cartridge containing both the stationary port, or seat, and the removable valve stem. The disclosed cartridge is readily adapted for use in existing valve housings so that present tooling and product lines can be retained. Still further, the cartridge can be used to retrofit previously installed valve units of the older compression washer-type, and this conversion can be accomplished even without temporary disconnection of the valve from its service connections.
The illustrated valve assembly requires only a quarter turn to change from full "off" to full "on" flow. Positive stops are integrated into the valve parts so that the user is afforded a clear indication of the state of the valve and the extreme positions of the stem always have the same angular orientation. The valve is constructed in such a way that, by virtue of its shear action between valving points, no judgment is necessary in determining the torque necessary to fully turn the valve to its "off" position and the risk of overtightening the valve is eliminated. The disclosed stem cup valving member operates in a surrounding bore with only a slight intentional radial interference so that a minimum of effort is necessary to manipulate the valve, frictional wear is substantially eliminated, and the tendency of the valving elements to gall or be scored by foreign particles is greatly reduced.
As the result of freedom from inadvertent overtightening and premature wear, the valve exhibits a relatively long maintenance-free service life. Where repair, inspection, or replacement is required, removal of the cartridge assembly can be simply accomplished with ordinary tools and without disturbing service connections of the valve housing. The cartridge with its removable seat can be completely replaced, or it can be simply rebuilt by providing a new stem unit. Since no close dimensional tolerances are required in the construction of the valve assembly, there is no difficulty in selecting dimensionally mated parts. The disclosed valve is adapted to be economically fabricated of plastic materials through injection molding techniques. The valve assembly incorporates only a limited number of parts, each of which does not require elaborate finishing operations or assembly techniques.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING
FIG. 1 is a cross sectional view of a cartridge assembly installed on a partially illustrated valve body;
FIG. 2 is an axially exploded view of the cartridge assembly shown in FIG. 1;
FIG. 3 is a fragmentary side view of an inner end of a stem element of the cartridge assembly; and
FIG. 4 is a fragmentary, cross sectional view taken in a plane transverse to the axis of the cartridge assembly as indicated in the line 4--4 of FIG. 1.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
Referring now to the drawing, a valve unit 10 comprises a valve body 11 and a cartridge assembly 12 mounted on the body. In the illustrated case, the valve body 11 is representative of a conventional type of faucet housing including a compression washer type. The valve body 11 is constructed of corrosion-resistant metal, such as brass or a suitable rigid plastic material. An inlet passage 13 formed in the body 11 is connected to a source of fluid, such as a water supply. The inlet passage 13 upstream of its illustrated portion is provided with mechanical threads or other means for coupling to a supply line in which a fluid is supplied under pressure. At a right angle to the inlet passage 13 is a fluid outlet or discharge passage 14. Downstream of the illustrated portion of the discharge passage 14 there is provided a suitable spout or equivalent outlet. The inlet passage 13 terminates at an annular seat 16 surrounded by a circular relief or depression 17. In a compression washer-type valve, the washer is compressed against a seat like the annular seat 16. A large cylindrical cavity 18 is axially aligned with the inlet passage 13, which is in the form of a cylindrical bore. The outlet 14 is radially oriented with respect to the cylindrical cavity 18 and communicates directly with it. An internally threaded end 19 of the cavity 18 forms an opening in the valve body 11.
The cartridge assembly 12 includes as its principal parts a bonnet 21, a stem 22, and a retaining ring 23. In the illustrated case, the bonnet 21 is a generally circular, hollow body having stepped diameters both at its inside and outside surfaces. The bonnet 21 is conveniently formed by injection molding of plastic material, such as acetal copolymer. At midlength, the bonnet 21 is externally threaded at 26 to enable it to be threaded into the internal threads 19 of the cavity 18. Inward of the external threads 26, the bonnet 21 has a cylindrical tubular wall portion 27 of reduced outside diameter somewhat smaller than that of the cavity 18. The tubular wall portion 27 is provided with diametrally opposed, pear-shaped ports 25 (FIG. 3). At its inward end, the bonnet 21 includes an inturned circular flange or end wall 28 having an annular groove 29 in its radial face 30. An annular seal 32 is fitted to this radial bonnet face 30 by positioning an integral annular projection 33 into the annular face groove 29. When the bonnet 21 is fully threaded into the valve body 11, the various elements are dimensioned such that the annular seal 32 is compressed to form a fluidtight barrier between the seat 16 and the lower radial face 30 of the bonnet.
An elastomeric annular seal 36 is captured between a radial shoulder 37 of the bonnet 21 and an annular face 38 of the valve body surrounding the threaded entrance 19 of the cavity 18 to prevent escape of fluid from the cavity along the threads 19, 26.
The hollow bonnet 21 has a series of generally cylindrical counterbores 41-44, inclusive, from the outer towards the inner end of the bonnet, respectively. The outermost counterbore 41 is interrupted by a pair of diametrically opposed lugs 46 (only one is shown in FIG. 2) which extend radially inwardly of the cylindrical surface of this counterbore. A second counterbore 42 is dimensioned to receive an O-ring 47 which surrounds and forms an auxiliary seal for the stem 22.
Inward of the O-ring receiving counterbore 42, the bonnet 21 is formed with two smooth wall, cylindrical counterbores 43,44, the inner one 44 being slightly smaller than the other 43. At a lower end of the bonnet, an innermost bore 45 provides communication between the inlet passage 13 and the relatively large main bonnet bore 43.
The stem 22 is a subassembly of a generally circular, rigid outer portion 51 and a generally circular, resilient inner portion 52. An inner end 53 of the rigid stem portion 51 has a diameter slightly smaller than the corresponding diameter of the bonnet bore 43 (e.g., a nominal stem diameter of approximately 0.430 inch, and a nominal bonnet bore of approximately 0.458 inch) to support the stem for relatively free rotation about its axis within the bonnet. At midlength, the rigid stem portion 51 includes an annular lip or shoulder 54 which, with the O-ring 47 in the bonnet counterbore 42, constrains the O-ring 47 to effectuate a fluid seal between the bonnet and stem at this point. Axially outward of this shoulder 54 on the rigid stem portion 51 is a circumferential flange 56 which is arranged to fit against a radial surface 58 in the bonnet to axially position the stem 22 in the bonnet by proper tightening of the retaining ring 23 against an outwardly facing side of this circumferential flange. Diametrically opposed lugs 61 from extensions of the circumferential flange 56 and are configured to cooperate with the bonnet lugs 46 to limit rotation of the stem 22 to a quarter turn, i.e., 90 degrees.
The retainer ring 23 is externally threaded at 71 for cooperation with complementary internal threads 72 in the first bonnet counterbore 41. The retainer ring 23 has a central bore 73 through which a head end 74 of the outer stem portion 51 extends with adequate clearance to permit free rotation therebetween. Blind holes 75 in the outer face of the retaining ring 23 permit the ring to be turned into and out of the bonnet with a spanner wrench, or other suitable tool, for assembly and disassembly of the various cartridge parts. The head end of the rigid outer stem portion 51 in internally threaded at 76 and keyed by a coarse knurl or other means 77 for assembly with a suitable handle in accordance with conventional practice to permit the stem to be conveniently manipulated by hand.
The cylindrical tubular wall portion 27 of the bonnet has a pair of diametrically opposed side ports 25. The side ports 25 are preferably pear-shaped in configuration and are oriented with their long dimensions running circumferentially of the cylindrical wall portion. As indicated in FIG. 3, the ports 25 are oriented with the base (wide end) of one port preceding in a circumferential direction the stem (narrow end) of the opposite port.
The rigid outer portion 51 of the stem 22 is preferably fabricated by injection molding a suitable platic. The inner end of the outer stem portion 51 is formed with an axial cylindrical bore 81 and a blind cavity 82 of square cross section. The inner resilient stem portion 52 is preferably injection-molded onto the outer stem portion 51. The outer stem 51, once formed, is used as an insert in a mold cavity for forming the inner resilient stem portion 52 during injection molding of the latter. If necessary, a chemical adhesive or bonding agent may be sprayed or otherwise applied to the cylindrical bore 81 and square cavity 82 prior to molding of the inner portion 52. The acircular cross section of the square bore 82 and the tight fit of a complementary formation 83 on the outer end of the resilient stem portion 52 provides an interlocking or torque-transmitting connection between the stem parts 51 and 52. The resilient stem portion 52 is preferably formed of elastomeric material, such as ethylene propylene, which is desirably internally lubricated by suitable commercial fillers and being relatively soft, with a hardness of, for example, 80 durometer. Axially inward of the square cross section 83 and an adjoining cylindrical formation 84, the resilient stem portion 52 is cup-shaped, opening in the direction of the inlet 13, and includes a generally cylindrical, hollow skirt zone 86 and an end wall 87 abutting a radial face 88 of the rigid stem portion 51. The length of the skirt 86 is dimensioned to fall slightly short of the inturned bonnet flange 28. The diameter of an outer surface 89 of the resilient stem cup 52 is dimensioned such that it, in a free state, has a minimal interference with the bonnet bore 44 and, by way of example, may have a nominal diameter of 0.423 inch, while the bore 44 has a nominal diameter of 0.416 inch.
A pair of diametrically opposed ports 91 are formed in the sidewall of the hollow cup skirt 86 at axial points in registration with the bonnet ports 25. These stem ports 91 are spaced from the stem cup end wall 87 to leave sidewall zone 92 intermediate these ports and the end wall, which ensures that a circumferentially continuous section of the sidewall exists axially outward of the ports. The stem ports 91 are angularly related to the stem and bonnet lugs 61, 46 in such a manner that in one extreme angular position of the stem, the stem ports are fully misaligned from the bonnet ports 25 (adjacent the small end of these ports) and in the opposite extreme angular position, the stem ports are in alignment with the large ends of the bonnet ports.
The valve assembly 10 is illustrated in a fully open condition in FIGS. 1 and 4. In this condition, fluid, such as service water, supplied to the passage 13 passes through the central aperture of the annular seal 32 and the axial bore 45 in the bonnet radial flange 28 into the cavity, designated 93, of the lower stem cup portion and out through each of the stem and bonnet ports 91 and 25 to the discharge passage 14.
When constructed in a conventional manner, the stem 22 is rotated clockwise to move the valve assembly from the open to the closed position. In the closed position, the stem ports 91 face solid areas of the smooth, main bore 44 of the bonnet 21 so that flow is effectively closed through the stem. This closeoff of the stem ports 91 increases pressure in the stem cavity 93 by increasing the pressure drop from the valve inlet 13 to the outlet 14. A positive shutoff of flow is developed with this increasing pressure in the stem cup by resilient radial expansion of the cup sleeve, or sidewall, 86 and a resulting tight sealing engagement between the outer skirt surface 89 and the bonnet bore surface 44. Under these circumstances, the bonnet ports 25 are completely sealed by the skirt sidewall 86, which tightly engages the boundary or edges of these ports. Resilient radial expansion of the resilient cup-shaped stem 52 at its circumferentially continuous zone 92 above the ports 91 completely and positively seals against axial flow along the upper stem portion 51 during valve shutoff. It is important for the stem cup area 86 to seal against axial stem leakage when the valve is closed, since it is at this time pressures in the valve body 11 are ordinarily at their highest levels. At times when the valve is open, the auxiliary stem O-ring 37 provides an adequate seal.
It will be appreciated from the foregoing description that closing and opening action of the valve unit 10 employs a shearing action of the respective sealing surfaces formed by the stem skirt 86 and main bonnet bore 44. This shear action is accomplished across the cylindrical plane defined by the bonnet bore 44. Only a quarter turn of the stem 22 is required to change the condition of the valve unit from a full "on" to a full "off" state. The pear-shaped configuration of the bonnet side ports 25 allows relatively linearly increasing flow rates to be achieved when limiting rotation of the stem to a fraction of a full quarter turn. The quick quarter turn response of the valve unit is very desirable from the standpoint of the user, who, with simple wrist movement, can completely control the action of the valve without having to regrip a handle several times to effectuate a complete change from an open to a closed state. Further, the positive stopping action of the stem and bonnet lugs 61, 46 gives a sure indication to the user that the valve is in either a fully opened or closed condition. With the valve in an open state and pressure reduced within the stem cup cavity 93, frictional forces required to turn the stem 22 in the bonnet 21 are quite small, so that only a light touch need be given to the valve to manipulate the stem. Further, the minimal interference provided between the stem 22 and bonnet 21 in the area of the main bore and the absence of screw threads between the stem end valve bonnet result in a valve unit which is relatively free of frictional wear and, accordingly, has a long service life.
Although a preferred embodiment of this invention is illustrated, it should be understood that various modifications and rearrangements of parts may be resorted to without departing from the scope of the invention disclosed and claimed herein.
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A valve assembly embodied in cartridge form for ease of manufacture, repair, and replacement and for retrofitting existing valve housings. The cartridge operates with shear on/off operation and includes a valve element having elastomeric properties and a configuration arranged to develop positive shut-off and seal action to prevent leakage in both the flow circuit and along an operating stem.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to apparatus for controlling the automatic opening and closing of doors. Known arrangements for control of automatically opened doors includes sensors which sense either the present or the movement of an object or person in the vicinity of the door. Such sensors include photocell detectors and doppler radar detectors.
According to known arrangements, the doppler radar senses movement of a person toward the door which triggers the opening of the door. The door is usually closed by operation of an automatic timing circuit, which holds the door in a fully opened position for a pre-selected time, this is usually generously allotted so that a slow moving person will have time to pass through the door. It will be recognized that it is desirable that the door not be opened for too long a period, because of the resulting loss of heat or air conditioning to the building. Present arrangements for automatic closing of the door usually rely on photocell or floormat detection of the passage of a person, for purposes of providing a closing operation.
Operational difficulties are encountered in such prior art systems in the event a person walks toward the door, is detected by the doppler radar to open the door, and then walks away without passing through the door. In this case, the prior art systems do not detect the passage of the person through the door and the door remains open until closed by an automatic time circuit.
Another difficulty with such prior art systems arises when a door is situated along a frequently used walk. The doppler radar may detect the motion of a person in a direction generally traverse to door opening, causing the door to open. Again, since the person does not pass through the door, the door remains opened for an unduly long period of time.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a new and improved arrangement of sensing devices and control circuits for detecting the movement of objects and persons and controlling operation of an automatic door.
It is an object of the invention to provide such an arrangement which solves the problems associated with prior art devices in situations where a person walks toward a door opening, is detected, and then does not pass through the door opening.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
In accordance with the present invention there is provided apparatus for controlling the operation of a motor operated door or the like. The apparatus includes means for detecting movement of a person or object toward the door, and for detecting movement of a person or object away from the door. There is further provided door control means which is responsive to the detection of the movement toward the door to operate the motor to open the door, and responsive to detection of movement away from the door to operate the motor to close the door. The means is also responsive to no detected movement to maintain the door in its current position. The door opening control has priority over the door closing control.
For a better understanding of the present invention, together with other and further objects, reference is made to the following description, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, and its scope will be pointed out in the appended claims.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is a top view of an automatically operated slide door having detectors and a control system in accordance with the present invention.
FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing the interconnection of the detectors and control unit in the door opening apparatus in accordance with the present invention.
FIG. 3 is a block diagram illustrating the operation of a portion of the control circuit used in the apparatus of the present invention.
FIG. 4 is a schematic illustration of the arrangement of a doppler radar apparatus, known in the prior art, and useful in connection with the present invention.
FIG. 5 is a drawing showing the voltage wave forms obtained using a doppler radar of the type shown in FIG. 4.
FIGS. 6A, 6B and 6C are drawings illustrating digitized doppler radar signals, which are obtained from the signals having the wave forms of FIG. 5.
FIG. 7 is an illustration showing the arrangements for photodetector units for use in connection with the door control apparatus of the present invention.
FIG. 8 is a circuit diagram showing a detection and control signal generating circuit useful in the apparatus of the present invention.
DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
Referring to FIG. 1 there is shown a portion of a wall 1, which includes a sliding automatic door 2 covering a door opening 3. Above the door opening on either side of the door there are provided doppler radar sensors 4 and 5, which are connected to an electronic control unit 6 which generates signals for operation of motor 7 which opens and closes the door 2. Each sensors provides a radiation lobe within which the motion of people or objects toward and away from the door may be detected. Doppler radar sensor 4 includes a radiation lobe 8 pointing outwardly in the direction of approach 11 toward the door. A person 10 is shown approaching the door 2 within the detection lobe 8. Likewise radar sensor 5 includes a radiation lobe 9 pointing outwardly on the opposite side of door 2. When a person 10 is moving in a direction of arrow 11 toward door 2, sensor 4 provides a doppler radar signal to electronic unit 6, which actuates the motor 7 to open the sliding door 2 in the direction of arrow 12.
For purposes of further explaining the operation of the arrangement in accordance with the present invention, reference is made to the block diagram of FIG. 2. Sensors 4 and 5 are connected by output leads 13, 14 and 15, 16, respectively, to electronic unit 6. A known type of doppler radar sensors is shown in somewhat greater detail in FIG. 4, wherein it may be seen that the sensor includes a microwave horn 30, which is attached to a waveguide 32. At one end of waveguide 32 there is provided a low power microwave signal source 34, which may be an oscillating diode. Signal source 34 causes radiation of CW microwave signals from horn 30. As a person approaches the unit, radiation reflected from the person is received by horn 30 and mixed with the original CW signal in mixer diodes 36 and 38, which are spaced along waveguide 32, and separated by a distance corresponding to a quarter wave length. The output of mixer diodes 36 and 38 correspond to doppler frequency signals, having a frequency between 5 and 200 Hz, depending on the speed of motion of the person or object approaching. The relative phase of the doppler radar signals which are detected in diodes 36 and 38 is different, and the phase leads or lags, depending on whether the motion is toward or away from horn 30. These signals are illustrated in FIG. 5, where a solid curve shows the detected doppler signal provided from one of the mixer diodes, for example, diode 36, and the dotted lines show leading or lagging doppler signals detected by mixer diode 38, depending upon whether the movement is toward or away from the detector. As shown in FIG. 5, the signal detected in mixer 38 will lead or lag by phase angles A and B, respectively.
Referring again to FIG. 2, the signal from mixer diode 36 is provided on lead 13 to detection circuit 17 and the signal from mixer diode 38 is provided by lead 14 to detection circuit 17. Circuit 17, which will be described in further detail, provides an output signal to motor control 19, indicating whether it has detected movement toward or away from the door, or has detected no movement at all. Likewise doppler radar 5 is connected by leads 15 and 16 to circuit 18, which is similar to circuit 17 and provides a signal to motor control 19 indicating motion toward or away from the opposite side of door 2.
When either of the doppler radars shown in FIG. 1 detects movement of a person or object toward door 2, a signal is provided to motor control 19 which causes motor 7 to operate and open the door in the direction 12 shown in FIG. 1. When there is no motion detected by either of the doppler radars, the door is maintained in its current position, i.e., open or closed. When either of the doppler radars sense the movement of a person or object away from the door, a signal is provided to motor control 19 which causes operation of motor 7 to close the door. Motor control 19 is arranged to provide preference for opening the door over closing the door, when conflicting signals are received, thereby to provide assurance that the door will not be closed while someone is passing through.
In a preferred arrangement of the present invention, circuits 17 and 18 provide binary level signals to motor control 19 which give an indication of their status in detecting movement toward or away from the door. Preferably, circuits 17 and 18 provide a low voltage control signal to motor control 19 in the event there is a detection of movement toward the door. The low voltage control signal is provided by a circuit with a low impedance, so that the supply of a low voltage signal from one of the circuits 17, 18, and a high level from the other circuit 17, 18, causes a low voltage at the common input to motor control 19 resulting in opening of the door. In the even circuit 17 or 18 detects movement away from the door, an alternating voltage control signal, switching between the high and low voltage levels as a pulse train, is provided to motor control 19. In this event the low level of the pulse train will override a high level signal from the other detector and cause a closing of the door when an alternating voltage control signal is provided from only one of the circuits 17, 18. Also the closing control signal, being alternating between high and low voltage, will be overridden by a low voltage opening control signal received from the other of circuits 17, 18. When no movement is detected by either circuit 17 or 18 a high voltage level control signal is provided to circuit 19. This high voltage control signal is provided from a relatively high impedance and can be overridden by either the low voltage control signal, which signals door opening, or by an alternating voltage control signal, which signals door closing. Motor control unit 19 responds to the high voltage control signal to maintain the door in its current position, either open or closed.
Assuming an initial state, wherein there is no motion detected by either radar 4 or 5, both circuits 17 and 18 will provide a high voltage control signal to motor control 19, and the door remains in a closed position. As a person, illustrated as 10 in FIG. 1, approaches the door, sensor 4 detects motion toward the door and provides a low voltage signal to motor control 19, overriding the high voltage control signal provided by circuit 18, and causing control 19 to operate motor 7 to open the door. As the person 10 passes through the door, no motion is detection by either radar 4 or radar 5, and both circuits 17 and 18 provide a high voltage control signal to motor control 19, which causes the door to remain in the open position during the passage. As the person continues walking in direction 11 he enters lobe 9 of radar sensor 5, which provides doppler signals to circuit 18, indicating movement away from the door opening. Circuit 18 respond by providing an alternating high-low voltage control signal to motor control 19, overriding the high voltage level from circuit 17 and causing motor control 19 to operate motor 7 to close the door. Accordingly the door is rapidly and efficiently closed as soon as person 10 has passed therethrough.
An advantage of the present invention is provided in the event person 10 approaches door 2 and enters lobe 8 causing the door to open. The person 10 then decides not to enter the door and starts walking in a direction out of lobe 8, opposite to arrow 11. In this event the signal provided by sensor 4 to circuit 17 indicates movement away, and circuit 17 responds by immediately supplying the alternating voltage control signal to motor control 19, thereby causing a rapid closing of door 2 by motor 7. Accordingly, door 2 is not unnecessarily kept opened.
In another operating condition, which has caused problems in prior art arrangements, a person 10 may be walking in a direction which is generally parallel to wall 1 and thereby pass through lobe 8 without intending to pass through door 2. In this event as he enters lobe 8 a signal may be provided indicating an approach by radar sensor 4 and circuit 17 will provide an opening signal to motor control 19. However, as the person passes midway through the lobe 8, a movement away signal will immediately be provided to motor control 19 causing rapid closing of the door.
In accordance with the invention it is also possible to provide circuitry which responds to the speed of a person moving toward the door, and may in some cases discriminate between a person walking directly toward the door and a person who is walking parallel to wall 1. The circuit shown in block diagram form in FIG. 3 provides for an opening signal to be indicated to motor control 17 only when a person is moving toward the door with sufficient speed to indicate that he intends to pass through it.
FIG. 3 is a block diagram of a portion of control circuit 17, which responds to digitized doppler signals provided on leads 13 and 14. The circuit includes latch circuits 21 and 22, which receive the output of a digital to analog converter responding to the doppler radar signals shown in FIG. 5. The digitized doppler signals form digital pulse streams, shown in FIGS. 6A, 6B and 6C. FIG. 6A shows the digital reference signal, provided by mixer diode 36, after it has been converted to a digital form. FIG. 6B shows a digital doppler signal, with lagging phase, which is derived from the analog signal provided by mixer diode 38, signifying motion toward a door, and FIG. 6C shows a digitized doppler signal which has a leading phase, which may be supplied by digitization of the signal from mixer diode 38 for movement away from a door. The digital doppler signals shown in FIG. 6A and either 6B or 6C, depending on the detected motion, are supplied to multivibrator latch circuits 21 and 22, each of which is connected to a separate counter circuit 23 and 24. Multivibrator circuits 21 and 22 are interconnected such that when a pulse is provided to one of the circuits, the operation of the other in inhibited. Accordingly, only one multivibrator 21, 22 will supply pulses to its corresponding counter 23, 24 depending upon whether the signal of FIG. 6B or 6C is present. When the FIG. 6A signal is supplied on lead 13 to multivibrator 21, and the FIG. 6B signal is supplied on lead 14 to multivibrator 22, the FIG. 6A pulses on lead 13 will inhibit operation of multivibrator 22, and therefor pulses will be passed to counter 23 and not to counter 24. In the alternate, if the signal on lead 14 corresponds to the signal format shown in FIG. 6C, which leads the signal supplied on lead 13, multivibrator 21 will be inhibited and pulses will be supplied only to counter 24. Operation of either counter 23 or counter 24 indicates the direction of movement of a person or object toward or away from the sensor. A timing circuit 27 is provided to periodically reset counters 23 and 24. The counters are arranged so that a predetermined number of digital doppler signal pulses must be counted before resetting in order to activate a motion detection output signal on lead 25 or 26. Typically these counters would be arranged so that 3 to 5 digitized doppler pulses must be detected in one of the counters before the time reset pulse from pulse generator 27 resets the counter. Upon the detection of the required number of pulses, a signal is output on lead 25, 26 and supplied to further logic to format the control signal which is supplied to motor control 19.
FIG. 8 is a circuit diagram showing one of the control circuits 17, 18 used in the present invention. The circuit shown in FIG. 8 includes initial amplifier section 44, which is formed from four differential amplifiers, provided on a single integrated circuit type LM2902. Analog to digital conversion, from the signal format of FIG. 5 to the signal format of FIG. 6, is provided in two places by a single integrated circuit, identified as IC2 which is a type LM2903. The two latch circuits, which respond to the digital doppler signal and comprise multivibrators 21 and 22 are shown as IC3, which is type HEF4098BT. As shown in the circuit diagram, the digitized doppler signal from lead 14 is provided to pin 3 to form an inhibit signal for multivibrator 21 and the digitized doppler signal from lead 13 is provided to pin 13 on multivibrator 22 as an inhibit signal.
The outputs of multivibrators 21 and 22 are provided to counter circuits 23 and 24 which are on a single integrated circuit, designated IC4 in FIG. 8, which is and type HEF4520BT. Counter circuits 23 and 24 are arranged to provide an output signal after a selected number of counts are received from multivibration 21, 22, for example, 3 to 5 pulses. These counter circuits are periodically reset by a reset timer 27 provided on integrated circuit IC6 which is type RC556. The other half of integrated circuit IC6 is timer 40, which provides a periodic pulse signal, used in generating the door closing output signal as will be further described. Reset circuit 27 provides a reset signal to counters 23 and 24 at a rate of 1.18 Hz. The outputs of counters 23 and 24 are provided to appropriate inverter circuits, which are formed on an integrated circuit type HEF40106BT. The inverted outputs on leads 25 and 26 initiate the generation of control signals to open or close door 2. Lead 25 provides a door opening signal when it is in a low voltage condition. Lead 26 provides a door closing signal when it is in a low voltage condition. As previously mentioned, circuit 40 provides periodic pulse signals at a rate of 167 Hz which are used in generating the door closing output signal. Diodes D8 and D9 combine the low level door closing output signal on lead 26 with the periodic signal provided by circuit 40 to the output stage and eventually to output terminal 50. The door opening signal on lead 25 is provided to the output through diode D7. The arrangement of diodes D7, D8 and D9 is such that the door opening signal on lead 25 will override the door closing signal and that either the door opening or door closing signal will override a nondetection signal, represented by a "high" logic level on leads 25 and 26. The output stage of the circuit, which is connected to output terminal 50, has a low impedance at a low voltage level, so that when output terminals 50 of two such circuits are connected together, the combined output will be drawn preferably to a low condition. Accordingly, the door opening signal overrides the door closing and nondetection signals, and the door closing signal overrides the nondetection signal. The circuit shown in FIG. 8 includes an indicator LED 48 with a driver circuit 46 which indicates the detection of doppler signals.
It is assumed that the doppler signals are supplied on leads 13 and 14, and actuate the respective multivibrator circuits 21 and 22 by their respective phase positions, so that if a movement towards the sensor 4 occurs, the multivibrators provide pulses corresponding to the doppler frequency obtained, these pulses being supplied to the counter 23 for counting. The pulses are counted during a given time interval, such that only a minimum number of pulses per time interval are required to enable an output control signal on lead 25. By counting pulses during a given time interval, determined by the timing circuit 27, which resets counters 23 and 24, there is obtained an indication of the distance a person or object has moved towards sensor 4, as well as the rate of movement. The criteria required for the door to open may thus be determined according to the number of counts required for an output control signal. If the person moves away from the sensor 4, the doppler phase will be such that pulses are supplied from multivibrator 22 to the counter circuit 24, which then counts in the same way as the counter 23. If the criteria are met, a closing control signal is provided on lead 26, causing closing movement of the door.
If it is assumed that the equipment as illustrated in FIG. 1 is disposed along the side of a corridor and a person approaches the lobe 8 of the sensor 4 walking in a direction parallel to wall 1, a pulse count will be started in the counter 23. However, the number of counts needed for a control signal on lead 25, signifying an opening movement, may be set so that the control signal does not occur until the person has reached the middle of the lobe. Immediately after this count, the sensor starts to detect outward doppler movement if the person moves away from the lobe 8 by continuing in the original direction. This means that the door is kept closed, even if the person quite clearly passes through the sensing zone 8 of the sensor 4. If a person moves towards the sensor 4 and the criteria for opening the door are thus present, a door opening operation will naturally take place. If the person in question should change his mind and walk out again, a minus movement will immediately be detected and counted within the detection area of the sensor, thus causing the door to close.
In all the embodiments described above, such conventional measures must naturally be taken so that if the outgoing movement of a person is not registered for some reason, a time circuit will even so ensure that the door closes.
In a similar arrangement, the sensors 4 and 5 can be replaced with photoelectric detectors. The photoelectric detector can be arranged as shown if FIG. 7, such that a light source 52 illuminates two adjacent photocells 54, 56, such that if a person moves across the beams, the nearest beam is interrupted first, and the next one afterwards. A movement direction indication can thus be easily provided. Such sensors can thus be connected to the operation circuits previously described for the door, but the degree of control obtained with doppler radar sensors cannot be achieved. All the circuits described above must naturally be implemented so that the opening control signal dominates over the closing control signal. This eliminates the risk of squeezing a person or object by a closing door. This priority can be achieved by priority logic as described.
While there have been described what are believed to be the preferred embodiment of the present invention, those skilled in the art will recognize that other and further changes may be made thereto without departing from the spirit of the invention, and it is intended to claim all such changes and modifications as fall within the true scope of the invention.
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An arrangement for controlling operation of a motor operated door is provided with doppler radar sensors facing the approach to the door from both sides. The doppler signals from the sensors are analyzed to determine the presence of motion toward or away from the door and the door is controlled to open upon motion toward the door and close upon motion away from the door.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0001] 1. Field of the Invention
[0002] The present invention relates to a semiconductor device. More specifically, the present invention relates to a LOCOS offset field-effect transistor having a high breakdown voltage and a high current drivability.
[0003] 2. Description of the Related Art
[0004] FIG. 2 illustrates an example of a conventional N-channel LOCOS offset MOS field-effect transistor having a high breakdown voltage structure. An N-channel LOCOS offset MOS field-effect transistor 101 includes a P-type silicon substrate 16 , a P-type well region 17 , a lightly-doped N-type source LOCOS offset region 18 , a lightly-doped N-type drain LOCOS offset region 19 , a heavily-doped N-type source region 20 , a heavily-doped N-type drain region 21 , a channel formation region 22 , a gate oxide film 23 , a gate electrode 24 , LOCOS oxide films 25 , a protective oxide film 26 , a source electrode 27 , a drain electrode 28 , and the like. As illustrated in FIG. 2 , features of the MOS field-effect transistor 101 reside in that the lightly-doped N-type drain LOCOS offset region 19 is formed between the channel formation region 22 and the heavily-doped N-type drain region 21 for the purpose of increasing a breakdown voltage, and in that the LOCOS oxide films 25 are each formed to be as thick as 5,000 Å to 10,000 Å for the purpose of preventing a channel formation in a parasitic field transistor formed between elements. In general a drain breakdown voltage of a MOS field-effect transistor having a large channel length is determined as a voltage at which an avalanche breakdown occurs in a portion to which the largest electric field is applied in a depletion layer formed at a boundary between the channel formation region and the drain region, that is, a surface portion which is the most sensitive to a gate potential. The reason for a high drain breakdown voltage of the MOS field-effect transistor 101 is that a bird's beak of the LOCOS oxide film 25 is positioned in the vicinity of the boundary surface between the channel formation region 22 and the offset region 19 , alleviating the influence of the gate potential so that an avalanche breakdown may less likely occur.
[0005] Further reduction of a dopant concentration of the offset region 19 to increase a width of the depletion layer to obtain a higher breakdown voltage leads to an increase of the resistance of the offset region 19 , causing a generation of Joule heat in the offset region 19 to break down the element at a turning on of the transistor to get a large drain current. There is a trade-off relationship between a high breakdown voltage and a current drivability.
[0006] In view of the above-mentioned problem, Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. H 11-26766 proposes the following method. Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. H11-26766 discloses a method of optimizing a film thickness of a LOCOS oxide film to a film thickness satisfying the following two conditions. The first condition is a film thickness condition as to whether to suppress the above-mentioned influence of the gate potential on the avalanche breakdown. The second condition is a film thickness condition as to whether or not the gate potential may allow the surface of the lightly-doped drain LOCOS offset region to enter an accumulated state. If the film thickness of the LOCOS oxide film is set to an optimum film thickness, a high breakdown voltage element having a high current drivability may be produced.
[0007] In a case where the above-mentioned conventional example is utilized to produce a high breakdown voltage element having a high current drivability, because the above-mentioned two conditions are inherently in a trade-off relationship, it is difficult to select an optimum film thickness satisfying the two conditions simultaneously.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0008] The present invention provides a LOCOS offset MOS field-effect transistor having a high breakdown voltage in which a first lightly-doped drain offset region with a LOCOS oxide film and a second lightly-doped drain offset region without a LOCOS oxide film are formed in a drain-side offset region, and both the regions are covered with a gate electrode. Specifically, the following means is employed.
[0009] The present invention provides a semiconductor device including: a first conductivity type semiconductor substrate; a first conductivity type well region formed in a surface of the first conductivity type semiconductor substrate; a second conductivity type well region formed in contact with the first conductivity type well region; a heavily-doped second conductivity type source region formed at a top of the first conductivity type well region; a channel formation region; a lightly-doped second conductivity type source offset region formed in contact with the heavily-doped second conductivity type source region so as to be spaced away from the second conductivity type well region by a length of the channel formation region; a heavily-doped second conductivity type drain region formed at a top of the second conductivity type well region; a second lightly-doped second conductivity type drain offset region formed in contact with the heavily-doped second conductivity type drain region on a side of the channel formation region; a first lightly-doped second conductivity type drain offset region formed at the top of the second conductivity type well region in contact with the channel formation region and the second lightly-doped second conductivity type drain offset region; a LOCOS oxide film formed in a surface portion of the first conductivity type semiconductor substrate except for the heavily-doped second conductivity type source region, the channel formation region, the second lightly-doped second conductivity type drain offset region, and the heavily-doped second conductivity type drain region; a gate oxide film which is formed on: a part of the LOCOS oxide film formed in contact with the channel formation region on a source side; the channel formation region; an entirety of the LOCOS oxide film formed in contact with the channel formation region on a drain side; and the second lightly-doped second conductivity type drain offset region; a gate electrode formed on the gate oxide film; a source electrode formed on the heavily-doped second conductivity type source region; a drain electrode formed on the heavily-doped second conductivity type drain region; and a protective oxide film formed over the surface of the first conductivity type semiconductor substrate except for the source electrode and the drain electrode.
[0010] In the drain-side offset region, the first lightly-doped drain offset region with the LOCOS oxide film and the second lightly-doped drain offset region without the LOCOS oxide film are formed so that the first lightly-doped drain offset region may mitigate a magnitude of an electric field applied to the first lightly-doped drain offset region, to thereby produce a high breakdown voltage MOS field-effect transistor. In addition, the second lightly-doped drain offset region without the LOCOS oxide film is formed so that an electric field may be applied from the gate electrode formed above the second lightly-doped drain offset region to allow the second lightly-doped drain offset region to enter an accumulated state. As a result, carrier density of the second lightly-doped drain offset region may be increased with the gate voltage remaining large, to thereby enhance a current drivability as well.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0011] In the accompanying drawings:
[0012] FIG. 1 is a cross-sectional view of a semiconductor device according to a first embodiment of the present invention;
[0013] FIG. 2 is a cross-sectional view of a semiconductor device in a conventional MOS field-effect transistor; and
[0014] FIG. 3 is a cross-sectional view of a semiconductor device according to a second embodiment of the present invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
[0015] Now, referring to the accompanying drawings, exemplary embodiments of the present invention are described.
First Embodiment
[0016] FIG. 1 is a cross-sectional view of a semiconductor device 100 according to a first embodiment of the present invention. Herein, an N-channel MOS transistor is described by way of example. The semiconductor device 100 of FIG. 1 has the following exemplary structure. In a surface of a P-type silicon substrate 1 having a resistance of 20 to 30 Ω·cm, a lightly-doped P-type well region 2 is formed at a depth of 20 μm with boron or the like doped at a concentration of approximately 1×10 16 cm −3 , and a lightly-doped N-type well region 3 is formed in contact with the P-type well region 2 at a depth of 20 μm with phosphorus or the like doped at a concentration of approximately 1×10 16 cm −3 .
[0017] Next, using a resist pattern as a mask, ion implantation is performed to form a lightly-doped N-type source offset region 4 at a depth of 1 μm with phosphorus or the like doped at approximately 5×10 17 cm −3 . In addition, using a resist pattern as a mask, ion implantation is performed to form a lightly-doped N-type drain offset region 5 at a depth of 1 μm with phosphorus or the like doped at approximately 5×10 17 cm −3 . Then, selective oxidation is performed to form a thermal oxide film of approximately 8,000 Å thickness on each of the lightly-doped N-type source offset region 4 and the lightly-doped N-type drain offset region 5 so as to grow as a LOCOS oxide film 12 . Subsequently, using a resist pattern as a mask, ion implantation is performed to form another lightly-doped N-type drain offset region 6 at a depth of 1 μm with phosphorus or the like doped at approximately 5×10 17 cm −3 .
[0018] Subsequently, thermal oxidation is performed to form a gate oxide film 10 of approximately 1,000 Å thickness on the silicon surface. Subsequently, chemical vapor deposition (CVD) is performed to form a polycrystalline silicon film of approximately 4,000 Å thickness over the gate oxide film 10 . Then, phosphorus or the like is doped and diffused into the polycrystalline silicon film at approximately 1×10 20 cm −3 . Then, a resist pattern is formed and dry etching is performed to form a gate electrode 11 so as to cover a range from a part of the LOCOS oxide film 12 formed on the lightly-doped N-type source offset region 4 to the lightly-doped N-type drain offset region 6 through a channel formation region 9 and the lightly-doped N-type drain offset region 5 .
[0019] Subsequently, using a resist pattern as a mask, ion implantation is performed to dope the silicon surface with arsenic or the like at approximately 1×10 20 cm −3 , to thereby form a heavily-doped N-type source region 7 and a heavily-doped N-type drain region 8 at a depth of 0.4 μm. Subsequently, a protective oxide film 13 is formed at a thickness of approximately 7,000 Å by CVD or the like. Subsequently, an opening is formed in the protective oxide film 13 at a position on each of the heavily-doped N-type source region 7 and the heavily-doped N-type drain region 8 . Then, an aluminum alloy is deposited therein and pattered to form a source electrode 14 on the heavily-doped N-type source region 7 and a drain electrode 15 on the heavily-doped N-type drain region 8 .
[0020] With the above-mentioned structure, in the drain-side offset region, the first lightly-doped drain offset region with the LOCOS oxide film and the second lightly-doped drain offset region without the LOCOS oxide film are formed so that the first lightly-doped drain offset region may mitigate a magnitude of an electric field applied to the first lightly-doped drain offset region, to thereby produce a high breakdown voltage MOS field-effect transistor. In addition, the second lightly-doped drain offset region without the LOCOS oxide film is formed so that an electric field may be applied from the gate electrode formed above the second lightly-doped drain offset region to allow the second lightly-doped drain offset region to enter an accumulated state. As a result, carrier density of the second lightly-doped drain offset region may be increased with the gate voltage remaining large, to thereby enhance a current drivability as well.
Second Embodiment
[0021] FIG. 3 is a cross-sectional view of a semiconductor device 102 according to a second embodiment of the present invention. The semiconductor device 102 of FIG. 3 has the following exemplary structure. In a surface of a P-type silicon substrate 29 having a resistance of 20 to 30 Ω·cm, a lightly-doped P-type well region 30 is formed at a depth of 20 μm with boron or the like doped at a concentration of approximately 1×10 16 cm −3 , and a lightly-doped N-type well region 31 is formed in contact with the P-type well region 30 at a depth of 20 μm with phosphorus or the like doped at approximately 1×10 17 cm −3 . Next, using a resist pattern as a mask, ion implantation is performed to form a lightly-doped N-type source offset region 32 at a depth of 1 μm with phosphorus or the like doped at approximately 5×10 17 cm −3 in a region at the top of the P-type well region 30 which is spaced away from the N-type well region 31 by a length of a channel formation region 43 .
[0022] Subsequently, selective oxidation is performed to form a thermal oxide film of approximately 8,000 Å thickness on each of the lightly-doped N-type source offset region 32 and a first drain offset region 33 so as to grow as a LOCOS oxide film 35 . In this case, an available method of forming a second drain offset region 34 is as follows. First, selective oxidation is performed to form the thermal oxide film of approximately 8,000 Å thickness on each of the lightly-doped N-type source offset region 32 , the first drain offset region 33 , and the second drain offset region 34 so as to grow as the LOCOS oxide film 35 . Then, using a photoresist, wet etching is performed to remove the LOCOS oxide film on the second drain offset region 34 , and thermal oxidation is subsequently performed to form a gate oxide film 36 of approximately 1,000 Å thickness on the silicon surface.
[0023] Subsequently, CVD is performed to form a polycrystalline silicon film of approximately 4,000 Å thickness over the gate oxide film 36 . Then, phosphorus or the like is doped and diffused into the polycrystalline silicon film at approximately 1×10 20 cm −3 . Then, a resist pattern is formed and dry etching is performed to form a gate electrode 37 so as to cover a range from a part of the LOCOS oxide film 35 formed on the lightly-doped N-type source offset region 32 to the second drain offset region 34 . Subsequently, using a resist pattern as a mask, ion implantation is performed to dope the silicon surface with arsenic or the like at approximately 1×10 20 cm −3 , to thereby form a heavily-doped N-type source region 38 and a heavily-doped N-type drain region 39 at a depth of 0.4 μm.
[0024] Subsequently, a protective oxide film 40 is formed at a thickness of approximately 7,000 Å by CVD or the like. Subsequently, an opening is formed in the protective oxide film 40 at a position on each of the heavily-doped N-type source region 38 and the heavily-doped N-type drain region 39 . Then, an aluminum alloy is deposited therein and pattered to form a source electrode 41 on the heavily-doped N-type source region 38 and a drain electrode 42 on the heavily-doped N-type drain region 39 .
[0025] It should be understood that the structure according to the second embodiment can also produce the same effect as in the first embodiment.
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Provided is a LOCOS offset MOS field-effect transistor in which a first lightly-doped N-type drain offset region with a LOCOS oxide film and a second lightly-doped N-type drain offset region without a LOCOS oxide film are formed in a drain-side offset region, and both the regions are covered with a gate electrode. Provision of the first lightly-doped N-type drain offset region mitigates an electric field applied to the first lightly-doped N-type drain offset region to increase a breakdown voltage. Provision of the second lightly-doped N-type drain offset region increases carriers within the second lightly-doped N-type drain offset region to obtain a high current drivability.
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TECHNICAL FIELD
This invention relates to male touch fastener components having arrays of fastener elements with stems extending integrally from a sheet of resin.
BACKGROUND
Early male touch fastener products were generally woven materials, with hooks formed by cut filament loops. More recently, arrays of very small touch fastener elements have been formed by molding the fastener elements, or at least the stems of the elements, of resin forming an interconnecting sheet of material.
In most applications, male fastener elements are designed to releasably engage with a mating female fastener component carrying a field of loops or fibers. To engage the loops, the male fastener elements must penetrate the field of fibers at least until the tips of the engaging fastener element heads have sufficiently extended beyond some of the fibers, such that the fibers can be engaged within the crooks of the heads. Thus, enhancing penetration tends to lead to longer, more slender hooks.
Subsequent to engagement, retention of an engaged fiber or loop depends, at least for loads within the ability of the loop to resist breakage, upon resistance of the hook to distention and/or breakage. Distention is the opening of the crook under load of an engaged loop. For high cycle life applications, breakage of either both loops and hooks is undesirable. Thus, the ability of the fastening to resist peel loads in such applications is generally limited by the ability of the hook to resist distention.
Unfortunately, for many applications increasing the rigidity of hooks designed for maximum loop penetration, to increase their peel resistance, is either undesirable or impractical. For example, many applications require a gentle ‘feel’ of the male fastener element array against the skin.
Further improvements in the overall design of male fastener elements, particularly those formed or molded of resin and arranged in large numbers upon a surface for engaging loops or fibers, are desired. Preferably, such improved fastener elements will be readily and efficiently manufacturable without great advances in manufacturing methods.
SUMMARY
We have found configurations of male fastener elements that provide good overall peel resistance, particularly when mated with low profile loop materials, while still exhibiting good loop field penetration.
In several aspects of the invention, the design of the resulting hooks features a head or crook that is quite large with respect to the size of the overall hook, or with respect to the entrance below the hook heads through which the loops must pass for engagement to occur, as compared to many prior molded hooks.
According to one aspect of the invention, a touch fastener component has a sheet-form base and an array of fastener elements. Each fastener element includes a molded stem and a head extending for the stem. The molded stem extends outwardly from and integrally with the sheet-form base, and the head extends forward from a distal end of the stem to a tip, the head having a lower surface forming a crook for retaining loops. Specifically, the head has an overall height, measured perpendicular to the sheet-form base from a lowermost extent of the tip to an uppermost extent of the head, that is greater than 55 percent of an overall height of the fastener element, measured perpendicular to the sheet-form base.
In some embodiments, each fastener element has multiple heads extending in different directions and forming separate crooks. Each fastener element may have two heads extending in essentially opposite directions, for example. Preferably, each such fastener element defines an upper well between the two oppositely-directed heads, the well extending down to a height, measured perpendicularly from the base, of at least about 70 percent of the overall height of one of the two oppositely-directed heads. Each such fastener element preferably has an overall length between opposite extents of the oppositely-directed heads, measured parallel to the base, of at least 1.8 times the overall height of the fastener element.
Each fastener element head tip preferably defines an entrance height, measured perpendicular to the sheet-form base below a lowermost extent of the tip, of between about 7 and 12 millimeters.
Preferably, the ratio of the overall height of the crook, measured perpendicular to the sheet-form base from a lowermost extent of the tip to an uppermost extent of the crook, to an entrance height measured perpendicular to the sheet-form base below a lowermost extent of the tip, is greater than 0.6.
Preferably, the overall head height is less than 60 percent of the overall height of the fastener element.
In some cases, the tip extends toward the base.
The lower surface of the head, forming the crook, is preferably arched.
In some cases, the head and stem form a unitary molded structure, such as one in which the head has a surface of resin cooled against a mold surface.
In some instances, the stem has opposing surfaces defined by severed resin, such as from being formed in a cut-and-stretch process.
In some applications, the stem and head have side surfaces lying in parallel planes.
The crook, in some embodiments, overhangs a surface of the stem. In preferred embodiments, the crook overhangs a stem surface that extends at an inclination angle of between about 20 and 30 degrees with respect to a normal to the base.
Each fastener element preferably has an overall height of between about 10 and 50 millimeters, measured from and perpendicular to the base, more preferably between about 20 and 30 millimeters.
Each fastener element head preferably has an overall height of between about 10 and 20 millimeters, measured perpendicular to the sheet-form base from a lowermost extent of the tip of the head to an uppermost extent of the head.
In some cases, each crook defines an overall crook height, measured perpendicular to the sheet-form base from a lowermost extent of the tip to an uppermost extent of the crook, of at least 6.0 millimeters.
In some applications, the touch fastener component includes a backing material laminated to a side of the base opposite the fastener elements. The backing material may provide reinforcement, or carry engageable loops, for example.
The fastener elements are preferably arranged in a density of at least 350 fastener elements per square inch of the base.
The fastener elements together preferably cover at least 20 percent of an overall surface area of the base from which the fastener elements extend.
Various preferred embodiments of the following aspects of the invention also include various combinations of the above-described, preferred features.
According to another aspect of the invention, a touch fastener component has a sheet-form base and an array of fastener elements. Each fastener element includes a molded stem and a head extending for the stem. The molded stem extends outwardly from and integrally with the sheet-form base, and the head extends forward from a distal end of the stem to a tip, the head having a lower surface forming a crook for retaining loops. Specifically, at least one head has an overall height, measured perpendicular to the sheet-form base from a lowermost extent of the tip of the head to an uppermost extent of the head, that is greater than half of an overall height of the fastener element, measured perpendicular to the sheet-form base.
In some cases, both of the heads have overall heights that are greater than half of the overall height of the fastener element.
According to another aspect of the invention, a touch fastener component has a sheet-form base and an array of fastener elements. Each fastener element includes a molded stem and a head extending for the stem. The molded stem extends outwardly from and integrally with the sheet-form base, and the head extends forward from a distal end of the stem to a tip, the head having a lower surface forming a crook for retaining loops. Specifically, the fastener element has a bulk aspect of more than 0.020 inch (0.51 mm). ‘Bulk Aspect’ is defined as a ratio of the product of an overall length of the fastener element, measured parallel to the sheet-form base in the engagement direction above an elevation of the tip, and fastener element thickness, measured parallel to the sheet-form base and the engagement direction at the elevation of the tip, to an overall height of the fastener element, measured perpendicular to the sheet-form base.
According to another aspect of the invention, a touch fastener component has a sheet-form base and an array of fastener elements. Each fastener element includes a molded stem and a head extending for the stem. The molded stem extends outwardly from and integrally with the sheet-form base, and the head extends forward from a distal end of the stem to a tip, the head having a lower surface forming a crook for retaining loops. Specifically, the ratio of an overall height of the crook, measured perpendicular to the sheet-form base from a lowermost extent of the tip to an uppermost extent of the crook, to an entrance height measured perpendicular to the sheet-form base below a lowermost extent of the tip, is greater than 0.6.
According to another aspect of the invention, a touch fastener component has a sheet-form base and an array of fastener elements. Each fastener element includes a molded stem and a head extending for the stem. The molded stem extends outwardly from and integrally with the sheet-form base, and the head extends forward from a distal end of the stem to a tip, the head having a lower surface forming a crook for retaining loops. Specifically, the ratio of an overall length of the fastener element, measured parallel to the sheet-form base in the engagement direction, to an overall height of the fastener element, measured perpendicular to the sheet-form base, is greater than 1.8.
Another aspect of the invention features a method of forming a touch fastener component having a sheet-form base and an array of fastener elements. Molten resin is introduced to a peripheral surface of a rotating mold roll defining an array of inwardly-extending cavities each including a stem region extending inwardly from the peripheral surface, and a head region extending laterally from a distal end of the stem region to a blind tip. The head region is bounded by an outer surface forming a crook. Specifically, each head region having an overall height, measured radially from a lowermost extent of the tip to an innermost extent of the head region, that is greater than 55 percent of an overall depth of the cavity, measured radially from the peripheral surface. Sufficient pressure is applied to force the resin into the cavities to mold an array of fastener elements having upper wells corresponding to the protrusions, while forming a sheet of the resin on the peripheral surface of the mold roll. The resin is cooled in the cavities. Finally, the fastener elements are freed from the mold cavities by stripping the sheet of resin from the surface of the mold roll, thereby pulling heads of the fastener elements formed in the head regions of the cavities through the stem regions of the cavities to remove the fastener elements from the cavities.
Another aspect of the invention features a method of forming a touch fastener component having a sheet-form base and an array of fastener elements. Molten resin is introduced to a peripheral surface of a rotating mold roll defining an array of inwardly-extending cavities each including a stem region extending inwardly from the peripheral surface, and a head region extending laterally from a distal end of the stem region to a blind tip. The head region is bounded by an outer surface forming a crook. Specifically, at least one of the head regions has an overall height, measured radially from a lowermost extent of the tip to an innermost extent of the head region, that is greater than half of an overall depth of the cavity, measured radially from the peripheral surface. Sufficient pressure is applied to force the resin into the cavities to mold an array of fastener elements having upper wells corresponding to the protrusions, while forming a sheet of the resin on the peripheral surface of the mold roll. The resin is cooled in the cavities. Finally, the fastener elements are freed from the mold cavities by stripping the sheet of resin from the surface of the mold roll, thereby pulling heads of the fastener elements formed in the head regions of the cavities through the stem regions of the cavities to remove the fastener elements from the cavities.
Another aspect of the invention features a method of forming a touch fastener component having a sheet-form base and an array of fastener elements. Molten resin is introduced to a peripheral surface of a rotating mold roll defining an array of inwardly-extending cavities each including a stem region extending inwardly from the peripheral surface, and a head region extending laterally from a distal end of the stem region to a blind tip. The head region is bounded by an outer surface forming a crook. Specifically, each cavity has a bulk aspect, defined as a ratio of the product of an overall length of the cavity, measured circumferentially outside an elevation of the tip, and cavity thickness, measured axially along the mold roll, to an overall depth of the fastener element cavity, measured radially from the peripheral surface, of more than 0.020 inch (0.51 mm). Sufficient pressure is applied to force the resin into the cavities to mold an array of fastener elements having upper wells corresponding to the protrusions, while forming a sheet of the resin on the peripheral surface of the mold roll. The resin is cooled in the cavities. Finally, the fastener elements are freed from the mold cavities by stripping the sheet of resin from the surface of the mold roll, thereby pulling heads of the fastener elements formed in the head regions of the cavities through the stem regions of the cavities to remove the fastener elements from the cavities.
Another aspect of the invention features a method of forming a touch fastener component having a sheet-form base and an array of fastener elements. Molten resin is introduced to a peripheral surface of a rotating mold roll defining an array of inwardly-extending cavities each including a stem region extending inwardly from the peripheral surface, and a head region extending laterally from a distal end of the stem region to a blind tip. The head region is bounded by an outer surface forming a crook. Specifically, each crook has an overall height, measured radially from a lowermost extent of the tip to an innermost extent of the crook, that is greater than 0.6 times a radial distance from the peripheral surface to the tip. n overall depth of the cavity, measured radially from the peripheral surface. Sufficient pressure is applied to force the resin into the cavities to mold an array of fastener elements having upper wells corresponding to the protrusions, while forming a sheet of the resin on the peripheral surface of the mold roll. The resin is cooled in the cavities. Finally, the fastener elements are freed from the mold cavities by stripping the sheet of resin from the surface of the mold roll, thereby pulling heads of the fastener elements formed in the head regions of the cavities through the stem regions of the cavities to remove the fastener elements from the cavities.
The improvements in hook design disclosed herein can provide a touch fastener product with particularly good peel resistance and other performance characteristics, and are especially applicable to hooks (whether J-hooks or multiple-crook hooks) that are to be mated with loop fields of generally open loop distribution. The large proportion of the hook heads and crooks, with respect to the overall size of the hooks, can enable the resulting closure to provide performance characteristics more typical of woven hook products, but at a much lower overall profile. Obtaining a lower closure profile is advantageous for many applications, in that such a closure is less cumbersome with respect to the article to which it is attached, and less likely to interfere with the aesthetic appearance of the article. Thus, such hook products should find application on garments and footwear, as well as backpacks, tents, sporting gear, etc.
In one sense, the high ratio of head footprint to hook height described herein is counter to the presumption that engagement is enhanced by lower footprints and higher hook heights. I have found that good engagement properties can be obtained even with such high ratios, with beneficial effect on closure strength, particularly as mated with a loop component with large loop filament diameters, high loop resiliency and open loop distribution.
The details of one or more embodiments of the invention are set forth in the accompanying drawings and the description below. Other features, objects, and advantages of the invention will be apparent from the description and drawings, and from the claims.
DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is a perspective view of male fastener component with palm tree-shaped hooks.
FIG. 2 is an enlarged photograph of an example of the fastener of FIG. 1 .
FIG. 3 is an enlarged side view of one of the fastener elements.
FIGS. 3A and 3B are top and end views, respectively, of the fastener element of FIG. 3 .
FIG. 4 is a perspective view of an alternate palm tree hook shape.
FIGS. 4A and 4B are top and end views, respectively, of the fastener element of FIG. 4 .
FIG. 5 is an enlarged side view of a J-hook fastener element.
FIGS. 6 and 6A illustrate alternate molding processes for forming the fastener components.
FIG. 7 illustrates a variation of the process of FIG. 6 , for forming a laminated fastener.
FIG. 7A is an enlarged cross-section of a product formed by the process of FIG. 7 .
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
Referring to FIGS. 1 and 2 , a male touch fastener component 100 includes a field of fastener elements 102 arranged in rows R extending outwardly from and integrally with a sheet-form base 104 . Spacing S between rows may be controlled by the manufacturing process and will be discussed further below. Fastener elements 102 are palm tree-shaped hooks and are engageable in two directions along a plane (i.e., an engagement plane) perpendicular to sheet-form base 104 in the direction of rows R. Each fastener element 102 includes two heads 106 extending from a single stem 108 .
Male fastener component 100 is designed to, for example, strongly engage a low pile height, loop touch fastener component, particularly a loop component with loops formed of, for example, a high strength multifilament yarn or a high strength monofilament. High strength loops are desirable for fasteners for high strength applications requiring high cycle life, as the resist breakage at higher peel loads. Typically, high strength yarns and monofilaments are made by extrusion. Generally, the process includes a drawdown step to impart orientation on the yarn or monofilament so as to improve, for example, tenacity of the yarn or monofilament. High strength fibers may also be formed by other methods, for example, by solution spinning. Suitable high strength loop filament materials include, for example, polyamides, polyesters, polyurethanes, ultra-high molecular weight solution spun polyethylene (e.g., SPECTRA® polyethylene), aramids (e.g., KEVLAR®), acrylics and rigid rod polymers like poly(p-phenylene-2,6-benzobisoxazole).
Referring now to FIGS. 3 , 3 A and 3 B, fastener element 102 has a substantially constant thickness from base to tip, and includes a stem 108 extending outwardly from and molded integrally with sheet-form base 104 . For purposes of the present disclosure, we refer to the stem 108 as beginning at the upper surface of base 104 and ending at an elevation where the inner crook surface is perpendicular to the base, an elevation 250 above which the inner crook surface begins to overhang the stem 108 or sheet-form base. Fastener element 102 also includes two heads 106 extending in essentially opposite directions in an engagement plane. Heads 106 extend from distal end 250 of the stem to corresponding, oppositely-directed tips 252 . Thus, fastener element 102 is an example of what is known in the art as a ‘palm-tree’ fastener element. The heads 106 have upper surfaces that alone or together with the stem define a well 254 between the heads. Each head 106 has a lower surface that rises up through an apex 258 and then falls again, forming an arched crook 256 for retaining loops of a mating female touch fastener component.
The overall height A of fastener element 102 is measured in side view perpendicular to sheet-form base 104 from the top of the sheet-form base. Under crook height C is the distance measured in side view, perpendicular to the sheet-form base, between the lowermost extent of the tip 260 and the apex 258 of the crook. Entrance height E is the distance measured in side view, perpendicular to the sheet-form base, from the top of the sheet-form base to the lowermost extent of tip 260 . If part of the stem is directly below the lowermost extent of the tip 260 , then the distance is measured from that portion of the stem directly below to the lowermost extent of the tip 260 . Head height J of fastener element 102 is measured perpendicular to sheet-form base 104 from the lowermost extent of tip 260 to the highest elevation of the head 106 above the base. In general, J will be the difference between A and E. Well height G is measured in side view from the lower extent of stem 108 to the lower extent of well 254 defined in the upper surface of the fastener element between the heads.
Width L of the fastener element is measured in side view and is the maximum lateral extent of the fastener element heads 106 as measured parallel to the sheet-form base. Hook thickness K is the overall thickness of the fastener element, taken at elevation 250 corresponding to the upper end of stem 108 . In most cases other than instances where the heads have been formed subsequent to stem molding, the heads will lie completely within this hook thickness K. In the example shown, hook thickness is the same at all elevations. The product of head width L and thickness K we call the footprint of the fastener element, and is related to the area of contact between the hook product and a mating loop product during initial engagement, although it will be understood to not be an exact measure of such contact area. The product of footprint and head height J (i.e., K×L×J) we refer to as displacement volume. For a more detailed explanation of the relevance of hook volume to fastener performance, see Provost, U.S. Pat. No. 5,315,740, the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference.
The front and rear surfaces of the stem define, in side profile, inclination angles φ of about 23 degrees with respect to vertical, with the width of the stem tapering to narrower away from the base, both for strength and ease of molding.
Under crook angle θ m is an angle defined in the crook by inner surfaces of the head and stem, between a pair of line segments perpendicular to facing surfaces of the fastener element, in side view. Line segment 1 1 is perpendicular to the forward edge of stem 108 at the elevation of the distal tip 260 of the head. Line segment 1 2 is perpendicular to the under crook surface of the head at a point of inflection ‘X’ of the under head surface. In cases where there is not a smooth curvature transition inside the tip, such as where the underside of the head forms a sharp corner adjacent the tip, line segment 1 2 should be taken as perpendicular to the underside surface of the head just above such a corner or discontinuity. As shown, angle θ m is measured from the upper side of line segment 1 1 , about the crook, to the upper side of line segment 1 2 . For this illustrated example, θ m is 201 degrees.
The linear and radial dimensions of the example illustrated in FIGS. 3 , 3 A and 3 B are as follows:
Dimension
Inches
Millimeters
A
0.025
0.635
C
0.0064
0.163
E
0.0105
0.267
G
0.0122
0.310
J
0.0145
0.368
K
0.012
0.305
L
0.0497
1.262
R 1
0.0011
0.279
R 2
0.0090
0.229
R 3
0.0026
0.0660
R 4
0.0040
0.102
R 5
0.0107
0.272
R 6
0.0164
0.417
These values result in a footprint of 5.96×10 −4 square inches (0.00385 cm 2 ), and a displacement volume of about 8.65×10 −6 cubic inches (0.000142 cm 3 ). Given a hook density of 380 fastener elements per square inch, the overall fastener component has an overall hook footprint of 22.6 percent of the overall array area.
Further description of the embodiment of FIG. 3 can be found in an application entitled “MULTIPLE-CROOK MALE TOUCH FASTENER ELEMENTS,” filed concurrently herewith and assigned U.S. Ser. No. 10/688,320, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated in full by reference.
Some examples have varying thickness, and non-planar sides. For example, the fastener element 102 a of FIGS. 4 , 4 A and 4 B has a greatest thickness at its base, and tapers in thickness to the distal tips of the heads. However, as seen in side view, fastener element 102 a has the same profile as shown in FIG. 3 , and approximately the same dimensions listed above also apply to this example.
Not all palm-tree fastener elements have two identical crooks. For example, some palm-tree fastener elements are intentionally formed to have one head extending up higher than the other, such as to engage loops of differing heights. Also, some palm-tree hooks are molded to have two identical crooks, but later processing alters one crook more than the other, such as discussed below.
Not all examples are of the ‘palm-tree’ variety. For example, the fastener element 302 of FIG. 5 defines only a single crook, and is thus an example of a ‘J-hook’ fastener element. In this case, head width L is taken from the forwardmost edge of the hook head 306 to the rearmost extent of the hook stem 308 . Otherwise, with the exception of well height G as inapplicable to J-hooks, the dimensions provided above with respect to FIG. 3 apply equally to the J-hook of FIG. 5 . Fastener elements 302 can be arranged in rows extending from a sheet-form base 304 , with hooks of adjacent rows facing in opposite directions. Other arrangements of such hooks are also envisioned.
The fastener elements of FIGS. 3-5 can be molded in the shapes shown. Referring to FIG. 6 , thermoplastic resin 200 is extruded as a molten sheet from extruder 202 and introduced into nip 204 formed between a pressure roll 206 and a counter-rotating mold roll 208 defining fastener element-shaped cavities in its surface. Pressure in the nip causes thermoplastic resin 200 to enter these blind-ended forming cavities to form the fastener elements, while excess resin remains about the periphery of the mold roll and is molded between the rolls to form sheet-form base 104 . The thermoplastic resin is cooled as it proceeds along the periphery of the mold roll, solidifying the fastener elements, until it is stripped by stripper roll 212 . The molded fastener elements distend during de-molding, but tend to recover substantially their as-molded shape. It is generally understood that fastener element crooks molded to face downstream tend to distend slightly more than those molded to face upstream, and can remain more distended in the final product. The direction of travel of the material illustrated in FIG. 6 is referred to as the “machine direction” (MD) of the material and defines the longitudinal direction of the resulting product, while the cross-machine direction (CD) is perpendicular to the machine direction within the plane of the sheet-form base. Further details regarding processing are described by Fischer, U.S. Pat. No. 4,775,310 and Clune et al., U.S. Pat. No. 6,202,260, the disclosures of which are hereby incorporated in full by reference.
In some embodiments, the mold roll 208 comprises a face-to-face assembly of thin, circular plates or rings (not shown) that are, for example, about 0.003 inch to about 0.250 inch (0.0762 mm-6.35 mm) thick, some having cutouts in their periphery defining mold cavities and others having solid circumferences, serving to close the open sides of the mold cavities and serve as spacers, defining the spacing between adjacent fastener element rows. A fully “built up” mold roll may have a width, for example, from about 0.75 inch to about 6 inches (1.91 cm-15.24 cm) or more and may contain, for example, from about 50 to 1000 or more individual rings. Further details regarding mold tooling are described by Fisher, U.S. Pat. No. 4,775,310. Additional tooling embodiments will also be described below.
The cavities that made the fastener element shown in FIG. 3-3B have sharp edges and straight sidewalls and create fastener elements with substantially similar cross-sections through the thickness of the fastener element. Tooling with straight sidewalls and edges can be made by, for example, laser cutting, wire EDM or electroforming. Further details regarding laser cutting and wire EDM mold tooling is described by Fisher, U.S. Pat. No. 4,775,310. The electroforming process is described by Clarner et al., U.S. Ser. No. 10/455,240, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated in full by reference.
By contrast, fastener elements formed in cavities that have been, for example, photochemically etched may have rounded surfaces in some or all regions, from base to tip, such as those illustrated in FIGS. 4-4B . For example, surfaces at the top of the heads can be made to taper to a point to give a wedge effect. A wedge-shape may, for example, assist the entry of the crook into the face of a mating female fastener component. Further details regarding photochemical etching is described in Lacey et al., U.S. Pat. No. 6,163,939, the entire disclosure of which is hereby incorporated in full by reference.
An alternate technique for molding fastener elements is shown in FIG. 6A . The process is similar to that described above with reference to FIG. 6 , except only a mold roll 208 is used, i.e., no pressure roll 206 is necessary. Here, the extruder 202 is shaped to conform to the periphery of the mold roll 208 and the extruded resin 200 is introduced under pressure directly to a gap 214 formed between mold roll 208 and extruder 202 . The molded fastener component is stripped from the mold cavities by a stripper roll 212 as described above. Further details regarding this process are described by Akeno, U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,781,969 and 5,913,482, the disclosures of which are hereby incorporated in full by reference.
Referring to FIGS. 7 and 7A , a laminated male touch fastener component 101 may be formed by introducing a pre-form material 215 into nip 204 between the mold and pressure rolls. As a result of the heat and pressure in nip 204 , pre-form material 215 becomes laminated and bonded to the thermoplastic resin 200 simultaneously with the forming of the fastener elements. The result can be a contiguous molded structure, without weld lines, extending from the tips of the fastener elements into the pre-form material, where the resin can intimately bond with features or fibers of the material to form a strong, permanent bond. Further details regarding this process are described by Kennedy et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,260,015, the disclosures of which is hereby incorporated in full by reference.
In one useful embodiment, pre-formed material 215 is a loose knit scrim, such as Knit 3901 from Velcro USA in Manchester, N.H., although Velcro USA loop products 3900, 3905, and 3400 may also be employed. Knit 3901 is a 2 bar Tricot knit nylon fabric which generally must be brushed or napped before it can be employed as the functioning loop of a hook and loop closure. However, it has been found to function well as a reinforcement when at least partially encapsulated by, or bonded to, the base resin contiguous with the resin forming the hooks, without brushing or napping. Reinforcing the base with such a scrim has been found to improve the stitch tear strength of the product, providing a resin-base hook product practical for attachment by sewing or stitching. Further details regarding scrim materials are described an application entitled “PLASTIC SHEET REINFORCEMENT,” filed concurrently herewith and assigned U.S. Ser. No. 10/688,301, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated in full by reference.
In some cases, the fastener elements are not molded in their final form. In any of the methods disclosed above, for example, the fastener component may be routed through subsequent processing station 230 to finalize the form of the fastener elements. Such subsequent processing may include “flat-topping” overhanging fastener element preforms, as described by Provost, U.S. Pat. No. 5,953,797, and Akeno, U.S. Pat. No. 5,781,969, the disclosure of both of which is hereby incorporated in full by reference. In some cases, even straight molded stems may be subsequently processed to result in fastener elements having the properties disclosed herein. Flat-sided fastener elements with the profiles shown in FIGS. 3 and 5 can also be formed by a cut-and-stretch method, such as the method disclosed in Nestegard, U.S. Pat. No. 4,895,569, for example. In such processes, moldable resin is extruded through a die with openings shaped in the desired hook profile, then the extruded rails are cut transverse to the extrusion direction, and the base stretched in the extrusion direction to separate the rails into rows of discrete fastener elements. This procedure results in fastener elements with broad sides that are cut rather than molded, as in the processes described above, and with profile edges formed by sliding resin through a shaped die rather than a filling cavity.
A number of embodiments of the invention have been described. Nevertheless, it will be understood that various modifications may be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention. Accordingly, other embodiments are within the scope of the following claims.
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Molded touch fastener elements or hooks that feature a head or crook that is quite large with respect to the size of the overall hook, or with respect to the entrance below the hook heads through which the loops must pass for engagement to occur. The hooks are particularly useful for high cycle life applications when mated with low loft loops.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Several types of catheters are made of a material which is radiopaque, so that the catheter is visible under fluoroscopy or other form of x-ray diagnosis. Typically, catheters for the arteriovenus system are made radiopaque generally by compounding into the plastic material of the catheter a radiopaque filler such as bismuth subcarbonate, bismuth trioxide, or barium sulfate.
Difficulties arise with thin-walled catheters, for example the well-known P.T.C.A. guiding catheters. These catheters are generally thin-walled since they are for the purpose of guiding another device thru its lumen. The lumen must be sufficiently large to allow the injection of contrast media around this second device (typically a PTCA dilatation catheter). As such, these thin walled catheters do not show up well on the fluoroscope or other forms of x-ray, even when they are loaded as much as possible with a radiopaque agent. The loading of radiopaque agent has an upper limit which is governed in part by the desired physical characteristics of the catheter. Plastic materials with heavy loadings of radiopaque agent decrease in flexibility, which may limit their use at higher concentrations in many types of catheters.
It is particularly desirable for the distal tip of the catheter to be visible in a fluoroscope or other form of x-ray, so that the positioning of the catheter at its distal end can be precisely determined. In the prior art, this has been accomplished by providing a metal ring to the catheter adjacent the distal end. It is generally undesirable to place the metal ring exactly on the distal tip of the catheter, since the distal tip needs to be very soft and pliable. However, when the metal ring is spaced from the distal tip, as is conventional, it still provides a rigid section of the catheter which can be undesirable. Also, since the metal ring is spaced from the distal tip, the use of such a metal ring does not completely resolve the problem of precisely locating the distal tip of the catheter within the body by means of a fluoroscope during a medical procedure, since the metal ring is and must be spaced from the distal tip.
In accordance with this invention, a catheter is provided which is of the appropriate stiffness throughout, and preferably free from any metal radiomarker member such as a metal ring, yet which carries a distal tip which is considerably softer and more radiopaque than the rest of the catheter. Thus, the catheter may be as stiff as desired, but the highly radiopaque tip of the catheter can be soft to avoid vessel trauma, while providing reliable locatability for the distal end by fluoroscope or the like. At the same time the desired degree of flexibility is provided along every portion of the catheter, including the distal tip and the catheter segment where in the prior art a metal ring is normally carried to achieve locatability.
DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
In this invention, a flexible plastic catheter defines a flexible, distal tip. The distal tip comprises a plastic formulation containing sufficient radiopaque agent to be substantially more radiopaque than portions of the catheter proximal to said tip. This is possible, in part, because the distal tip of the catheter may comprise a resin that is softer than other portions of the catheter, so that it remains softer with higher radiopaque filler loadings. For example, to make the desired radiopaque tip, a typically polyurethane resin having a shore A durometer of 75A to 85A may be loaded with 40 (or 45) to 75 weight percent of radiopaque filler.
Thus, in accordance with this invention, the distal tip may desirably comprise a higher weight percent of radiopaque agent than the plastic formulation of the catheter portions proximal to the tip. As an alternate embodiment, the distal tip may carry a more effective radiopaque agent at generally equal concentrations to the concentration of a less effective radiopaque agent in the remainder of the catheter.
It is preferred for the plastic of the distal tip to comprise 50-70 weight percent of radiopaque agent, preferably bismuth trioxide. In this circumstance, it is generally preferred for the portions of the catheter proximal to said tip to comprise from 25-38 weight percent of radiopaque agent, for example, bismuth trioxide also.
It is generally preferred for the plastic formulation from which the tip is made to comprise polyurethane as a structural binder (i.e. resin) ingredient, for example polyether-polyurethane or polyester-polyurethane. It is preferred for the plastic formulation that makes up the remainder of the catheter to comprise a structural binder ingredient that is sealingly compatible with polyurethane, or if the tip is other than polyurethane, then the structural binder ingredient is preferably sealingly compatible with whatever constitutes the structural binder of the distal tip. Generally, the structural binders of the distal tip and the remainder of the catheter comprise the same, or similar, formulations for the best sealing compatibility; i.e. when the distal tip comprises polyurethane, the remainder of the catheter also comprises polyurethane. Thus, it is possible for the distal tip to be separately formed from the rest of the catheter body, and then to be heat sealed in any appropriate way to the remainder of the catheter body, for example, by heating in an appropriate die, so that the two members bond together.
While it is preferred for both the distal tip and the remainder of the catheter body to comprise polyurethane, other inert plastic materials besides polyurethane may be used to manufacture catheters, for example, polyethylene, poly(ethylene terephthalate) and other polyesters, polypropylene, polyamides such as nylon, elastomers such as latex or Kraton (a product of Shell Chemical Company), or the like.
Accordingly, a flexible, radiopaque catheter may be provided, in which the distal tip has a significantly increased radiopaque characteristic, but at the same time the distal tip preferably exhibits more flexibility, to be nondamaging as it advances through body tissues, for example, the arteriovenous system. Such catheters are manufactured with ease, and are preferably free of any metallic radiomarker member, to obtain advantages as described above.
DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS
In the drawings, FIG. 1 is a plan view of a P.T.C.A. guiding catheter in accordance with this invention.
FIG. 2 is a fragmentary, enlarged longitudinal, sectional view of the distal end of the catheter of FIG. 1.
FIG. 3 is a schematic view, similar to a view as might be seen in a fluoroscope during a P.T.C.A. procedure, showing the catheter of this invention passing through the aorta into a coronary artery.
DESCRIPTION OF SPECIFIC EMBODIMENTS
Referring to the drawings, P.T.C.A. guiding catheter 10 is shown, having a catheter shaft made in accordance with conventional design for a P.T.C.A. procedure out of a polyether polyurethane formulation. The catheter shown is similar to catheters which have been sold by the Cordis Corporation for P.T.C.A. procedures except as otherwise described herein. The natural shape of the distal end 12 of catheter 10 is as shown in FIG. 1, but catheter 10 is quite flexible so that it can be and is straightened out as it is inserted into the arteriovenous system of the patient. Other designs of catheter ends are also available, and may also incorporate the invention of this application.
Distal end 12 comprises a transition zone 13 which connects distal tip 14 with catheter body 15. Typically, transition zone 13 is free of tubular reinforcing braid, while catheter body 15 carries such reinforcing braid in its interior, in conventional manner.
In accordance with this invention, distal tip 14 is bonded at seal line 16 to the distal end of transition zone 13, which is bonded in similar manner at its other end 17 to catheter body 15. As stated above, this may be accomplished by heating the respective portions while pressed together in a die, so that the polyether polyurethane of the respective sections flows together into intimate contact and forms a firm seal line at junctions 16,17, while the bore 18 of the catheter remains open.
Distal tip 14 of the catheter is made of a polyether polyurethane formulation which is somewhat different from the polyurethane formulation used to manufacture catheter sections 13 and 15. Specifically, the formulation used to manufacture distal tip 14 may contain 39.7 weight percent of a commercially available polyurethane (Pellethane 80AE, sold by the Dow Chemical Company); 60 weight percent of bismuth trioxide: and 0.3 weight percent of oxidized polyethylene, which is a commercially available and known dispersing agent, release agent, and lubricant for the system.
A specific formulation out of which the catheter body 15 and transition zone 13 may be formulated is as follows: 79.66 weight percent of a commercial polyurethane base similar to the above formulation; 20 weight percent of barium sulfate; and 0.34 weight percent of the above-described oxidized polyethylene ingredient.
While both catheter body 15 and transition zone 13 are flexible, distal tip 14 exhibits greater flexibility and lower Durometer than the rest of the catheter, while it also exhibits substantially greater radiopaque characteristics.
Accordingly, as indicated in FIG. 3, when the catheter of FIG. 1 is inserted into the aorta 20 of a patient, from there curving around so that distal tip 14 occupies a coronary artery 22, distal tip 14 will show up on the fluoroscope with significantly greater intensity than the remainder of catheter 10, to provide the physician who is observing through the fluoroscope or other x-ray means with precise information on the location of the distal tip of catheter 10. This information greatly facilitates the P.T.C.A. procedure, and many other desired medical procedures.
By way of another example, most of catheter 10 may be formulated from 64.86 weight percent of a commercially available polyurethane formulation (Estane 58271-021 of B.F. Goodrich Corporation); 33.5% of bismuth subcarbonate; 1.34% of blue pigment; and 0.33% of a commercially available oxidized polyethylene. The distal tip 14 of such a catheter may be formulated of the following formulation: 49.83 weight percent of the polyurethane formulation described immediately above; 49.83 weight percent of powdered bismuth subcarbonate; and 0.33 weight percent of the oxidized polyethylene. After separate extrusion of the two different formulations into catheter tubes of equal inner and outer diameters, a short segment of the tube formed by the latter formulation may be heat sealed to one end of the tube made from the former formulation, to serve as distal tip 14. X-ray of the catheter shows that the resulting catheter tip exhibited substantially increased radiopaque characteristics.
As a modified formulation of material from which distal tip 14 may be made, the following formulation was prepared: 49.83 weight percent of the polyurethane formulation last described above; 49.83 weight percent of bismuth trioxide; and 0.033 weight percent of the oxidized polyethylene ingredient. This formulation, when formed into distal tip 14 and applied by heat sealing to a polyurethane catheter of the type described above exhibits even greater radiopaque characteristic than that of the previous distal tip formulation.
Additionally, it is generally desirable to use a finely powdered grade of the radiopaque agent, such as bismuth trioxide, bismuth subcarbonate, barium sulfate, or other material, to provide homogeneity to the plastic formulations to which they are added.
The above has been offered for illustrative purposes only, and is not intended to limit the scope of the invention of this application, which is as defined in the claims below:
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A flexible plastic catheter defines a flexible, distal tip. In accordance with this invention, the distal tip comprises a plastic formulation containing sufficient radiopaque agent to be substantially more radiopaque and preferably softer than portions of the catheter proximal to the tip. Thus, the distal tip area of the catheter can be flexible to avoid possible tissue damage as the catheter is advanced, but is still readily visible by x-ray. At the same time, the majority of the catheter may be of normal flexibility and strength.
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PRIORITY
[0001] This application is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/958,761, filed Dec. 2, 2010, now pending, which claims benefit from U.S. Provisional Application No. 61/265,988, filed Dec. 2, 2009, now expired. The complete disclosures of both applications are incorporated herein by reference.
TECHNICAL FIELD
[0002] This disclosure relates to excavation tools, and more particularly to bucket type excavation tools, for excavators, backhoes, and wheel, crawler and skid-type loaders.
BACKGROUND
[0003] Excavation tools of the types described herein are typically mounted to conventional excavators of the type having a backhoe, or mounted to a conventional loader with a pair of boom arms. The backhoe version includes a dipper stick, and the tool is mounted on the outboard end of the dipper stick. The loader version would include boom arms of wheel loaders, crawler loaders and skid steer loaders where the tool is mounted to the outboard end of the boom arms. These tool types are employed for excavation of medium packed substrate, e.g. substrate between the category of loose soil or loose gravel and the category of substrate requiring a ripper or hammer. Medium packed substrate does not usually require special tools or rippers to be excavated; however, conventional buckets that have teeth horizontally aligned do not excavate efficiently. Loose soil or gravel can be excavated with a conventional bucket, but a conventional bucket is generally not efficient in hard packed substrate. Solid rock excavation generally requires a hydraulic hammer, but a hydraulic hammer is not efficient for excavating hard packed substrate because it is slow and requires an additional bucket to remove the material. Intermediate substrate excavation generally requires a ripper, but a ripper may not be efficient for excavating hard packed substrate because it requires an additional bucket to remove the material. Intermediate substrate excavation also generally requires a ripper bucket combination, e.g., similar to that described in Horton, U.S. Pat. No. 7,322,133, entitled “Multi-Shank Ripper”, the complete disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference, but a ripper bucket combination is considerably more expensive and may not be efficient for excavating hard packed substrate because it generally has a small capacity and it is not flat on the bottom for easily forming flat trench bottoms. Excavation projects generally require that the bottom of the excavated hole or trench be flat. Attempts have been made to develop tools that are effective, inexpensive, and efficient in excavating hard packed substrate while making the trench bottom flat. Simply stated, there has been one general approach, i.e. the spade nose bucket approach, e.g. as described in Evans et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,992,062, entitled “High Penetration Bucket Arrangement,” and replaceable versions, e.g. as described in Grant, U.S. Pat. No. 7,266,914, entitled “Wear Plate Assembly,” and versions thereof, the complete disclosures of which are incorporated herein by reference. Evans et al. describes a forward center tooth that makes penetration engagement with the soil prior to the side teeth and side teeth assemblies that will engage the material at the same time. This arrangement provides for good penetration and efficiency when the first center tooth engages; however, as soon as the two outer tooth assemblies engage with the soil, the efficiency drops and the soil resistance becomes dramatically higher. Grant also described a spade nose type bucket for a loader; however, the front leading edge contains a replaceable spade nose wear portion. This design also provides good penetration when the first center tooth engages; however, as soon as the subsequent multiple side teeth engage, the efficiency drops dramatically as the teeth engage in pairs. These teeth also align with each other when viewed from the side. Each of these approaches has been found to have drawbacks.
SUMMARY
[0004] According to a first aspect of the disclosure, a staggered edge excavation tool for use mounted to an arm of an excavation machine and having an axis of rotation relative to the arm comprises a body mounted for rotation from the arm, a pair of generally flat, side leading edge plates mounted to the body, a formed back sheet mounted to said body and to the side leading edge plates, and a planar plate having a staggered front leading edge, the planar plate being mounted to span the region of the staggered edge bucket between the side leading edge plates, and attached to the formed back sheet and the side plates, to define, together, a staggered edge bucket volume for receiving material excavated from a hard packed substrate during excavation action. Also included is a set of two of more teeth mounted along the staggered front leading edge of the planar plate, wherein each tooth of the set of two or more teeth defines a forward surface non-aligned with the forward surfaces of all other teeth of the set of two or more teeth and thereby disposed for individual, sequential initial engagement with the hard packed substrate during excavation action, and the set of two or more teeth defines a flat plane that is generally parallel to the planar plate. Each tooth of the set of two or more teeth defines an excavation angle measured between a surface of the tooth and the axis of rotation, and the excavation angle of each tooth of the set of two or more teeth is different from the excavation angles of all other teeth of the set of two or more teeth.
[0005] Preferred implementations of the disclosure may include one or more of the following additional features. The staggered front leading edge of the planar plate defines scalloped front leading edge segments between teeth of the set of two or more teeth. The set of two or more teeth comprises at least three teeth, with each tooth equally spaced along the staggered front leading edge of the planar plate from every adjacent tooth. The front leading edge defines multiple edge portions, the multiple edge portions being disposed at contrasting angles relative to the direction of substrate engagement motion, e.g., the front leading edge is a staggered edge having two edge portions. The front leading edge defines a single multiple edge portion, the single portion being disposed at a predetermined angle relative to the direction of substrate engagement motion.
[0006] Preferred implementations of this aspect of the disclosure may also or instead include one or more of the following additional features. The excavation teeth are replaceably mounted to the tool. The excavation teeth are integral with the tool. The body portion comprises a body upper portion and a body tubular cross brace portion. Each excavation tooth comprises a weld-on adapter. Each excavation tooth has a top cutting surface and a bottom surface. Each excavation tooth terminates in a tip, and the first excavation tooth top cutting surface is disposed at a predetermined angle to the line through the arm pivot. The predetermined angle is between about 20° and about 50° from the tangent. The excavation teeth can be any standard or special style of excavation teeth. A tip radius dimension between the dipper stick pivot and each excavation tooth tip is about the same as a tip radius dimension of a conventional bucket.
[0007] Preferred implementations of this aspect of the disclosure may also or instead include one or more of the following additional features. The first excavation tooth is linearly advanced relative to the second excavation tooth in a direction of substrate excavation motion, whereby the first excavation tooth is engaged for excavating the substrate before the second excavation tooth is engaged for excavating the substrate. The tool further comprises additional teeth, for excavation engagement with a substrate, each additional tooth being laterally spaced from each other shank along the axis of rotation of the staggered edge excavation tool relative to the arm, and the excavation tooth of each additional tooth being linearly spaced from the excavation tooth of each other of the additional shanks in a direction of excavation motion. The excavation tooth is replaceably mounted to the tool. The excavation tooth is integral with the tool.
[0008] Preferred implementations of this aspect of the disclosure may further or instead include one or more of the following additional features. A front leading edge is staggered spanning both laterally at an angle, and connecting the forward side leading edge and tooth to the rearward side leading edge and tooth. Additional teeth are spaced along the front leading edge. All of the teeth and the front leading edge are positioned generally on a flat plane, providing a flat bottom on the excavation tool that is parallel to the angle of rotation. The forward tooth is set to the optimum excavation angle relative to the axis of rotation.
[0009] Preferred implementations of this aspect of the disclosure may still further or instead include one or more of the following additional features. The rearward side leading edge is shaped to support the front leading edge while also limiting side spillage, thus providing for maximum capacity of excavated material.
[0010] Preferred implementations of this aspect of the disclosure may include the additional feature of the staggered front leading edge plate including non-aligning teeth mounted thereto.
[0011] According to another aspect of disclosure, a method for excavation of a substrate employing a staggered edge excavation tool mounted to an excavation machine comprises the steps of: engaging a first excavation tooth of the staggered edge excavation tool with the substrate surface to be excavated and applying excavation force only to the first excavation tooth to cause the first excavation tooth to penetrate the substrate in excavation action, thereafter, engaging a second excavation tooth of the staggered edge excavation tool with the substrate surface being excavated and applying excavation force to the second excavation tooth to cause the second excavation tooth to penetrate the substrate in excavation action, and thereafter engaging, in succession, succeeding excavation teeth of the staggered edge excavation tool with the substrate surface being excavated and applying excavation force to the succeeding excavation teeth, in succession to cause the succeeding excavation teeth, in succession, to penetrate the substrate in excavation action.
[0012] Preferred implementations of this aspect of the disclosure may include one or more of the following additional features. The method comprises the further steps of, as the first excavation tooth penetrates the substrate surface to break out material from the substrate surface, allowing the tool and dipper stick to nosedive until a second excavation tooth engages the substrate surface with full cylinder force; and, as the second excavation tooth penetrates the substrate surface to break out material from the substrate surface, allowing the tool and dipper stick to nosedive until a third excavation tooth engages the substrate surface with full cylinder force. The method may further comprise the step of, as each succeeding excavation tooth, in succession, penetrates the substrate surface to break out material from the substrate surface, allowing the tool and dipper stick to nosedive until a still further succeeding excavation tooth, in succession, engages the substrate surface with full cylinder force.
[0013] According to yet another aspect of the disclosure, a method for excavation of a substrate employing a staggered edge excavation tool mounted on a dipper stick of an excavation machine comprises the steps of: (a) extending the dipper stick to full extent forward of the excavation machine and pivoting the excavation tool at the end of the dipper stick back to full extent; (b) lowering the dipper stick until a first excavation tooth of the excavation tool engages the substrate; (c) drawing the excavation tool toward the excavation machine to cause the first excavation tooth to penetrate the substrate surface in excavation action; (d) simultaneously pivoting the excavation tool forward until a second excavation tooth of the excavation tool engages the surface of the substrate being ripped; (e) drawing the excavation tool toward the excavation machine to cause the second excavation tooth to penetrate the substrate surface in excavation action; and (f) repeating steps (d) and (e) for each succeeding excavation tooth of the excavation tool, in succession.
[0014] According to yet another aspect of the disclosure, a method for excavation of a substrate employing a staggered edge excavation tool mounted on a dipper stick of an excavation machine comprises the steps of: (a) extending the dipper stick to full extent forward of the excavation machine and pivoting the excavation tool at the end of the dipper stick back so that the flat bottom is parallel to the ground; (b) lowering the dipper stick until the flat bottom of the excavation tool engages the substrate; (c) drawing the excavation tool toward the excavation machine to cause all of the teeth to shave substrate surface in excavation action; (d) simultaneously pivoting the excavation tool rearward thus keeping the bottom flat to the surface of the substrate being excavated; (e) drawing the excavation tool toward the excavation machine to cause the teeth to shave the substrate surface flat in excavation action.
[0015] The staggered edge bucket excavation tool described herein outperforms prior art tools, e.g. as described by Evans, et al., because no two teeth are in alignment. Each tooth of the disclosed excavation tool engages the hard packed substrate at different times, thus creating a smooth, higher force concentration as the bucket engages the material. None of the prior excavation tools is as efficient and effective for excavation of hard packed substrate as the staggered edge bucket described herein.
[0016] One advantage of the staggered edge excavation tool of this disclosure is realized when working with a top frost layer condition. Since the teeth engage one at a time, the staggered edge excavation tool has the ability to simplify excavation of a top layer of frozen ground due to the concentration of the breakout force on one tooth at a time. Once the top layer is removed, the soft soil underneath can be excavated easily and quickly with the large capacity of this tool. Other ripper/bucket combinations that might function similarly would be on the order of, e.g., four times as expensive, and typically would not have as large a capacity.
[0017] A further object of the disclosure is to provide excavation tools and systems that apply maximum working force to the working tooth for efficient and effective excavation of hard packed substrate.
[0018] It is another object of the disclosure is to provide excavation tools and systems with smooth operation and minimum stress on an excavating vehicle as it efficiently and effectively excavates hard packed substrate.
[0019] It is a further object of the disclosure to provide excavation tools and systems capable of easily forming a flat bottom in the trench or excavated formation of hard packed substrate.
[0020] It is a further object of the disclosure to provide excavation tools and systems capable of high quality, large capacity and low cost manufacture, with long and useful service life and, minimum of maintenance.
[0021] Drawbacks experienced with the prior art devices have been obviated in a novel manner by the present disclosure. It is, therefore, an outstanding object of the present disclosure to provide excavation tools and systems that efficiently and effectively excavate hard packed substrate.
[0022] The details of one or more implementations of the disclosure are set forth in the accompanying drawings and the description below. Other features, objects, and advantages of the disclosure will be apparent from the description and drawings, and from the claims.
DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS
[0023] FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a first implementation of a staggered edge excavation tool of the present disclosure having a front leading edge with multiple portions, the multiple portions being disposed at contrasting angles relative to the direction of substrate engagement motion, i.e., a staggered edge, in this case having two edge portions.
[0024] FIG. 2 is a top view of a portion of the excavation tool of FIG. 1 .
[0025] FIG. 3 is a right side view of a portion of the excavation tool of FIG.
[0026] FIG. 4 is a front view of the excavation tool of FIG. 1 .
[0027] FIG. 5 is a perspective view of a second implementation of a staggered edge excavation tool of the present disclosure having a front leading edge with only a single portion, the single portion disposed at a predetermined angle relative to the direction of substrate engagement motion, i.e., a staggered edge having a single edge portion.
[0028] FIG. 6 is a top view of the staggered edge excavation tool of FIG. 5 .
[0029] Like reference symbols in the various drawings indicate like elements.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
[0030] Referring to FIGS. 1-4 , a staggered edge excavation tool 100 having a staggered or non-symmetrically angled, multiple portion edge has a body 120 for mounting from an arm (not shown), e.g., a dipper arm or a boom arm, and a set of first and second side leading edge plates 130 , 131 mounted to the body. The body 120 consists of two plates 121 that form a tube spanning between the side leading edge plates 130 and 131 . Each side leading edge plate 130 , 131 is perpendicular to an axis of rotation, R, of the tool, and each side leading edge is connected by a front leading edge plate 150 positioned for engagement with a substrate. Referring to FIG. 2 , the front leading edge plate 150 has an irregular, non-symmetrically angled (or staggered) front leading edge 151 with two edge portions at contrasting angles in the directions of substrate engagement motion. The front leading edge plate 150 connects the first side leading edge 132 to the second side leading edge 133 shown in FIG. 1 . The staggered front leading edge plate 150 shown in the drawings has mounted teeth 161 ; however, other implementation may or may not have mounted teeth. The side leading edge plates 130 , 131 and teeth 161 are laterally spaced apart along the axis of rotation relative to the arm, and the teeth are positioned in a direction of substrate engagement motion. The first side leading edge 132 and second side leading edge 133 are spaced apart in the direction of bucket motion, and a first tooth 161 A positioned foremost in the direction of substrate engagement motion is separated from a rearmost tooth 161 D by distance, D′, e.g., 11 inches for an 30-inch wide bucket or 15 inches for a 40-inch wide bucket, as shown in FIG. 3 . Additional teeth 161 (e.g. 161 B and 161 C as shown in FIG. 2 ) may be intermediately spaced along the front leading edge 151 of the front leading edge plate 150 . All of the teeth 161 and the front leading edge 151 are positioned generally on a flat plane, S, as shown in FIG. 3 , providing a flat bottom on the excavation tool that is generally parallel to the path of rotation. The top of the forward tooth 161 A can be set to the optimum excavation angle B, e.g. about 30°, relative to the axis of rotation, R, to provide maximum penetration in the substrate. The front leading edge plate 150 is configured to support tooth adapters 160 (to which teeth 161 are mounted, e.g. by pins), while also limiting side spillage, thus providing for maximum capacity of excavated material. The front leading edge 151 is scalloped to help slice through the hard packed substrate, e.g., as shown in FIG. 2 . The scallop segments generate a non-uniform, irregular pattern such that each tooth 161 is positioned at a different distance from the rear of the front edge plate 150 .
[0031] A curved back plate 140 as shown in FIG. 1 is mounted to span a region between the side leading edge plates 130 and 131 , and the side plates 141 , providing a bucket volume, V, of predetermined capacity, e.g. 1.2 cubic yards, for receiving material excavated from the substrate. The tip radius and the width of the staggered edge bucket may be similar to conventional buckets in order to maintain capacities that are also similar. As shown in FIG. 2 , the teeth 161 arranged on the tooth adaptors 160 may or may not be directly aligned in the direction of substrate engagement, e.g., perpendicular to the axis of rotation R′ or to the rear of the front leading edge plate 150 . By way of example, the midpoints of teeth 161 C and 161 D have non-perpendicular angles 163 C and 163 D, respectively, which are greater than 90 degrees.
[0032] The staggered edge bucket 100 of FIG. 1 improves the efficiency of excavating hard packed substrate, e.g., as compared to prior art tools, by focusing the breakout force one tooth at a time, while the flat bottom, as shown in FIG. 3 , simplifies the operation of forming a flat bottom in the trench. When the operator is excavating hard packed substrate, the bucket is rolled away from the operator, and then lowered, such that the first tooth 161 A engages the material first. The concentration of machine breakout force on one tooth provides a concentration of the forces that are high enough to easily break up hard packed substrate. As the bucket is rolled toward the operator and lowered, the second tooth, e.g., the tooth 161 B adjacent to tooth 161 A, engages the substrate. Looking only at the second tooth, because the second tooth is closer to the arm bucket pin location of rotation (axis, R′), the force on this tooth will be relatively higher, i.e. than the force on the first tooth, and also because the teeth are positioned in a flat plane, the angle, B′, as shown in FIG. 3 , for the second tooth, e.g. 32°, is relatively larger than the angle, B, for the first tooth, e.g. the angle for the first tooth is about 30°. This relatively larger angle, B′, creates a greater material slicing effect than the smaller angle, B, on the first tooth. Looking at the first and the second tooth together, the first tooth engages with the hard packed substrate with full breakout force. When the second tooth engages the substrate, some of the load is shared with the first tooth. As the bucket continues to be rolled forward the third tooth 161 C also adjacent to tooth 161 A engages the substrate. As the rolling motion continues, the fourth tooth 161 D immediately adjacent to the second tooth 161 B and closest to second side leading edge plate 131 engages the substrate. When all of the teeth have engaged with the substrate, the efficiency is only slightly better than a conventional bucket. Throughout a good portion of the digging of the hard packed substrate, the bucket will have all teeth engaged; however, when the material becomes difficult to dig the operator will know to position the bucket so that relatively fewer teeth are engaged, thus providing relatively higher forces for simplifying the excavation of the hard packed substrate.
[0033] The bucket volume, V, of the staggered edge bucket 100 fills and empties easily, permitting the operator to scoop all excavated materials. When the operator has excavated to the bottom of the trench to where he/she would like to produce a flat bottom, the staggered edge bucket can be positioned flat, similar to FIG. 4 , and can be forced laterally using the machine hydraulics, to shave the trench bottom material to produce a perfectly flat bottom. This technique is similar to the technique used with a conventional bucket.
[0034] Referring to FIGS. 5-6 , in a second implementation of a staggered edge excavation tool 200 , a front leading edge has only a single portion, with the single portion disposed at a predetermined angle relative to the direction of substrate engagement motion, i.e., a staggered edge having a single edge portion. The arrangement of the staggered edge bucket 200 allows an operator to own a relatively inexpensive bucket while being able to more efficiently excavate hard packed substrate, and also being able to easily shave the bottom of the trench flat, without requiring a tool change or machine change as required in order to use another style bucket. The staggered edge excavation tool 200 has a body 220 for mounting from an arm (not shown), e.g. a dipper arm or a boom arm, and a set of first and second side leading edge plates 230 , 231 mounted to the body. The body 220 consists of two plates 221 that form a tube spanning between the side leading edge plates 230 and 231 . Each side leading edge plate 230 , 231 is perpendicular to an axis of rotation, R′, of the tool, and each side leading edge is connected by a front leading edge plate 250 positioned for engagement with a substrate. The front leading edge plate 250 has a single edge portion that is angled laterally by angle, A ( FIG. 6 ), e.g. about 10° to about 35°, and connects the forward side leading edge 232 to the rearward side leading edge 233 shown in FIG. 5 . The staggered front leading edge plate 250 shown in the drawings has mounted teeth 261 . (Other implementations of the staggered edge excavation tool 200 may or may not have teeth mounted thereto.) The side leading edge plates 230 , 231 and teeth 261 are laterally spaced apart along the axis of rotation relative to the arm, and the teeth are positioned in a direction of substrate engagement motion, thus providing a forward side leading edge 232 and tooth 261 F ( FIG. 5 ) and a rearward side leading edge 233 and tooth 261 R ( FIG. 5 ) that are spaced apart in the direction of bucket motion by distance (e.g., a distance D′, e.g., 11 inches for an 30-inch wide bucket or 15 inches for a 40 -inch wide bucket) As shown in FIG. 5 , additional teeth 261 may be intermediately spaced along the front leading edge 251 of the front leading edge plate 250 . All of the teeth 261 and the front leading edge 251 are positioned generally on a flat plane, S, providing a flat bottom on the excavation tool that is generally parallel to the path of rotation.
[0035] The top of the forward tooth 261 F is set to the optimum excavation angle, B, e.g. about 30°, relative to the axis of rotation, R′, to provide maximum penetration in the substrate. The rearward side leading edge plate 231 is shaped to support the front leading edge plate 250 and tooth adapters 260 (to which teeth 261 are mounted, e.g. by pins 262 ), while also limiting side spillage, thus providing for maximum capacity of excavated material. The front leading edge 251 is scalloped to help slice through the hard packed substrate, e.g. as shown in FIG. 6 . The front leading edge 251 is disposed at angle A, as shown in FIG. 6 . Ideally, angle A ranges between about 10 ° and about 35°, but other angles may be employed. A curved back plate 240 as shown in FIG. 5 is mounted to span a region between the side leading edge plates 230 and 231 , and the side plates 241 , 242 , providing a bucket volume, V, of predetermined capacity, e.g. 1.2 cubic yards, for receiving material excavated from the substrate. The tip radius and the width of the staggered edge bucket may be similar to conventional buckets in order to maintain capacities that are also similar.
[0036] The staggered edge bucket 200 of FIG. 5 improves the efficiency of excavating hard packed substrate, e.g. as compared to prior art tools, by focusing the breakout force one tooth at a time, while the flat bottom simplifies the operation of forming a flat bottom in the trench. When the operator is excavating hard packed substrate, the bucket is rolled away from the operator, and then lowered, such that the first tooth 261 F engages the material first. The concentration of machine breakout force on one tooth provides a concentration of the forces that are high enough to easily break up hard packed substrate.
[0037] As the bucket is rolled toward the operator and lowered, the second tooth, i.e. the tooth 261 next adjacent to tooth 261 F, engages the substrate. Looking only at the second tooth, because the second tooth is closer to the arm bucket pin location of rotation (axis, R′), the force on this tooth will be relatively higher, i.e. than the force on the first tooth, and also because the teeth are positioned in a flat plane, the angle, B″′ for the second tooth, e.g. 32°, is relatively larger than the angle, B″, for the first tooth, e.g., the angle for the first tooth is about 30°. This relatively larger angle, B″′, creates a greater material slicing effect than the smaller angle, B″, on the first tooth. Looking at the first and the second tooth together, the first tooth engages with the hard packed substrate with full breakout force. When the second tooth engages the substrate, some of the load is shared with the first tooth, and as subsequent teeth engage with the hard packed substrate, the load is shared between each subsequent tooth until all of the teeth have engaged with the substrate. When all of the teeth have engaged with the substrate, the efficiency is only slightly better than a conventional bucket. Throughout a good portion of the digging of the hard packed substrate, the bucket will have all teeth engaged; however, when the material becomes difficult to dig the operator will know to position the bucket so that relatively fewer teeth are engaged, thus providing relatively higher forces for simplifying the excavation of the hard packed substrate.
[0038] The bucket volume, V′, of the staggered edge bucket 200 fills and empties easily, permitting the operator to scoop all excavated materials. When the operator has excavated to the bottom of the trench to where he/she would like to produce a flat bottom, the staggered edge bucket can be positioned flat and can be forced laterally using the machine hydraulics, to shave the trench bottom material to produce a perfectly flat bottom, G. This technique is similar to the technique used with a conventional bucket.
[0039] A number of embodiments of the invention have been described. Nevertheless, it will be understood that various modifications may be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention. For example, the side leading edge plates 30 , 31 , of the staggered edge bucket 10 may be fitted with replaceable bolt-on or weld-on side cutters for severe applications. Also, the front leading edges could be a separate bolt-on or weld-on aftermarket assembly for existing buckets. Also, the excavation tool of the disclosure could be used on wheel-type, crawler-type and skid steer-type loaders or shovels. Additionally, teeth 161 A- 161 D can be arranged to engage the substrate in a sequence different than sequence described above, for example in the order of 161 A, 161 B, 161 D, 161 C. Accordingly, other implementations are within the scope of the following claims.
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A staggered edge bucket excavation tool has a body formed by side-leading edge plates, a back sheet, and a plate with a front leading edge spanning a region of the bucket between edge plates. The tool defines a volume for receiving material excavated from a hard packed substrate. Two or more teeth may be mounted along the front leading edge, with each tooth defining a forward surface non-aligned with forward surfaces of all other teeth, thereby disposed for individual, sequential initial engagement with the substrate during excavation. The teeth define a flat plane generally parallel to the planar plate. Each tooth defines an excavation angle between a surface of the tooth and the axis of rotation, and the excavation angle of each tooth being different from excavation angles of all other teeth. In implements, the front leading edge defines multiple edge portions or defines a single multiple edge portion.
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This is a continuation of application No. 09/569,793 filed May 12, 2000 now U.S. Pat. No. 6,530,577.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
Gasket material, more specifically, a gasket material comprising a resilient, pliable body having a skeletal mesh member embedded therein.
2. Background Information
A gasket is a sealing member for use between two mating surfaces to help prevent the movement of fluid or gas between the mating surfaces. Gaskets are often used on vehicles such as aircraft to prevent moisture from corroding the sealed off areas and the mating surfaces. For example, on the outside skin of an aircraft antenna are often mounted to assist in communication is between the aircraft and a remote location. Such antennas often consist of a tabular mounting plate having an inner and outer surface, the inner surface mating to the outer skin of the aircraft and having an electrical connector projecting from the inner surface. The electrical connector is intended to fit partially into the interior of the aircraft through a small opening in the aircraft skin designed for such purpose. The electrical connector element will connect to the appropriate electrical circuit in the aircraft. On the outer surface of the mounting plate, and often incorporated with the mounting plate, is the antenna transceiving member for transmitting and/or receiving radio frequencies.
Traditionally, the antenna is removably mounted to the aircraft through typical threaded fasteners. Holes in the tabular mounting plate of the antenna support the threaded fasteners which pass into the aircraft's skin, typically threading into blind nuts mounted against the inside surface of the aircraft's skin.
Gaskets typically are provided for covering a portion of the “footprint” of the antenna against the outer surface of the aircraft. When the fasteners are tightened down they compress the gasket typically with some defamation, between the aircraft's skin and the inner surface or face of the antenna mounting plate. This is done in an effort to prevent moisture from penetrating the gasket barrier.
However, prior art gaskets have a number of shortcomings which applicants novel gasket material overcomes. These shortcomings include allowing moisture to penetrate the area between the antenna and the aircraft's skin. Often, for example, a site of corrosion is the junction between the antenna inner surface and the electrical connective elements of the antenna. Moisture has been found to “pool” in this area, accelerating corrosion. Further shortcomings of the prior art gaskets include their moisture content or moisture absorption ability, which moisture may encourage the formation of corrosion, when the gasket is under pressure between the mating surfaces and, especially, where such gasket includes a metallic element. Further shortcomings of the prior art gaskets include their “non-selective retentivity.” This means that after the gasket has been installed and in use for a period of time, that upon an attempt to separate the antenna from the aircraft's skin some portions of the gasket will non-selectively stick to portions of the aircraft's skin and other portions of the gasket will stick to the antenna (see FIG. 1A.) The result, often, is the destruction of the gasket.
Applicants have invented a gasket with a novel combination of properties and qualities that effectively prevent moisture from passing the sealed area while maintaining selective retentivity. This allows the effective separation between the mating surfaces upon removal of the antenna.
Flexibility, resiliency, compressibility and pliability are other favorable properties which help affect a good seal between the mating surfaces.
All of these beneficial properties should have a useful life that is reasonable in view of operating conditions and aircraft maintenance schedules. The gasket should be inert, that is non-reactive with the work pieces (typically aluminum) as well as non-reactive to water, including salt water.
Not surprisingly, it has proven to be a challenge to develop a gasket with these properties that will survive repeated heat and pressure cycling (as the aircraft climbs and descends), structural flexing, and vibration while protecting the aircraft components and having a useful life.
While some of the prior art gaskets have provided some of the favorable properties set forth above, none have provided all of these properties in an aircraft gasket with a useful life. Such typical useful life would be a minimum of greater than one year under proper torque specifications.
Applicants, however, provide for all of the above properties in aircraft gasket and gasket tape and a novel method of manufacturing the aircraft gasket and gasket tape. Gasket tape is gasket material that is rolled into tape rather than precut to the pattern of the mating surfaces. Applicants further provide for a method of using the preformed gasket with a liquid setable gel too, in some cases, help insure a waterproof seal.
Applicants have also found a novel method of preparing a gasket material.
Applicants provide a gasket with the following beneficial properties, heretofore unavailable in a preformed gasket or a gasket tape: elasticity (with memory), low water absorption, low water content, leak free (especially of silicon oil), dessication resistant, compressibility and surface tackiness (including selective retentivity).
The elasticity and pliability helps make an effective seal between the two mating surface as compression against such elasticity helps seal over mating surface irregularities and structural flexing or vibration of the two surfaces. The maintenance of this elasticity property is important since the surfaces undergo thermal expansion and contraction during repeated altitude and temperature changes which causes relative movement (flexing) between the mating surfaces.
Low water absorption and low water content is also a beneficial quality as it is typically water or moisture that the gasket is meant to keep out.
Nor should a gasket material itself be the source of oil, as such oil can mar the finish of the aircraft surface. This oil leaching has been a problem with prior art gaskets including those silicon-based gaskets.
An additional beneficial property of an effective gasket includes a resistence to drying out. Drying out of a gasket brings the problem of shrinkage and break-up, which destroys the integrity of the gasket/mating surface.
Tackiness has been found beneficial since there is also vibration and flexing of the mating surfaces. Tackiness and resiliency provide a better seal should there be a slight separation between the mating surfaces.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Applicant's novel gasket consists of two parts. The first part comprises a skeletal member—typically an open-weave mesh member and, more typically, an open-woven mesh made of a metallic material or a non-metallic fabric such as fiberglass.
The second part of applicant's novel gasket is a flexible resilient body member typically formed around and through the skeletal member so that the skeletal member is substantially encapsulated within the resilient body member and gives some structure and form to the gasket.
The gasket and gasket tape are usually tabular in shape and the skeletal member and resilient body share a tabular shape and plane. However, when viewed in cross-section, Applicants skeletal member is not centered between the two opposed tabular surfaces of the gasket (or gasket tape), but instead is closer to one surface than the other. It is believed that this property provides selective retentivity to the material.
The resilient body is typically comprised of a semi-solid gelatin polyurethane, typically between 40 and 150 (10 −1 mm) cone penetration and having a surface tackiness of between about 2 to 7 inch pounds and which tackiness allows some adhesion to a metal mating surface, but will release easily and leave no residue upon release. The resilient body will not undergo dessication, does not leak oil, but retain memory and does not absorb more than about one percent by weight water. Other resilient, pliable bodies may be used, such as silicon or polyolefinic block copolymers or other materials with similar cone penetration and tackiness.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIGS. 1 and 1A illustrate prior art gaskets and their use.
FIG. 2 is a cross-sectional view of Applicants preformed gasket.
FIG. 3 is a side elevational view of Applicants preformed gasket in use.
FIGS. 4, 5 and 6 are elevational views of various “footprints” of Applicants preformed gaskets.
FIG. 7 is a cross-sectional elevational view of Applicants gasket tape.
FIG. 8 is a perspective view of a step in the manufacture of Applicants preformed gaskets.
FIG. 9 is a perspective view of another step in the process of manufacturing Applicants preformed gaskets.
FIG. 9A is a side elevational view of a table for use in the method of manufacturing Applicants gasket material and illustrating Applicants' gasket material on the upper surface
FIG. 10 is a perspective view of a manufacturing step in preparing Applicants' gasket material.
FIG. 11 is a perspective view of a step in the manufacturing of Applicants' preformed gaskets.
FIG. 12 is a side elevational view of a step undertaken in preparation for manufacturing Applicants gasket material.
FIG. 13 is a side elevational view of a table for use in the manufacture of Applicants gasket tape illustrating the stretching and clamping of a woven, non-metallic fiberglass member against the upper surface of the table, the table upper surface having been covered with a release film.
FIG. 14 is a perspective view of the cutting of gasket tape stock into tape.
FIGS. 15, 15 A and 15 B illustrate a method of using Applicants preformed gasket with liquid, curable mix with a preformed gasket to provide an effective gasket seal between an aircraft skin and an aircraft antenna.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
“FIGS. 1 and 1A illustrate a prior art gasket. In FIG. 1 the prior art gasket is seen to contain a woven, typically mesh member within a gel body. However, the mesh member is located in a central area of the gasket body between the two outer faces of the gasket. This is to be compared to Applicant's preformed gasket 10 as illustrated in FIG. 2 . Applicant's preformed gasket 10 has a metallic skeletal member 12 (or non-metallic skeletal member 12 A, see FIG. 14) wherein the skeletal member lays close to or adjacent one of the two outer surfaces of the gasket. One beneficial result of this placement is that Applicant's gasket has selective tackiness of retentivity, unlike prior art gaskets. Without such selective retentivity or tackiness, when prior art gaskets undergo tension during the release of the mating surfaces as illustrated in FIG. 1A (Prior Art) one face of the gasket often sticks to one mating surface and the other face of the gasket to a second mating surface. Such a result may be damaging to the gasket, preventing its reusability.”
As seen in FIG. 2, Applicant's preformed gasket or gasket tape (FIG. 7) includes a skeletal member which may be metallic 12 or nonmetallic 12 A. A typically woven skeletal member is, more typically, a woven aluminum mesh of thickness typically between 0.11 to 0.25 mil. Non-metallic mesh 12 A (see FIGS. 13 and 14) may be woven fiberglass, for example, as when used in Applicant's gasket tape 16 typically between 7 and 20 mil. Sources of 1010 aluminum wire mesh are Estey wire and woven fiberglass is available from Teague Lumber as part number 337,600.
Substantially encapsulating skeletal member 12 or 12 A is a resilient body 14 typically a semisolid gel and more typically formed from a curable polyurethane mix. The resilient body includes a first surface 14 A and an opposed second surface 14 B, the two surfaces with parallel planes. A typical thickness of Applicant's preformed gasket 10 is 0.032 inches to 0.050 inches before compression. A typical thickness of Applicants gasket tape is between 0.032 and 0.060 inches before compression. The preformed gasket and tape share the same resilient body and both have a sticky or tacky surface typically in the range of 2 to 7 inch pounds.
FIG. 3 illustrates Applicant's gasket as it is used to mount between two mating surfaces, here aircraft skin As and aircraft antenna Aa, with preformed gasket 10 cut to dimensions dictated by the specifications of the antenna. It is placed between the aircraft skin and antenna and fasteners are tightened down typically to between about 15 and 35 inch pounds, to compress and slightly deform (squish out along the gasket edges) the gasket.
FIGS. 4, 5 , and 6 illustrate three “footprints” available for Applicants preformed gasket.
EXAMPLE 1
Applicant provides in example 1 a preformed gasket 10 with a footprint similar to FIG. 4 with an inner diameter about 5 inches and an outer diameter of 7 inches. The gasket has a resilient body of about 40 mil thickness comprised of polyurethane from a curable mix available from KBS Chemical of Fort Worth, Tex. as part numbers P-1011 (polyol) and U-1010 (urethane). Aluminum mesh of about 22 mil thickness is used. The preformed gasket was installed on a commercial jet airliner (Boeing 737) between the aircraft skin and the aircraft antenna to between 15 and 35 inch pounds pressure. The resulting compression allowed the wire mesh to ground the antenna to the skin, with the making surfaces about 20 mil distance apart. Upon removal, after 7 months of service, there was observed clean separation of the antenna from the gasket and the gasket maintained adhesion to the aircraft skin, expanding to about 40-90% of its original thickness and shape. The gasket did not dry out, and maintained its structural integrity and other chemical and physical properties, providing an effective seal.
EXAMPLE 2
A second gasket, similar in dimensions and structure to that set forth in Example 1, was joined between two mating surfaces under conditions similar to Example 1 and underwent 1,554 hours of salt fog testing per ASTM B 117. This gasket had a central cutout area in which a high tac, self leveling, green polyurethane sealant (Part No. U-1020 and P-1021 from KBS) was injected. The gasket was subject to a specified torque of 15 and 35 inch pounds. Upon release of the two mating surfaces the gasket was seen to maintain its integrity and to release clean from one mating surface of the two mating surfaces. It was seen to retain its resiliency and memory, as did the gasket in Example 1 above making an effective environmental seal.
FIG. 7 illustrates the use of Applicant's unique gasket material in tape form 16 , rolled up and available to be cut to length for placing between a pair of mating surfaces or as a self sealing tape. Applicant's tape 16 uses, typically, the same polyurethane body as preformed gasket 10 which has surface tackiness and has a mesh, 12 A, typically woven fiberglass, that is closer to one of the two tape other surfaces then to the other. This is believed to result in Applicants unique selective retentivity.
FIGS. 8, 9 , 10 and 11 illustrate a method of producing Applicant's precut gasket 10 .
The first step is the flattening step. The purpose of this step is to flatten out a skeletal member 12 . The way in which this is done, if the skeletal member is metallic wire mesh, is to place the wire mesh 12 between two flat weighed members 20 A and 20 B and then placing the weighed members with the wire mesh between them in all oven. The wire mesh is typically 18 inches by 24 inches and the weighed members are typically ¼″ stainless steel plates. The mesh and weighed member are typically laid flat in an oven and heated to 600 degrees F. for about 30 minutes. This anneals the metallic wire mesh and keeps it flat. The metal plates and the wire mesh are then removed from the oven and allowed to cool. Following cooling the weighed plates are removed and the wire mesh is ready for placement onto flat table 24 .
At this point it is germane to examine the nature of flat table 24 in more detail. With reference to FIG. 9A, table 24 has legs and a table top. The table top typically includes a flat transparent glass member 24 A with a flat upper surface. It also includes beneath the glass member 24 A longitudinal aligned flourescent lights 24 B. Before placement of wire mesh 12 onto the glass table top a release sheet, such as an FEP sheet (fluorinated ethylene propylene) film is applied to the table top. The FEP film is inert and will not stick to the polyurethane mix or the cured mix and will allow a clean removal of the cured polyurethane mix, which comprises the resilient body, from the table top. It is noted with reference to FIG. 12 the FEP film is typically applied to the flat glass table top 24 A from a roll, after Windex® an ammonia based cleaner 38 is applied to the surface of a table top and a squeegee 40 is used to squeeze out any air bubbles. This is done to insure a flat, bubble free surface for gasket formation. Thus, it is seen with reference to FIGS. 9A and 12 that table top 24 A has been prepared prior to the placement of the flattened wire mesh on top thereof, with an FEP or otherwise suitable release film which will lay flat to the table top, be inert to the cure mix and allow the gasket material to release therefrom.
The next step in the manufacture of the preformed gasket, may be called the “mixing and pouring” step and is best illustrated with reference to FIG. 9 . In FIG. 9 it is seen that a mix applicator 28 containing a curable mix of resilient body such as a mix of polyol and urethane available from KBS Chemical as set forth above, is applied to the mesh through the applicator. The prior art applicator stores the liquid mix typically as a resin (here urethane) and hardener (here polyol) in the body thereof, but injection through the nozzle thereof allows the two compositions to mix. Thus, in the process of pouring or applying the resilient body liquid mix, the two components are typically combined. This application and pouring step is typically done at room temperature. Moreover, it is noted that the resilient body liquid mix is sell leveling. This step may also be done as two separate steps. First, one could separately mix the two components of the curable mix and, before it begins to set, apply it by pouring or any other suitable manner, onto the skeletal member.
With a minimum practice and experience the proper amount of liquid mix for the mesh may be determined. That is, sufficient liquid mix should be applied to the mesh for it to sufficiently cover the mesh such that the resilient body contains the wire mesh closer one surface than the other (see FIG. 2 ). For example, it been determined that using a 10½ inch by 17 inch 22 mil aluminum wire mesh such as set forth above, one applies about 160 milliliters of mix, typically, in the crisscross or zig zag pattern as illustrated in FIG. 9 . This will typically result in a gasket of about 40 mil thickness.
The next step in preparing Applicant's preformed gasket is to allow the liquid mix to cure. Typical time to curing is about 4 hours at room temperature. Upon curing a second FEP layer here 38 (see FIG. 10) is applied to the top surface of the gasket stock 10 A as seen in FIG. 10 . This second layer of FEP material will help protect the gasket stock in handling and also will release easily from the surface therefrom.
Further in FIG. 11 it is seen that gasket stock 10 A may be cut with a die stamp machine 34 in ways known in the trade to form precut gaskets 10 to any number of suitable configurations (see for example FIGS. 4, 5 and 6 ).
FIG. 13 illustrates a manner for making Applicant's gasket tape 16 . This involves the step utilizing a table such as is illustrated in FIG. 9 A and stretching a non-metallic skeletal member 12 A from a roll or other stock of such material under tension atop the FEP layered table. Some tension and clamping is necessary to insure that the mesh 12 A is maintained flat against the FEP bottom layer 30 B.
The mixing and pouring step is similar to that illustrated in FIG. 9, with the same resilient body liquid mix as used in the preformed gasket 10 , coating all of the skeletal member to a thickness sufficient to place the skeletal member closer to one surface of the gasket tape than the other.
Following a period of curing the resulting gasket tape stock as illustrated in FIG. 14 may be cut longitudinally, covered with a top layer of FEP and rolled into a roll resulting in the gasket tape 16 illustrated in FIG. 7 .
This tape may be then used in lining aluminum structural members of the frame of aircraft such as those in cargo bays and also on aluminum mating, surface beneath lavatories and galleys, where moisture may be a problem. This will help prevent access of moisture to the structural member. It is noted that use of Applicant's tape or gaskets will be self sealing around fasteners hole. This occurs when there is some defamation of the tape or gaskets at their edges under compression between the two joined mating surfaces.
In summary, it may be seen that Applicant's unique method of manufacturing either the tape or the prevent gasket includes the step of flattening the skeletal member against a flat surface, typically a table top and more typically table top against which a flat release film such as an FEP film has been placed thereon. It is seen that a curable liquid mix is combined and applied in liquid form, to cover the skeletal member to a depth sufficient to insure that the skeletal member is closer to the bottom surface of the resulting stock then to the upper surface. It is further seen that the resilient body liquid mix is typically self leveling and will cure at room temperature. The resulting stock may be then precut to a desire shape or cut to a preselected width and rolled up in a form of gasket tape. It is further seen that tile gasket tape, as illustrated in FIG. 7 is provided with a first protected film 18 A and a second protective film 18 B, typically FEP and that after by cutting, the precut (caskets are typically covered top and bottom with the same protective FEP film.
FIG. 15 shows Applicants preformed gasket 10 ready for installation between two mating surfaces As and Aa. FIG. 15A illustrates the use of non-preformed pliable sealant mix 13 , typically a resin and a hardner, more typically a polyurethane curable mix. Mix 13 will set in place, and may fill any central cut-out areas 13 A in gasket 10 . This will often protect against the trapping of moisture in such area. Note that this curable mix should have the beneficial properties of the resilient body of Applicants preformed gasket 10 . Such curable mixes are available from KBS Chemical of Fort Worth as U-1020 and P-1021.
Although the invention has been described with reference to specific embodiments, this description is not meant to be construed in a limited sense. Various modifications of the disclosed embodiments, as well as alternative embodiments of the inventions will become apparent to persons skilled in the art upon the reference to the description of the invention. It is, therefore, contemplated that the appended claims will cover such modifications that fall within the scope of the invention.
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A gasket material for sealing between two members. The gasket material includes a flexible, woven skeletal member. Enclosing the skeletal member is a flexible, compressible resilient body member having a tacky outer surface, the tacky outer surface for engagement between the two members. In a preferred embodiment the flexible skeletal member is closer to a top surface of the resilient body then it is to a bottom surface of the resilient body. The resilient body may be comprised of urethane. The flexible skeletal member may be comprised of a metallic or a non-metallic material.
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CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] The present application claims priority from Australian Provisional Patent Application No 2006903417 filed on 26 Jun. 2006, the content of which is incorporated herein by reference.
INTRODUCTION TO THE INVENTION
[0002] This invention relates to the packaging of consumer products and relates particularly to products that are formed of pulp material, particularly pulp material formed of waste paper, waste timber, waste fabric material, virgin timber and other similar pulp material. The invention more particularly relates to high quality products carrying high definition printing or other decoration.
BACKGROUND TO THE INVENTION
[0003] The creation of compelling and high quality packaging for consumer durables is well established and is executed in a variety of forms and formats known in the prior art but with each of the prior art, the formats and methodologies having their own particular limitations. The consumer market demands increasing colour, vibrancy and novelty in addition to sophistication in order to provide eye catching shapes that will serve to differentiate products available for sale in a given marketplace. An element of protection is also required for the goods in question and such protection requirements of the packaging in question, often require complex internal structures or substructures to protect the product in question which introduces, in some cases, considerable cost to the packaging products commonly available.
[0004] The core packaging functions, that is to contain, protect, preserve and promote the products in question, are often offset by substantial cost and lack of sustainability, that is the material is from a non-renewable source, or manufactured with a process that causes harmful environmental emissions, or in such a way as to preclude recycling and re-use. The cost of packaging can add considerably to the final cost of a product as it enters commerce and it is desirable to provide the best packaging possible at the most economical cost. Sustainability is also another key issue and becoming an increasingly politicised issue of keen interest in the minds of consumers who may consider the type of packaging used for a product as part of any “buying decision”. In addition, there is a general move and sympathy towards the provision of legislation and guidelines against non-sustainable packaging of consumer products.
[0005] The commonly available packaging techniques and materials can be summarised as follows:
Paper and Cardboard
[0006] Paper or Cardboard packaging is the most common form of packaging found in the market today. Paper and cardboard packaging is low cost and has the ability to accept printing and finishing to a very high standard but has a principal restriction by limitation of its form. Card is printed and then folded so as to create boxes or constructions limited by largely planer configurations. The inability to readily conform cardboard to other than linear and planer shapes does not allow this material to be adapted for brand or product discrimination in the marketplace as all packaging based on cardboard incorporates substantial planer elements. The ubiquitous nature of cardboard also means that it is difficult for suppliers to create perceived value around the product without resorting to complicated treatments of the boxes, including lamination and use of metallic and plastic films etc. The more complicated the printing and laminating and/or folding involved in any manufacture of a packaging product, the more costly the end product results which must be passed onto the consumer. In addition, a number of the perceived high quality treatments in cardboard and paper packaging, require the use of processes that are not environmentally sustainable, or which hinder the recycling of the packaging and therefore make the packaging less environmentally friendly than it otherwise could be.
[0007] Use of recycled materials is also limited by a reduction in strength of cardboard; the main process used for packaging materials is the Fourdrinier process. This process creates a flat sheet of material where fibres are aligned in the direction of the production flow, giving rise to distinct properties within the finished board, which can be used to either increase the compression strength of the board or its flexibility. These particular features are compromised by the use of recycled pulp because of the changes occurring in the pulp particles during recycling processes. In addition, legislation governs the application and use of recycled materials in this process due to hygiene issues.
[0008] Plastic is a highly creative medium allowing for the development, design and creation of packaging shapes that are unique, individual and include curves, compound curving or organic forms and which may in turn produce an enormous range and configuration of packaging and presentations, thereby allowing the branding of a particular product or the shape of the actual container to be used as powerful marketing and branding tools. Plastics are able to be brightly coloured and have the ability to take up print and decoration across compound surfaces to give a similar result to that of moulded metal but at a much lower cost. Plastics can be decorated by a number of means; direct printed, labelled or in-mould labelled. This latter process involves the insertion of a polymer label into the empty plastic forming-mould, the label is robotically placed and as it is a planar printed label is positioned on a planar section of the tool. The plastic material is introduced and the surface of the plastic product fuses with the label material to create a smooth decorated surface. This technique of “in mould labelling” is well known and creates interesting and unique packages for use with a variety of goods.
[0009] A key limitation and drawback with plastic packaging is the non-sustainability of this packaging methodology and an increasingly poor consumer perception of the throwaway and disposable nature of plastic packaging. Most thermo-plastics are derived from oil and as such the price of this commodity is invariably increasing, in addition to the perception of the non-renewable nature of this commodity, it suffers a generally poor public perception. Most thermo plastics are readily recycled, although the variety of plastics complicates the sorting process. The recycled material is classed as re-grind material and as such its use is more limited than virgin material. This is most notable in the products that have direct food contact were the use of regrind material is not permitted or in some cases it has to be the external material, tied to the inner which is virgin plastic.
[0010] An increasing use of organically-derived plastics to address some of the environmental concerns are provided for in the prior art, however, organically-derived materials can also have problems, in particular the so called “bio-polymers”, which may not be as sustainable as they first appear. Most first generation bio-polymers are derived from polylactic acid and this material is not catered to in the current plastic recycling methodologies. In addition, polylactic acid is not compatible with petroleum based plastics and is generally considered a contaminant. In addition, the current rationale understood with respect to bio-polymers is that they are compostible and so can be added to landfill. However the energy required in their creation is not returned or reduced by this process and in a number of cases, polylactic acid is inferior and/or requires more material to equal the performance of petroleum based plastics.
Glass
[0011] Clarity, strength and substance as well as premium perception has kept glass a first choice material for a number of high end products including perfumes, skin care products etc where the weight of the glass and its inherent coolness serves to enhance the perception of quality. However glass as a packaging medium, is heavy, fragile and requires a lot of energy to melt and reform.
Metal
[0012] Pressed metal boxes and tins are often used in consumer packaging because they can be brightly coloured and formed into a number of eye catching shapes, including curved and organic shapes.
[0013] Metal can be formed either by welding into cylinders or through impact moulding. Impact moulding involves the use of a flat sheet of metal which is formed between two shaped metal dyes which subject the metal to a high impact and forces the flat sheeted material to conform to the profile of the dye.
[0014] The deformation of metal during this process, whilst it can be severe, generally with respect to the artwork applied to metallic boxes and tins, deformation is of little concern and the artwork can be readily applied to the flat sheet of material in a pre-distorted form which then goes through the moulding process and deforms with the metal such that the requisite imagery or graphics are rendered onto the final product
[0015] Metal itself is however an expensive raw material and in comparison to paper, the unit cost of a metallic container is far greater than the similar piece of packaging made from plastic or cardboard. The use of metallic boxes and packaging is generally less sustainable than the previously described materials and requires substantial energy for recycling. In addition, the use of metallic materials for packaging involves the use of a finite resource and the mining industry and forging of metals for packaging is increasingly being perceived by the consuming public as environmentally questionable.
Pulp Fibre
[0016] Formed pulp paper has a restricted and limited public perception at this point in time due to its principal association with low end single colour products like fruit trays or egg boxes. The fibre used in the preparation of pulping products can be the same which is used in typical paper production but its also possible to use fibres derived from products other than wood. The development of pulp fibre processing in its simplest form involves a creation of a mat of fibres by lifting a mesh through a vat of fibres in suspension. The fibres are then collected by the mesh and excess water drains away. The positively shaped mesh is then brought into contact with the negatively shaped mould and subsequently heated with the application of pressure to remove excess water. The process then dries the mat into its final form. The currently used processes generally give pulp a distinctive coarse finish with the marks of the mesh clearly visible as witnesses on one or more of the faces.
[0017] Modern high pressure pulp thermoforming has provided many improvements to the previously described single stage process. Modern high pressure pulp thermoforming generally involves a two stage forming process which can result in high quality finished products with a smooth finish which is comparable to that of high quality flat cardboard. The modern two stage pulp thermoformer works in such a way that the pulp is moulded over the extraction mesh then transferred to a conventional solid male-female mould with extraction vents. The mould is then heated to about 200° and steam extracted through vents in the mould by vacuum which results in a dense, smooth finish product that can be curved or contain multiple compound curves.
[0018] The benefits of pulp as a packaging medium include low cost and the ability to conform the product into a wide variety of highly complex compound shapes. The added benefit of pulp as a packaging medium include the ability for the product to be coloured right through with the use of dyes in the pulp vat. In addition, the material can have variable wall thickness depending on the specific localised pressure used at the point of forming which gives excellent insulation properties for heat and shock.
[0019] The key disadvantage of pulp fibre packaging from a commercial point of view is the limitation to the use of a single colour throughout the packaging material. In addition, once the pulping material has been formed and dried into the final moulded shape, it is not possible to economically print upon or decorate such surfaces.
[0020] Whilst it is possible to place adhesive stickers on such packaging, adhesive stickers are only able to be applied economically to planer surfaces which provide distinct limitations to the form and design of such packaging products. In addition, adhesive stickers are not visually appealing because they are not fully integrated with the design and manufacture of the product and the application of adhesive labels requires precision and specific care in alignment and places limitations on any high speed industrial process. A further technique for use with pulp fibre packaging includes the use of vacuum or heat to form a laminated plastic film over the finished dried packaging product complete with compound curves. However, such films have disadvantages including their appearance as add-ons or additions and distraction from the integrated perception of the whole design; such products are also limited by the compound nature of the surface to which they can adhere where extremely deep valleys or ridges are not possible without the film ripping or folding which compromises the final product; and finally, the nature of the adhered film is such that it is necessarily a plastic adhered to paper pulp which then compromises recycling and sustainability.
[0021] It would be desirable to provide an alternative to current packaging processes and techniques utilising the advantages of pulp fibre providing such packaging can be provided with a high finished quality and with the ability to receive high definition printing and decoration as found in the previously detailed prior art products.
[0022] Accordingly, one object of the invention is to provide an improved method of moulding and printing pulp fibre materials.
[0023] For the purposes of this specification, the term “pulp material” shall be taken to mean pulp formed of a mixture of cellulose fibres, including, but not limited to, cellulose fibres derived from waste and other paper, cardboard, yarns and textiles, plant fibres including wood chips and other timber and plant material including waste, and any other material predominately of cellulose.
[0024] Moulded pulp products are well known, particularly as both internal and external packaging products. For example, moulded pulp egg crates, or cartons have been used for decades for packaging eggs. Similar packaging products are used for a variety of fruit and vegetables and other products that require protection during transportation. Computer components, printer cartridges, vehicle components and many other products are packaged using moulded pulp packaging. Moulded pulp is used for containers for plants in plant nurseries.
[0025] The pulp for such packaging is conveniently and cheaply manufactured from waste paper and other waste material. In one process, a pulp slurry is prepared from waste paper, cardboard, textiles and other similar waste material. The slurry may include additives of any type, including, but not limited to, chalk and fabric material. Such additives impart desirable characteristics to the finished product. For example, chalk added to the pulp slurry results in a product having a china-like feel, while the addition of fabric to the slurry results in a product having a quality fabric feel.
[0026] In producing a product of moulded pulp, a mould is prepared for the product to be made. A mat of pulp is lifted from the slurry container, generally using a framed mesh, and is deposited into the preliminary mould. The thickness of the pulp mat is determined by the relative speed of the framed mesh dip into the slurry container, and subject to the fibre and moisture content of the pulp slurry. The mat is placed into the mould and pressure or heat and pressure is applied to remove the water content and force the pulp and mat to adopt the shape of the mould.
[0027] With products of this type, printing or other decoration may be applied only to any planar surfaces or surfaces that contain only two dimensional curves, such as cylindrical or conical surfaces or the like.
[0028] It is therefore desirable to provide an improved product manufactured from pulp material, particularly waste paper pulp, virgin paper pulp and pulp made from other waste materials, having a decorative and/or pleasing appearance.
[0029] It is also desirable to provide a product manufactured from pulp material which has a high quality printed surface.
[0030] It is also desirable to provide a pulp product having multiple complex shapes and which contain printed material.
[0031] It is also desirable to provide a method of manufacturing a moulded pulp product having printing or decoration applied thereto during the manufacturing process.
Statements of the Invention
[0032] According to one aspect of the invention there is provided A method of forming a moulded and printed product from pulp material comprising the steps of:
[0033] forming a pre-form mould to have one or more planer surfaces, compound conjoined planar surfaces and/or two dimensional curved surfaces;
[0034] transferring an amount of pulp slurry material to said pre-form mould;
[0035] forming a moulded pre-form from said transferred pulp slurry material;
[0036] applying printing to said planar and/or dimensional curved surfaces in a pre-distorted configuration; and
[0037] moulding the printed pre-form to a different final shape whereby said printed surfaces retain said printing without running and said printing conforms to a desired post distortion configuration.
[0038] With this aspect of the invention, and in accordance with preferred embodiments of the invention, the conventional moulding process is divided preferably into two parts, where the pulp is moulded and formed twice, in two separate and different moulds. A preliminary mould is prepared for the product to be made. The preliminary mould is designed to be within predetermined tolerances, shapes and dimensions of the final mould shape as there is a limited elasticity in a preliminary moulded pulp pre-form for the subsequent moulding stage.
[0039] A mat of pulp is lifted from the slurry container, preferably by a framed mesh, which is itself shaped to be the opposing part of the preliminary mould and is offered up into the preliminary mould. The thickness of the pulp mat is determined by the relative speed of the framed mesh dip into the slurry container, and subject to the fibre type, consistency of the slurry and moisture content of the pulp slurry.
[0040] The mat is formed into a pre-form shape in the preliminary mould by applying heat and pressure. A vacuum is applied to the rear of the mesh to facilitate the extraction of water content form the pulp in the form of steam. This process sets the overall material parameters of the pulp and the initial characteristics of the product shape. These characteristics include the volume of pulp in the product, uniformity of wall thickness, initial density and dimensional size. These characteristics are calculated to allow for specific tolerances in specific areas, such that those areas that will be subjected to deformation in the secondary moulding process are left with higher moisture contents and lower particle density, so that the pulp retains elasticity at this point. During this stage of the moulding process, an amount of the moisture content of the pulp slurry is removed from the mat. When the pre-form has been formed by and to the desired shape by the preliminary mould, preferably using pressure or heat and pressure, the pre-form is removed therefrom and transferred to a final mould which will impart the final product shape to the pre-form. The final shape may involve the provision of ribs, areas of different thicknesses, areas of different densities, complex curved shapes, planar surfaces and many other different features. The development of such features may be the function of differing heat and pressure applications, and over varying times, calculated to give the desired characteristics for the moulded pulp product. Accordingly, levels of rigidity, dryness, insulation, barrier properties and other properties may vary within a product and between products.
[0041] Thus, for any given product design, the pre-form and final form moulds will involve designing the moulds to apply different amounts of heat and pressure in different locations to create areas of differing shapes, thicknesses and densities in walls, differing rib and fin densities, and other product shape characteristics in order, for example, to retain or disburse heat (as an insulator) or physical shock, as required by the end product.
[0042] Preferably, the moulded product is formed in two stages as outlined above, and the printing is applied to the pulp after the first moulding process, but before the second moulding process by a printing process. The printing is designed so that, during the final moulding process, the printed material, when conformed to the final complex moulded shape, presents an image which may be easily identified, read and understood, or scanned. Decoration, in the form of embossing, raised or depressed areas which accentuate or complement the printing may occur either in the preliminary or secondary moulding, in both, or progressively, that is the same areas partially raised or depressed in the preliminary moulding are then further depressed or raised in the secondary moulding. Thus, the printing and decorating that occurs on the pre-form prior to forming the final shape is formed into identifiable indicia, logos, recognisable printing or recognisable decoration when the pre-form is subsequently processed in the final mould to its final shape.
[0043] Products of some embodiments of the invention may take the form of a complex shape, such as a food container in the shape of an animal head, such as the head of a monkey. With such a product, the pre-form may be in the shape of two connected parts of a polyhedral having multiple planar surfaces each of which can be easily printed with a decoration or design. During final moulding, the printed polyhedral halves are formed into the lower and upper head shapes of multiple, complex curves in the shape of, for example, a monkey's head, and the printed surfaces take the shape, form and appearance of the facial features of the monkey's head, including eyes, nose and ears. The edges of each container half are designed to meet and are shaped and printed in the form of the mouth. Such a novel container may have many uses in the food industry, such as a container for takeaway food products, confectionery, or the like; or as packaging for a wide variety of personal care goods such as perfume and toiletries.
[0044] Products made in accordance with embodiments of the present invention may take any shape or form that is able to be moulded using pulp moulding techniques. Thus, high quality moulded pulp products with sophisticated printing and decoration may be produced relatively cheaply to replace products of other relatively expensive materials such as synthetic plastics.
[0045] In preferred embodiments of the invention, the design of the print or decoration to be applied to the two dimensional surfaces of the pre-form is developed so that, when the surfaces are moulded to complex curves, the printing and/or decoration takes up a desired appearance, which may be in the form of printed letters, pictures, logos or other indicia. The printing is therefore designed to be developed, on moulding from a planar to a curved shape, to the required finished appearance of lettering or the like, including barcodes or other product identification information. During the moulding process, the printed material on the planar or two dimensional curved surfaces morphs or transmutes into the shapes and appearance on the complex curved shapes on the moulded surfaces to display the desired finished appearance. Thus, the printing may expand or contract with the change in the shape of the surface on which it is printed.
[0046] Preferably, the inks or other fluid, or powder, that is used for the printing are selected from inks, powders or fluids having the necessary elasticity, colour depth, high drawing and opaqueness to be able to deform, during moulding, without colour change, separation and undesired intensity variation. The ink or other coating compound must also be able to withstand the pressures and heat used during the secondary moulding stage. The processes of preferred embodiments of the invention, however, are particularly relevant to designs with lettering, barcodes, logos and the like on the finished moulded product. This may use an anamorphic projection to modify the aspect ratio of the finished graphic design by optical distortion to stretch or compress the image in various dimensions so that the design is faithfully reproduced in the finished form from a distorted initial image printed on the two dimensional surfaces. A computer assisted design program may be used to transfer the design directly or through the more traditional reprographic methods onto a carrier film, into an automated printing machine or print spray machine as required by the end product design. An optimum target point of decoration on the pre-form is identified, using a deformation grid to ensure that the anamorphic distortion is able to be distorted to a predictable extent during final moulding.
[0047] The surfaces of the pre-form to which printing is to be applied, which surfaces may be planar or curved in one direction, such as part cylindrical or conical surfaces, can have the printing applied thereto by one or more of many known printing processes. For example, the printing step or steps may be performed using offset letterpress printing, in which the shaped pre-form is supported by a mandrel or the like, which may also serve as the male element of the pre-form mould. A dry offset letterpress process may combine desired colours onto a single transfer printing head which then applies the “wet” ink in a single pass.
[0048] In other embodiments, an “in-mould” process may be used whereby a pre-printed piece of carrier film is inserted into the pre-form mould and the print thereon is then transferred to the pulp pre-form by heat, pressure or adhesive. The carrier material of the film can then be removed from the mould or from the moulded pre-form at the end of the moulding cycle. The carrier film can also be used to laminate the exterior of the pulp pre-form, if desired. The pre-printed film may be fully registered within the mould by means of lugs or other registration processes to ensure that the printed material is properly and accurately applied to the pre-form during the print transfer process. The direct transfer cylinders, labels or the print transfer film may be printed with a combination of specific single colours, which could either be referenced directly to a commercial colour palette (such as pantone), or be a specific mix based on a non-palette hue, or in any of the full colour process techniques (cmyk/hexachrome) to create an accurate representation of photographic/illustrative/graphic elements/indicia/text and data related devices (barcodes/RFID etc). Special effect inks, finishes and beneficial coatings can also be applied at this time, these are able to increase some of the physical or visual aspects of the product. This can include, but is not limited to, increasing resistance to scuffing, delivering anti-counterfeiting, magnetic or UV inks to allow for increased product security, sealing varnishes to prevent or resist contamination of the pulp substrate by biological or chemical elements (anti-fungal etc), reactive coatings which can highlight, by physical change (typically colour change) additional information to pack users, such as product contamination, product temperature, freshness levels etc.
[0049] A further process which may be used with embodiments of the invention include a pad printing process which involves applying the decoration to a semi-malleable, or resilient pad which is then engaged with surfaces of the pre-form. The image may be transferred to the pad from a printing plate, and the semi-malleable pad is able to transfer the image to the pre-fomm even when some surfaces of the pre-form are uneven or have small curves to which the semi-malleable pad is able to conform.
[0050] Screen printing processes may also be used to print images onto the surfaces of the pre-form. The screen printing process may be beneficial when it is needed to apply high build inks or when applying other surface treatments to the pre-form. Such other surface treatments may include specific coatings to improve the barrier properties of the material, tactile coatings to improve grip or create Braille dots, amongst others.
[0051] Combinations of the printing processes referred to above, or other known printing processes may also be adapted for use in performance of embodiments of the present invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF INVENTION
[0052] In order that the invention is more readily understood, embodiments thereof will now be described with reference to the accompanying drawings wherein:
[0053] FIG. 1 is a schematic illustration of one embodiment of the process of forming a moulded pulp product;
[0054] FIG. 2 is a schematic illustration of another embodiment of the invention;
[0055] FIG. 3 is a schematic illustration of a further embodiment of the invention;
[0056] FIG. 4 is a schematic illustration of a still further embodiment of the invention;
[0057] FIG. 5 is a perspective view of a printed pre-form of one embodiment of a product moulded from pulp material in accordance with an embodiment of the invention; and
[0058] FIG. 6 is a perspective view of the final moulded product of FIG. 5 .
[0059] FIG. 7 shows the detailed packaging available from the invention when applied to a popular confectionery product.
[0060] FIG. 8 shows another example of the invention.
[0061] Referring to FIG. 1 , a product 12 moulded from pulp material is in the form of a cup having a complex outer surface shape with a plurality of ribs 14 which may be of different thicknesses and spacings to provide insulation, crush-resistance and other characteristics to the cup product 12 .
[0062] A slurry 16 of pulp material as hereinbefore defined is mixed in a container 17 , and the desired additives to produce desired end-product characteristics are added to the slurry 16 . Such additives may include chalk, fabric material, and the like known in the art of pulp moulding. The fibre content and moisture levels of the pulp slurry 16 are controlled so as to obtain maximum control over the deform characteristics of the pulp during the moulding processes and to thereby obtain control of the deformation profile and retention of the subsequently applied decoration or other printed material. Preferably, the moisture level of the slurry 16 in the container 17 is between 100% and 600% by weight (total weight/dry weight), more preferably between 200% and 450%, and, in some embodiments, between 300% and 400% by weight. It will be understood that the moisture content will depend to a large extent on the nature of the fibres in the slurry.
[0063] A preliminary, or pre-form mould 18 is prepared so as to have planar and/or two dimensional curved surfaces, such as cylindrical or conical surfaces, to which printing or other coatings may be easily applied. In the illustrated embodiment, the pre-form mould 18 has a substantially conical form, to produce a pre-form with a conical outer surface 20 . A framed mesh 19 , which is in the form of the preliminary mould is dipped into the slurry 16 and lifts out a mat 21 of the pulp material from the slurry 16 in the container 17 . The mat 21 is offered up to the matching part of the preliminary mould by the shaped mesh platen 19 where it is formed into the pre-form 22 using, air pressure, heat or other moulding processes which set the overall material parameters of the pulp product and the initial characteristics of the product shape. These characteristics include the volume of pulp material in the product, the uniformity of wall thickness, initial density and product size. The pre-form mould also removes a proportion of the liquid from the pulp mat 21 by applying a highly controlled amount of heat and pressure, and extracting steam through the mesh and through special vents 30 built into the opposing part of the preliminary mould (note, typically these vents are placed so as not to align with print areas as they cause a change in surface texture which interferes with the printing process) so that the pre-form is able to receive printed material thereon.
[0064] When the pre-form 22 is released from the mould 18 , it is not self-supporting because there is still a high moisture content within the pulp, to allow deformation at the final stage. It is held onto the preliminary mould by suction. At this point it has the shape of a hollow, frustroconical container matching the shape of the pre-form mould 18 . The outer, conical surface 20 of the pre-form 22 is then able to be printed with appropriate printing and/or decoration using, for example, a dry, offset letterpress printing process schematically indicated at 23 , or using offset photolithography, or other printing processes.
[0065] The image printed onto the two dimensional conical surface of the pre-form 22 is an anamorphic projection which is designed so that, when the final product 12 is moulded, the printed indicia takes the desired form and shape required for the finished product. To create an accurate model for the distortion profile there are two distinct methods, the first is to utilise a printed grid with either uniform or otherwise predetermined pattern. A typical grid would use either an XY format or concentric circle. The product to be manufactured is then printed with the grid and the process of shaping and distorting is completed to create a finished product. The grid on the finished product will typically be distorted and mapping the final co-ordinates of this grid against the pre-deformed co-ordinates allows the creation of a distortion map. The other method is based on profiling the material to ascertain its deformation characteristics. This data would then be used to create a virtual distortion map which would then enable specific computer aided design software to predict the final level of distortion across any given shape. The mapping of the distortion across the surface, real or virtual, then enables the accurate pre-distortion of the original image/insignia/type/device so that it, the design, is faithfully reproduced in the finished form from the projection printed on the two dimensional surfaces. This form and shape may include the reproduction of lettering, barcodes, logos, images or any other design or decoration to be identified on the outer surface of the finished product 12 .
[0066] The printed pre-form 22 is then transferred to the final mould 24 where it is subjected to heat and/or pressure to cause the pre-form 22 to conform to the shape of the final mould 24 . This shape includes the ribs 14 on the finished product 12 , which ribs 14 have complex shapes. The transformation of the printing on the two dimensional surface of pre-form 22 to the three dimensional shapes formed in the final product 12 require the inks used during the printing process to be able to be deformed, stretched, compressed or otherwise transmuted to the desired form on the finished product 12 .
[0067] Referring to FIG. 2 , this embodiment is similar to that of FIG. 1 except that there are two separate preliminary mould processes before the final moulding. The first is where the shaped mesh platen lifts the pulp mat into the preliminary mould and a low heat (approx 50 degrees Celsius) and pressure is applied to create a loosely tamped version of the pre-form 22 . As the pre-form mould opens, the pre-form is held onto the mould by suction, to give adequate support for the ensuing printing process. Then the indicia is applied to the pre-form 22 comprising a pre-printed label or film 26 which is applied to the pre-form. Appropriate tabs, or lugs 27 or other means, may be used to orient the label in the desired position within the pre-form mould 18 . The pre-form mould then closes again, and heat and pressure are applied, under close parameters. The key here is to melt the heat release coating on the film, such that the ink is able to transfer to the wet pulp, and also to apply adequate pressure for the ink to bind and adhere to the pulp, whilst retaining enough moisture content within the pulp to allow for deformation inside the final moulding process. In one particular embodiment a temperature of 175 degrees Celsius, for one second combined with a pressure of 400 Kpa is sufficient.
[0068] This process is the optimum one for this embodiment of the invention, because it allows for a fast-moving automated process. When the product is relatively flat, the film may be advanced over the pre-form 22 whilst being held on an opposing pair of rollers. As the process proceeds then each section of used film is advanced from one spool or roller onto the opposing spool or roller. In some cases, where the finished article has a deep recess, and it is not practical to lay the print film over the product, then the film is cut into pieces and positioned in the pre-form mould 18 , thereafter the rest of the process remains the same.
[0069] The label carrier film may either act as a laminate on the pre-form surface where it actually adheres to the surface, or may be ejected from the pre-form mould 18 on completion of the pre-form moulding process. The pre-form 22 is then transferred to the final mould 24 where the final product 12 is produced, with the shapes, texts and designs on the printed material transmuting to the desired appearance on the finished product 12 . A higher heat is applied, typically 200 degrees Celsius, and all moisture extracted from the pulp by means of steam extraction vents, which are all placed on the opposing face of the pulp to the printed face.
[0070] Where in-mould and release film methods are used in the invention, a stable film is used, such as a Garfilm ERC film (trademark), onto which is applied a Heat Release coating, typically at a coverage in the region of 2.7 gsm film weight. Then a specific high-draw ink is used to print on the images or text, using a system with an engraved gravure cylinder with a line screen ranging between 110 and 200 lines per inch. The ink contains the usual additives to increase scuff resistance and adhesion, flexibility and specifically draw (which is required because of the distortion during the re-form process). Heat is then applied to the rear of the film so that the release coating forms a film with the ink, partially bonding with it, which further increases the adhesion and transfer to the pulp. At this stage the printed film is stable and can be transported or stored if required. Once ready for use the film is used either in pre-cut pieces or direct from a roll. As the product emerges from the preliminary mould, it is retained on the male component of the mould by suction applied through the vents in the mould designed for this purpose, and for the purpose of steam extraction. The film is placed onto the planar surfaces designed to receive it. Then the female mould is re-applied and heat applied, typically 150 degrees Celsius, for one second combined with a pressure of 400 Kpa. Referring to FIG. 3 , in this embodiment, the printed design is applied to the conical outer surface of the pre-form 22 by a resilient pad 29 , such as that known as a Tampo (trade mark) pad or similar, which is sufficiently malleable to facilitate printing onto uneven surfaces. Pad Printing is a relative of gravure printing. The inked image is created on an etched flat plate (cliché) in a manner similar to gravure (in the surface rather than proud or in relief as in letterpress or flexographic printing). A large, resilient silicone rubber pillow (the pad) is pressed against the cliché. The ink pattern is transferred to the pad, which is subsequently pressed against the substrate (in this case the pulp pre-form). Process (4 colour) printing can be accomplished by using several printing stations in sequence. The key feature of pad printing is the ability to print highly irregular surfaces. The resilient pad transferring the ink can conform intimately to surprisingly asymmetric and uneven surfaces. The resilient transfer pad lifts the image from the plate (cliché) etched with the decorative image prior to engaging the pad with the outer surface 20 of the pre-form 22 . The printed pre-form 22 is then moulded to the final product 12 as previously described.
[0071] FIG. 4 illustrates an embodiment wherein the pre-form 22 is printed using a screen printing technique. The screen mesh 28 is contacted by the surface of the pre-form 22 and the print is applied from the screen to the pre-form surface. The screen mesh 28 may be rotated around the axis of the pre-form 22 or the pre-form may be rotated and rolled along the planar surface of the screen mesh 28 . Many forms of screen printing are known and may be adapted for use in embodiments of the present invention.
[0072] As shown in FIGS. 5 and 6 , a product 12 , having a complex outer surface shape moulded from pulp material, in this case, a hemispherical bowl, can be printed or decorated in such a manner that decorative material in the form of letters, codes, logos or the like printed as an anamorphic projection 31 on the conical side surface 34 and planar top surface 33 of the pre-form 22 is recognisable and identifiable when the pre-form 22 is re-shaped to exhibit the complex curved surface 36 . In the embodiment illustrated, the lettering 31 as an anamorphic projection is able to be printed by simple printing techniques on the flat top surface 33 and two dimensional side surface 34 . The final moulding process causes the printed material to change shape to exhibit the desired properties.
[0073] Embodiments of the invention thus facilitate the manufacture of a multitude of moulded products using pulp material, the moulded products having complex shapes which, nonetheless, are able to be printed or decorated to produce attractive, aesthetically pleasing and/or informative products.
[0074] It will be appreciated by persons skilled in the art that numerous variations and/or modifications may be made to the invention as shown in the specific embodiments without departing from the spirit or scope of the invention as broadly described. The present embodiments are, therefore, to be considered in all respects as illustrative and not restrictive.
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A method of forming a moulded and printed product from pulp material including the steps of: forming a pre-form mould to have one or more planar surfaces, compound conjoined planar surfaces and/or two dimensional curved surfaces; transferring an amount of pulp slurry material to the pre-form mould; forming a moulded pre-form from the transferred pulp slurry material; applying printing to the planar and/or dimensional curved surfaces in a pre-distorted configuration; and moulding the printed pre-form to a different final shape whereby the printed surfaces retain the printing without running and the printing conforms to a desired post distortion configuration.
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CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION
[0001] This application is a continuation of U.S. application Ser. No. 11/764808 filed Aug. 12, 2007 all of which is herein incorporated by reference.
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
[0002] The present invention relates to the field of inkjet printers. In particular, the invention concerns printheads with heater elements that vaporize ink to eject an ink droplet from the nozzle.
CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0003] The following patents or patent applications filed by the applicant or assignee of the present invention are hereby incorporated by cross-reference.
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7,111,935
7,562,971
7,735,982
7,604,322
7,261,482
7,002,664
10/760,252
7,088,420
11/446,233
7,470,014
7,470,020
7,540,601
7,654,761
7,377,635
7,686,446
7,237,888
7,168,654
7,201,272
6,991,098
7,217,051
6,944,970
10/760,215
7,108,434
7,210,407
7,186,042
6,920,704
7,217,049
7,607,756
7,147,102
7,287,828
7,249,838
7,431,446
7,611,237
7,261,477
7,225,739
7,712,886
7,665,836
7,419,053
7,191,978
10/962,426
7,524,046
10/962,417
7,163,287
7,258,415
7,322,677
7,258,424
7,484,841
7,195,412
7,207,670
7,270,401
7,220,072
7,588,381
7,726,785
11/585,925
7,578,387
11/706,298
7,575,316
7,384,206
7,628,557
7,470,074
7,425,063
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7,556,446
7,367,267
11/754,359
7,695,204
7,322,761
11/223,021
7,735,994
7,079,292
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0004] The present invention involves the ejection of ink drops by way of forming gas or vapor bubbles in a bubble forming liquid. This principle is generally described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,747,120 to Stemme.
[0005] There are various known types of thermal inkjet (Bubblejet™ is owned by Canon K.K.) printhead devices. Two typical devices of this type, one made by Hewlett Packard and the other by Canon, have ink ejection nozzles and chambers for storing ink adjacent the nozzles. Each chamber is covered by a so-called nozzle plate which is mechanically secured to the walls of the chamber. These devices also include heater elements in thermal contact with ink that is disposed adjacent the nozzles, for heating the ink thereby forming gas bubbles in the ink. The gas bubbles generate pressures in the ink causing ink drops to be ejected through the nozzles.
[0006] Thermal inkjet printheads are traditionally prone to overheating. The rapid successive vaporization of ink during printing can build up heat in the printhead. If too much builds up in the printhead, the ink will boil in an uncontrolled manner. This heat is removed from the printhead either by an active cooling system or with heats sinks and the use of small nozzle arrays. The overheating problem has limited the firing frequency of the nozzles and printhead size, both of which reduce the print speed.
[0007] The Applicant has developed a range of pagewidth printheads that overcome the problem of excess heat generation. The large pagewidth arrays and high nozzle firing frequencies provide print speeds in excess of 60 pages per minute at full color 1600 dpi resolution. These printheads avoid excess heat generation by reducing the energy used by the heaters to eject the drops of ink. The heat input to the printhead by the heaters is removed from the printhead by the ejected drops of ink.
[0008] One aspect of reducing the energy required to eject drops of ink is a reduction in the mass of the ejected drop, and hence the volume of the drop. The Applicant's ‘self cooling’ printheads eject drops of about 1 pl to 2 pl (pico-liters). Unfortunately drop volumes this small are susceptible to trajectory misdirection. The trajectory of the ejected drop is particularly sensitive to the nozzle geometry and the shape of the bubble generated by the heater element. It will be appreciated that any misdirection of the ejected ink drops is detrimental to print quality.
[0009] Fluidic symmetry around the heater is not possible unless the heater is suspended directly over the ink inlet. The Applicant has developed printheads with this arrangement (see U.S. Pat. No. 6,755,509 filed Nov. 23, 2002—Our Docket MJT001US), however there are production efficiencies and nozzle density gains available if multiple ink chambers are supplied from a single ink supply channel through the supporting wafer. This requires that the individual chambers are supplied with ink through lateral inlets—that is, inlets extending parallel to the planes of the heaters and the nozzles. As the heater is laterally bounded by the chamber walls except for the ink inlet, the bubble generated by the heater is distorted by this asymmetry. The inlet can be lengthened and or narrowed to increase its fluidic resistance to back flow caused by the bubble. This will reduce the fluidic asymmetry caused by the inlet but also increase the chamber refill times because of the higher flow resistance.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0010] Accordingly, the present invention provides a printhead for an inkjet printer, the printhead comprising:
[0011] an array of nozzles each defining a planar ejection aperture;
[0012] a plurality heater elements corresponding to each of the nozzles respectively, each heater element formed as a planar structure, the heater element having opposing sides positioned parallel to the plane of the ejection aperture, the opposing sides defining a two dimensional shape with two orthogonal axes of symmetry and during use the heater element generates a vapor bubble that is asymmetrical about at least one of the axes of symmetry; wherein,
[0013] the ejection aperture has a centroid that is offset from the centroid of the two dimensional shape of the heater element in a direction parallel to the plane of the ejection aperture.
[0014] The invention is predicated on the realization that misdirected drop trajectories caused by asymmetries in the vapor bubble can be compensated for by offsetting the nozzle centroid from the heater centroid. The ordinary worker in this field will understand that the centroid is a point at the geometric centre of a two dimensional shape.
[0015] The vapor bubble generated by the heater can be asymmetrical because of the configuration of the heater relative to the nozzle and the ink inlet. As the bubble grows, it not only forces ink from the nozzle but also creates a small back flow of ink through the ink inlet. The back flow is usually negligible compared to the ink ejected because the fluidic drag resisting flow out of the inlet compared to flow out of the nozzle is very high. If the ink inlet is at the side of the chamber (that is, the inlet flow is parallel to the plane of the heater and the nozzle), the small back flow of ink allows the bubble to skew towards the ink inlet. The pressure pulse through the ink is likewise skewed and meets one side of the ejection aperture slightly before the other side.
[0016] The ink drop ejected through the nozzle will trail a thin stem of ink behind it immediately after ejection. Eventually the momentum of the drop overcomes the surface tension in the trailing stem of ink to break the stem so that the drop completely separates from the printhead. With a skewed pressure pulse ejecting the drop, the trailing stem of ink pins to one particular side or part of the ejection aperture. Before the thin stem of ink between the nozzle and the ejected drop breaks, the surface tension in the stem can drag the droplet away from a trajectory normal to the plane of the nozzles. This causes consistent droplet misdirection. However, the invention addresses this by offsetting the heater and nozzle from each other so that the pressure pulse is much less skewed when it is incident on the nozzle aperture.
[0017] Preferably, the printhead further comprising a plurality of chambers in fluid communication with each of the nozzles respectively, each of the chambers adapted to hold printing fluid in contact with each of the heater elements respectively, wherein the chamber has a printing fluid inlet that defines a fluid path that extends parallel to the plane of the heater element. In a further preferred form, the chambers defines walls extending generally transverse to the plane of the heater element, the walls surrounding the heater element except for an opening defining one end of the printing fluid inlet. In a particularly preferred form, the ejection aperture centroid is offset from the centroid of the two dimensional shape of the heater element in a direction away from the printing fluid inlet.
[0018] Optionally, the ejection aperture is elliptical. In another option, the heater element is a rectangular beam. In some embodiments, the major axis of the elliptical ejection aperture is parallel to the longitudinal extent of the rectangular beam heater element.
[0019] Preferably, the heater element is a rectangular beam suspended in the chamber. In a further preferred form, the vapor bubble vents to atmosphere through the ejection aperture.
[0020] Preferably, the ejection aperture centroid is offset from the centroid of the two dimensional shape of the heater element in a direction parallel to the major axis of the ejection aperture.
[0021] Preferably, the nozzle is formed in a roof layer that partially defines the chamber, and the roof layer and the walls of the chamber are integrally formed.
[0022] In some embodiments, the heater element is a rectangular beam and the chamber is less than 40 microns wide in a direction transverse to the rectangular beam, and less than 80 microns long in the elongate direction of the rectangular beam. In these embodiments, it is preferable when the vapor bubble ejects a drop of printing fluid through the ejection aperture, the drop having a volume between 1 pl and 2 pl.
[0023] Preferably the offset is less than 20 microns. In a further preferred form, the offset is less than 5 microns. In a particularly preferred form, the offset is between 1 micron and 3 microns.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0024] Preferred embodiments of the present invention will now be described by way of example only with reference to the accompanying drawings in which:
[0025] FIGS. 1 to 5 schematically shows the ejection of a drop of ink from a prior art printhead without any offset between the nozzle and the heater;
[0026] FIG. 6 is a partial plan view of a printhead with offset heater and nozzle;
[0027] FIG. 7 is a partial section view taken along line 7 - 7 of FIG. 6 ; and,
[0028] FIGS. 8 to 13 schematically shows the ejection of a drop of ink from a printhead with the nozzle and the heater offset from each other.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
[0029] FIGS. 1 to 5 sketch the ejection stages of a misdirected drop of ink from a prior art printhead. The printhead structure is a simplified representation of the printheads described in detail in U.S. Ser. No. 11/246,687 (Our Docket MNN001US) filed Oct. 11, 2005, the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference. While the invention is described here with reference to this particular printhead design, it will be appreciated that this is purely illustrative and in no way restrictive on the printheads to which the invention can be applied.
[0030] Referring to FIG. 1 , a unit cell of an inkjet printhead 2 is shown. The unit cell is the smallest repeatable unit making up the printhead—in this case the ink supply channel 4 extending from the supply side 6 of the wafer substrate 10 , to the ejection side 8 of the wafer substrate, the nozzle 14 , the chamber 16 , the suspended beam heater 18 with its contacts 20 and associated CMOS drive circuitry 12 .
[0031] The heater 18 is a thin rectangular strip suspended as a beam over a trench 24 in the floor of the chamber 16 . The centroid of the top surface rectangle shape of the heater 18 is simply the intersection of the rectangle's diagonals. The nozzle 14 is an ellipse so the centroid is simply the intersection of the major and minor axes. As described in the above referenced U.S. Ser. No. 11/246,687 (Our Docket MNN001US) filed Oct. 11, 2005 the roof layer 22 is formed by CVD of silicon nitride and the nozzles 14 subsequently etched. Hence the centroids of the nozzle and the heater are closely aligned.
[0032] FIG. 1 shows the nucleation of the vapor bubble 26 around the heater 18 . It begins with film boiling of the ink directly in contact with the heater surface. In FIG. 2 , the vapor bubble 26 has grown and has forced a bulb of ink 28 through the nozzle 14 . A stem 30 of ink trails behind the bulb 28 and pins to the edges of the nozzle 14 . The pressure pulse in the chamber 16 also causes a small backflow 34 of ink through the chamber inlet 32 .
[0033] FIG. 3 shows the bubble 26 immediately before it vents to atmosphere through the nozzle 14 . The ejected drop 28 is still connected to the ink in the chamber by the thin stem of ink 30 . The backflow 34 of ink through the chamber inlet 32 has allowed the bubble 26 to widen and flatten on the inlet side 40 , while the side 42 constrained by the chamber walls 44 has grown to the roof layer 22 and one side 38 of the nozzle 14 . The bubble surface 40 is still spaced from the opposing side 38 of the nozzle 14 .
[0034] In FIG. 4 , the thin stem of ink 30 is shown immediately before the momentum of the ejected drop 28 overcomes the surface tension of the ink and breaks the connection to the side 32 of the nozzle 14 . The bubble 26 has vented to atmosphere through the nozzle 14 . However, as the bubble is always first incident on the nozzle aperture at the side 38 , the stem 30 invariably pins to the side 32 . The side 32 is spaced from the centre line 50 of the nozzle 14 . The surface tension acting on the stem has a component acting normal to the centre line 50 . As a result, the centre of mass 46 of the drop 28 is pulled away from the centre line 50 until the stem 30 breaks. The drop trajectory 48 now deviates from the centre line 50 by the angle A.
[0035] FIG. 5 shows the now separated drop 28 continuing along it's deviated trajectory 48 . The bubble has become an ink meniscus 52 in the chamber 16 rapidly shrinking toward the nozzle 14 under the action of surface tension. This draws a refill flow 54 of ink through the inlet 32 and the process repeats when the heater 18 is next actuated.
[0036] The invention takes the asymmetry of the bubble into account and offsets the heater and nozzle accordingly. FIGS. 6 and 7 show this arrangement. The plan view shown in FIG. 6 , the nozzle aperture centroid 56 is slightly offset from the heater centroid 58 by a distance D. The offset D of the nozzle 14 is away from the chamber inlet 32 to counter the bubble asymmetry caused by ink back flow.
[0037] As seen in FIG. 7 , the spacing between the plane of the heater and the plane of the nozzle is not the relevant offset—only the displacement of the heater centroid 58 relative to the nozzle centroid 56 in the plane of the nozzle aperture 14 . It will also be appreciated that centroid of the heater is a reference to the entire heater element structure. It may be the case that the heater has several parallel beams extending between the electrodes 20 . The bubbles generated by each individual beam will coalesce into a single bubble that ejects the ink from the nozzle. Accordingly, the nozzle centroid 56 is to be offset from a centroid of the overall two dimensional shape of the heater element(s) that generate the coalesced bubble.
[0038] FIGS. 8 to 13 schematically illustrates the drop ejection process using a printhead according to the present invention. FIG. 8 shows the unit cell 2 in the quiescent state. The chamber 16 is primed with ink which completely immerses the heater 18 . The heater 18 is powered by contacts 20 in the CMOS drive circuitry 12 . The CMOS 12 is supported on the underlying silicon wafer 10 . The ink supply channel 4 fluidically connects the supply side 6 and the ejection side 8 of the printhead IC. Ink flows to the individual chamber 16 via the inlets 32 . The nozzles 14 are etched into the roof layer 22 such that the heater centroid 58 is offset from the nozzle centroid 56 by a distance D in the plane of the nozzle aperture.
[0039] In FIG. 9 , the heater 18 has received a drive pulse and film boiling at the heater surface nucleates the bubble 26 . The increased pressure in the chamber forces the ink meniscus at the nozzle 14 to bulge outwardly and begin forming the drop 28 . In FIG. 10 , the bubble 26 grows and forces more ink from the chamber 16 out of the nozzle 16 . It also starts a small back flow 34 in the inlet 32 . As the bubble 26 expands further (see FIG. 11 ) the side 40 facing the inlet 32 is unconstrained and has a flatter, broader profile. In contrast, the side 44 facing the away from the inlet 32 is constrained so the bubble has a taller profile on this side. However, as the nozzle 14 is offset away from the inlet 32 by the distance D, the bubble 26 is approximately the same distance from the nozzle edge 36 as it is from the nozzle edge 38 .
[0040] If the printhead is of the type that vents the bubble 26 through the nozzle to avoid the cavitation corrosion of a bubble collapse point, the bubble will ideally contact all points on the nozzle's periphery simultaneously. This is shown in FIG. 12 . As the bubble 26 touches the edge 36 and the edge 38 at the same time so the stem 30 trailing the drop 28 is not induced to pin itself at one specific location on the nozzle periphery. Consequently, as shown in FIG. 13 , when the stem 3 breaks and the drop 28 separates, it has not been dragged away from the centroidal axis 50 of the nozzle by surface tension in the ink. The ejection trajectory stays on the centroidal axis of the nozzle 14 .
[0041] Also shown in FIG. 13 , the vented bubble becomes an ink meniscus 52 within the chamber 16 . Surface tension drives the meniscus to the smallest surface area possible so it rapidly contracts to span the nozzle aperture 14 . This draws the refill flow 54 of ink through the inlet 32 .
[0042] The magnitude of nozzle offset will depend on a large number of variables such as chamber configuration, the dimensions of the heater, nozzle, and roof layer height and the nozzle shape. However, in most cases the offset need only be relatively small. For example, the unit cell of the printhead described in the above referenced U.S. Ser. No. 11/246,687 (Our Docket MNN001US) filed Oct. 11, 2005, has chambers of 32 microns wide and less than 80 microns from the ink supply channel to outside of the chamber end wall (opposite the inlet). In these printheads, offsetting the nozzle centroid from the heater centroid by less than 5 microns was sufficient to address instances of drop misdirection. As these printhead unit cells are particularly small relative to other prior art printhead unit cells, the maximum offset necessary for the vast majority of so called ‘roof-shooter’ printheads would be 20 microns. In the Applicant's range of printheads, most offsets would be between 1 and 3 microns.
[0043] The present invention has been defined herein by way of example only. The skilled addressee would readily recognize many variations and modifications which do not depart from the spirit ad scope of the broad invention concept.
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An inkjet nozzle assembly includes: a nozzle chamber having a planar roof spaced apart from a floor, the roof having a nozzle aperture defined therein; and a heater element disposed in the nozzle chamber, the heater element being configured as a planar beam extending longitudinally and parallel with a plane of the roof. The nozzle aperture is elliptical having a centroid, a major axis and a minor axis, the major axis of the nozzle aperture is parallel with a longitudinal axis of the beam, the centroid of the nozzle aperture is offset from a longitudinal centroid of the planar beam, and the minor axis of the nozzle aperture overlaps with a whole width of the beam.
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REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] This application is a division of U.S. application Ser. No. 14/619,205 filed Feb. 11, 2015, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated in its entirety by reference herein.
TECHNICAL FIELD
[0002] This disclosure relates to protective structures for battery enclosures for electric vehicle batteries.
BACKGROUND
[0003] Electric vehicles use batteries that are enclosed in an enclosure or housing that is assembled to the vehicle body. The battery may be assembled to the vehicle body at a location that is spaced from the front, rear and sides of the vehicle. For example, the battery may be assembled below the passenger compartment, in the trunk, in front of the passenger compartment or in a longitudinally extending tunnel.
[0004] The battery must be protected from damage in a collision. The battery housing may be tightly packed with lithium ion battery packs or other types of battery cells. Deformation of the battery housing is to be avoided to prevent intrusion of the housing into the area housing the battery cells. Intrusions into the battery housing may rupture of battery cells and spill the contents of the battery cells.
[0005] When the battery housing is assembled in a central location in the vehicle, e.g. beneath the passenger compartment, limited crush space is available between the side of the vehicle body and the battery enclosure. More crush space is available between the battery enclosure and the front or rear ends of the vehicle. In either situation, there is a long felt and unfulfilled need for an efficient and effective lightweight structure for absorbing energy from a collision that minimizes battery enclosure deformation. The structure must have limited package space requirements while providing added stiffness to the battery enclosure assembly including the impact absorbing structure.
[0006] Some approaches to protecting the battery enclosure have proposed adding beams and cross members on the battery enclosure or extending outboard of the battery enclosure. These approaches add weight to the vehicle and require additional space to package the beams and cross members. Added weight is to be avoided because added weight adversely affects fuel economy. Increasing packaging space requirements adversely affects vehicle design freedom.
[0007] The above problems and other problems are addressed by this disclosure as summarized below.
SUMMARY
[0008] According to one aspect of this disclosure, a housing is disclosed for a traction motor battery of a vehicle. The housing includes a plurality of side walls, a top wall and a bottom wall. Each of the walls includes a plurality of parallel T-shaped guides. The T-shaped guides on the top wall and on the bottom wall extend horizontally and the T-shaped guides on some of the side walls extend vertically. The housing also includes a plurality of elongated attachments assembled between the T-shaped guides.
[0009] According to other aspects of this disclosure, the T-shaped guides may include a pair of cantilevered flanges and a spacing leg that extends from each of the walls to a juncture of the pair of cantilevered flanges. The attachments may include edge portions that have a thickness that is substantially equal to the length of the spacing leg.
[0010] The attachments may include a first edge portion and a second edge portions that are adapted to be received by a pair of parallel T-shaped guides. The attachments may also include a central portion between the first edge portion and the second edge portion that is co-planar with the edge portions. The attachments may include a central portion between the first edge portion and the second edge portion that includes a partially cylindrical wall that protrudes outwardly from the T-shaped guides and connects the first edge portion and the second edge portion. Alternatively, the attachments may include a central portion between the first edge portion and the second edge portion that includes an impact receiving outer face and supporting walls that extend between the central portion and the edge portions.
[0011] The attachments may include a first embodiment including a first central portion between the first edge portion and the second edge portion that includes a first impact receiving outer face and a first pair of supporting walls that extend a depth “D” between the first central portion and the first and second edge portions, and a second embodiment including a second central portion between a third edge portion and a fourth edge portion including a second central portion between the third edge portion and the fourth edge portion that includes a second impact receiving outer face and supporting walls that extend a depth “D” between a second central portion and the third and fourth edge portions, wherein the depth “D” is greater than the depth “d.”
[0012] According to another aspect of this disclosure, the plurality of attachments may include different first and second sets of attachments. The first set of attachments may have a depth “D” measured from the respective wall to an impact receiving surface of the attachment in a direction normal to the wall. The second set of attachments may have a depth “d” measured from the respective wall to an impact receiving surface of the attachment in a direction normal to the wall, wherein the depth “D” is greater than the depth “d.” The attachments may also include a third set of attachments having a depth “d1” measured from the respective wall to an impact receiving surface of the attachment in a direction normal to the wall, wherein the depth “d” is greater than the depth “d1.”
[0013] The attachments may include different types of attachments. A first type of attachment may be provided that has a first central portion between a first edge portion and a second edge portion, wherein the first central portion is partially cylindrical. A second type of attachment may have a second central portion between a third edge portion and a fourth edge portion, wherein the second central portion includes a planar impact receiving outer face. The second type of attachment may include first and second supporting walls that extend between the second central portion and the third and fourth edge portions. Alternatively, the planar impact receiving outer face may be provided on an outer side of a planar reinforcement plate.
[0014] According to another aspect of this disclosure, method is disclosed for providing an impact absorbing enclosure for a battery of a vehicle having a battery powered traction motor. The method comprises providing vertically extending walls that have a plurality of parallel vertical guides providing a plurality of attachments and inserting the attachments between the vertical guides to provide the vertically extending walls with an impact absorbing assembly formed by of the attachments on an outer surface of the vertically extending walls.
[0015] According to other aspects of this disclosure as it relates to the method, the method may further comprise providing horizontally extending walls that having a plurality of parallel horizontally extending guides. Providing a plurality of second attachments and inserting the second attachments between the horizontally extending guides to provide the horizontally extending walls with impact absorbing assembly formed by the second attachments on a second outer surface of the horizontally extending walls.
[0016] According to other alternative aspects of this disclosure the vertically extending guides on the vertical walls may be T-shaped guides and the horizontally extending guides on the horizontal walls may be T-shaped guides. The T-shaped guides may include a spacing leg and a pair of cantilevered flanges, wherein the spacing leg extends from each of the walls to a juncture of the pair of cantilevered flanges. The attachments may include edge portions that have a thickness that is substantially equal to the length of the spacing leg.
[0017] According to other aspects of this disclosure, a peripheral space may be defined by the vehicle around the impact absorbing enclosure that is available for inserting the attachments includes small areas and large areas. The method may further include: a first additional step of selecting a first set of attachments having a depth “D” measured from the respective wall to an impact receiving surface of the attachment in a direction normal to the wall, and inserting the first set of attachments in the large areas; and a second additional step of selecting a second set of attachments having a depth “d” measured from the respective wall to an impact receiving surface of the attachment in a direction normal to the wall, and inserting the second set of attachments in the small areas, wherein the depth “D” is greater than the depth “d.”
[0018] The method may also relate to a peripheral space defined by the vehicle around the impact absorbing enclosure that is available for inserting the attachments includes a first area having a first configuration and a second area having a second configuration. The method may include the use of a first type of attachment having a partially cylindrical first central portion between a first edge portion and a second edge portion. The method may further include the use of a second type of attachment having a planar second central portion between a third edge portion and a fourth edge portion, wherein the first area is provided with the first type of attachment and the second area is provided with a second type of attachment.
[0019] The above aspects of this disclosure and other aspects are described below with reference to the attached drawings.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0020] FIG. 1 is a diagrammatic bottom plan view of a vehicle illustrating a battery enclosure disposed on the vehicle frame beneath the passenger compartment.
[0021] FIG. 2 is a perspective view of a first embodiment of a battery enclosure including several different types of attachments provided on the sides and top of the enclosure.
[0022] FIG. 3 is a fragmentary enlarged perspective view of a portion of the battery enclosure illustrated in FIG. 2 .
[0023] FIG. 4 is a fragmentary enlarged cross-sectional view of a portion of the battery enclosure illustrated in FIG. 2 .
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
[0024] The illustrated embodiments are disclosed with reference to the drawings. However, it is to be understood that the disclosed embodiments are intended to be merely examples that may be embodied in various and alternative forms. The figures are not necessarily to scale and some features may be exaggerated or minimized to show details of particular components. The specific structural and functional details disclosed are not to be interpreted as limiting, but as a representative basis for teaching one skilled in the art how to practice the disclosed concepts.
[0025] Referring to FIG. 1 , a vehicle 10 is diagrammatically illustrated with a battery 12 for a battery-powered traction motor. The vehicle 10 includes a body 14 that is supported on a frame 16 . A traction motor 18 is also assembled to the frame 16 . The traction motor 18 is a battery-powered traction motor that is powered by the battery 12 to drive the wheels 20 . This disclosure focuses on the enclosure 21 for the battery.
[0026] The body 14 includes a side body 22 , a front bumper 24 and a rear bumper 26 . The battery 12 in the enclosure 21 is shown to be centrally located underneath the passenger compartment of the vehicle 10 . It should be noted that there is a substantially greater amount of space between the battery and the front and rear bumper 24 and 26 compared to the relatively closer spacing of the side body 22 to the battery 12 . Side impact collisions that result in driving the side body 22 toward the battery 12 present a greater challenge when designing attachments for the battery 12 due to the reduced amount of crush space available between the side body 22 and the battery 12 .
[0027] Referring to FIGS. 2-4 , the enclosure, generally indicated by reference numeral 21 , is shown to include a bottom wall 30 (shown in FIG. 1 ) and a top wall 32 . A front wall 36 faces the front bumper 24 (shown in FIG. 1 ) and a rear wall 38 faces the rear bumper 26 (shown in FIG. 1 ). The battery enclosure 21 includes a right side wall 40 and a left side wall 42 . The side walls are joined at corners 44 .
[0028] In the illustrated embodiments three different types of attachments are shown but it should be understood that other configurations and shapes of attachments may be utilized depending in part on the space available within the vehicle. The three types of attachments illustrated include a partially cylindrical attachment 48 , a trapezoidal space defining attachment 50 and a planar attachment 52 .
[0029] The impact absorbing wall 54 of the semi-cylindrical attachment 48 as illustrated in FIGS. 2 and 3 is an arcuate, or semi-cylindrical, wall 54 that forms a semi-cylindrical pocket 56 with the planar wall of the enclosure 21 . The impact absorbing wall 48 is an arcuate shaped elongated member with the arc of the wall being generated about a horizontal axis X when the partially cylindrical attachment 48 is mounted in a horizontal orientation when the partially cylindrical attachment 48 is attached to a top wall 32 or a bottom wall 30 or a vertical axis Y when attached to a vertical wall 36 - 42 . The attachments may also be secured in a horizontal orientation on one or more of the vertical walls. Attachment flanges 58 and 60 are provided on opposite edges of the semi-cylindrical impact absorbing wall.
[0030] The trapezoidal space defining attachment 50 defines a trapezoidal pocket 62 . The attachment 50 includes a spaced wall, or impact absorbing wall 64 , a right ramp wall 66 and a left ramp wall 68 on opposite sides of the impact absorbing wall 64 . The right ramp wall 66 and the left ramp wall 68 extend to right and left attachment flanges 72 and 74 , respectively. As shown the ramp walls 66 and 68 are disposed at about a 45° angle relative to the wall of the enclosure. It should be understood that the orientation of the ramp surfaces could be at any angle or even at a right angle to the wall of the enclosure.
[0031] The planar attachment 52 is a planar member that is attached to one of the walls on the enclosure 21 . The planar attachment 52 has a right edge 76 and a left edge 78 that function as attachment flanges.
[0032] The attachments 48 - 52 are attached to the walls of the enclosure by T-shaped guides 80 that are provided on the enclosure in a parallel orientation. The attachment flanges 58 and 60 of the semi-cylindrical attachment, right and left flanges 72 and 74 of the trapezoidal attachment 50 and edges 76 and 78 are adapted to be received by adjacent T-shaped guides 80 that hold the attachments against the enclosure 21 . The T-shaped guides include a central flange 82 that is attached to a wall on an inner end and extends outwardly to a crossbar 84 . The cross-bar 84 is parallel to the wall of the enclosure to which the T-shaped guide 80 is attached. Generally, one T-shaped guide supports two attachments except at a corner where only one attachment flange requires support.
[0033] Referring to FIG. 4 , the different styles of attachments each have a different depth as measured from the walls and require more or less space. For example, in FIG. 4 the semi-cylindrical attachment 48 is shown to have a depth “D” and the trapezoidal attachment 50 has a depth “d.” Depth “d” is less than depth “D” and would require less packaging space around the enclosure. The depth of the planar attachment is equal to the thickness of the planar attachment 52 and would be less than the depth “d” and would require even less space.
[0034] The ability of the respective attachments to absorb impact energy also varies depending upon the type of attachment. The attachments may be fabricated to have different thicknesses and may be made of different materials including aluminum alloys, steel alloys, fiber reinforced composites or polymers compositions. This disclosure enables the battery enclosure 21 to resist a wide range of impact forces while being accommodated within the packaging space available around the enclosure 21 . Other vehicle components are generally indicated by structure 86 shown in FIG. 4 . The other structure may be frame rails, beams, floor structure, accessories, or the like.
[0035] The T-shaped guides 80 provide a flexible mechanism for supporting the attachments on the enclosure 21 . Changes in the design of a vehicle may impact the space available for the impact absorbing attachments. If there is a reduction in the space available as a result of a design change, a trapezoidal attachment may be substituted for a semi-cylindrical attachment. If a test indicates that additional impact energy absorption is needed on a side or part of one of the sides, stronger or thick attachments may be used or a different style of attachment may be specified.
[0036] The embodiments described above are specific examples that do not describe all possible forms of the disclosure. The features of the illustrated embodiments may be combined to form further embodiments of the disclosed concepts. The words used in the specification are words of description rather than limitation. The scope of the following claims is broader than the specifically disclosed embodiments and also includes modifications of the illustrated embodiments.
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A battery housing for a traction motor battery of a vehicle is disclosed that includes attachments retained by parallel T-shaped guides on the outer surface of the walls of the enclosure. The attachments are oriented to extend either in a horizontal orientation or vertical orientation. The depth of the attachments and shape of the attachments may be selected to meet impact force requirements and packaging space limitations imposed by the structure of the vehicle.
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This application relates to polymeric isocyanate binders and more particularly to a method for forming an isocyanate binder system having an internal release agent and the resinous composition therefor.
Organic polyisocyanates have been recognized for some time as useful competitive alternate binders in the manufacture of particle boards. As known in the art the isocyanate binders, whether in solution or emulsified, are mixed with the wood chip particles utilized as the base for the particle board. A wood chip and binder mixture is then formed into a mat and hot-molded in the desired size. A principal disadvantageous of the use of isocyanate has been the tendency of the molded particle board to adhere to the cauls of the press thereby creating a buildup of wood particles on the caul, which causes succeeding particle board surfaces to be unnecessarily rough. Such a poor release of the cured particle board from the mold or caul surface creates difficulty in the automatic handling of the cauls.
The above drawbacks to the use of organic polyisocyanates as particle board binders can be minimized through the incorporation of certain acid phosphates, their derivatives and mixtures thereof as internal release agents with the organic polyisocyanate, as taught in U.S. Pat. No. 4,257,995. However, when the organic polyisocyanate binders are mixed with such phosphate compounds as taught in U.S. Pat. No. 4,257,995 it has been found the isocyanate mixture suffers from a short shelf life and thus must be used within a short period of time in order to avoid the formation of a hard skin or barrier on the upper surface of the isocyanate mixtures. Because of the existence of this barrier the shelf life of the resulting isocyanate mixture becomes relatively short, thereby limiting the usefulness and effectiveness of an organic polyisocyanate binder incorporating such phosphate internal release agents.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Therefore an object of the subject invention is an improved binder with internal release agent for use with particle boards and the like.
Another object of the subject invention is an improved binder comprising a blend of isocyanate resin and organic esters of ortho-phosphoric acid.
A further object of the subject invention is an improved isocyanate binder having an internal release agent comprising an organic ester of ortho-phosphoric acid where the release agent blended as a furfural solution with the polyisocyanate, for increased stability and improved physical properties on curing.
These and other objects are obtained in accordance with the subject invention wherein there is provided on improved binder which incorporates an internal release agent of an organic ester of ortho-phosphoric acid. More particularly, the invention comprises an improved process for the preparation of particle board in which the wood chips are contacted with a polyisocyanate having about 0.1 percent to 5 percent by weight of the polyisocyanate resin solids present of an organic ester of ortho-phosphoric acid of the formula: ##STR1## including salts and derivative mixtures of such compounds, and polyphosphates of the formula: ##STR2## including the cyclometaphosphates (n-3). In the above formulae each "R" is independently selected from the class consisting of an alyky group having from 3 to 35 carbon atoms inclusive; X=1-3 and Y=0-2. X in each instance may be oxygen or sulfur. Related phosphoric acid esters may be utilized as release agents of the subject invention as further set forth and described in the above identified U.S. Pat. No. 4,257,995.
In the process of the present invention a phosphoric acid ester as identified above is blended with furfural in the desired amounts and, just prior to the time of use, is further blended with the organic polyisocyanate in the desired amounts. The resulting isocyanate binder system, when mixed with wood chips, yields a particle board with good release properties without losing any of the desirable physical properties of a particle board as measured by the internal bond, modulus of rupture, the percent swell, and similar values.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
The binder system of the subject invention comprises a copolymer including a combination of furfural, an isocyanate resin, and an organic ester of phosphoric acid. With the binder system of the subject invention, particle board, among other articles, may be produced by bonding together wood chips or other cellulosic or organic material capable of being compacted, using heat and pressure in the presence of the binder system.
The polyisocyanate component of the binder system can be any organic polyisocyanate which contains at least two isocyanate groups per molecule. Illustrative of organic polyisocyanates are resin based diphenylmethane diisocyanate, m- and p-phenylene diisocyanates, chlorophenylene diisocyanate,α,α,-xylene diisocyanate, 2,4- and 2,6-toluene diisocyanate and the mixtures of these two isomers which are available commercially, triphenylmethane triisocyanates, 4,4'-diisocyanate diphenyl ether, and polymethylene polyphenyl polyisocyanates. Other polyisocyanates are also available in various modified forms and are included within the scope of the subject invention. The polyphenyl polyisocyanates are the preferred polyisocyanates for use in the binder system of the subject invention. Particularly preferred polyphenyl isocyanates are those resins based on 4,4'-diphenylmethane diisocyanate.
The esters of phosphoric acid which may be utilized as release agents in the binder system of the subject invention are, as set forth above, those phosphates of the formula: ##STR3## including salts and derivative mixtures of such compounds, and those polyphosphates of the formula: ##STR4## including the cyclometaphosphates (n=3). where x=1-3, Y=0-2 and R is selected from an alkyl group having from 3-35 carbon atoms. The salts of such compounds, as well as pyrophosphates and other derivatives of such compounds are included within the scope of the invention. X in each instance may be oxygen or sulfur. A primary consideration in determining inclusion within the scope of the invention is its solubility or its capability of being otherwise placed in solution, such as by emulsification, in furfural within the limits set forth below.
The wood particles of preference for use in forming the particle boards with the binder of the subject invention are those obtained from the Douglas fir, preferably in the form of peeler cores, a by-product generally available from plywood mills. The peeler cores are chipped green and then processed through a Pallman flaker to yield a commercial type of flake suitable for structural particle board, as known in the art. After drying, the flakes were screened to remove the fines and packaged in large polyethylene bags until used. As known in the art, particles of other cellulosic materials such as shredded paper, pulp or vegetable fibers such as corn stalks, straws, bagasse and the like, and of non-cellulosic materials such as scrap polyurethane, polyisocyanurate and like polymer foams can also be used. The methods for producing suitable particles are well known and conventional. If desired, mixtures of cellulosic particles may be used.
The binder composition of the subject invention is formed by initially mixing the phosphate release agent with the furfural. Such a release solution enjoys an extended shelf life, showing little or no increase of viscosity over a period of time. The release solution is preferably retained separate from isocyanate resin until just prior to use when it may be admixed to the isocyanate resin. While some increase in viscosity has been observed on standing, the observed shelf life of the isocyanate release solution appears sufficient to preserve its capabilities for at least a couple of days, and certainly for the duration of a shift or overnight at room temperature. These properties represent a vast difference from an isocyanate resin mixture with the phosphate release agent alone which became unusable within a few hours after being mixed together, as stated previously.
The phosphate furfural mixture is formulated to allow addition of both ingredients to the isocyanate resin in the desired amounts. While the phosphate may be added in amounts from 0.1% to 5.0% by weight of the isocyanate resin and the furfural may be added in amounts from 1-50% by weight of the isocyanate resin, the preferred mixture contains from about 0.5-1.5% phosphate and about 15% to 25% furfural, both by weight of the isocyanate resin. The most preferred mixture contains about 1% phosphate and 20% furfural both by weight of the isocyanate resin.
Particle board is traditionally fabricated by spraying the cellulosic or wood chip particles with the components of the binder composition either separately or in combination while the particles are tumbled or agitated in a blender or like mixing apparatus. Generally the binder system is added in an amount equal to 2-8 percent by weight of the cellulosic material based on the dry weight of the particles. If desired other material such as fire retardants, pigments and the like, may also be added to the particles during the blending stage.
After blending sufficiently to form a uniform mixture the coated particles are formed into a loose mat or felt, preferably containing between about 4 percent and 18 percent moisture by weight. The mat is then placed in a heated press (300°-450° F.) between caul plates and compressed (300-700 psi) to consolidate the particles into a board. Pressing times, temperatures, and pressures may vary widely, depending on the thickness of the board produced, the desired density of the board, the size of the particles used and other factors well known in the art. The examples cited herein below were boards prepared with 3 percent resin solids on an oven dry wood basis to form 3/8" thick boards, felted to a target density of 0.6 g/cc and pressed at 500 psi and 350° F. for 7 minutes. The boards thus prepared were tested for modulus of rupture (MOR), internal bond (IB) and percent thickness swell. In addition, a wet MOR or bending strength after 2 hour boil--15 minute cold soak, was conducted. The results of these tests are
TABLE I.sup.a______________________________________Ingredients A B C D______________________________________Isocyanate.sup.b 2.4 2.40 -- 3.0Furfural .6 .57 -- --Phosphate Ester.sup.c -- .03 -- --Wood Chips (dry) 100.0 100.0 100.0 100.0Phenol-formaldehyderesin -- -- .sup.d --IB (psi) 130 136 65 min. 155MOR (psi) 2513 2562 1800 min. 2616MOR (wet) (psi) 1294 1565 -- 861% Swell 35 33 15 max. 14 (2 hr. (2 hr. (24 hr. (24 hr. boil) boil) soak) soak)______________________________________ .sup.a The experimental error which might be observed with these values should be approximately +15%. .sup.b Diphenylmethane diisocyanate resin blend available from Mobay Chemical Corporation. .sup.c A mixture principally comprised of lauryl diacid phosphate, and dilauryl monoacid phosphate, available from E. I. duPont de Nemours and Company as Zelec UN. .sup.d Values given are standards promulyated by The National Particleboard Association, August, 1973, NPA 473. Resin content is generally 7%.
The board formed from mixture A of Table I caused a build-up of wood particles on the caul surface because of adhesion of the board to the caul. Such build-up caused an unacceptable rough surface on the boards which got worse with the molding of successive boards. The board formed from mixture B of Table I provide good release of the board from the mold cauls. The cauls remained clean during successive board moldings.
As can be seen from the physical properties of those boards listed in Table I, the boards prepared utilizing isocyanate resin were substantially equivalent to the board prepared with phenol formaldehyde resin, the current favorite in the industry. In addition those boards prepared with the isocyanate blend with furfural and the acid phosphate also appeared equivalent in all physical properties to those boards prepared with isocyanate resin alone. It may therefore be concluded that the addition of both the furfural and the phosphate release agent did not materially adversely affect the physical properties of particle board prepared from such mixtures, and, since the materials or ingredients used are of a less expensive nature than isocyanate, actually result in a less expensive, and therefore more desirable product.
While the invention has been described with reference to a preferred embodiment, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes may be made and equivalents may be substituted for elements thereof without departing from the scope of the invention. In addition, many modifications may be made to adapt a particular situation or material to the teachings of the invention without departing from the essential scope thereof. Therefore, it is intended that the invention not be limited to the particular embodiment disclosed as the best mode contemplated for carrying out this invention, but that the invention will include all embodiments falling within the scope of the appended claims.
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A binder system is disclosed which incorporates an internal release agent and comprises a mixture of polyisocyanate resin, furfural and an ester of phosphoric acid. In the process of the invention the ester of phosphoric acid is placed into solution with furfural and subsequently blended with the polyisocyanate. Increased stability of the binder system is observed as well as providing for increased mold releasing capabilities.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to retainers and, more particularly, to systems and methods for mounting devices using dovetail grooves and expanders.
2. Description of Related Art
Network devices commonly include non-compliant retainers, such as wedge locks, that lock circuit boards or other devices into position. These non-compliant retainers, however, do not allow for mounting of the circuit boards or other devices in a cantilevered state, such that the plane of the circuit board assembly or other device is supported only at one end or edge. Moreover, the network devices are not configured to allow for multiple wedge locks to be implemented in a coplanar fashion.
Accordingly, there is a need in the art for systems and methods that improve the retention of circuit boards or modules in a network device.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Systems and methods consistent with the present invention address this and other needs by using an expanding device, such as a wedge lock, to retain a processing module having a dovetail portion within a frame.
In accordance with the principles of this invention as embodied and broadly described herein, an optical processing device includes a group of processing modules, a frame, and an expanding device. A portion of each of the processing modules is configured in a dovetail shape. The frame is configured to receive the dovetail end of the processing modules. The expanding device is configured to lock the dovetail end of the processing modules to the frame.
In another implementation consistent with the present invention, a retainer includes a device having a dovetail-shaped portion, a frame configured to receive the dovetail-shaped portion, and at least one expanding device configured to compress the dovetail-shaped portion against the frame.
In yet another implementation consistent with the present invention, a method for retaining a device, having a dovetail portion, in a frame is provided. The method includes attaching at least one expanding device to the dovetail portion or the frame, sliding the dovetail portion into the frame, and expanding the at least one expanding device to retain the dovetail portion in the frame.
In a further implementation consistent with the present invention, a method for dissipating heat from a processing module, having a dovetail portion, to a frame is provided. The method includes attaching at least one expanding device to the dovetail portion or the frame, inserting the dovetail portion into the frame, and expanding the at least one expanding device to bring the dovetail portion into contact with the frame and allow for heat dissipation from the processing module to the frame.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The accompanying drawings, which are incorporated in and constitute a part of this specification, illustrate an embodiment of the invention and, together with the description, explain the invention. In the drawings,
FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary system in which systems and methods consistent with the present invention may be implemented;
FIG. 2 illustrates an exemplary configuration of the line unit of FIG. 1;
FIG. 3 illustrates an exemplary cross sectional view of the processing module/frame interface in an implementation consistent with the present invention;
FIG. 4 illustrates an exemplary expanding device in an implementation consistent with the present invention;
FIG. 5 illustrates the expanding device of FIG. 4 in an assembled, unexpanded state;
FIG. 6 illustrates the expanding device of FIG. 4 in an assembled, expanded state;
FIG. 7 illustrates an exemplary configuration of the processing module/frame interface in an alternative implementation consistent with the present invention;
FIG. 8 illustrates an exemplary configuration of the dovetail interface in another implementation consistent with the present invention; and
FIG. 9 illustrates an exemplary configuration of the processing module/frame interface in a further implementation consistent with the present invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
The following detailed description of implementations consistent with the present invention refers to the accompanying drawings. The same reference numbers in different drawings may identify the same or similar elements. Also, the following detailed description does not limit the invention. Instead, the scope of the invention is defined by the appended claims and equivalents.
Implementations consistent with the present invention provide a dovetail interface for retaining modules within a frame of an underwater device. In an exemplary embodiment, an expanding device is attached to the frame of the underwater device. A dovetail portion of a processing module may be inserted within a receiving portion of the frame. Upon expansion of the expanding device, the dovetail portion is brought into compression with the receiving portion of the frame. Such a configuration enhances the dissipation of heat to the surrounding frame.
Exemplary System Configuration
FIG. 1 illustrates an exemplary system 100 in which systems and methods consistent with the present invention may be implemented. As illustrated, system 100 includes two land communication portions that are interconnected via an underwater communication portion. The land portions may include land networks 110 and land terminals 120 . The underwater portion may include line units 130 (sometimes referred to as “repeaters”) and an underwater network 140 . Two land networks 110 , land terminals 120 , and line units 130 are illustrated for simplicity. It will be appreciated that a typical system may include more or fewer devices and networks than are illustrated in FIG. 1 .
The land network 110 may include one or more networks, such as the Internet, an intranet, a wide area network (WAN), a local area network (LAN), or another type of network. Land terminals 120 include devices that convert signals received from the land network 110 into optical signals for transmission to the line unit 130 , and vice versa. The land terminals 120 may connect to the land network 110 via wired, wireless, or optical connections. In an implementation consistent with the present invention, the land terminals 120 connect to the line units 130 via an optical connection.
The land terminals 120 may include, for example, long reach transmitters/receivers that convert signals into an optical format for long haul transmission and convert underwater optical signals back into a format for transmission to the land network 110 . The land terminals 120 may also include wave division multiplexers and optical conditioning units that multiplex and amplify optical signals prior to transmitting these signals to line units 130 , and line current equipment that provides power to the line units 130 and underwater network 140 .
The underwater network 140 may include groups of line units and/or other devices capable of routing optical signals in an underwater environment. The line units 130 include devices capable of receiving optical signals and transmitting these signals to other line units 130 via the underwater network 140 or to land terminals 120 .
FIG. 2 illustrates an exemplary configuration of the line unit 130 of FIG. 1 . As illustrated, the line unit 130 may include an outer case 210 , an insulating layer 220 , a frame 230 , groups of processing modules 240 - 246 , and expanding devices 250 . It will be appreciated that a typical line unit 130 may include other devices (not shown) that aid in the reception, processing, or transmission of optical signals.
The outer case 210 holds the electronic circuits needed for receiving and transmitting optical signals to other line units 130 and land terminals 120 . The outer case 210 provides the electronic circuits with a pressure or watertight environment. As illustrated, the outer case 210 may be of a hollow cylindrical shape. Alternative configurations are also possible.
The outer case 210 may be fabricated of a high strength material, such as beryllium copper, aluminum, steel, or the like. In an underwater or undersea environment, such a material should be chosen that provides good heat transfer characteristics for dissipating heat from inside the line unit 130 to the surrounding water.
The insulation layer 220 electrically isolates the electronic circuits and circuit mountings within the line unit 130 from the outer case 210 . The insulator 220 may be applied uniformly to the inside of the outer case 210 to a thickness to withstand expected high voltage within the line unit 130 , but limited from any excessive thickness to maximize heat transfer through the insulator 220 .
The frame (or chassis) 230 holds the processing modules 240 - 246 in place within the line unit 130 . The frame 230 may also act as a heat sink for the processing modules 240 - 246 and as a heat conduit for the layer of insulation 220 . The frame 230 may be constructed from a high conductivity material, such as aluminum.
The processing modules 240 - 246 may include electronic circuits for receiving, processing, and transmitting optical signals. The processing modules 240 - 246 may be positioned so that free space exists between adjacent ones of them, allowing them to be free of stress when the line unit 130 is in a high pressure location (e.g., at sea bottom). As will be described in more detail below, one end of each of the processing modules 240 - 246 may have a dovetail configuration that allows the processing module 240 - 246 to be slid into place within the frame 230 in which it is installed.
The expanding devices 250 lock the processing modules 240 - 246 in place within the frame 230 . With the expanding devices 250 in a relaxed (i.e., non-expanded) state, the processing modules 240 - 246 may slide freely into position within the frame 230 . This allows for a loose fit and generous tolerances in the designs of both the processing modules 240 - 246 and the frame 230 . As the expanding devices 250 are expanded, the interface between the processing modules 240 - 246 and the frame 230 is closed and put into compression. Keeping the processing modules 240 - 246 in intimate contact with the frame 230 assures good thermal conductivity. FIG. 3 illustrates this connection in greater detail.
As illustrated, a dovetail interface exists between the processing module (e.g., processing module 240 ) and the frame 230 . The optimum angle of the dovetail may depend upon the mass of the processing module 240 , the distance of the center of mass from the base of the sliding dovetail, the direction of any external loads, such as gravity, shock impulses, vibration, centripetal forces, and the like, the width of the sliding dovetail, the desired compression at the interface of the processing module 240 with the frame 230 , and the load producing capability of the expanding device 250 . In an implementation consistent with the present invention, the dovetail angles may be between 30 and 75 degrees. Generally, steeper dovetail angles allow for a wider interface between the processing module 240 and the frame 230 , and the shallower the angle, the greater the compression force generated at the dovetail interface by the expanding device 250 .
FIG. 4 illustrates an exemplary expanding device 400 in an implementation consistent with the present invention. It will be appreciated that other expanding devices may alternatively be used. As illustrated, the expanding device 400 includes a rail 410 , a group of wedge lock segments 420 - 428 , washers 440 , and a fastener 450 .
The rail 410 allows for mounting of the wedge lock segments 420 - 428 . The length and composition of the rail 410 may be selected so as to ensure that the expanding device 400 is capable of locking a processing module 240 - 246 into position within the frame 230 . In one implementation consistent with the present invention, the length of the rail 410 may be approximately equal to the length of the line unit 130 . The rail 410 may be configured to have a “T” bar-like cross-section along its length. Such a configuration allows the rail 410 to retain the wedge lock segments 420 - 428 once the wedge lock segments 420 - 428 are in place. Other configurations may alternatively be used. The rail 410 may be securely mounted to the frame 230 via screws, adhesives, rivets, or the like.
The wedge lock segments 420 - 428 may be of such a configuration as to allow the wedge lock segments 420 - 428 to slide onto and mate with the rail 410 in such a way that precludes the wedge segments 420 - 428 from becoming easily misaligned. In other words, the wedge segments 420 - 428 should not be able to rotate about the rail 410 , or be removed from the rail 410 except by sliding them off an end of the rail 410 . The wedge lock segments 420 - 428 may include ramped ends that allow the overall height of the expanding device 400 to be adjusted once the segments 420 - 428 are positioned on the rail 410 . The number of wedge segments, and the length of each wedge segment, may be varied in accordance with the type or size of expanding device desired. The wedge lock segments 420 - 428 may be composed of aluminum or other similar types of heat conductive materials.
The washers 440 may include any conventional type of washers. The fastener 450 may be a screw or another type of fastening device capable of applying pressure to the wedge lock segments 420 - 428 in order to compress the various wedge segments 420 - 428 together and expand the expanding device 400 to the desired height.
The expanding device 400 may be assembled in the following manner. The rail 410 may be attached to the frame 230 or another appropriate surface, such as the processing module 240 . As illustrated, the rail 410 may include a group of attachment holes 415 that allow the rail 410 to be mounted to the frame 230 via screws, rivets, and the like. Alternatively, the rail 410 may be mounted to the frame 230 through the use of adhesives.
The end wedge segment 420 may be attached to the rail 410 via an attachment pin 430 or other similar type of mechanism. The end wedge segment 420 serves to retain the other wedge segments 422 - 428 on the rail 410 . The end wedge segment 420 may be attached to the rail 410 prior to or after the rail 410 has been mounted to the frame 230 .
Once the end wedge segment 420 has been attached to the rail 410 , the other wedge segments 422 - 426 and end wedge segment 428 may be slid onto the rail 410 . As illustrated, the end wedge segment 428 may be configured with an unramped front end that allows the fastener 450 to apply pressure equally through the washers 440 to the wedge lock segments 420 - 428 . The washers 440 and fastener 450 should be locked in place so as to prohibit loosening during use. This may be accomplished, for example, through the use of a mechanical locking device or a thread-locking adhesive.
Once the wedge segments 420 - 428 have been slid onto the rail 410 , the fastener 450 may connect to the rail 410 via the wedge lock attachment opening 460 in a well-known manner. FIG. 5 illustrates the expanding device 400 of FIG. 4 in an assembled, unexpanded state. As illustrated, when the expanding device 400 is in an unexpanded state, a gap may exist between the expanding device 400 and the processing module 240 . By tightening the fastener 450 , the expanding device 400 expands to fill the gap, as illustrated in FIG. 6 . In such a position, the expanding device 400 causes the dovetail interface of the processing module 240 to come in contact with the frame 230 thereby improving thermal dissipation.
FIG. 7 illustrates an exemplary configuration of the processing module/frame interface 700 in an alternative implementation consistent with the present invention. As illustrated, gap-filling thermal material 710 is positioned between the dovetail end of the processing module 240 and the frame 230 . The thermal material 710 may include any type of material (e.g., a mica-filled epoxy) that facilitates heat transfer from the processing module 240 to the frame 230 . The thermal material 710 may be applied uniformly to the frame 230 at a thickness to maximize heat transfer through the thermal material 710 to the frame 230 . While shown to fill only part of the gap between the processing module 240 and frame 230 , the thermal material 710 may fill a larger or smaller part of the gap. With the thermal material 710 in place, the transfer of heat from the processing module 240 to the frame 230 is improved.
FIG. 8 illustrates an exemplary configuration of the dovetail interface 800 in another implementation consistent with the present invention. Depending upon the length of the processing modules 240 - 246 , two or more expanding devices may be used to lock the processing modules 240 - 246 in place within the frame 230 . For simplicity, two expanding devices 810 and 820 are illustrated in FIG. 8 .
The expanding devices 810 and 820 may be configured in a manner similar to the expanding device described above with respect to FIGS. 4-6. For ease of access, expanding devices 810 and 820 may be accessible via different ends of the processing module 240 . For smaller processing modules, two or more expanding devices may be desirable to increase the compressive load, thereby supporting greater loads and enhancing thermal performance.
FIG. 9 illustrates an exemplary configuration of the processing module/frame interface 900 in a further implementation consistent with the present invention. As illustrated, the processing module 240 may include dissimilar dovetail interfaces 910 and 920 . Dovetail angles may be selected so as to optimize thermal and/or structural performance. As described above, an optimum dovetail angle may be selected based on a variety of factors, such as the mass of the processing module 240 , the distance of the center of mass from the base of the sliding dovetail, the direction of any external loads, such as gravity, shock impulses, vibration, centripetal forces, and the like, the width of the sliding dovetail, the desired compression at the interface of the processing module 240 with the frame 230 , and the load producing capability of the expanding device 250 .
Conclusion
Systems and methods, consistent with the present invention, improve retention of and heat dissipation from processing modules in an underwater device. A dovetail portion of a processing modules is forced into compression with a receiving portion of a frame through the use of an expanding device. As a result, heat transfer to the frame is enhanced.
The foregoing description of exemplary embodiments of the present invention provides illustration and description, but is not intended to be exhaustive or to limit the invention to the precise form disclosed. Modifications and variations are possible in light of the above teachings or may be acquired from practice of the invention. For example, while the above description focused on an underwater environment, implementations consistent with the present invention are not so limited. For example, the dovetail interface could alternatively be implemented in other environments, such as ground-based, space, or aerospace environments.
No element, act, or instruction used in the description of the present application should be construed as critical or essential to the invention unless explicitly described as such. Also, as used herein, the article “a” is intended to include one or more items. Where only one item is intended, the term “one” or similar language is used.
The scope of the invention is defined by the claims and their equivalents.
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A retainer includes a device having at least one dovetail-shaped portion, a frame configured to receive the dovetail-shaped portion, and at least one expanding device. The expanding device is configured to compress the dovetail-shaped portion against the frame, thereby securing the device against the frame.
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FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a louver driving device for an air-conditioner and a method of controlling the louver driving device. More particularly, it relates to a louver driving device for an air-conditioner which has the capability of automatically directing the flow of cool air towards the occupants of a room by detecting the respective positions in the room.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The following description concerns traditional techniques related to the present invention.
Japanese Patent Unexamined Publication No. 1993-240488 (filed on Sep. 7, 1993) discloses an air conditioning system in which an infrared sensor uses a human organism tracking mechanism to scan an entire room which it partitions into zones. A control portion controls the airflow in response to the output signal of the infrared sensor, calculates the temperature difference between any two adjacent zones, and determines whether a detected heat source is in fact a human body.
Japanese Patent Unexamined Publication No. 1993-149791 (filed on Jun. 15, 1993) discloses an indoor environmental information detecting apparatus which allows an air conditioner to perform comfortable air conditioning by calculating the volume of a room, angles of the room and wall temperatures.
Japanese Patent Unexamined Publication No. 1990-143047 (filed on Jun. 1, 1990) discloses a system of performing more comfortable air conditioning by setting a human body detection zone to a human body's floor surface when a difference between the temperature of the floor surface adjacent to the human body detecting zone and the room temperature exceeds a reference value.
Korean Patent Unexamined Publication No. 1995-25366 (filed on Sep. 15, 1995) discloses a system wherein air conditioning is automatically directed towards a human's location by using a distance sensor that scans the room to be air conditioned so as to determine if a human body is present.
A conventional air-conditioner and its louver driving system will now be described with reference to the attached drawings.
As shown in FIG. 6, the louver driving system of the conventional air-conditioner includes a function selecting section 200 by which an air conditioning type and the airflow are selected, an elevational louver position detecting section 300 for detecting the driving position of the louver that controls the air flow's vertical vector, and a horizontal louver position detecting section 400 for detecting the driving position of the louver that controls the air flow's horizontal vector. The louver driving device also includes an elevational louver driving section 500 for driving the elevational louver, a horizontal louver driving section 600 for driving the horizontal louver, a human body detecting section 700 consisting of a plurality of human body sensors for detecting the location of a human body in a room to be air-conditioned, and a microcomputer 100 which controls the louver driving sections in response to the output signals from the human body sensors.
The following description relates to the operation of the conventional air-conditioner and its louver driving system.
The common-type air-conditioner includes a compressor, a condenser, a capillary tube, an evaporator, and a refrigerant pipe. The air-conditioner lowers the temperature and reduces the humidity of air in a room by absorbing warm air in the room or raises the temperature of a room by emitting warm air into the room. The latter is performed by reversing the refrigerant's phase. An intake grill provided to one side of the air-conditioner's main body suctions the relatively warm indoor air, and a cool air outlet, provided above or below the intake grill, blows air cooled by refrigerant passing through the evaporator into the room. An indoor fan installed within the main body circulates the air to and from the air-conditioner.
A wind direction control louver, rotatably installed in the cool air outlet, controls the flow of the cool air. This wind-direction control louver includes an elevational louver which directs the cool air upward or downward thereby altering the distance it is projected, and a horizontal louver for directing the cool air right or left. The elevational louver and the horizontal louver control are respectively controlled by an elevational motor and a horizontal motor.
As shown in FIG. 7, once a plurality of sensors A1, A2, B1, B2, C1 and C2 senses the presence of a human body, a control circuit 140 rotates the louver 130 to direct the flow of cool air.
As shown in FIG. 6, the louver driving system of the conventional air-conditioner includes a function selecting section 200 by which an air conditioning type and the airflow are selected, an elevational louver position detecting section 300 for detecting the driving position of the louver that controls the air flow's vertical vector, and a horizontal louver position detecting section 400 for detecting the driving position of the louver that controls the air flow's horizontal vector.
Referring to FIG. 6, the human body detecting section 700 includes a plurality of human body sensors 710 to 760. Each of these human body sensors is composed of an infrared sensor installed on one side of the air-conditioner' main body in a horizontal or vertical orientation.
FIGS. 8 and 9 show a horizontal zone detecting section's detecting zone and a proximity detecting section's detecting zone, respectively. Six human body sensors of the human body detecting section 700 are installed on one side of the main body 110 of the air-conditioner so as to sense a human body present in a space that is divided into six zones vertically and horizontally.
The six human body sensors 120 sense horizontal zones of detection, namely, right, center and left, and they determine if the distance between a human body 160 and the main body 110 of the air-conditioner is long (I) or short (II). The integration of these results in the room being divided into six three-dimensional zones. The presence of a human body in these zones results in the horizontal louver and the elevational louver being manipulated accordingly. When the human body sensor 120 detects that the human body 160 is located within a left short-distance zone (Left, II), the horizontal louver is set to the left, and the elevational louver is driven downward so that cooled air is directed at the human body 160.
In the above-described conventional air-conditioner, the vertical space of a room to be air conditioned is divided by the human body sensor according to the air-conditioner, location with respect to the vertical direction, the human body sensor may misjudge the location of the human body, which causes the erroneous operation of the elevational louver, thus decreasing the efficiency of the air conditioning and the precision.
In the case where a room to be air conditioned is divided into a plurality of zones for the purpose of controlling air conditioning properly, human body sensors have conventionally been installed for each zone of the room, thereby increasing the production costs.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention eliminates the above-mentioned problems of the conventional art by introducing a louver driving device for an air-conditioner and a method of controlling the louver driving device.
The first objective of the present invention is to provide a louver driving device for an air-conditioner and a method of controlling the louver driving device whereby a human body's location is precisely determined in order to facilitate the control of an elevational louver and a horizontal louver appropriately.
The second objective of the present invention is to provide a louver driving device for an air-conditioner using human body sensors whose number is relatively smaller than that of the divided zones of a room to be air conditioned, and a method of controlling the louver driving device.
In order to achieve the above objectives and advantages, and in accordance with the purpose of the present invention as embodied and broadly described, the present invention relates to a louver driving device for an air-conditioner having a main body for intaking and heat-exchanging the air of a room and for furnishing the heat-exchanged air to the room, and louvers for directing the airflow in a given direction.
The inventive louver driving device includes a plurality of human body sensors that monitor the presence of a human body in the room; human body position detecting sections that each receive output signals from the human body sensors, thereby determining a human body's horizontal location from and proximity to the air-conditioner; louver driving sections for operating the louvers so as to direct heat-exchanged air towards the human body; and a microcomputer that receives detection signals from the human body position detecting sections and then sends a control signal to the louver driving sections.
Another aspect of the present invention is a method of controlling the aforementioned louver driving device that includes the steps of detecting the horizontal movement of a human body according to output signals of the sensors; determining the distance between the human body and the air-conditioner according to the output signals of the sensors; and controlling the louvers to direct the heat-exchanged air towards the human body.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a louver driving device for an air-conditioner in accordance with the first preferred embodiment of the present invention;
FIGS. 2A to 2E show output waveforms of a proximity in accordance with the preferred embodiment;
FIG. 3 depicts detecting zones of a human body sensor in accordance with the present invention;
FIG. 4 is a flowchart of the control sequence of the louver driving control mechanism in accordance with the present invention;
FIGS. 5A and 5B are detailed flowcharts of the control sequence of the louver driving control mechanism of FIG. 4;
FIG. 6 is a block diagram of a louver driving control device in accordance with a conventional art;
FIG. 7 schematically depicts a conventional air-conditioner' construction;
FIG. 8 depicts the detecting zones of a horizontal zone detecting section in accordance with the conventional art; and
FIG. 9 depicts the detecting zones of a proximity detecting section in accordance with the conventional art.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
The preferred embodiments of the present invention will now be discussed in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a louver driving device for an air-conditioner in accordance with the first preferred embodiment of the present invention.
The louver driving device includes a function selection section 20 by which the user selects desired types of air conditioning and airflow; an elevational louver position detecting section 30 for monitoring the current driving position of an elevational louver; a horizontal louver position detecting section 40 for monitoring the current driving position of a horizontal louver; and an elevational louver driving section 50 for driving the elevational louver.
The louver driving device also includes a horizontal louver driving section 60 for driving the horizontal louver. The louver driving device also includes a plurality of human body sensors 91, 92 and 93 for monitoring the presence of a human body in a room by dividing the room into right, left and center zones; vertical location (i.e., distance) detecting (calculating) sections 71, 72 and 73 for detecting the distance of a human body from the air-conditioner on the basis of the outputs of the human body sensors 91, 92 and 93; horizontal location detecting (i.e., zone-detecting) sections 81, 82 and 83 for detecting the horizontal location of a human body in the room on the basis of outputs of the human body sensors 91, 92 and 93; and a microcomputer 10 for sending control signals to the elevational louver driving section 50 and horizontal louver driving section 60 after receiving the output signals of each of the vertical location detecting sections 71, 72 and 73 and horizontal location detecting sections 81, 82 and 83.
The horizontal location detecting sections 81, 82 and 83 each have signal amplifiers 812, 822, 832 that amplify the output signals of the human body sensors to be square-wave signals, and comparators 811, 821 and 831 that each compare the signals amplified by the signal amplifiers 812, 822 and 832 with a preset reference voltage and then send output signals to the microcomputer 10.
FIGS. 5A and 5B are detailed flowcharts of the control sequence of the louver driving control mechanism in accordance with the present invention. The louver driving control mechanism includes the steps of detecting (S10) the horizontal location of a human body on the basis of outputs of the human body sensors; detecting (S12) the distance between the human body and the air-conditioner on the basis of outputs of the human body sensors; determining (S14) if a human body is in the right zone of a room to be air conditioned by analyzing the horizontal location and the resultant distance; when the human body is in the right zone of the room, determining (S16) if a human body is also in the center zone; and when the human bodies are in the right zone and center zones, determining (S18) if a human body is also in the left zone.
The louver driving control mechanism also includes the steps of determining (S20) if a human body is in the left zone when a human body is located in the right zone but not in the center zone; swinging (S22) the horizontal louver across the overall horizontal area of the room if the human bodies are present in the right, center and left zones; swinging (S24) the horizontal louver from the center to the right zone if the human bodies are present in the right and center zones but there is no one in the left zone; swinging (S26) the horizontal louver across the overall horizontal area of the room if the human bodies are present in the right and left zones but there is no one in the center zone; setting (S28) the horizontal louver to the right if the human body is in the right zone but there is no one in the center and left zones; determining (S30) if the human body is in the center zone when a human body is not present in the right zone in Step S12; determining (S32) if the human body is in the left zone when a human body is not present in the right zone but in the center zone; swinging (S34) the horizontal louver from the center to the left if human bodies are not present in the right zone but are in the center and left zones; and setting (S36) the horizontal louver to the center if no human body is in the right or left zones but is in the left zone.
The louver driving control mechanism further includes the steps of determining (S38) if a human body is in the left zone of the room when there is no one in its right or center zones; setting (S40) the horizontal louver to the left if there is no one in the right and center zones but a human body is present in the left zone; setting the horizontal louver to the center and completing (S42) the control sequence by operating a compressor at the lowest driving level when there is no one in the right, center and left zones; determining (S50) if a human body is located in a short-distance zone after swinging or setting the horizontal louver to a predetermined direction; setting (S52) the elevational louver to the short-distance zone when a human body is located in the short-distance zone; determining (S54) if a human body is located in the middle-distance zone when the human body is not in the short-distance zone; adjusting (S56) the elevational louver to the middle-distance zone when a human body is located in the middle-distance zone; and if the human body is not in the middle-distance zone, determining that it is located in the long-distance zone, and setting (S58) the elevational louver to the long-distance zone.
The following description relates to the operation of the louver driving device for an air-conditioner and its control mechanism.
Referring to FIG. 1, the desired air conditioning type and the air-conditioner' airflow are selected through the function selection section 20. The elevational louver position detecting section 30 detects the current position of the elevational louver, and the horizontal louver position detecting section 40 detects the current position of the horizontal louver. The elevational louver driving section 50 operates the elevational louver, and the horizontal louver driving section 60 operates the horizontal louver. A plurality of the human body sensors 91, 92 and 93 each monitor the presence of a human body in the right, left or center zone of a room.
The vertical location detecting sections 71, 72 and 73 detect the distance of a human body from the air-conditioner on the basis of outputs of the human body sensors 91, 92 and 93, and the horizontal location detecting sections 81, 82 and 83 detect the horizontal location of a human body on the basis of outputs of the human body sensors 91, 92 and 93.
The horizontal location detecting sections 81, 82 and 83 each include the signal amplifiers 812, 822, 832 for amplifying output signals of the human body sensors to square-wave signals, and the comparators 811, 821 and 831 that each compare these square-wave signals with a preset reference voltage to produce high-level or low-level for the microcomputer 10.
Each of the vertical location detecting sections 71, 72 and 73 serves as an amplifier by amplifying a signal indicative of the distance between a human body and the air-conditioner to a signal of predetermined amplitude. The amplified signal is input to the microcomputer 10 through an analog/digital conversion input terminal 1A/D, 2A/D or 3A/D. The microcomputer 10 detects the amplitude of the signal and its inclination to determine the distance between the air-conditioner and the human body.
FIGS. 2A to 2E show output waveforms of the vertical location detecting sections for an air-conditioner. The longer the distance between the air-conditioner and the human body becomes, the smaller the amplitude and inclination of the analog signal that is applied to the analog/digital conversion input terminal 1A/D, 2A/D or 3A/D become.
Referring to FIG. 1, when the air-conditioner detects the location of a human body, the human body sensors 91, 92 and 93 amplify voltages of the sensor films with two different amplification factors. For detection of a vertical distance, detection signals are each input to the analog/digital conversion input terminal 1A/D, 2A/D and 3A/D of the microcomputer 10. For detection of a horizontal distance, the amplifiers 812, 822 and 832 amplify the signals, and a digital signal is input to the microcomputer 10 through the comparators 811, 821 and 831. The microcomputer 10 detects a human body's horizontal position and vertical distance from the air-conditioner by referring to the signals, and produces a louver driving control signal. The signal amplification factor B of the vertical location detecting sections 71, 72 and 73 is relatively smaller than that (A) of the horizontal location detecting sections 81, 82 and 83 (A>B).
FIG. 3 depicts detecting zones of the air-conditioner' human body sensor in accordance with the present invention, and FIGS. 5A and 5B are detailed flowcharts of the control sequence of the louver driving control mechanism for the air-conditioner in accordance with the present invention.
After the desired air conditioning type, temperature and airflow are selected by the user, the microcomputer 10 calculates the difference between the selected temperature and the actual indoor temperature, which is detected by the air-conditioner' temperature sensor, and determines the operation frequency of the compressor. The compressor is driven at the operation frequency under the control of the microcomputer 10 and its function varies with the indoor air conditioning load. The louver operation is controlled simultaneously with the actuation of the compressor in the order shown in FIGS. 5A and 5B. First, a plurality of human body sensors monitor (S10) the current horizontal position of a human body and detect (S12) the distance between the human body and the air-conditioner.
If the human body is in a left middle-distance zone 3B, the human body sensor 91 for detecting the left zone of the room determines that the human body is in the left zone and produces a square-wave signal. In addition, the distance between the human body and the air-conditioner is determined by the horizontal location detecting section according to the human body sensor 91's output. When an output signal of the human body sensor 91 is amplified by the predetermined amplification factor B and input to the analog/digital conversion input terminal, the microcomputer 10 compares it with reference values α and β (α>β). If the analog-digital converted signal is smaller than α but larger than β, the microcomputer 10 determines that the human body is in the middle-distance zone.
After the microcomputer 10 determines (S14) if a human body is located in the right zone by analyzing the result obtained by detecting the horizontal position and distance, it then determines (S16) if a human body is also in the center zone. Since a plurality of human bodies are present in the room, the presence of the human bodies is detected in at least two zones of the room.
If human bodies are detected in the right and center zones of the room, the microcomputer 10 then determines (S18) if a human body is in the left zone. When a human body is in the right zone but not in the center zone, the microcomputer 10 determines (S20) if a human body is present in the left zone of the room.
If human bodies are present in the right, center and left zones of the room, the microcomputer 10 swings (S22) the horizontal louver over the entire horizontal range of the air-conditioner. When the human bodies are in the right and center zones but not in the left zone, it swings (S24) the horizontal louver from the center to the right. When a human body is in the left zone while another human body is located in the right zone not in the middle, the microcomputer 10 swings (S26) the horizontal louver across the entire range of the air-conditioner.
When the human body is in the right zone but not in the center and left zones, the horizontal louver is set to the right (S28) so as to direct the heat-exchanged air to the human body in the right zone.
If the microcomputer 10 detects (S12) that a human body is not in the right zone, it determines (S30) whether or not another human body is located in the center of the room. If there is, it determines (S32) if another human body is in the left zone.
When a human body is not in the right zone but human bodies are in the center and left zones, the microcomputer 10 swings (S34) the horizontal louver from the center to the left. When no human body is in the left and right zones but a human body is in the center zone, the microcomputer 10 sets (S36) the horizontal louver to the middle.
When no human bodies are in the right and center zones of the room, the microcomputer 10 determines (S38) if another human body is in the left zone. When no human bodies are in the right and center zones of the room and a human body is present in the left zone, the microcomputer 10 sets (S40) the horizontal louver to the left.
If no human bodies are in the right, center and left zones of the room, the microcomputer 10 sets the horizontal louver to the middle, and operates (S42) the compressor at the lowest driving level, thereby completing the step. In other words, when no human body is in the room, the microcomputer 10 sets the horizontal louver to the center and presets the operation frequency for the compressor to the lowest level, and as there is no need to operate the compressor, the power consumption can be minimized.
After fixing or swinging the horizontal louver by detecting the horizontal location of a human body, the microcomputer 10 determines (S50) if a human body is in the short-distance zone of the room, and when the human body is in the short-distance zone of the room, it lowers (S52) the elevational louver to the short-distance zone.
When the human body is not in the short-distance zone, the microcomputer 10 determines (S54) if the human body is in the middle-distance zone, and adjusts (S56) the elevational louver to the middle-distance zone. If the human body is not in the middle-distance zone, the microcomputer 10 raises (S58) the elevational louver to the long-distance zone.
According to the inventive louver driving device for an air-conditioner and its control mechanism, the current location of the human body is determined by output signals of the vertical position detecting sections 71, 72 and 73 and horizontal position detecting sections 81, 82 and 83. The operation of each of the elevational louver and the horizontal louver is controlled by the location of the human body so that the heat-exchanged air can be directly provided to the human body. Since the distance between the human body and the air-conditioner is exactly calculated by one human body sensor in each zone, the number of expensive infrared sensors is less than that of the conventional air-conditioner.
As described above, the inventive vertical and horizontal position detecting sections exactly detect the location of the human body, thus allowing the heat-exchanged air to be furnished to users directly and properly. The infrared sensors whose number is relatively smaller than the conventional ones' are employed to monitor detecting zones of a room to be air conditioned, thereby lowering the production costs.
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A louver driving device for an air-conditioner is disclosed. The air-conditioner has a main body for intaking and heat-exchanging the indoor air of a room, and for furnishing the heat-exchanged air to the room, and louvers for controlling the airflow in a direction of up and down/right and left. The inventive louver driving device includes a plurality of human body sensors for monitoring the presence of a human body in the room; human body position detecting sections that each receive output signals from the human body sensors, and detect a human body's horizontal location and vertical distance from the air-conditioner; louver driving sections for operating the louvers so as to provide heat-exchanged air towards the human body; and a microcomputer that receives a detecting signal from the human body position detecting sections and produces a control signal to the louver driving sections.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates generally to an opto-electronic device, and more particularly to an opto-electronic device with a junction.
Although the characteristics of the opto-electronic device with a junction have been improved significantly due to the design of the heterojunction, it still has a bottleneck, i.e., if there is a slight mismatching of the physical or chemical characteristics at the junction, the resulting device will have defects, which will inevitably cause deterioration of the characteristics thereof. Such defects may be reduced or alleviated by strictly controlling the heterojunction material system and the selection of the growth conditions, but such control is not only costly, but also is not always satisfactory.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide an opto-electronic device having a good junction characteristic.
Another object of the present invention is to provide an opto-electronic device, the growth system and procedures which are simple, and need not consider the memory effect of the system.
The basic technical concept of the present invention utilizes the practical principle that there is a different energy gap between the ordered and disordered structures, the junction of which is treated as a hetero-equivalent junction. The experiment demonstrated that the semiconductor device manufactured in accordance with this principle is improved in its characteristics, such as an increased luminescence intensity as well as the increased linear region of the luminescence intensity current diagram. Furthermore, the growth system therefore is simple, and does not need to consider the memory effect of the system. Moreover, since the heterojunction is made of the same material, its physical and chemical characteristics are self-matching and excellent, and the problem of the constituent mutual diffusion will not occur at the junction.
Utilizing the Ga 0 .5 In 0 .5 P as an example, the ordered/disordered structures described above mean that if the Ga and In atoms are arranged at random on the sublattice, it is called a disordered structure. On the contrary, if the Ga and In atoms are arranged on the (111) lattice plane in the order of Ga-P-In-P, it is called an ordered structure.
In accordance with the present invention, an opto-electronic device includes a wafer, an ordered (disordered) first layer grown on the wafer, and a disordered (ordered) second layer grown on the first layer. Providing an ordered (disordered) third layer grown on the second layer can produce a better effect. The so-called opto-electronic device may be a light emitting diode (LED), a laser diode, or a high speed device. Of course, the wafer as well as the second or third layer should be provided with ohmic contacts in practical applications.
The materials for the layers may be a metal and a compound capable of providing phosphorus. The so-called metal, if being an organic metal, may be organometallic gallium or indium. The compound capable of providing phosphorus may be a gas, such as PH 3 . The p-type dopant may be a Group II metal, and the n-type dopant may be a compound having s Group IV or VI element. Furthermore, the wafer of the present invention may be constituted by the GaAs.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The present invention can be better understood with reference to the following description and accompanying drawings, in which:
FIG. 1 shows the manufacturing process of an opto-electronic device in accordance with one preferred embodiment of the present invention;
FIG. 2 is a growth temperature-growth time diagram in the manufacturing process for an opto-electronic device as shown in FIG. 1;
FIG. 3 is a diagram showing the relative energy gaps for an opto-electronic device as shown in FIG. 1;
FIG. 4 is a diagram showing the testing results, by means of photoluminescence, of an opto-electronic device as shown in FIG. 1; and
FIG. 5 is a comparative diagram of the luminescence intensity between an opto-electronic device of the present invention and the prior light emitting diode.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
According to a preferred embodiment of the present invention, an opto-electronic device includes a wafer, an ordered (disordered) first layer grown on the wafer, a disordered (ordered) second layer grown on the first layer, an ordered (disordered) third layer grown on the second layer, and two ohmic contacts provided on the wafer and the third layer respectively by means of a vacuum evaporation process. The manufacturing process for a red light emitting diode, which is grown on a GaAs wafer and has double heterojunctions, in accordance with the present invention, will be hereinafter described in detail, particularly with reference to FIG. 1.
First, a (100) 2° of [110] n + -GaAs substrate having a concentration of 7.3× 10 18 cm -3 , an etch pit density (EPD) of 5×10 3 cm 2 , and a thickness of 350 μm undergoes an epitaxy growth of the Ga 0 .5 In 0 .5 P in a metal organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) system. (C 2 H 5 ) 3 Ga maintained at 5° C., (CH 3 ) 3 In retained at -5° C. and PH 3 being 5% in H 2 are utilized as the growing materials for Ga, In, and P, respectively. In addition, SiH 4 being 500 ppm in H 2 and (C 2 H 5 ) 2 Zn are utilized as the materials for the n-type dopant Si and p-type dopant Zn, respectively. The system is then heated by the high frequency wave, and the epitaxy is grown within a reaction tube having a diameter of 4.5 cm under a low pressure (100 Torr). The above-mentioned materials can all be bought from the Morton Company in the United States of America.
During growth, as shown in FIG. 2, a Si-doped n-type disordered Ga 0 .5 In 0 .5 P layer is firstly grown as a lower confinement layer having a concentration of 3×10 17 cm -3 at 730° C. An undoped and ordered active layer having a background concentration of 2×10 16 cm -3 is then grown at 675° C. A high Zn-doped and disordered p-type upper confinement layer having a concentration of 3×10 18 cm -3 is further grown at 675 ° C.
Finally, after the ohmic contacts go through the vacuum evaporation process provided therewith, the light emitting diode with double heterojunction is completed. The relative energy gaps for such a diode are shown in FIG. 3.
Since the ordered and disordered structures have different energy gaps and the photoluminescence is a good testing medium for the energy gaps. An experiment was conducted which shows the test results in FIG. 4, from which it can be clearly seen that the energy gap of the disordered structure is 2.014 eV while the energy gap of the ordered structure is 1.928 eV (with another Zn energy level at 1.984 eV). The energy gap difference of 86 meV is determined by the test conducted at 77 ° K. If the test is executed at room temperature (300° K.), the energy gap difference will be 70 meV.
As shown in FIG. 5, the luminescence intensity of the present invention can be increased seven times if compared with the general Ga 0 .5 In 0 .5 P light emitting diode with the homojunction.
In summary, the advantages of the present invention can be listed briefly as follows:
1. The characteristics of the resulting semiconductor device are significantly improved to successfully simulate that the device has a heterojunction;
2.The growth system for the present invention is simple, and does not need to consider the memory effect thereof;
3. The physical and chemical characteristics at the heterojunction can be self-matched, and the junction properties are excellent;
4. The problem of the constituent mutual diffusion will not occur at the junction;
5. The principle of the present invention can be applied to all of the disordered/ordered material systems; and
6. The growing process for the present invention is simple and easily controllable.
While the invention has been described in terms of what is presently considered to be the most practical and preferred embodiment, it is to be understood that the invention is not limited to the disclosed embodiment. On the contrary, it is intended to cover various modifications and similar arrangements included within the spirit and scope of the appended claims, the scope of which should be accorded the broadest interpretation so as to encompass all such modifications and similar structures.
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An opto-electronic device with the physical and chemical characteristics at the junction thereof being well matched is disclosed. The opto-etectronic device includes a wafer, a first layer grown on the wafer, and a second layer grown on the first layer, wherein one of the first and second layers is an ordered structure while the other is a disordered structure.
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CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/945,977, filed Jun. 25, 2007, the disclosure of which is incorporated herein by reference.
BACKGROUND
1. Field
The present invention relates generally to encapsulant shapes for light emitting devices and specifically to a shape designed to maximize linear polarization.
2. Description of the Related Art
Polarized light sources are highly desirable for numerous applications including liquid crystal display (LCD) backlighting, illumination for polarization microscopy, reduction of headlight glare in automobiles, and for noise reduction in free-space optical communications. Generally, in these applications, a single linear polarization is desired, and the orthogonal polarization may be considered non-desirable. However, semiconductor light emitting diodes (LEDs), which are attractive for many of these applications, are generally considered to be unpolarized sources. In addition, the encapsulant shapes typically used for LEDs are rotationally symmetric, which results in equal output for the desired polarization and undesired polarization. Accordingly, an encapsulant shape used for an LED or any other light source that can increase extraction of a particular linear polarization is needed.
SUMMARY
The light-emitting device includes a light source and a transparent encapsulating material that is shaped to modify the polarization anisotropy of light emitted by the light source in at least one direction.
In the light-emitting device the polarization anisotropy of light emitted in at least one direction may be increased.
In the light-emitting device the polarization anisotropy of light emitted in at least one direction may be decreased.
In the light-emitting device the cumulative effect of modified polarization anisotropy may be that for all emitted light, the total component of light polarization along a particular direction has greater magnitude than components orthogonal to this direction.
In the light-emitting device the cumulative effect of modified polarization anisotropy may be that for all emitted light, the total component of light polarization lying in a particular plane has greater magnitude than the components lying in orthogonal planes.
In the light-emitting device the light source may be a semiconductor light-emitting diode chip.
In the light-emitting device the light source may be one of a plurality of light sources arranged within the encapsulation.
The light-emitting device may also include a phosphor above light source.
In the light-emitting device the encapsulating material may be a polymer.
The encapsulant for a light emitting device, such as a light emitting diode (LED), has a geometrical shape that enhances the extraction of a particular linear polarization. The encapsulant shape takes advantage of the low reflection coefficient at an interface for transverse magnetic (TM) polarized light incident near the Brewster angle. This concept can be realized with more than one distinct encapsulant shape design. One common characteristic for all designs is the lack of rotational symmetry. Rotational symmetry is typically a property of conventional encapsulants for LEDs commercially available at the present time. In addition, the encapsulant is shaped so that the angle formed between the normal to the encapsulant surface and a light ray originating from the light emitting device is approximately equal to the Brewster angle for some fraction of rays which lie within at least one plane that also contains the light emitting device.
Additional aspects and/or advantages will be set forth in part in the description which follows and, in part, will be apparent from the description, or may be learned by practice of the invention.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
These and/or other aspects and advantages will become apparent and more readily appreciated from the following description of the embodiments, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings of which:
FIG. 1 is a cross sectional view of an encapsulant shape which enhances xtraction of a light polarized in the xz-plane;
FIG. 2 is a wireframe view of the polarization-enhancing encapsulant shape;
FIG. 3 is a perspective view of a polarization-enhancing encapsulant shape;
FIG. 4 is a plan view of the setup used for measuring the polarization-enhancing encapsulant; and
FIG. 5 is a graph showing the intensity of light passing through a polarizer aligned in the x-direction and y-direction as a function of the zenith angle φ.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF EMBODIMENTS
In the following detailed description of various embodiments, reference is made to the accompanying drawings that form a part hereof, and in which are shown by way of illustration, and not of limitation, specific embodiments in which the subject matter may be practiced. The embodiments illustrated are described in sufficient detail to enable those skilled in the art to practice the teachings disclosed herein. Other embodiments may be utilized and derived therefrom, such that compositional, structural, and logical substitutions and changes may be made without departing from the scope of this disclosure. Examples and embodiments merely typify possible variations. Individual components and functions are optional unless explicitly required, and the sequence of operations may vary. Portions and features of some embodiments may be included in or substituted for those of others. The following description is, therefore, not to be taken in a limiting sense.
The concept of the encapsulant shape is to take advantage of the low reflection coefficient near the Brewster angle for transverse magnetic (TM) polarized light. The cross section of the optimized shape is easy to visualize. Consider a light source embedded in an encapsulant with a cross section as shown in FIG. 1 . For any ray that can be drawn from the light source to the surface of the encapsulant, the angle between the incident ray and the normal to the surface is the Brewster angle. Light which is polarized within the xz-plane is TM with regard to the surface and does not experience reflection when it strikes the interface because it is incident at the Brewster angle ⊖ B . Any other shape for the encapsulant will result in reflections for xz-polarized light and lower extraction efficiency. Light polarized in the y-direction is transverse-electric (TE) with regard to the surface, and does undergo some reflection at the interface. Therefore, the shaped encapsulant increases the extraction efficiency for a particular linear polarization when compared to a conventional encapsulant. As a result, light leaving the encapsulant will be partially polarized even when the light source itself is completely unpolarized.
In one embodiment of the present invention the three dimensional optimized structure is numerically determined as follows. An unpolarized, isotropic point-like light source is assumed to be located at the origin. The point source approximation is valid as long as the surface area of the emitter is small compared to the dimensions of the encapsulant. Because of symmetry, it is sufficient to calculate only one quarter of the encapsulant structure. The encapsulant surface is defined in terms of a rectangular grid of points in spherical coordinates in which the azimuthal angle ⊖ and zenith angle φ for each point are fixed and spaced at regular intervals. The radial coordinate r is initially unknown. For the point directly above the light source, r is set equal to the unit length. A single line of points on the mesh for which ⊖ is fixed is now calculated. For each point on this line other than the one where φ=0, two new points (⊖+Δ⊖, φ) and (⊖−Δ⊖, φ) are considered. A triangle can be formed between the φ=0 point and the two new points with adjacent φ value. The calculation now considers an unpolarized beam which travels through the center of the three rays formed between the origin and the three triangle vertexes. The pair of r-values which maximizes transmission of this beam through a linear polarizer that lies in the xy-plane and allows light polarized in the x-direction to pass is found. Once r has been found for these two points, it is possible to form four distinct triangles between the two points with newly found r and the two points with the next φ value. The pair of r-values which simultaneously maximize transmission through the linear polarizer for beams traveling through the center of each of the four triangles is then found. This process continues until all the points on the line have been found. The values for r for the points (⊖, φ) on the line are then found by averaging r for the points (⊖+Δ⊖, φ) and (⊖−Δ⊖, φ). This process is repeated until all the points on the mesh have been calculated. The entire encapsulant shape is formed by appropriately rotating and reflecting the known quarter structure. A wireframe view of the optimized encapsulant shape is shown in FIG. 2 .
Calculations to determine the effectiveness of the encapsulant shape were performed using LightTools optical engineering software, which uses ray tracing with full optical accuracy to simulate optical systems. In the simulations, the single point source was placed in the middle of the encapsulant at the base. The bottom of the encapsulant was covered with an absorber to minimize the effect of beams which undergo multiple reflections. The figure of merit used to determine the effectiveness of the encapsulant is the polarization ratio R P , which is defined as R P =P x /P y (Equation 1) where P x and P y are the total optical powers which are transmitted through a polarizer lying parallel to the xy-plane above the encapsulant which allows light polarized in the x-direction and y-direction, respectively, to pass. LightTools simulation results predict an overall enhancement in the polarization ratio of 8.3% for the optimized encapsulant with refractive index n=1.5. When the same structure is simulated with n=1.6, the enhancement is 14.1%. The higher value for R P is due to the increase in reflection for TE polarized light near the Brewster angle with increasing refractive index.
The encapsulant shape is experimentally realized by fabricating an aluminum mold with a computer controlled milling machine and then extensively polishing the mold to achieve a specular optical surface. A two-component epoxy intended for optics applications is poured into the mold and then cured at 120° C. for 2 hours. FIG. 3 shows a photograph of the fabricated encapsulant shape. For experimental measurements, the light source is formed by a mixture of yellow phosphor and epoxy that is embedded in the center of the bottom side of the encapsulant and is optically excited by a high power blue LED. The LED-excited phosphor is selected as a source because it allows simple index matching between the source and encapsulant, and because the light emitted by the phosphor is completely random in polarization. Using an unpolarized phosphor source rather than, for example, an LED—which may have some subtle polarization effects—simplifies verification that the encapsulant shape is working as intended.
A schematic of the measurement setup is shown in FIG. 4 . The encapsulant with embedded phosphor is located at the axis of rotation for an arm which holds a 533 nm 15 filter, linear polarizer, and photodetector. The arm can be rotated about the encapsulant to measure the intensity as a function of the zenith angle φ. The backside of the encapsulant is masked with the exception of a small square less than 0.5 mm wide so as to reveal only the phosphor; together with the 533 nm filter, this ensures that only light generated by the phosphor is measured. The mask also serves to eliminate multiple reflections inside the encapsulant, which aligns the experimental setup with the simulations performed in LightTools and should give better agreement with calculated predictions. However, in practice it would be desirable to introduce a reflector at the base. For example, if a diffuse reflector is used, then light with the non-desirable polarization—which has a stronger initial reflection—will be randomized in polarization and direction when it strikes the reflector, and will contribute to the intensity of the desired polarization at the output.
FIG. 4 shows the measured intensity as a function of the angle when the polarizer is oriented in the x-direction and when the polarizer is oriented in the y-direction. The intensity is low for φ=0 and becomes larger as the magnitude of ⊖ increases. This is because the encapsulant also acts as a lens which focuses the light produced by the phosphor in specific directions. The intensity of x-polarized light is consistently higher than that of y-polarized light throughout the range of angles measured. FIG. 5 shows the ratio of the two intensities as a function of angle and provides a comparison with the numerically simulated result. The measured ratio is greater than unity for all angles other than those close to φ=0, where the actual intensity is very low. For angles where the intensity is higher, the polarization ratio becomes larger than unity. The shape of the measured curve agrees well with the theoretical result from LightTools. However, the peak measured value is approximately 1.28, which is higher than the peak calculated value. This difference can be attributed to a discrepancy between the actual epoxy refractive index and the refractive index used in the calculations. As mentioned earlier, an increase in refractive index results in a larger polarization ratio for the same geometrical structure.
In conclusion, a non-rotationally symmetric encapsulant shape has been shown to enhance the extraction of a particular linear polarization from an unpolarized source by both numerical ray tracing simulations and experimental measurements. The encapsulant shape takes advantage of the low reflection coefficient for TM polarized light at the Brewster angle and results in an overall theoretical enhancement of 8.3% when the refractive index is 1.5. The measured enhancement is somewhat larger than the simulated result.
Although a few embodiments have been shown and described, it would be appreciated by those skilled in the art that changes may be made in these embodiments without departing from the principles and spirit of the invention, the scope of which is defined in the claims and their equivalents.
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The light-emitting device includes a light source and a transparent encapsulating material that is shaped to modify the polarization anisotropy of light emitted by the light source in at least one direction.
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TECHNICAL FIELD
[0001] The present invention was made with the support of the Ministry of Knowledge Economy, Republic of Korea, under Project No. KT-2008-NT-AP-FS0-0001. This project was conducted in the program titled “Korea-US Technology Cooperation Program (KORUS Tech)” in the project named “the development of leukocyte-specific RNA interference nanodrug for treating AIDS” by the Industry-Academic Cooperation Foundation, Hanyang University, under management of the Korea Evaluation Institute of Industrial Technology, during the period of Dec. 1, 2008 to Nov. 30, 2011.
[0002] This application claims priority to and the benefit of Korean Patent Application No. 10-2012-0149456 filed in the Korean Intellectual Property Office on Dec. 20, 2012, the disclosure of which are incorporated herein by reference.
[0003] The present invention relates to a T cell-specific scFv carrier, and more specifically, to a humanized scFv carrier specifically targeting human T cells.
BACKGROUND ART
[0004] As modern societies are gradually aging together with the development of medical technology, age-related diseases with an increasing incidence are emerging as a new social problem. Autoimmune diseases, which are caused by abnormal immunomodulatory activity of immune cells of the human body, such as rheumatic disease or colon diseases, make up a large proportion of the age-related diseases. A method of modulating immune responses through immune cells, such as T cells or macrophagocytes, is receiving renewed attention as an alternative for the treatment of the autoimmune disease. The T cells play a very important role in the immune responses, and the immune responses can be modulated due to the cytokine secretion of T cells. Therefore, the above diseases can be treated by delivering siRNA gene or immune response modulating proteins to modulate immune responses. A T cell-specific carrier is used to deliver the siRNA gene or immune response modulating proteins to T cells, thereby modulating the immune responses of T cells and treating the above diseases.
[0005] Recently, studies about the use of antibodies are being conducted in order to deliver cell-specific therapeutic proteins or genes, and here, the specific binding of epitopes of the antibody to antigens is employed. Antibodies produced from rabbits, goats, and rodents are used, but since animal testing is performed on rodents in most study stages, rodent-derived antibodies are used more frequently. As a result of these studies, a muscFvCD7-9R carrier in which Oligo-9-Arginine (9R) binds to mouse-derived scFv (muscFvCD7) specifically binding to CD7, which is the T-cell surface protein, was manufactured. It was verified that, small interfering RNA (siRNA) capable of preventing the infection and replication of AIDS viruses is allowed to bind to the scFvCD7-9R carrier, thereby delivering anti-virus siRNA specifically to T cells, and suppressing replication of viruses, which are previously present in vivo, including the infection and replication of AIDS viruses (Kumar et al., Cell, 2008 Aug. 22; 134(4):577-586).
[0006] Nevertheless, CD7-specific scFv (muscFvCD7) used in conventional studies by Kumar et al. (2008) is derived from a rodent ( Mus musculus ), and exhibits antigenicity in vivo when applied to the humanized mouse or the human body. The carrier having antigenicity as above may cause an immune response in vivo prior to cell-specific delivery of siRNA gene or immune response modulating protein, lowering efficiency of delivering siRNA gene or immune response modulating protein into T cells. Therefore, a humanized single chain antibody for using the foregoing rodent-derived scFv as a carrier needs to be developed.
[0007] Throughout the entire specification, many papers and patent documents are referenced and their citations are represented. The disclosures of cited papers and patent documents are entirely incorporated by reference into the present specification, and the level of the technical field within which the present invention falls and details of the present invention are explained more clearly.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
Technical Problem
[0008] An aspect of the present invention is to provide humanized scFv specifically targeting human T cells without exhibiting antigenicity in the body, and a carrier of a drug or label using the same.
[0009] Other purposes and advantages of the present disclosure will become more obvious with the following detailed description of the invention, claims, and drawings.
Technical Solution
[0010] In accordance with an aspect of the present invention, there is provided a humanized scFv including a heavy chain variable region (V H ) composed of a polypeptide including an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 32, and a light chain variable region (V L ) composed of a polypeptide including an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 34.
[0011] In accordance with another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a carrier for delivering a drug or label specifically to T cells by targeting the T cells, the carrier including the humanized scFv.
[0012] Hereinafter, the present invention will be described in detail.
[0013] 1. Humanized scFv to Human CD7 (HzscFvCD7) and Vector Expressing Same
[0014] An aspect of the present invention provides a humanized scFv comprising a heavy chain variable region (V H ) composed of a polypeptide including an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 32, and a light chain variable region (V L ) composed of a polypeptide including an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 34.
[0015] Another aspect of the present invention provides a heavy chain variable region (V H ) of a T cell-specific humanized antibody, composed of a polypeptide including an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 32 and a light chain variable region (V L ) of the T cell-specific humanized antibody, composed of a polypeptide including an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 34.
[0016] Still another aspect of the present invention provides a recombinant vector including a nucleotide sequence coding the humanized scFv.
[0017] The humanized scFv of the present invention includes a heavy chain variable region (V H ) of a T cell-specific humanized antibody and a light chain variable region (V L ) of the T cell-specific humanized antibody.
[0018] Each of the heavy chain variable region (V H ) and the light chain variable region (V L ) of the T cell-specific humanized antibody includes three complementarity determining regions (hereinafter referred to as CDR) and four frameworks (hereinafter, referred to FR), which are arranged in the order of “FR1-CDR1-FR2-CDR2-FR3-CDR3-FR4” from the N-terminal to the C-terminal of the heavy chain variable region (V H ) and the light chain variable region (V L ).
[0019] Preferably, the heavy chain variable region (V H ) of the humanized antibody is configured such that amino acid sequences of FRs and CDRs have high identity to FRs of the human heavy chain sequence, especially, IGHV3-h*01(P), and CDRs of the non-human-derived antibody to human CD7, respectively. More preferably, the heavy chain variable region (V H ) of the humanized antibody is composed of a polypeptide including an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 32. Most preferably, the heavy chain variable region (V H ) of the humanized antibody is composed of a polypeptide including an amino acid sequence coded with a nucleotide sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 33. However, the heavy chain variable region (V H ) of the humanized antibody is not limited thereto, and includes various variants derived from the amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 32 while having both complementarity specific to T cells and the minimum antigenicity to a human immune system. In a specific embodiment of the present invention, the heavy chain variable region (V H ) having an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 32 was designed by combining CDRs of the mouse-derived antibody to human CD7 (CD7cys) and FRs of IGHV3-h*01(P), which is a human heavy chain sequence, and arranging the CDRs and the FRs in the order of “FR1-CDR1-FR2-CDR2-FR3-CDR3-FR4” (see FIG. 1 ).
[0020] Preferably, the light chain variable region (V L ) of the humanized antibody is configured such that amino acid sequences of FRs and CDRs have high identity to FRs of the human light chain sequence, especially, IGKV1-27*01, and CDRs of the non-human-derived antibody to human CD7, respectively. More preferably, the light chain variable region (V L ) of the humanized antibody is composed of a polypeptide including an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 34. Most preferably, the light chain variable region (V L ) of the humanized antibody is composed of a polypeptide including an amino acid sequence coded with a nucleotide sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 35. However, the light chain variable region (V L ) of the humanized antibody is not limited thereto, and includes various variants derived from the amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 34 while having both complementarity specific to T cells and the minimum antigenicity to a human immune system. In a specific embodiment of the present invention, the light chain variable region (V L ) having an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 34 was designed by combining CDRs of the mouse-derived antibody to human CD7 (CD7cys) and FRs of IGKV1-27*01, which is a human light chain sequence, and arranging the CDRs and the FRs in the order of “FR1-CDR1-FR2-CDR2-FR3-CDR3-FR4” (see FIG. 1 ).
[0021] The humanized scFv of the present invention preferably includes a heavy chain variable region (V H ) composed of a polypeptide including an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 32, and a light chain variable region (V L ) composed of a polypeptide including an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 34. Especially, preferably, the heavy chain variable region (V H ) is coded with a gene construct including a nucleotide sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 33, and the light chain variable region (V L ) is coded with a gene construct including a nucleotide sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 35, but are not limited thereto.
[0022] The humanized scFv is not particularly limited as long as it includes various variants derived from an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 36 while having both complementarity specific to T cells and the minimum antigenicity to a human immune system. However, preferably, the humanized scFv is composed of a polypeptide including an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 36. More specifically, the humanized scFv is coded with a gene construct including a nucleotide sequence coding an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 36. Most preferably, the humanized scFv is coded with a gene construct including a nucleotide sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 37. However, the humanized scFv is not limited thereto.
[0023] The gene construct coding the humanized scFv, more preferably, the gene construct including a nucleotide sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 37 may be included in an expression vector. The humanized scFv may be repeatedly mass-produced by using the vector. Besides, in cases where a recombinant protein in which the humanized scFv is fused with a heterologous protein needs to be prepared, a polynucleotide coding the heterologous protein is inserted into a multi-closing site (MCS) of the expression vector including the gene construct, thereby mass-producing the recombinant protein in which the humanized scFv is fused with the heterologous protein.
[0024] Since the humanized scFv is designed to have high identity to the CDRs of the non-human-derived antibody to human CD7, the humanized scFv also has complementarity specifically to human CD7. Since the CD7 is a protein that is specifically expressed on surfaces of human T cells, the humanized scFv of the present invention specifically binds to human T cells, ultimately.
[0025] In addition, the humanized scFv is designed to have high identity to FRs of human-derived heavy chain and light chain sequences, and thus exhibits the minimum antigenicity to a human immune system. Therefore, the humanized scFv can be applied to the human body without a particular immune rejection reaction.
[0026] In a specific embodiment of the present invention, recombinant PCR is repeatedly performed to finally prepare HzscfvCD7-pET21b expression vector including a nucleotide sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 37 (see FIG. 3 ), and the expression vector is expressed and purified in E. coli strain BL21 to give about 27-kDa HzscFvCD7 composed of an amino acid sequence represented by SEQ ID NO: 36 (see FIG. 4 ). (1) In vitro competition assay on the thus prepared HzscFvCD7 and the conventional muscFvCD7 (Kumar et al., Cell, 2008 Aug. 22; 134(4):577-586) verified that HzscFvCD7 and muscFvCD7 recognize the same antigen (see FIG. 11 ). (2) It was verified in vivo that the thus prepared HzscFvCD7 is injected into the humanized mouse (Hu-HSC) to specifically bind to the CD7 protein of CD45+/CD3+ human T cells, more accurately, the CD protein of human T cells (see FIGS. 12 to 14 ). (3) It was verified in vivo that siFITC (FITC-conjugated CD4 siRNA) or poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid) (PLGA) is specifically delivered to human T cells by the thus prepared HzscFvCD7 in the humanized mouse (Hu-PBL) (see FIGS. 15 and 16 ). Furthermore, pharmacokinetic assay verified that the specificity of HzscFvCD7 to T cells is superior to that of the previously humanized antibody/scFv (see FIG. 17 and table 1). Furthermore, as a result of in vitro measuring the degree of antigenicity of HzscFvCD7 in the body by using a human anti-mouse antibody (HAMA), the immune response by the HAMA gradually decreased as the HAMA is further diluted, and the immune response decreased by approximately 70% when the HAMA is diluted at 1:100 (see FIG. 18 ). The above results verified in vitro that the antigenicity in the body significantly decreased in the HzscFvCD7 rather than in the conventional mAbCD7 and muscFvCD7 (Kumar et al., Cell, 2008 Aug. 22; 134(4):577-586). Furthermore, it was verified that, as a result of measuring the degree of induction of differentiation and proliferation of pancreatic cells by injecting the thus prepared HzscFvCD7 into the humanized mouse (Hu-BLT), HzscFvCD7 did not really induce the differentiation and proliferation of pancreatic cells in the humanized mouse (see FIGS. 19 and 20 ).
[0027] 2. Carrier Including HzscFvCD7
[0028] Still another aspect of the present invention provides a carrier for delivering a T-cell activity regulator or a label specifically to T cells by targeting T cells, the carrier including the humanized scFv described in “1. Humanized scFv to human CD (HzscFvCD7) and vector expressing same” above.
[0029] Still another aspect of the present invention provides a composition for diagnosing T cell-mediated diseases, the composition containing the humanized scFv; and a label fused to the N-terminal or C-terminal of the scFv.
[0030] Still another aspect of the present invention provides a pharmaceutical composition for diagnosing T cell-mediated diseases, the pharmaceutical composition containing the humanized scFv; and a T-cell activity regulator fused to the N-terminal or C-terminal of the scFv.
[0031] The humanized scFv are the same as described in “1. Humanized scFv to human CD (HzscFvCD7) and vector expressing same” above. Therefore, detailed descriptions thereof will be omitted by citing the descriptions of “1. Humanized scFv to human CD (HzscFvCD7) and vector expressing same” above, and hereinafter, only particular features of the carrier and composition will be described.
[0032] The scFv described in “1. Humanized scFv to human CD (HzscFvCD7) and vector expressing same” can be applied to the human body without a particular immune rejection reaction while having complementarity to specifically bind to human T cells, and thus can be used as a carrier for specifically delivering a T-cell activity regulator or a label to T cells.
[0033] (1′) When a label binds to the scFv, the scFv can specifically label only T cells. Therefore, the scFv and label fused product can be used as a composition for diagnosing T cell-mediated diseases. Furthermore, (2′) when a T-cell activity regulator binds to the scFv, the scFv can deliver the T-cell activity regulator specifically to T cells, and thus the scFv and T-cell activity regulator fused product can be used as a pharmaceutical composition for preventing or treating T cell-mediated diseases.
[0034] According to another aspect of the present invention, the present invention provides a method for preventing or treating T cell-mediated diseases, the method comprising administering to a subject a composition containing a pharmaceutically effective amount of a T-cell activity regulator fused on the N-terminal or C-terminal of the humanized scFv of the present invention.
[0035] The composition for diagnosing T cell-mediated diseases of the present invention contains a label fused on the N-terminal or C-terminal of the humanized scFv of the present invention.
[0036] Since the humanized scFv are the same as described in “1. Humanized scFv to human CD (HzscFvCD7) and vector expressing same”, detailed descriptions thereof will be omitted.
[0037] The label is for detecting and quantifying T cells, and may be at least one selected from the group consisting of chromogenic enzymes (peroxidase, alkaline phosphatase, etc.), fluorescent materials (FITC, RITC, rhodamine, Texas Red, fluorescein, phycoerythrin, and quantum dots), chromophores, and radioactive isotopes ( 124 I, 125 I, 111 In, 99m Tc, 32 P, 35 S, etc.). In cases where the label is fused on the scFv, the label is preferably fused so as to avoid an influence on specificity or selectivity of the scFv to T cells. To this end, the label may be directly linked (covalent linkage or cross-linkage) to the scFv or may be indirectly fused through a linker (9R3L, 18R6L, liposome, etc.). The fused location of the label can be easily determined by a person skilled in the art through repeated tests.
[0038] Since the label-fused scFv targets T cells, the scFv specifically binds to T cells when the composition is injected into the human body, and thus the location or amount of the label fused on the scFv are measured to diagnose T cell-mediated diseases.
[0039] The T cell-mediated disease may be at least one selected from the group consisting of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), graft rejection, graft-versus-host disease, unwanted delayed type of hypersensitivity reactions, T cell-mediated pulmonary diseases, and autoimmune diseases. More specifically, the T cell-mediated disease may be at least one selected from the group consisting of acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS), multiple sclerosis, neuritis, polymyositis, psoriasis, vitiligo, Sjogren's syndrome, rheumatoid arthritis, type 1 diabetes, autoimmune pancreatitis, inflammatory bowel disease, Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis, celiac disease, glomerulonephritis, scleroderma, sarcoidosis, autoimmune thyroid disease, Hashimoto's thyroiditis, Graves' disease, myasthenia gravis, Addison's disease, autoimmune uveoretinitis, pemphigus vulgaris, primary biliary cirrhosis, pernicious anemia, and systemic lupus erythematosis.
[0040] The pharmaceutical composition for treating T cell-mediated diseases of the present invention contains a T-cell activity regulator fused on the N-terminal or C-terminal of the humanized scFv.
[0041] Since the humanized scFv are the same as described in “1. Humanized scFv to human CD (HzscFvCD7) and vector expressing same”, detailed descriptions thereof will be omitted.
[0042] The T-cell activity regulator may be a T-cell activity inhibitor or a T-cell activity enhancer. In cases where the T-cell activity regulator is fused on the scFv, the T-cell activity regulator is preferably fused so as to avoid an influence on specificity or selectivity of the scFv to T cells. To this end, the T-cell activity regulator may be directly linked (covalent linkage or cross-linkage) to the scFv or may be indirectly fused through a linker (9R or liposome). The fused location of the T-cell activity regulator can be easily determined by a person skilled in the art through repeated tests.
[0043] In cases where the T-cell activity regulator is a T-cell activity inhibitor, the T-cell activity inhibitor may be antisense nucleotide, small interfering RNA (siRNA), short hairpin RNA (shRNA), or the like. The pharmaceutical composition containing the T-cell activity inhibitor can be used for the treatment of diseases caused by hyperactivity due to hyper-differentiation and hyper-proliferation of T cells. The diseases caused by the hyperactivity of T cells may be graft rejection, graft-versus-host disease, unwanted delayed type of hypersensitivity reactions, T cell-mediated pulmonary diseases, and autoimmune diseases. More specifically, the diseases may be multiple sclerosis, neuritis, polymyositis, psoriasis, vitiligo, Sjogren's syndrome, rheumatoid arthritis, type 1 diabetes, autoimmune pancreatitis, inflammatory bowel disease, Crohn's disease, ulcerative colitis, celiac disease, glomerulonephritis, scleroderma, sarcoidosis, autoimmune thyroid disease, Hashimoto's thyroiditis, Graves' disease, myasthenia gravis, Addison's disease, autoimmune uveoretinitis, pemphigus vulgaris, primary biliary cirrhosis, pernicious anemia, and systemic lupus erythematosis.
[0044] The antisense nucleotide binds to (hybridizes with) a complementary nucleotide sequence of DNA, unmatured-mRNA, or matured mRNA, as defined in Watson-Crick base pairs, to interrupt the flow of genetic information from DNA to proteins. The antisense nucleotide is a long chain of monomer units, and may be easily synthesized with respect to a target RNA sequence. Many recent studies validated the usefulness of the antisense nucleotide as a biochemical unit for researching target proteins (Rothenberg et al., J. Natl. Cancer Inst., 81:1539-1544, 1999). Since many advances have been recently made in fields of oligonucleotide chemistry, and synthesis of nucleotides exhibiting improved cell adhesion, target binding affinity, and nuclease resistance, the antisense nucleotide may be considered to be used as a novel type inhibitor.
[0045] The small interfering RNA (siRNA) complementarily binds to (hybridizes with) mRNA coding a target polypeptide in cells, thereby interrupting the flow of genetic information of the target polypeptide from DNA to proteins. The small interfering RNA (siRNA) is composed of a 15- to 30-nt sense sequence selected from the mRNA nucleotide sequence of any one gene expressed in T cells, and an antisense sequence complementarily binding to the sense sequence. The sense sequence is not particularly limited thereto, but is preferably composed of a 25-nt polynucleotide sequence.
[0046] The short hairpin RNA (shRNA) means a full-length RNA molecule including a 50- to 100-nt single strand RNA forming a stem-loop structure in cells, 15- to 50-nt new RNAs in base pairs, which complementarily bind to both sides of the loop region of a 5- to 30-nt (nucleotides), forming a double-strand stem, and further including 1- to 500-nt (nucleotides) before and after the stem forming strand. The loops of the shRNA are cut in cells, and the shRNA interrupts the flow of genetic information of the target polypeptide from DNA to protein, like siRNA. After the shRNA is cut in cells, the shRNA preferably has a 15- to 30-nt sense sequence selected from the mRNA nucleotide sequence of any one gene expressed in T cells and an antisense sequence complementarily binding to the sense sequence, but is not limited thereto.
[0047] In cases where the T-cell activity regulator is a T-cell activity enhancer, the T-cell activity enhancer may be an antiviral agent, such as Zidovudine, Didanosine, Zalcitabine, Stavudine, Lamivudine, Nevirapine, Delavirdine, Ritonavir, Indinavir, or Nelfinavir. The pharmaceutical composition containing the T-cell activity enhancer may be used to treat diseases caused by the degradation in T-cell activity, and a representative example of the disease caused by the degradation in T-cell activity may be acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS).
[0048] In preferable examples of the present invention, CD4 siRNA (siCD4) or FITC-conjugated siCD4 (siFITC) was fused to HzscFvCD7 using a linker, such as 9R or liposome, thereby preparing a complex having a structure as shown in FIG. 5 or 6 (see FIGS. 5 and 6 ). The prepared complex was used to treat Jurkat cells as T cells, or human peripheral blood mononuclear cells, thereby measuring the efficiency of introduction of siFITC into cells and the inhibition rate of expression of CD4 expressed one the cell surface. As a result, siFITC was introduced into Jurkat cells with high efficiency by HzscFvCD7-9R (see FIG. 7 (A)), the CD4 expression was silenced in Jurkat cells and human peripheral blood mononuclear cells by siCD4 delivered by HzscFvCD7-9R (see FIG. 7(B) and FIG. 8 ), and the CD4 expression was silenced in Jurkat cells by siCD4 delivered by the HzscFvCD7-liposome (see FIG. 9 ). In addition, it was verified that protein GFP and polymer PLGA binding to HzscFvCD7 are specifically targeted in Jurkat cells (see FIG. 10 ). It can be seen from the above results that HzscFvCD7 of the present invention can be used to regulate T-cell activity by delivering a T-cell activity regulator, such as siRNA, specifically to T ells.
[0049] The pharmaceutical composition contains a fused product of the scFV and the T-cell activity regulator in, preferably, 0.0001 to 50 wt % based on the total weight of the composition, but is not limited thereto. In addition, the pharmaceutical composition may further include at least one pharmaceutically acceptable carrier in addition to the foregoing active ingredients, for administration. The pharmaceutically acceptable carrier may be at least one selected from a saline solution, sterile water, Ringer's solution, buffered saline, a dextrose solution, a maltodextrin solution, glycerol, ethanol, and liposome, and if necessary, other common additives, such as an antioxidant, a buffer solution, and a bacteriostatic agent, may be added to the pharmaceutical composition. Also, a diluent, a dispersant, a surfactant, a binder, and a lubricant are additionally added to the composition, which may be then formulated into an injectable dosage form, such as an aqueous solution, a suspension, or an emulsion, a pill, a capsule, or a tablet. A target organ specific antibody for specifically acting on a target organ, or other ligand may be used by binding to the carrier. Furthermore, the pharmaceutical composition may be preferably formulated according to the disease or ingredient, by using a suitable method in the art or a method disclosed in the document by Remington (Remington's Pharmaceutical Science (recent edition), Mack Publishing Company, Easton Pa.).
[0050] An administration method of the pharmaceutical composition may be orally administered or parenterally administered (for example, intravenous, subcutaneous, intraperitoneal, brain, or topical application), but is not particularly limited thereto. Here, the parenteral administration is preferable, and the direct injection to the midbrain is most preferable, but the administration method is not particularly limited thereto.
[0051] In addition, the dose of the pharmaceutical composition administered to the human body may vary depending on the age, body weight, and gender of the patient, the manner of administration, the health condition, and the severity of the disease. Based on the adult patient weighting 70 Kg, the dose thereof is generally 0.1 to 1,000 mg/day, and preferably 1 to 500 mg/day. The unit formulation may contain the daily dose or ½, ⅓, ¼ of the daily dose of the pharmaceutically composition. The pharmaceutical composition may be administered once a day or divided into one to six times at predetermined time intervals according to the judgment of the doctor or pharmacist.
Advantageous Effects
[0052] The humanized scFv of the present invention has minimized antigenicity, and thus does not cause an immune response even when applied to the human body, so that the humanized scFv of the present invention can be favorably used as a carrier for delivering a target material, such as siRNA gene or an immune response modulating protein specifically to T cells.
[0053] Meanwhile, the effects of the present invention are not limited to the above-mentioned effects, and other effects could be understood from the following descriptions by a person skilled in the art.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0054] FIGS. 1(A) and 1(B) illustrate that amino acid sequences of heavy chain sequence and light chain sequence of humanized antibody are designed by comparing mouse-derived antibody to human CD7 (CD7cys) with human heavy chain sequence (A) and human light chain sequence (B), and FIG. 1(C) illustrates mouse-derived antibody and humanized antibody.
[0055] FIG. 2 illustrates a map of pdCMV-dhfrC-HzCD7 vector expressing a heavy chain variable region and a light chain variable region of the humanized antibody of the present invention.
[0056] FIG. 3 illustrates a map of HzscfvCD7-pET21b expression vector expressing HzscFvCD7 of the present invention.
[0057] FIG. 4 is an SDS-PAGE gel image of HzscFvCD7 obtained through expression and purification E. coli BL21.
[0058] FIG. 5(A) is a schematic view showing a structure of a complex in which polyoligo-9-arginine (9R) binds to the C-terminal of HzscFvCD7, and FIG. 5(B) is a graph showing MALDI-TOF results confirming whether polyoligo-9-arginine (9R) bound to HzscFvCD7.
[0059] FIG. 6 is a schematic view showing a structure of a complex in which HzscFvCD7 binds to liposome.
[0060] FIG. 7(A) shows graphs illustrating results confirming induction efficiency of HzscFvCD7-9R/siFITC complex into Jurkat cells, and FIG. 7(B) shows graphs illustrating results that CD4 expression is silenced by HzscFvCD7-9R/siCD4 complex in Jurkat cells.
[0061] FIG. 8 shows graphs illustrating results that CD4 expression was silenced by HzscFvCD7-9R/siCD4 complex in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs).
[0062] FIG. 9 shows graphs illustrating results that CD4 expression was silenced by HzscFvCD7-liposome/siCD4 complex in Jurkat cells.
[0063] FIG. 10(A) shows graphs illustrating results that GFP was introduced into HSB2 cells by HzscFvCD7-GFP complex, and FIG. 10(B) shows graphs illustrating results that PLGA was introduced into Jurkat cells by HzscFvCD7-PLGA complex.
[0064] FIG. 11 shows graphs illustrating competition assay results of HzscFvCD7 and muscFvCD7.
[0065] FIG. 12 shows graphs confirming whether human cells are present in tissues of humanized mouse (Hu-HSC). FIG. 12(A) shows graphs of FACS results confirming whether human CD45+ cells were present in blood, liver, thymus, and brain, and FIG. 12(B) shows a graph illustrating cell count in respective tissues of six mice.
[0066] FIG. 13 illustrates results confirming specificity of HzscFvCD7 to human cells in humanized mouse (Hu-HSC). FIG. 13(A) shows graphs confirming that human CD45+ cells were present in blood of Hu-HSC; FIG. 13(B) shows graphs confirming that HzscFvCD7 did not bind to mouse CD45+ cells; and FIG. 13(C) shows graphs confirming that HzscFvCD7 specifically bound to human CD45+ cells.
[0067] FIG. 14 illustrates results confirming specificity of HzscFvCD7 to human T cells of human cells in humanized mouse (Hu-HSC). FIG. 14(A) shows graphs confirming the percentage of CD3+ T cells in human CD45+ cells in blood of Hu-HSC; FIG. 14(B) shows graphs confirming that HzscFvCD7 specifically bound to CD3+ T cells; and FIG. 14(C) shows graphs confirming that HzscFvCD7 did not bind to CD3− cells without CD3 expression, among CD45+ human cells.
[0068] FIG. 15 is a graph illustrating results confirming whether siFITC was specifically delivered to T cells by HzscFvCD7-9R/siFITC complex in humanized mouse (Hu-PBL).
[0069] FIG. 16 shows graphs illustrating results confirming whether PLGA was specifically delivered to T cells by HzscFvCD7-PLGA complex in humanized mouse (Hu-PBL).
[0070] FIG. 17 is a graph illustrating pharmacokinetics (PK) assay in humanized mouse (Hu-PBL).
[0071] FIG. 18 is a graph illustrating in vitro measurement results of antigenicity of HzscFvCD7 in human body by using human-anti-mouse antibody.
[0072] FIG. 19 shows graphs illustrating in vitro measurement results of antigenicity of HzscFvCD7 in the human body, by measuring the degree of differentiation of pancreatic cells after injecting HzscFvCD7 into humanized mouse (Hu-BLT).
[0073] FIG. 20 is a graph illustrating in vitro measurement results of antigenicity of HzscFvCD7 in the human body, by measuring the degree of proliferation of pancreatic cells after HzscFvCD7 was injected into humanized mouse (Hu-BLT).
MODE FOR CARRYING OUT THE INVENTION
[0074] Hereinafter, the present invention will be described in detail with reference to examples. These examples are only for illustrating the present invention more specifically, and it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that the scope of the present invention is not limited by these examples.
Example 1
Preparation of Humanized scFv to Human CD7 (HzscFvCD7)
[0075] <1-1> Design of HzscFvCD7
[0076] As a result of searching human germ cell lines having the highest amino acid sequence identity to a mouse-derived antibody to human CD7 (CD7cys) through the IMGT site (www.imgt.org), (1) the heavy chain sequence of the mouse-derived antibody to human CD7 (CD7cys) was most similar to IGHV3-h*01(P) of the human heavy chain sequence, and (2) the light chain sequence of the mouse-derived antibody to human CD7 (CD7cys) was most similar to IGKV1-27*01 of the human light chain sequence. Based on the above results, humanized scFv to CD7 (HzscFvCD7) was designed by replacing framework (FR) regions with human heavy chain or light chain sequence while conserving CDRs (in CDR of the antibody, the most variable region is referred to as hyper variable (HV) region, and a region of which the amino acid sequence is less changed and stable is referred to as FR) ( FIG. 1 ). However, when designing the HzscFvCD7, portions of the FR regions that influence the structure or affinity of scFv were maintained as the sequence of the mouse-derived antibody as it is without being replaced with the human heavy or light chain sequence.
[0077] As a result, the heavy chain sequence of HzscFvCD7, which has an amino acid sequence of SEQ ID NO: 32, (HzCD7cys in FIG. 1 (A)), and the light chain sequence of HzscFvCD7, which has an amino acid sequence of SEQ ID NO: 34, (HzCD7cys in FIG. 1 (A)), were designed.
[0078] <1-2> Preparation of Humanized Heavy Chain and Light Chain Variable Regions Using Whole IgG Vector
[0079] <1-2-1> Synthesis of Nucleotide Sequence of Humanized Heavy Chain Variable Region
[0080] First, in order to synthesize a signal sequence of a heavy chain gene having a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 38, PCR was performed using pdCMV-dhfr-AKA/HzK (Korean Patent Registration No. 10-0318761) as a template and LHS39 primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 1 and HCleaderBack primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 2 in a pair.
[0081] Then, in order to synthesize a heavy chain variable region of a mouse-derived antibody to human CD7, which has a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 39, PCR was performed using scfvCD7-pET21b (prepared by PCR-amplifying pAK400scFvCD7-GFP construct (Matthias Peipp et al., CANCER RESEARCH 62, 2848-855, May 15, 2002) obtained from Dr. George Fey according to the coding sequence of scFvCD7 so as to s-s (disulfide) conjugate with a positively charged siRNA binding moiety, using a primer into which the C-terminal cysteine residue is introduced, and then cloning the PCR-amplified scFvCD7Cys into pET21b vector (Cat#69741-3, Novagen, US) as a template and CD7H-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 3 and CD7H-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 4 in a pair.
[0082] In order to humanize the thus obtained heavy chain variable region of the mouse-derived antibody to human CD7, which has the nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 39, (1) “humanized heavy chain variable region fragment 1” having a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 40 was obtained by performing PCR using CD7H-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 3 and CD7H1-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 6; (2) “humanized heavy chain variable region fragment 2” having a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 41 was obtained by performing PCR using CD7H1-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 5 and CD7H2-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 8; (3) “humanized heavy chain variable region fragment 3” having a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 42 was obtained by performing PCR using CD7H2-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 7 and CD7H3-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 10; (4) “humanized heavy chain variable region fragment 4” having a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 43 was obtained by performing PCR using CD7H3-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 9 and CD7H4-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 12; (5) “humanized heavy chain variable region fragment 5” having a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 44 was obtained by performing PCR using CD7H4-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 11 and CD7H5-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 14; and (6) “humanized heavy chain variable region fragment 6” having a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 45 was obtained by performing PCR using CD7H5-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 13 and CD7H6-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 15.
[0083] In order to ligate the thus obtained six nucleotide sequence fragments of the humanized heavy chain variable region to human CD7, recombinant PCR was performed using “humanized heavy chain variable region fragment 1”, “humanized heavy chain variable region fragment 2”, and “humanized heavy chain variable region fragment 3” as templates and CD7H-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 3 and CD7H3-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 10, thereby obtaining “humanized heavy chain variable region fragment 1-1” having a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 46. In addition, recombinant PCR was performed using “humanized heavy chain variable region fragment 4”, “humanized heavy chain variable region fragment 5”, and “humanized heavy chain variable region fragment 6” as templates and CD7H3-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 9 and CD7H6-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 15, thereby obtaining “humanized heavy chain variable region fragment 1-2” having a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 47. Then, recombinant PCR was performed using the thus obtained humanized heavy chain variable region fragments 1-1 and 1-2 as templates and CD7H-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 3 and CD7H-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 4, thereby preparing a nucleotide sequence of the humanized heavy chain variable region to human CD7 of SEQ ID NO: 33.
[0084] Then, recombinant PCR was performed using the thus obtained signal sequence of SEQ ID NO: 38 and humanized heavy chain variable region to human CD7 of SEQ ID NO: 33 as templates and LHS39 primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 1 and CD7H-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 4, to ligate the signal sequence of SEQ ID NO: 38 and the humanized heavy chain variable region to human CD7 of SEQ ID NO: 33 to each other (hzCD7(VH)). Then, both ends of the thus ligated hzCD7(VH) fragment were digested with restriction enzymes EcoRI and ApaI, which were then inserted into the EcoRI-ApaI site of pdCMV-dhfrC-AKA/HzK vector, thereby preparing pdCMV-dhfrC-hzCD7(VH).
[0085] All the PCRs during the preparation of such a hzCD7(VH) fragment were performed with a pre-denaturation at 95° C. for 5 minutes, followed by 30 cycles with Taq DNA polymerase of 94° C., 52° C., and 72° C. for 50 seconds, 50 seconds, and 1 minute, respectively.
[0086] <1-2-2> Synthesis of Nucleotide Sequence of Humanized Light Chain Variable Region
[0087] First, in order to synthesize a signal sequence of a light chain gene having a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 48, PCR was performed using pdCMV-dhfr-AKA/HzK (Korean Patent Registration No. 10-0318761) as a template and LHS42 primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 16 and KCleaderback primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 17 in a pair.
[0088] Then, in order to synthesize a nucleotide sequence of a light chain variable region of a mouse-derived antibody to human CD7, which has a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 49, PCR was performed using scfvCD7-pET21b of example <1-2-1> above as a template and CD7L-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 18 and CD7L-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 19 in a pair.
[0089] In order to humanize the thus obtained light chain variable region of the mouse-derived antibody to human CD7, which has the nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 49, (1′) “humanized light chain variable region fragment 1” having a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 50 was obtained by performing PCR using CD7L-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 18 and CD7L1-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 21; (2′) “humanized light chain variable region fragment 2” having a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 51 was obtained by performing PCR using CD7L1-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 20 and CD7L2-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 23; (3′) “humanized light chain variable region fragment 3” having a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 52 was obtained by performing PCR using CD7L2-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 22 and CD7L3-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 125; and (4′) “humanized heavy chain variable region fragment 4” having a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 53 was obtained by performing PCR using CD7L3-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 24 and CD7L-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 19.
[0090] In order to ligate the thus obtained four nucleotide sequence fragments of the humanized light chain variable region to human CD7, recombinant PCR was performed using “humanized light chain variable region fragment 1” and “humanized light chain variable region fragment 2” as templates and CD7H-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 18 and CD7L2-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 23, thereby obtaining “humanized light chain heavy regions 1-1” having s nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 54. In addition, recombinant PCR was performed using “humanized light chain variable region fragment 3” and humanized light chain variable region fragment 4″ as templates and CD7L2-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 22 and CD7L-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 19, thereby obtaining “humanized light chain variable region fragments 1-2” having a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 55. Then, recombinant PCR was performed using the thus obtained humanized light chain variable region fragments 1-1 and 1-2 as templates and CD7L-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 18 and CD7L-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 19, thereby preparing a nucleotide sequence of the humanized light chain variable region to human CD7, of SEQ ID NO: 35.
[0091] Then, recombinant PCR was performed using the thus obtained signal sequence of SEQ ID NO: 48 and the nucleotide sequence of the humanized light chain variable region to human CD7, of SEQ ID NO: 35, as templates and LHS42 primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 16 and CD7L-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 19, to ligate the signal sequence and the nucleotide sequence of the humanized light chain variable region to human CD7, of, SEQ ID NO: 35, to each other (hzCD7(VK). Then, both ends of the thus ligated hzCD7(VH) fragment were digested with restriction enzymes HindIII and BsiWI, which were then inserted into the HindIII-BsiWI site of the pdCMV-dhfrC-hzCD7(VH) prepared in example <1-2-1>, thereby preparing pdCMV-dhfrC-HzCD7 vector having a structure shown in FIG. 2 .
[0092] All the PCRs during the preparation of such a hzCD7(VK) fragment were performed with a pre-denaturation at 95° C. for 5 minutes, followed by 30 cycles with Taq DNA polymerase of 94° C., 52° C., and 72° C. for 50 seconds, 50 seconds, and 1 minute, respectively.
[0093] <1-3> Nucleotide Sequencing of Prepared Light Chain and Heavy Chain Variable Regions
[0094] Nucleotide sequencing of the light chain and heavy chain variable regions of pdCMV-dhfrC-hzCD7 clones prepared in example <1-2> was conducted using T7 Sequenase V2.0 DNA sequencing kit (Amersham).
[0095] As a result, it was verified that the humanized heavy chain and light chain variable regions to human CD7 are composed of nucleotide sequences of SEQ ID NO: 33 and SEQ ID NO: 35, respectively, as designed in example <1-1>.
[0096] <1-4> Construction of Humanized scFv to Human CD7
[0097] In order to prepare humanized scFv to human CD7, PCR was performed using the pdCMV-dhfrC-hzCD7 vector prepared in example <1-2> as a template and scFv L-ndeI-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 26 and scFv L-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 27, thereby obtaining a nucleotide sequence (SEQ ID NO: 35) of the light chain variable region of the humanized antibody to human CD7. PCR was performed using the pdCMV-dhfrC-hzCD7 vector as a template and scFv H-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 30 and scfv H-XhoI-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 31, thereby obtaining a nucleotide sequence (SEQ ID NO: 33) of the heavy chain variable region of the humanized antibody to human CD7. Last, PCR was performed using scfvCD7-pET21b as a template and linker-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 28 and linker-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 29, thereby obtaining a nucleotide sequence of SEQ ID NO: 56 coding the linker of scFv.
[0098] As described above, recombinant PCR was performed using the thus obtained light chain variable region, linker region, and heavy chain variable region as templates and scFv L-ndeI-F primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 26 and scfv H-XhoI-R primer represented by SEQ ID NO: 31, to sequentially ligate the light chain variable region, linker region, and heavy chain variable region to each other (hzscFvCD7). Then, both ends of the hzscFvCD7 fragment ligated as above were digested with restriction enzymes ndeI and XhoI, which were then inserted into the ndeI-XhoI site of the scfvCD7-pET21b vector, thereby preparing HzscfvCD7-pET21b expression vector having a structure shown in FIG. 3 .
[0099] All the PCRs during the preparation of the hzscFvCD7 fragment above were performed with a pre-denaturation at 95° C. for 5 minutes, followed by 30 cycles with Taq DNA polymerase of 94° C., 52° C., and 72° C. for 50 seconds, 50 seconds, and 1 minute, respectively.
[0100] <1-5> Nucleotide Sequencing of Prepared Humanized scFv to Human CD7 (HzscFvCD7)
[0101] Nucleotide sequencing of HzscFvCD7 of the clones prepared in example <1-4> was conducted using T7 Sequenase V2.0 DNA sequencing kit (Amersham).
[0102] As a result, it was verified that the light chain and heavy chain variable regions of HzscFvCD7 were derived from nucleotide sequences (SEQ ID NO: 33 and 35) of the light chain (HzCD7(VK)) and heavy chain (HzCD7(VH)) variable regions of pdCMV-dhfrC-HzCD7.
Example 2
Expression and Purification of Humanized scFv to Human CD7 (HzscFvCD7)
[0103] E. coli strain BL21 was transformed with the HzscfvCD7-pET21b constructed in example <1-4> to obtain BL21 single colony. The BL21 single colony was inoculated in LB liquid media containing ampicillin, and then cultured in a shaking incubator at 37° C. The absorbance thereof was measured at O.D. 600 nm using a spectrophotometer, and the BL21 single colony was cultured until the O.D. value reached 0.6 to 0.8, followed by the addition of IPTG, and then cultured at 26° C. overnight. The bacteria pellets obtained by 4000×g centrifugation at 4° C. for 10 minutes were sonicated using a sonicator while the lysis buffer was added thereto, and again centrifuged at 4000×g for 40 minutes at 4° C. to separate a supernatant. After that, humanized scFv to human CD7 (HzscFvCD7) was purified using FPLC.
[0104] The purified HzscFvCD7 was subjected to dialysis in DPBS of pH 7.4, and then concentrated using a concentration column. The purified HzscFvCD7 was subjected to a concentration measurement using BCA kit (Pierce, US) and then a size measurement through SDS-PAGE.
[0105] As a result, the purified HzscFvCD7 was verified to have a size of about 27 kDa ( FIG. 4 ).
Example 3
Preparation of Carrier Using Specificity of HzscFvCD7
[0106] <3-1> Conjugation of HzscFvCD7 and Poly Oligo-9-Arginine
[0107] As one method for using HzscFvCD7 as a carrier for siRNA, poly oligo-9-Arginine (hereinafter, referred to as 9R) capable of binding to siRNA was conjugated to HzscFvCD7.
[0108] More specifically, the N-terminal of HzscFvCD7 was inactivated with sulfo-NHS-acetate, and then unreacted sulfo-NHS-acetate was removed using the dialysis membrane. Then, the primary amine group (N-terminal) of 9R was disulfide-bonded to Cys of the C-terminal of HzscFvCD7 through the NHS-EDC reaction, thereby preparing a carrier for siRNA having a structure shown in FIG. 5(A) .
[0109] Then, it was confirmed through MALDI-TOF whether HzscFvCD7 bound to 9R. As a result, it was verified that HzscFvCD7 chemically bound to 9R by about 90% or more ( FIG. 5(B) ).
[0110] <3-2> Conjugation of HzscFvCD7 and Liposome
[0111] The liposome was prepared to have the following composition, and then used to deliver siRNA.
[0112] HSPC:HSPE:Chol:DCchol:DSPE-PEG-Mal=6:1:1:1:0.14
[0113] Lipid was dissolved in chloroform in the 5-ml flask, and a dry film was prepared using a rotary evaporator, followed by removal of remaining chloroform using a desiccator. The reaction product of 9-Arginine and siRNA (molar ratio=5:1), which was obtained by previously performing the reaction in PBS, was put on the lipid dry film, followed by hydration, and then extrusion was performed using a PC membrane (100 nm). The thus prepared liposome was put in a 1.5-ml tube, and HzscFvCD7 and DSPE-PEG-Mal were mixed at a molar ratio of 1:1. The mixture was allowed to react (Maleimid reaction, 25° C., pH 7.4), followed by vortexing for 2 hours, and then subjected to ultracentrifugation at 80000×g for 40 minutes at 4° C. to remove unbound humanized HzscFvCD7, thereby preparing a carrier for siRNA having a structure of FIG. 6 .
Example 4
Evaluation on In Vitro Efficacy of HzscFvCD7 as Carrier
[0114] In order to evaluate targeting efficacy of HzscFvCD7 as a carrier, siRNA (hereinafter, referred to as siCD4) inhibiting the CD4 expression on T cell surfaces, FITC-conjugated siCD4 (hereinafter, referred to as siFITC), green fluorescent protein (GFP), or poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid) (PLGA) polymer was allowed to chemically bind to a carrier including HzscFvCD7, and a Jurkat cell line and a primary cell line of peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) were treated with the resultant material.
[0115] <4-1> Evaluation on siRNA Delivery Efficacy to T Cells or Jurkat Cells Using “HzscFvCD7-9R”
[0116] First, the siFITC was mixed with the HzscFvCD7-9R prepared in example <3-1> to prepare a complex, and then Jurkat cells were treated with the complex. The induction efficiency of siFITC into Jurkat cells and the inhibition rate of CD4 expression were analyzed using a flow cytometry instrument.
[0117] As a result, it was verified that 80% or more of siFITC was introduced into the Jurkat cells (FIG. 7 (A)), and the CD expression was silenced by about 50% in the Jurkat cells ( FIG. 7(B) ). It can be seen from the above results that the HzscFvCD7-9R can introduce siRNA into T cells, the HzscFvCD7-18R6L delivers siRNA specifically to T cells and silences the CD4 expression.
[0118] Then, siCD4 was mixed with the HzscFvCD7-9R prepared in example <3-1> to prepare a complex, and then peripheral blood mononuclear cells were treated with the complex. The expression rate of CD4 was analyzed using a flow cytometry instrument.
[0119] As a result, the CD expression was silenced by 50% or more in the peripheral blood mononuclear cells ( FIG. 8 ). It can be seen from the above results that the HzscFvCD7-18R6L delivers siRNA specifically to T cells and silences the CD4 expression.
[0120] <4-2> Evaluation on siRNA Delivery Efficacy to T Cells Using “HzscFvCD7-Liposome”
[0121] In order to evaluate targeting efficacy of HzscFvCD7-liposome to T cells, siCD4 was mixed with the HzscFvCD7-liposome prepared in example <3-2>, and then Jurkat cells were treated with the mixture. The inhibition rate of CD4 expression was analyzed using a flow cytometry instrument.
[0122] As a result, the CD expression was silenced by about 65% in T cells ( FIG. 9 ). It can be seen from the above results that the HzscFvCD7-liposome delivers siRNA specifically to T cells and silences the CD4 expression.
[0123] <4-3> Evaluation on Protein or Polymer Delivery Efficacy to T Cells Using “HzscFvCD7”
[0124] In order to evaluate targeting efficacy of HzscFvCD7 to T cells, GFP protein or PLGA was chemically conjugated with the HzscFvCD7 prepared in example 2 by the same method as shown in example <3-1> for 9R binding, and then HSB2 cells and Jurkat cells were treated with the conjugate. The GFP or PLGA delivery degree to T cells was analyzed using a flow cytometry instrument.
[0125] As a result, it was verified that the induction efficiency of GFP protein to T cells (HSB2 cells) was 90% or more (HSB2 cells) (FIG. 10 (A)), and the induction efficiency of PLGA to T cells (Jurkat cells) was also 80% or more ( FIG. 10(B) ). It can be seen from the above results that the HzscFvCD7 can deliver protein or polymer as well as siRNA specifically to T cells.
Example 5
Characterization of HzscFvCD7
[0126] <5-1> Confirmation on Whether HzscFvCD7 and Mouse-Derived scFv to Human CD7 Recognize Same Antigen
[0127] Competition assay was performed in order to verify whether the HzscFvCD7 prepared in example 2 and the existing mouse-derived scFv to human CD7 (muscFvCD7 (Kumar et al., Cell, 2008 Aug. 22; 134(4):577-586)) recognize the same antigen. First, Jurkat cells were treated with HzscFvCD7 bound with Alexa 488 to confirm the binding of HzscFvCD7 to Jurkat cells as T cells. Then, Jurkat cells were cross-treated with HzscFvCD7 and T3Ale (full-length antibody including muscFvCD7 (Kumar et al., Cell, 2008 Aug. 22; 134(4):577-586)) to confirm the binding to Jurkat cells.
[0128] As a result, it was verified that the binding of muscFvCD7 to Jurkat cells were inhibited when Jurkat cells were treated with HzscFvCD7 before muscFvCD7 ( FIG. 11 ). It can be seen from the above results that HzscFvCD7 and muscFvCD7 recognize the same antigen.
[0129] <5-2> Evaluation on T-Cell Targeting Efficacy of HzscFvCD7 in Humanized Mouse
[0130] <5-2-1> Evaluation on T-Cell Targeting Efficacy of HzscFvCD7 in Humanized Mouse Hu-HSC
[0131] In order to evaluate T-cell targeting efficacy of HzscFvCD7 prepared in example 2 in vivo, the following experiments were conducted.
[0132] First, humanized mouse Hu-HSC was prepared according to Ishikawa et al. (Blood 2005; 106:1565-1573) and Kumar et al. (Cell, 2008 Aug. 22; 134(4):577-586), and the presence of human cells in blood, liver, thymus, and brain of the mouse Hu-HSC after 8 weeks was confirmed using a flow cytometry instrument.
[0133] As a result, it was verified that 70% of cells were differentiated into human cells after about 8 weeks, and a large amount of human leukocytes were present in pancreas and liver, including blood ( FIG. 12 ), and, especially, it was verified that a large amount of human leukocytes were also present in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) of Hu-HSC ( FIG. 13(A) ).
[0134] Next, HzscFvCD7 bound with Alexa 488 was intravenously injected into mouse Hu-HSC one time to collect peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs), and it was confirmed using a flow cytometry instrument whether HzscFvCD7 was delivered to CD45+ human cells, and delivered to CD3+ T cells of human cells.
[0135] As a result, it was verified that HzscFvCD7 never bound to the mouse cells (FIG. 13 (B)), but about 50% of HzscFvCD7 bound to CD45+ human cells through a single intravenous injection ( FIG. 13(C) ). In addition, it was verified that about 80% of the CD45+ human cells were CD3+ T cells (FIG. 14 (A)), and HzscFvCD7 specifically bound to about 40% to 60% of CD3+ T cells ( FIG. 14(B) ). Furthermore, it was verified that HzscFvCD7 did not bind to CD3− cells without CD3 expression, in CD45+ human cells ( FIG. 14(C) ). From the above results that HzscFvCD7 can target about 40% to 60% of T cells through only a single intravenous injection, the possibility of targeting most of T cells by repetitive administration of HzscFvCD7 was verified.
[0136] <5-2-2> Evaluation on T-Cell Targeting Efficacy of HzscFvCD7 in Humanized Mouse Hu-PBL
[0137] Humanized mouse Hu-PBL was prepared according to Nakata et al. (J Virol 2005; 79:2087-2096) and Kumar et al. (Cell, 2008 Aug. 22; 134(4):577-586).
[0138] The complex of HzscFvCD7-9R and siFITC prepared in example <4-1> or the complex of HzscFvCD7 and PLGA prepared in example <4-3> was intravenously injected into mouse Hu-PBL one time to collect blood, and it was confirmed using a flow cytometry instrument whether siFITC or PLGA was delivered to T cells.
[0139] As a result, it was verified that HzscFvCD7-9R delivered siFITC specifically to human T cells ( FIG. 15 ), and delivered PLGA specifically to human T cells ( FIG. 16 ).
[0140] <5-3> Confirmation on Pharmacokinetics (PK) of HzscFvCD7 in Humanized Mouse
[0141] HzscFvCD7 bound with Alexa 488 (HzscFvCD7-AF488) was intravenously injected into the tail of mouse Hu-HSC to collect blood after 5, 30, 60, 120, 140, and 900 minutes, and then the presence of AF488 was confirmed using PKSolver.
[0142] As a result, it was measured that the delivery half-life of HzscFvCD7 as a carrier was about 21 minutes, and the HzscFvCD7 was completely degraded after 10 hours ( FIG. 17 ). It can be seen from the above results that the HzscFvCD7 of the present invention has an excellent PK value compared with the existing developed humanized antibody (table 1).
[0000]
TABLE 1
Comparision of PK value between HzscFvCD7 and
previously developed humanized antibody/scFv
PK
scFv
(pharmacokinetics)
Reference
HzscFvCD7
T 1/2α = 21.2 min
—
T 1/2β = 1.3 h
Hu-scFv3077
T 1/2α = 7.12 min
Krinner et al., Protein Eng Des
(anti GM-CSF)
T 1/2β = 2 h
Sel. 2006 Oct; 19(10):461-70
ML7-wt
T 1/2α = 36 min
Arndt et al., Int J cancer. 2003
(anti CD22)
T 1/2β = —
Dec 10;107(5):822-9
G28-5 scFv-PE40
T 1/2α = 16.7 min
Francisco et al, Blood. 1997 Jun
(anti CD40
T 1/2β = 45.3 mm
15;89(12):4493-500
immunotoxin)
hu/muCC49 scFv
T 1/2α = 6 min
Pavlinkova et al., Cancer
(anti TAG72)
T 1/2β = —
Immunol Immunother. 2000
Jul;49(4-5):267-75
Example 6
Confirmation on Humanization of HzscFvCD7
[0143] <6-1> Measurement of Immune Response of HzscFvCD7 Using Human Anti-Mouse Serum (HAMA)
[0144] Purified mAbCD7, muscFvCD7 (Kumar et al., Cell, 2008 Aug. 22; 134(4):577-586), and HzscFvCD7 prepared in example 2 were titrated to 10 ug/ml, and respectively dispensed on the ELISA plate, followed by HAMA treatment, to confirm the immune response. HRP-conjugated goat anti-human Fc specific mAb was used as a secondary antibody of HAMA.
[0145] As a result, it was verified that, as for the HzscFvCD7 of the present invention, the immune response by the HAMA gradually decreased as the HAMA was diluted, and the immune response decreased by approximately 70% when the HAMA was diluted at 1:100 (see FIG. 18 ). It can be seen from the above results that HzscFvCD7 hardly causes the immune response by the human antibody in vitro.
[0146] <6-2> Measurement of Immune Response of HzscFvCD7 in Humanized Mouse
[0147] The Hu-BLT mouse model (Shimizu et al. (Blood, 2010; 115:1534-1544) and Melkus et al. (Nat Med. 2006; 12(11):1316-1322)) was divided into (1) “HzscFvCD7 treatment group” and (2) “DNP-KLH (2,4-dinitrophenylated keyhole limpet protein) treatment group”, and 200 ug of HzscFvCD7 and 100 ug of DNP-KLH as antigens were injected thereinto. After 2 weeks, the equivalent amount of antigens (200 ug of HzscFvCD7 and 100 ug of DNP-KLH) were secondarily injected into the respective antigen treatment groups, and then pancreatic cells were isolated. The isolated pancreatic cells were stained with carboxyfluorescein succinimidyl ester (CFSE), and treated with the same antigen to induce differentiation and proliferation of pancreatic cells.
[0148] As a result, the cell differentiation ( FIG. 19 ) and proliferation ( FIG. 20 ) were much less induced in pancreatic cells derived from mice of the HzscFvCD7 treatment group rather than in pancreatic cells derived from mice of the DNP-KLH treatment group. It can be seen from the above results that HzscFvCD7 hardly caused the immune response in vivo as well as in vitro.
[0149] Although the present invention has been described in detail with reference to the specific features, it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that this description is only for a preferred embodiment and does not limit the scope of the present invention. Thus, the substantial scope of the present invention will be defined by the appended claims and equivalents thereof.
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The present invention relates to a humanized scFv delivery vehicle targeted to be human T-cell specific, and provides: a humanized scFv which comprises a heavy-chain variable region (VH) consisting of a polypeptide comprising an amino acid sequence given by sequence number 32 and comprises a light-chain variable region (VL) consisting of a polypeptide comprising an amino acid sequence given by sequence number 34; and a T-cell-specific drug or marker delivery vehicle comprising the humanized scFv. The humanized scFv of the present invention has minimalised antigenicity and has an effect which does not give rise to an immune reaction even when used in the human body, and thus can advantageously be used as a delivery vehicle for specifically delivering a target substance such as a siRNA gene or an immune reaction regulating protein to T-cells.
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CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] This application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Application 60/472,545, filed May 22, 2003 and Provisional Application 60/472,543, filed May 22, 2003, both herein incorporated by reference in their entirety. This application is also related to U.S. application Ser. No. 10/716,060, filed Nov. 18, 2003 and U.S. patent application ______, filed the same day as this application, entitled “Hermetic Terminal Assembly for Hermetic Inverters/Converters”, both herein incorporated by reference in their entirety.
STATEMENT REGARDING FEDERALLY SPONSORED RESEARCH
[0002] This invention was made with Government support under Contract No. DE-AC05-00OR22725 awarded to UT-Battelle, LLC, by the U.S. Department of Energy. The Government has certain rights in this invention.
TECHNICAL FIELD
[0003] The field of the invention relates to methods for making seal materials in hermetic terminal assemblies and more particularly to vacuum pressure casting of the seal material which produces a more durable hermetic terminal assembly for hermetic inverters/converters using refrigerant for cooling.
DESCRIPTION OF THE BACKGROUND ART
[0004] The reliability of the methods of making hermetically sealed terminal assemblies used in compressors is well recognized. Terminal assemblies made by the Vitrus Company, Amphenol, and Ceramaseal are typical examples of compressor assemblies made with standard methods. Examples of compressor assemblies are also disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,584,433, issued to B. Bowsky, et al. on Apr. 22, 1986; U.S. Pat. No. 5,471,015, issued to F. Dieter Paterek, et al. On Nov. 28, 1995. These two aforementioned patents were further concerned with conductive pin fusing and with pin design, respectively. U.S. Pat. No. 4,580,003, issued to B. Bowsky et al. on Apr. 1, 1986 teaches an aperture with flattened neck portion. U.S. Pat. No. 4,584,333, issued to B. Bowsky et. al. on Apr. 22, 1986, teaches the relative coefficients of expansion and softening point temperatures in U.S. Pat. No. 5,471,015, issued to F. D. Paterek et. al. on Nov. 28, 1995. U.S. Pat. No. 6,509,525 issued to Honkomp et al. on Jan. 21, 2003 further teaches an arc-resistant assembly.
[0005] The electrical current level and differential pressure experienced by compressor terminal assemblies is generally less than hermetic refrigerant container terminal assemblies that contain power electronic inverter/converter components. Hermetic terminal assemblies for inverters/converters require the longitudinal and radial coefficients of thermal expansions of the conductors to be compatible with those of the seal material (glass, ceramic, polymer, or other equivalent material). Furthermore, the chosen seal material between the terminal assembly and the material of the hermetic container must be compatible. Methods for making terminal assemblies used for the hermetic inverters/converters are distinct from the available hermetic terminal/connector assembly methods because:
[0006] (1) The electrical rating of the hermetic inverter/converter is generally much higher than that of a hermetic compressor. A 50 kW motor requires an inverter/converter that roughly corresponds to 1150-amp 3-phase line current for a 42-volt DC-link, and to 120-amp line current for a 400-volt DC-link.
[0007] (2) The DC-link bus, signal leads, and refrigerant tubing are extra items that differ from the AC electric power of a compressor. The DC-link-current magnitudes are also high. They are roughly 1400 amp and 150 amp, respectively, for the above two cases.
[0008] (3) The DC-link requires a low inductance circuit.
[0009] (4) There are minimums of six gate signal inputs that require low interference and short connections.
[0010] (5) Other additional diagnostic signals may also need to be included.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0011] Power electronic dies in inverters/converters, such as those of the IGBT or MOSFET, have little thermal capacity and a critical junction temperature and can be located in high pressure regions of hermetic containers. The electrolytic capacitors in the same inverter/converter have better thermal capacity but should not be mounted in high pressure regions of hermetic containers to prevent contamination from sipping into the gap material between the positive and negative foils. Electrical and mechanical services for these power electronic devices placed inside hermetic containers require specialized seal materials and methods for making the terminal assemblies at the service conduit penetrations.
[0012] The polymer seal material can be hardened either at room temperature or at a higher baking temperature depending on the admixture of the polymer seal material. The baking step provides additional handling time before the polymer seal material sets. This invention teaches both hardening methods.
[0013] [0013]FIGS. 1 a and 1 b show embodiments for a method of vacuum pressure casting seal material used in hermetic terminal assemblies. FIG. 2 shows a hermetic container, using the terminal assembly, which can be made of steel or other magnetic or non-magnetic materials as long as these materials meet the pressure and sealing requirements. There are two zones inside the hermetic container; one is the liquid refrigerant zone and the other is the vapor refrigerant zone. The liquid refrigerant zone is good for cooling the power electronic dies and any other critical components. The vapor refrigerant zone is good for cooling the less critical components having relatively higher thermal capacities. The zone outside the hermetic container is cooled but without a high pressure. It has an ambient pressure. This zone can be used to cool the components such as the electrolytic capacitors. A thermally isolated housing is separating this zone from the ambient. The hermetic container and the thermally isolated housing with metal mesh (or foil) can be used for EMI shielding. A need exists for a method of making the hermetic terminal assemblies that provide electrical and mechanical services to the inverter/converter.
[0014] The hermetic terminal assembly method in this invention provides for routing AC power terminals, DC-link bus, signal leads, refrigerant tubing, and any additional wires for simplifying the manufacturing process and reducing the cost.
[0015] [0015]FIG. 3 shows an alternate embodiment of the hermetic inverter/converter with the terminal assembly housing electrical connections only. The liquid refrigerant supply tube comes from the top of the hermetic container, and mates to a distributor built into the terminal assembly, fitting in as the terminal assembly is inserted.
[0016] This invention teaches methods of making a hermetic terminal assembly comprising the steps of: inserting temporary stops, shims and jigs on the bottom face of a terminal assembly thereby blocking assembly core open passageways; mounting the terminal assembly inside a vacuum chamber using a temporary assembly perimeter seal and flange or threaded assembly interfaces; mixing a seal admixture and hardener in a mixer conveyor to form a polymer seal material; conveying the polymer seal material into a polymer reservoir; feeding the polymer seal material from the reservoir through a polymer outlet valve and at least one polymer outlet tube into the terminal assembly core thereby filling interstitial spaces in the core adjacent to service conduits, temporary stop, and the terminal assembly casing; drying the polymer seal material at room temperature thereby hermetically sealing the core of the terminal assembly; removing the terminal assembly from the vacuum chamber, and; removing the temporary stops, shims and jigs.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0017] [0017]FIG. 1 a shows a preferred embodiment for a method of vacuum pressure casting seal material used in hermetic terminal assemblies wherein the polymer seal material is dryed at room temperature.
[0018] [0018]FIG. 1 b shows another embodiment for a method of vacuum pressure casting seal material used in hermetic terminal assemblies wherein the polymer seal material is cured at higher than room temperature.
[0019] [0019]FIG. 2 shows an example of a hermetic inverter/converter with terminal assembly of electrical connections and tubing.
[0020] [0020]FIG. 3 shows an example of a hermetic inverter/converter with electrical only terminal assembly.
[0021] [0021]FIG. 4 shows the seal diameter, d, and shearing stress on seal material.
[0022] [0022]FIG. 5 a is a side view of an embodiment of the hermetic terminal assembly.
[0023] [0023]FIG. 5 b is a front view of an embodiment of the hermetic terminal assembly.
[0024] [0024]FIG. 6 shows another embodiment of the hermetic terminal assembly using tapered or bent shapes for stress modification.
[0025] [0025]FIG. 7 is an example of flange O-ring mounting for the terminal assembly.
[0026] [0026]FIG. 8 is an example of threaded O-ring mounting for the terminal assembly.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
[0027] [0027]FIG. 1 a shows an embodiment for a method of vacuum pressure casting seal material used in hermetic terminal assemblies wherein the polymer seal material is cured at room temperature. The pressure inside the vacuum chamber 96 is controlled by two control valves 99 to achieve either atmospheric or higher pressure 98 or vacuum 97 . The bottom face of the terminal assembly 86 uses a temporary stop 82 of wax or an equivalent substance, such as gypsum or silicon rubber that can be removed after the polymer seal material is cured, to contain the polymer seal material 85 during manufacturing. Shims or jigs 84 are used to maintain alignment of the service conduits during manufacturing. If the terminal assembly 86 contains refrigerant tubes, the lower ends of the tubes are stopped with temporary plugs 83 or other equivalent means. The vacuum chamber 96 is placed over the terminal assembly 86 with O-ring type temporary assembly perimeter seal 80 plus flange or threaded interfaces 89 to produce a vacuum seal between the terminal assembly 86 and the vacuum chamber 96 . The seal admixture 93 comprising a mixture of at least one polymer and at least one material selected from the group consisting of graphite fibers, ceramic powder, glass powder, and glass fibers is then mixed with the hardener 92 before being delivered to the polymer reservoir 91 through a mixer conveyor 94 . To prevent premature hardening, the seal admixture 93 is mixed with the hardener 92 immediately before feeding. A polymer outlet valve 95 that leads to the inside of the vacuum chamber 96 controls the flow of the polymer. Multiple polymer outlet tubes 87 can be used as an option. The setup can be mounted on a shaker 81 to produce vibration during casting. An optional control arm 88 that moves the polymer outlet tube can be incorporated to the vacuum chamber 96 for controlling the polymer distribution. The polymer tubing 87 and polymer outlet valve 95 can be disposable for easy cleaning. After the seal material 85 is placed in the terminal assembly 86 , the polymer outlet valve 95 is closed. Subsequently, the control valves 99 can alternate the pressure in the vacuum chamber 96 from vacuum 97 to pressure 98 for exerting settling forces on the seal material 85 thereby eliminating voids in the seal material 85 caused by, for example, vacuum or air pockets. After the seal material 85 is hardened, the temporary stop 82 and the shims or jigs 84 are removed.
[0028] [0028]FIG. 1 b shows an embodiment for a method of vacuum pressure casting seal material of a higher-than-room temperature cured polymer mix used in hermetic terminal assemblies. The pressure inside the vacuum chamber 96 is controlled by two control valves 99 to achieve either a pressure (atmospheric or higher) 98 or vacuum 97 . The bottom face of the terminal assembly 86 uses a temporary stop 82 of gypsum or an equivalent substance that can withstand the baking temperature and be taken away after the polymer is cured to contain the polymer seal material 85 during manufacturing. Shims or jigs 84 are used to maintain alignment of the service conduits during manufacturing. If the terminal assembly 86 contains refrigerant tubes, the lower ends of the tubes are stopped with temporary plugs 83 or other equivalent means. The vacuum chamber 96 is placed over the terminal assembly 86 with O-ring type temporary assembly perimeter seal 80 plus flange or threaded interfaces 89 to produce a vacuum seal between the terminal assembly 86 and the vacuum chamber 96 . The seal admixture comprising at least one polymer and at least one thermal expansion controlling material selected from the group consisting of glass powder, ceramic powder, glass fibers, and graphite fibers, is mixed with a higher-temperature hardener to form a seal premixture 90 before being delivered to the polymer reservoir 91 . A polymer outlet valve 95 leading to the inside of the vacuum chamber 96 controls the flow of the premixture 90 . Multiple polymer outlet tubes 87 can be used as an option. The setup can be mounted on an optional shaker 81 to produce vibration during casting. An optional control arm 88 that moves the polymer outlet tube can be incorporated into the vacuum chamber 96 for controlling the polymer distribution. The polymer tubing 87 and polymer outlet valve 95 can be reused because, without going through a baking process, the polymer in the tubing 87 and polymer outlet valve 95 is not hardened. After the seal premixture 90 is placed in the terminal, the polymer outlet valve 98 is closed. Subsequently, the control valves 99 can alternate the pressure in the vacuum chamber 96 from vacuum 97 to pressure 98 for exerting settling forces on the seal material 85 thereby eliminating voids in the seal material 85 caused by, for example, vacuum or air pockets. The terminal 86 is then placed in an oven (not shown) for curing the seal material 85 . After being properly baked thereby hardening the seal material 85 , the temporary stop 82 and the shims or jigs 84 are removed.
[0029] [0029]FIG. 2 shows a preferred arrangement of the hermetically sealed terminal assembly 1 , manufactured using vacuum pressure casting of this invention, mounted in a multi-zone hermetic inverter/converter cooling chamber 40 . The hermetic container 2 can be made of steel, magnetic material, non-magnetic material, metal, and non-metal pressure vessel materials that meet the pressure, temperature and sealing requirements of the refrigerant and the EMI shielding requirements of the electronic components. A joint seam 6 is integral with the walls of the hermetic container 2 . The hermetic container 2 has a sealed terminal assembly 1 having service conduits 3 selected from the group consisting of AC phase conductors, DC link conductors, gate signal leads, diagnostic signal wires, and refrigerant tubing. The hermetic container 2 also has at least one vapor refrigerant outlet 5 . There are two zones inside the hermetic container 2 ; one is the liquid refrigerant zone 9 and the other is the vapor refrigerant zone 10 . The liquid refrigerant zone 9 is suitable for cooling the power electronic dies and other critical components using direct liquid refrigerant contact cooling. The vapor refrigerant zone 10 is suitable for cooling the less critical, high thermal capacity components using direct vapor refrigerant contact cooling. The ambient cooling zone 8 , outside the hermetic container 2 , provides cooled ambient pressure conditions for cooling components such as the electrolytic capacitors at atmospheric pressure. A thermally isolated housing 4 isolates the ambient cooling zone 8 from the ambient and creates a cooled interstitial space between the refrigerant filled hermetic container 2 and the thermally isolated housing 4 . The interstitial space is the ambient cooling zone 8 that is cooled by indirect heat transfer to the refrigerant through the refrigerant filled hermetic container 2 . The hermetic container 2 and the thermally isolated housing 4 with metal mesh (or foil) can be used for EMI shielding.
[0030] [0030]FIG. 3 shows another preferred arrangement of the hermetically sealed terminal assembly 1 with a liquid refrigerant supply tube 7 routed from the top of the hermetic container 2 and mating to a distributor (not shown) built into the terminal assembly 1 . The terminal assembly 1 is mounted in a multi-zone hermetic inverter/converter cooling chamber 40 . The hermetic container 2 can be made of steel, magnetic material, non-magnetic material, metal, and non-metal pressure vessel materials that meet the pressure, temperature and sealing requirements of the refrigerant and the EMI shielding requirements of the electronic components. A joint seam 6 is integral with the walls of the hermetic container 2 . The sealed terminal assembly 1 has service conduits 11 selected from the group consisting of AC phase conductors, DC link conductors, gate signal leads, and diagnostic signal wires. The hermetic container 2 also has at least one vapor refrigerant outlet 5 . There are two zones inside the hermetic container 2 ; one is the liquid refrigerant zone 9 and the other is the vapor refrigerant zone 10 . The liquid refrigerant zone 9 is suitable for cooling the power electronic dies and other critical components using direct liquid refrigerant contact cooling. The vapor refrigerant zone 10 is suitable for cooling the less critical, high thermal capacity components using direct vapor refrigerant contact cooling. The ambient cooling zone 8 , outside the hermetic container 2 , provides cooled ambient pressure conditions for cooling components such as the electrolytic capacitors at atmospheric pressure. A thermally isolated housing 4 isolates the ambient cooling zone 8 from the ambient and creates a cooled interstitial space between the refrigerant filled hermetic container 2 and the thermally isolated housing 4 . The interstitial space is the ambient cooling zone 8 that is cooled by indirect heat transfer to the refrigerant through the refrigerant filled hermetic container 2 . The hermetic container 2 and the thermally isolated housing 4 with metal mesh (or foil) can be used for EMI shielding.
[0031] [0031]FIG. 4 shows the shear stress 31 imposed by force 33 on the seal material 32 of a sealed hermetic terminal with an outer diameter, d, with the seal material 32 adhering to the terminal casing inner wall. Under a given pressure difference, ΔP, between the inside and the outside of the hermetic container, the force 33 pushing the seal material towards outside of the container is
π · d 2 4 Δ P .
[0032] This force is countered by the seal material 32 having an interfacing periphery area of π·d·L The shearing stress 31 on the seal material 32 is the force divided by the peripheral area, which yields:
Shearing stress = π · d 2 4 Δ P π · d · L = d · Δ P 4 · L
[0033] Under a given pressure difference ΔP and seal length L, the shearing stress of the seal material goes up in proportion to the seal diameter d. Therefore, for a relatively large seal diameter we can transfer part of the shearing stress 31 to a compression stress for the seal material 32 using service conduits with tapered shapes.
[0034] [0034]FIG. 5 a is a side view of an embodiment of the hermetic terminal assembly 40 mounted in a hermetic container 41 . The terminal assembly casing 42 encompasses a collection of service conduits identified as; negative DC link conductor 43 , positive DC link conductor 44 , refrigerant tubing 45 , AC phase conductor 46 , diagnostic signal wires 47 , gate signal leads 48 , and seal material 49 . FIG. 4 b is a front view of the hermetic terminal assembly 40 showing the same components.
[0035] [0035]FIGS. 5 a and 5 b show an example of the hermetic terminal assembly made using this invention method. The terminal can be used in conjunction with the cascaded die mounting technology described in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/716,060, filed Nov. 18, 2003. The routed services are shown, but not limited to, AC phase conductors, DC link conductors, gate signal leads, diagnostic signal wires, and refrigerant tubing. These services are routed into the hermetic container through the hermetic terminal assembly that is mounted to the container using a flange or threaded interfacing piece. A seal material is injected into the gaps and space among the service conduits and the inner wall of the terminal assembly casing.
[0036] The seal material is made of material that can be injected or poured and has a thermal expansion coefficient similar to that of the service conduits that are contacting the seal materials. The mechanical strength and the dielectric property of the seal material are sufficiently high for the temperature range that the terminal may encounter. As an example, the seal material can be a polymer containing graphite fibers for matching the thermal expansion coefficient of the service conduits and for reinforcing the mechanical strength of the seal material.
[0037] The DC link conductors can be arranged to have as much parallel arrangement as possible for lowering the inductance of the DC bus. The refrigerant tubing can also go through the terminal for the purpose of reducing the number of individual terminals.
[0038] Another embodiment of the terminal assembly made with this invention method, shown in FIG. 3, moves the refrigerant tubing 45 penetrations from the hermetic terminal assembly 40 to the top of the hermetic container 41 thereby supplying refrigerant to a refrigerant distributor (not shown) embedded in the terminal assembly 40 .
[0039] [0039]FIG. 6 is a side view of an embodiment of the hermetic terminal assembly mounted in a hermetic container 51 that transfers a portion of the seal material 59 shearing stress to a compression stress using service conduits with tapered and bent shapes. The terminal assembly casing 52 encompasses a collection of service conduits identified as; negative DC link conductor 53 , positive DC link conductor 54 , refrigerant tubing 55 , AC phase conductor 56 , diagnostic signal wires 57 , gate signal leads 58 , and seal material 59 .
[0040] [0040]FIG. 7 is a mounting arrangement for the hermetic terminal assembly 61 where a terminal flange 64 , housing the terminal assembly 61 , is bolted to the hermetic container 62 with an O-ring seal 65 at the mating point. An optional boss 63 is used to provide bolt hole threading.
[0041] [0041]FIG. 8 is a mounting arrangement for the hermetic terminal assembly 71 where a threaded terminal coupling 74 , housing the terminal assembly 71 , is threaded to the hermetic container 72 with an O-ring seal 75 at the mating point.
[0042] Some of the distinctive features of the assembly include:
[0043] 1. A single terminal assembly to bring services that include but are not limited to the AC phase conductors, DC link conductors, gate signal leads, diagnostic signal wires, and refrigerant tubing are brought into the hermetic container through a flange or threaded interfacing piece.
[0044] 2. The terminal assembly can be built with only electrical connections as shown in FIG. 2.
[0045] 3. The seal material can be injected or poured and has a thermal expansion coefficient similar to that of the materials of the service conduits that are contacting the seal materials. The mechanical strength and the dielectric property of the seal material should be sufficiently high for the temperature range that the terminal may encounter. As an example, the seal material can be a polymer and graphite fibers mixture for matching the thermal expansion coefficient of the contacting materials and for reinforcing the mechanical strength of the seal material.
[0046] 5. For a relatively large seal diameter part of the shearing stress can optionally be converted to a compression stress for the seal material using tapered or bent service conduits.
[0047] 6. The DC link conductors can be in an axially aligned arrangement for lowering the inductance of the DC bus.
[0048] 7. The refrigerant tubing can penetrate through the terminal for the purpose of reducing the number of individual terminals.
[0049] 8. The gate-signal service conduit can feed the gate-drive circuit inside the hermetic container or outside of the container in the ambient pressure cooling zone.
[0050] 9. The diagnostic-signal service conduit for the liquid refrigerant level, the die temperatures, over-currents, and over-voltages can also penetrate through the terminal assembly.
[0051] 10. Additional leads can also be brought out from the terminal assembly if needed.
[0052] 11. Either the flange with O-ring seal (or gasket) or the threaded interface with O-ring seal (or gasket) can be selected for mounting the terminal assembly.
[0053] The hermetic terminal assembly has potential for use in numerous industrial and military applications. Applications requiring high power and high differential pressure can be simplified using a total system approach to their interconnections. It is likely that a reduction in size and costs may be achieved. Systems that can benefit in this manner include: Automotive—future hybrid and fuel cell inverter and converter power requirements; Avionics and space—high power and differential pressures requirements offer unique challenges in hermetic terminal requirements, system approaches lowering volume and size can open up new possibilities for technical advancements. These advantages also pertain to and naval and marine underwater applications such as oil drilling and deep sea mining and exploration; Medical usages involving power requirements utilizing cryogenic, nuclear and laser techniques; Semiconductor processing requirements which currently require high vacuum systems for device fabrication. Uses can be expanded to also include more compact, lighter weight air conditioning and refrigeration compressor systems.
[0054] While there has been shown and described what are at present considered the preferred embodiments of the invention, it will be obvious to those skilled in the art that various changes and modifications can be made therein without departing from the scope.
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This invention teaches methods of making a hermetic terminal assembly comprising the steps of: inserting temporary stops, shims and jigs on the bottom face of a terminal assembly thereby blocking assembly core open passageways; mounting the terminal assembly inside a vacuum chamber using a temporary assembly perimeter seal and flange or threaded assembly interfaces; mixing a seal admixture and hardener in a mixer conveyor to form a polymer seal material; conveying the polymer seal material into a polymer reservoir; feeding the polymer seal material from the reservoir through a polymer outlet valve and at least one polymer outlet tube into the terminal assembly core thereby filling interstitial spaces in the core adjacent to service conduits, temporary stop, and the terminal assembly casing; drying the polymer seal material at room temperature thereby hermetically sealing the core of the terminal assembly; removing the terminal assembly from the vacuum chamber, and; removing the temporary stops, shims.
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FIELD OF INVENTION
This invention relates to a quadrature coil for magnetic resonance imaging ("MRI") and/or spectroscopy ("MRS"). Specifically this invention relates to a method and apparatus for the electrical adjustment of at least two magnetic resonance coils to assure the proper tuning and orthogonal relationship of the coil fields in order to increase the signal to noise ratio of the magnetic resonance signal.
BACKGROUND OF INVENTION
Quadrature magnetic resonance imaging coils, and more recently, multicoil systems using a plurality of independent data acquisition channels, are generally known in the art. Quadrature magnetic resonance systems offer advantages over previous magnetic resonance imaging techniques in that they provide a better signal to noise ratio by using both component vectors of the circularly polarized field of the magnetic resonance phenomenon, and lower RF transmitter power requirements when used as transmit coils. Multicoil systems offer some or all of the above-noted advantages, plus additional advantages in enhancing the imaging signal to noise ratio due to the reduced imaging volume of each independent coil and data acquisition path in the multicoil system. However, when these systems are used for magnetic resonance imaging, the isolation of the signal currents in one coil mode or coil system from currents in the other mode or coil system must be at a high level to obtain the benefits of quadrature operation, or multicoil operation.
Those skilled in the art will appreciate that it is desirable to reduce or eliminate the inductive coupling between the two coil systems forming the RF quadrature coil used in a magnetic resonance imaging system in order to solve these and other problems. Additionally, it is desirable to reduce or eliminate the inductive coupling between the various coil systems in a multicoil configuration. Ideally there should be no inductive coupling between the coil systems comprising the RF quadrature coil or multicoil system. Previously the adjustment of such coils to minimize the coupling between the coils was accomplished by either the physical movement of the coils or the physical adjustment of a variable element to electrically accomplish the same result.
Changing a single element generally alters the tuning or other coil parameters. In the past, adjusting the isolation or orthogonality of a coil has yielded undesirable manual secondary adjustment of one or more other coil parameters. Further, if physical adjustment of the location of the coils is employed to accomplish this result, many coil formations are eliminated as a practical matter, thereby dramatically decreasing the versatility of these systems.
Providing optimum orthogonality adjustment is required to improve the signal to noise ratio of MRI and MRS signals. Furthermore, such an adjustment is essential in order to implement more flexible, and anatomically conformal MR coils operating in quadrature and/or multi-coil modes. Also, flexible surface coils impart advantages in filling factor and patient comfort; however, the variability of the coil geometry generally precludes the use of the quadrature technique due to the loss of defined geometry. Thus a need exists for a mechanism to provide optimal tuning and orthogonality adjustment to improve the signal to noise ratio of MRI and or MRS signals for flexible and variable quadrature coil configurations.
SUMMARY OF INVENTION
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide optimum orthogonality adjustment to improve signal to noise ratio in a coil MRI system.
Another object of the present invention is to permit flexible and variable quadrature coil configurations for imaging selected anatomical regions.
Still another object of the present invention is to provide a quadrature magnetic resonance coil that may be tuned automatically to provide optimal orthogonality adjustment.
These and other objects may be realized in the present invention, which consists of a quadrature surface coil system having first and second flexible coil systems designed to operate in quadrature and covering largely the same imaging area. The net magnetization vector of the second coil is at an approximate right angle to the net magnetization vector of the first flexible coil. First and second variable capacitors contribute a first RF value in series with the first flexible coil and a variable capacitor contributes a third RF value in series with the second coil. The variable capacitors are operable to change the RF values of the first and second coils such that optimum tuning and orthogonality are achieved.
According to another aspect of the invention, a surface coil system is provided which is capable of being operated in quadrature, and which consists of a first and second coil. The first and second coils can be either flexible or rigid, and can be of any of several types, and further can be types which are different from each other. The first and the second coils are adapted to be positioned adjacent a region of interest in the subject for intercepting a magnetic field of a predetermined radio frequency, such that the net magnetization vector of the first and second coils at that frequency are at approximate right angles to each other. A signal source is operable to be selectively coupled to the first coil for inputting a test signal of the predetermined radio frequency. A reflection sensor is operable to be coupled to a selected one of the first and second coils and to the signal source for sensing the matching of impedance of the signal source to each of the first and second coils. An orthogonality sensor, preferably an RF level detector, is operable to be coupled to the second coil while the signal source is coupled to the first coil for sensing the degree of orthogonality of a signal on the first coil with respect to a signal on the second coil. First and second variable capacitors, which may for example be varactor diodes, are coupled to the first coil, and a third variable capacitor (also preferably a varactor diode) is coupled to the second coil. A controller is coupled to the reflection sensor, the orthogonality sensor and the first, second and third variable capacitors, and is operable to vary the capacitance in the first, second and third variable capacitors to match the impedance of the first and second coils at the predetermined frequency, and to optimize the orthogonality of the signals appears on the first and second coils.
The tuner operates by connecting its internal signal source to a reflectometer with the signal port of the first coil as the load. The controller adjusts the voltage applied to the first and second varactor diodes until the value of reflection, represented by the parameter S11, is minimized.
The controller then connects its internal signal source to the reflectometer, with the signal port of the second coil as the load. The controller adjusts the common mode voltage applied to the third diode of the second coil until S11 is minimized. The controller then connects its internal signal source to the signal port of the first coil and connects the RF level detector to the signal port of the second coil. The controller adjusts the differential mode voltage applied to the first and second varactor diodes on the first coil until the value of the orthogonality parameter S21 is minimized. These steps are repeated until an optimal setting is achieved. The controller then connects the signal ports of the coils to the host magnetic resonance system.
The present invention confers a principal technical advantage in that the or magnetic field isolation of RF quadrature coils can be precisely adjusted and optimized for various different configurations of coils. This allows optimal imaging for different anatomical regions. The present invention has applications in many different types of quadrature magnetic resonance surface coils and/or multicoil systems.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The present invention may be better understood with reference to the detailed description in conjunction with the following figures where like numerals denote identical elements.
FIG. 1 is an electrical schematic diagram of a surface coil configuration of a first embodiment of the present invention, showing use with a single-loop coil and a double-loop coil.
FIG. 2 is an block diagram of the automatic tuning device attached to the coil configuration of FIG. 1.
FIG. 3 is a flow diagram of the process used by the automatic tuning device to achieve an optimal orthogonality adjustment.
FIG. 4 is an electrical diagram of an application of the present invention to a quad birdcage coil.
FIG. 5 is a electrical diagram illustrating the application of the present invention to a quad multiple port birdcage coil.
FIG. 6 is a electrical diagram illustrating the application of the present invention to a quad saddle coil.
FIG. 7 is a electrical diagram illustrating the present invention embodied in a multiple port planar coil.
FIG. 8 is a electrical diagram illustrating the application of the present invention to a quadrature planar multiport coil.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
The invention consists of a quadrature surface coil having two coil systems designed to operate in quadrature and covering largely the same imaging area, and a device that is capable of both tuning each of the two quadrature modes of the coil, and then optimizing the isolation between the modes by changing variable capacitance or reactance elements such as variable capacitors. In the preferred embodiment, the variable elements are varactor diodes.
The invention is best understood with reference to FIG. 1 which shows a specific embodiment of the present invention for purposes of illustration. FIG. 1 shows the electrical diagram of a preferably flexible coil indicated generally at 2. The flexible coil 2 may be used for MRI or MRS imaging.
The flexible coil 2 is composed of two separate coil systems, a single loop coil 4, and a double loop coil 6. Both single loop coil 4 and double loop coil 6 are fitted within a flexible plastic housing (not shown) having a length and width appropriate for holding a patient. The plastic housing in conjunction with the coils 4 and 6 permits imaging of a variety of anatomical regions. The coils 4 and 6 have mirror symmetry about a center line 12 when placed on a flat surface. The shape of the two coils 4 and 6 allows the coils 4 and 6 and the flexible housing to be wrapped about the anatomical region of interest on a patient. The position of the two coils 4 and 6 about the anatomical region of interest is such to cause the net magnetization vector corresponding to each coil 4 and 6 to be at approximate right angles.
An orthogonality input 20 is connected to an inductor 19. A tune control input 22 is connected to an inductor 21. A common voltage return 44 is connected to an inductor 43. The output signal which is emitted from single loop coil 4 is output from a signal port 30. The tune control input 22 is connected to the cathode of a varactor diode 16. The anode of the varactor diode 16 is connected to one end of a parallel conductor 24. The other end of the parallel conductor 24 is connected to the capacitor 32 and one end of a parallel conductor 26. The other end of the parallel conductor 26 is connected to the cathode of the varactor diode 18 and the orthogonality control input 20. The capacitor 32 is connected to a single-conductor segment 33 of the single loop coil 4 which is also connected to the capacitor 34 and the signal port 30.
A tune control input 46 of double loop coil 6 is connected to an inductor 45. A common voltage return 48 of double loop coil 6 is connected to an inductor 47. The output signal which is emitted from double loop coil 6 is output from a signal port 28. The tune control input 46 is connected to one of the outputs of the signal port 28 and the cathode of a varactor diode 14. The anode of the varactor diode 14 is coupled to the other output of the signal port 28 and the common voltage return 48. A first loop 8 of double loop coil 6 begins at the cathode of the varactor diode 14, includes the capacitor 40 and ends at the anode of the varactor diode 14. Similarly, a second loop 10 of double loop coil 6 begins at the cathode of the varactor diode 14, includes the capacitor 42 and ends at the anode of the varactor diode 14.
The varactor diode 14 contained in the double loop coil 6 is capable of tuning the double loop coil 6 to exact resonance at the desired operating frequency by changing the RF characteristics of the loop coil 4. The single loop coil 6 is configured so that adjusting both of the varactor diodes 16 and 18 in a common mode manner by changing the voltage at the tune control input 22 adjusts the single loop coil 4 to exact resonance at the desired operating frequency. Adjusting both the varactor diodes 16 and 18 in a differential mode at the orthogonality control input 20 changes the effective placement of the single loop coil 4 relative to the double loop coil 6 by changing the relative current levels in the two parallel conductors 24 and 26 displaced in space thus enabling the orthogonality or isolation of the fields from the two coil loops 4 and 6 to be adjusted. The balance of the coil design follows methods and techniques well known persons skilled in the MRI/MRS art.
An S11 transmission parameter measurement taken at output 30 or 28 can be used to correct the tuning of each coil system corresponding to each mode of the quadrature coil system. An S21 transmission parameter measurement from node 28 to node 30 may then be used as a criterion to optimize the isolation of single loop coil 4 from the double loop coil 6 to provide idealized quadrature operation for any arbitrary final geometry of the flexible coil package. Included within the tuning/orthogonality device architecture may be a means to perform several iterations due to the interactive nature of the adjustments, as will be hereinafter described.
Tuning of the double loop coil system 6 can be readily accomplished by using an S11 transmission parameter measurement of the coil system's output impedance at the signal port 28, and incrementing the voltage applied to the varactor diode 14 tuning the double loop coil 6 to optimize the tuning by determining the voltage level corresponding to the best impedance match as indicated by a minimizing of the S11 parameter.
Tuning of the single loop coil system 4 may also be readily accomplished by using a similar S11 measurement of the coil system's output impedance at the signal port 30, and incrementing the common mode voltage applied to the varactor diodes 16 and 18 at input 22 to optimize the tuning by determining the total common mode voltage level corresponding to the best impedance match as indicated by a minimizing of the S11 parameter.
The quadrature isolation or orthogonality may then be optimized by measuring the magnitude of the S21 transmission parameter from either the signal port 28 or the signal port 30 of one coil system of the quadrature coil to the other. Adjustment of the embodiment shown in FIG. 1 is achieved by adjusting the differential mode voltage on the two varactor diodes 16 and 18 on the single loop coil 4 at the orthogonality control input 20 to minimize the S21 parameter which represents the transmission of the signal from one coil system to the other.
The hardware in the embodiment shown in FIG. 1 for making the above described adjustments consists of the two coils 4 and 6 and an automatic tuning device indicated generally at 50 in FIG. 2. The automatic tuning device 50 has a controller or logic control circuitry 52, an internal signal source 54, a reflectometer 56, an RF switch 58 and an RF level detector 60. The internal signal source 54 is designed to provide an RF signal source to measure the RF response of the coil on a scan subject at a predetermined frequency and amplitude. The controller 52 coordinates the operation of the automatic tuning device 50. The controller 52 may be a microprocessor or a dedicated integrated circuit which is capable of controlling the components of the automatic tuning device 50. The controller 52 is connected to switches 62, 64, 66, 67 and 69 which are contained in RF switch 58. The switches 62, 64, 66, 67 and 69 are preferably PIN diode switches. The controller 52 also has a control input connected to the signal source 54. The reflectometer 56 is connected to the RF level detector 60. The controller 52 takes input data from the RF level detector 60.
The RF switch 58 has a first input 68 which is connected to the signal port 30 of the single loop coil 4. The RF switch 58 also has a second input 70 which is connected to the signal port 28 of the double loop coil 6. The RF switch 58 has outputs 72 and 73 which are coupled to a magnetic resonance system 74. Inputs 30 and 28 may be selectively connected to outputs 72 and 73, respectively, by switches 67 and 69; these switches would be open during the operation of internal signal source 54.
The signal source 54 is connected to one end of the switch 62. The switch 62 may connect the output of the signal source 54 to either the second input 70 or an input of the reflectometer 56. The switch 64 connects the input of the reflectometer 56 to either the first input 68 or the second input 70 of the RF switch 58, or to neither. The switch 66 establishes a connection between the first input 68 and the RF level detector 60. The switches 62, 64, and 66 are all controlled by the controller 52.
One method of using the automatic tuning device 50 is illustrated in the flow diagram of FIG. 3 as follows. The method may be programmed into a microprocessor which may be used for the controller 52. As shown in block 80, and with continued reference to FIG. 2, the controller 52 in the automatic tuning device 50 connects the internal signal source 54 to the reflectometer 56 via the switch 62 of the RF switch 58. Switch 64 is closed to node 65, connecting the signal port 28 of the double loop coil 6 as the load. The controller 52 adjusts the voltage applied to the varactor diode 14 (FIG. 1) in the double coil loop 6 until the value of reflection as determined from the output of the RF level detector 60 from reflectometer 56, and as represented by the S11 transmission parameter, is minimized.
After block 80 is performed the controller 52 continues to block 82 where the controller 52 connects its internal signal source 54 to the reflectometer 56. Switch 64 is closed to node or terminal 71 to use the single loop coil 4 as the load. The controller 52 adjusts the common mode voltage applied to the two varactor diodes 16 and 18 in the single loop coil 4 until the value of reflection as determined from the output of the RF level detector 60, and as represented by the S11 transmission parameter, is minimized.
The controller 52 then proceeds to block 84 where it connects its internal signal source 54 via the switch 62 to node 65, thereby using the double loop coil 6 as the load. The RF level detector 60 is connected via the switch 66 to the signal port 30 of the single loop coil 4, thereby connecting the single loop coil 4 as the signal source. The controller 52 adjusts the differential mode voltage applied to the two varactor diodes 16 and 18 on the single loop coil 4 until the value of the S21 transmission parameter is minimized.
The controller 52 then reaches decision block 86. The above three steps are repeated by the controller 52 until no additional improvement can be obtained, or until the precision of tuning and orthogonality adjustment reaches some predetermined threshold which may be programmed into the controller 52 by the user.
After an optimal level has achieved in tuning and orthogonality, the controller 52 in the automatic tuning device 50 disables its internal signal source 54 via the switch 62 as shown in block 88. The controller 52 then switches the outputs of the coils 4 and 6 to the inputs of the magnetic resonance system 74 via switches 67 and 69 in the RF switch 58, thus ending the adjustment process as shown in block 90. This is accomplished either through independent quadrature inputs, or through a combining circuit and into a singular input on the host MR system 74.
It should be clear from the above description that the basic principle described here can be applied to a large variety of quadrature coil systems, and also to multicoil systems with a plurality of unrelated receiver channels and reconstruction means. For example the present invention may be used with the following quadrature coil configurations.
a. Quadrature coil systems containing two coils each of a single loop design.
b. Quadrature coil systems containing two coils each of a complex design, including but not limited to saddle coils, birdcage coils, Helmholtz coil pairs, and combinations of the above coils.
c. The above two configurations in a flexible package, a conformal package, or a rigid package.
d. Multiple coil systems containing two or more coils each of a single loop design.
e. Multiple coil systems containing two or more coils each of a complex design, including but not limited to saddle coils, birdcage coils, Helmholtz coil pairs, and combinations of the above coils.
f. Any of the above multiple coil systems in a flexible package, a conformal package, or a rigid package.
g. Multiple quadrature coil systems containing two or more coils each of a single loop design.
h. Multiple quadrature coil systems containing two or more coils each of a complex design, including but not limited to saddle coils, birdcage coils, Helmholtz coil pairs, and combinations of the above coils.
i. Any of the above multiple quadrature coil systems in a flexible package, a conformal package, or a rigid package.
Several coil systems which incorporate the present invention in certain of the configurations described above are show in FIGS. 4-8.
FIG. 4 shows an application of the present invention to a quad birdcage coil shown generally at 220. A pair of varactor diodes 221 and 222 are operable to change the RF characteristics of a first coil loop with parallel segments 226 and 228. Similarly a pair of varactor diodes 223 and 224 are operable to change the RF characteristics of a second coil loop with parallel segments 230 and 232. Each pair of varactor diodes may be independently tuned as previously discussed to provide the desired isolation of the coils. First and second outputs are available to a tuner similar to that described above across inductors 234 and 236, respectively.
FIG. 5 is a schematic diagram illustrating the application of the present invention to a quad multiple port birdcage coil shown generally at 238. In this example four pairs of varactor diodes 239, 240; 241, 242; 243, 244; and 245, 246 are employed to provide the desired isolation of respective coil pairs. Each of pair of varactor diodes is connected to respective parallel segments 248, 250; 252, 254; 256, 258; and 260, 262 to provide for the adjustment of the RF current flowing through the respective paths as previously discussed. As with the other designs it is contemplated that in one embodiment the pairs of varactor diodes may be replaced with other types of remotely adjustable variable capacitance devices. Output coils 264 and 266 are provided in conjunction with parallel segments 248 and 250. Output coils 268 and 270 are provided in conjunction with parallel segments 252 and 254.
FIG. 6 is a schematic electrical diagram illustrating the application of the present invention to a quad saddle coil design shown generally at 280. A first saddle coil 282 has coil halves 284 and 286. A second saddle coil 288 has coil halves 290 and 292. A pair of varactor diodes 293 and 294 are connected to loop segments 296 and 298 respectively, which overlap with loop segments 300 and 302 of coil half 290 of second saddle coil 288. A second pair of varactor diodes 303 and 304 are connected to loop segments 300 and 302 respectively to increase the tunable range of the coils. In this arrangement, the varactor diodes may be replaced with variable capacitance devices.
FIG. 7 is a schematic diagram illustrating the present invention embodied in a multiple port planar coil shown generally at 310. The diagram illustrates two pairs of varactor diodes 311, 312 and 313, 314 respectively located in line with separate, overlapping coils 316 and 318. Coil 316 is separated into parallel segments 320 and 322. Coil 318 is formed with parallel segments 324 and 326. Segments 320-326 are located within a critically overlapped area 328. The pairs of varactor diodes 311, 312 and 313, 314 operate in a manner identical to that previously discussed and may be formed by other types of variable capacitance devices.
FIG. 8 is a schematic diagram illustrating the application of the present invention to a quadrature planar multiport coil shown generally at 330. In this example two pairs of varactor diodes 331, 332 and 333, 334 are employed to provide the desired isolation of respective coil pairs 336 and 338. Each of the pairs of varactor diodes 331, 332 and 333, 334 are connected in series to respective parallel segments 340, 342 and 344, 346 to provide for the adjustment of the RF current ratio flowing through the respective paths as previously discussed. As with other designs, it is understood that more or fewer pairs of parallel segments in the critically overlapped areas 348, 350 can be used to increase the flexibility of orthogonality and isolation adjustment available. Also as with the other designs it is contemplated that the pairs of varactor diodes may be replaced with other variable capacitance devices.
The aforementioned description is not to be interpreted to exclude other coil and transmitter arrangements advantageously employing the present invention. The above described quadrature coil is merely an illustrative embodiment of the principles of this invention. Other arrangements and advantages may be devised by those skilled in the art without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention. Accordingly, the invention should be deemed to be limited to the above detailed description but only by the spirit and scope of the claims which follow.
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An MRI/MRS magnetic coil system is disclosed wherein the isolation between the coils can be adjusted to decrease or virtually eliminate the coupling between quadrature magnetic resonance imaging coils in order to optimize orthogonality between the coils. The adjustment allows the use of flexible coils which may be conformed to image specific anatomical regions. The RF characteristics of the coils are controlled by variable capacitors. The capacitors are controlled by a remote automatic controller which functions to adjust the RF characteristics of the coils until an optimal orthogonality and signal to noise ratio is achieved between and by the coils.
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This is a continuation-in-part of copending application Ser. No. 08/013,081 filed Feb. 3, 1993, now U.S. Pat. No. 5,288,095, Feb. 22, 1994.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to improvements in the attachment of towed vehicles to towing vehicles, and more particularly, to an improved trailer hitch which allows misalignment of a towing vehicle with respect to a vehicle to be towed as the vehicles are being coupled together.
Trailer hitches typically have a hitch ball mounted on a hitch bar rigidly secured to a towing vehicle. This ball is adapted to be coupled to the socket on the tongue of a vehicle or trailer to be towed. Generally, with trailer hitch assemblies of this type, the towing vehicle must be moved in reverse with the ball properly aligned with the trailer socket to make the necessary connection.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Attempts have been made to solve a misalignment problem when the socket of a vehicle to be towed is not properly aligned with the ball of the towing vehicle when the latter is moving in reverse. U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,860,267 and 4,350,362 disclose trailer hitches having singable bars which pivot in a horizontal plane to accommodate such misalignment between a towing vehicle and a trailer. However, both patents show a one-piece bar movable out of a bar-like housing, but such construction does not allow the user to pivot the bar until the bar is completely out of the housing. This is the main drawback of the trailer hitch of U.S. Pat. No. 3,860,267
U.S. Pat. No. 4,350,362 shows a slightly different trailer hitch in that it does not have a long, slender housing for supporting the main hitch bar. The hitch bar of U.S. Pat. No. 4,350,362 has the same drawback as U.S. Pat. No. 3,860,267 in that it has a hitch bar which cannot pivot about a vertical axis until the full length of the hitch bar is pulled outwardly from its retracted position.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,951,957 shows a typical wide-range hitch assembly which mounts on the towing vehicle generally underneath and protrudes as little as possible beyond the bumper of the vehicle. The advantage of placing the hitch under the vehicle to avoid protrusion of the ball far beyond the rear bumper is offset by the reduced lateral maneuverability or movement of the ball and extendibility beyond the bumper to accommodate a wide-range misalignment between the towing vehicle and the trailer.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is directed to a trailer hitch or swivel hitch of improved construction which is simple and rugged and which provides greater flexibility in maneuvering a towing vehicle into a position to be hitched to a trailer.
The present invention is readily attached to the existing pick-up bumpers which are accommodated for mounting trailer balls directly to the bumper and generally provide at least three holes for various size trailer balls. Applicant utilizes this bumper configuration to secure the base plate and housing which retains a telescoping draw or slide bar, of his swivel hitch to the vehicle. The housing and base plate are secured by a shoulder bolt which acts as a trunnion for the lateral movement of the housing. The base plate is additionally secured in the other remaining holes of the bumper to provide substantial support for the hitch assembly. The hitch includes a safety bar which limits vertical movement between the base plate and housing. A releasable locking pin holds the housing and slide bar in a locked or transporting position and is readily released by a pull-ring to withdraw and allow the slide bar and the housing to move relatively to the locking pin. Once the trailer has been hitched to the hitch bar, then the vehicle is pulled forward and the housing and slide bar move into alignment such that the locking pin protrudes through a bore in the bottom of the housing and when the vehicle is slowed or stopped, the draw or slide bar closes in the housing until the bore therethrough encounters the locking pin which immediately seats into the slide bar, thus locking the trailer hitch in towing position.
The swivel hitch of the present invention provides all the features desirable in a trailer hitch and can be readily mounted without the necessity of welding or any other method of attaching a trailer hitch to a bumper or the under-frame of the towing vehicle by merely bolting means.
Thus, the present invention provides an improved swing hitch for trailers which is versatile and comprises relatively few parts and readily attaches to the bumpers of most presently manufactured pick-up trucks and the like.
The object of the present invention is to provide an improved trailer hitch which has a high degree of lateral movement about a trunnion which is centered on the .bumper of the towing vehicle and has an extendable and retractable draw bar for mounting the trailer ball to accommodate securing a trailer to the hitch.
Another object of this invention is to provide a simple trailer hitch which by releasing a locking pin can be laterally and longitudinally maneuvered to accommodate ease of attachment of a trailer to the hitch and automatically realigns and locks in a traveling position.
In a different embodiment an objective of this invention is to provide an improved gooseneck trailer hitch which has a high degree of lateral movement about a trunnion and has an extendable and retractable draw bar with a gooseneck trailer coupler, which is mounted in the bed and secured to the frame of the towing vehicle.
In such different embodiment the object of this invention is to provide a simple gooseneck trailer hitch which by releasing a locking pin can be laterally and longitudinally maneuvered to accommodate ease of attachment of a trailer to the hitch and automatically realigns and locks in a traveling position.
Other objects of this invention will become apparent from the following description, as described in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.
IN THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is an exploded perspective view of the swivel hitch of the present invention secured to a vehicle bumper; and
FIG. 2 is a partial cross-sectional view of the assembled hitch illustrating the extendibility of the slide bar in phantom; and
FIG. 3 illustrates the hitch mounted to a pick-up truck bumper with three trailer hitch mounting bores which are utilized to secure Applicant's hitch and illustrates in phantom the lateral and longitudinal movement of the hitch relative to the central trunnion;
FIG. 4 is a top view of the bed of a vehicle illustrating the mounting arrangement for the gooseneck hitch;
FIG. 5 is a sectional view taken along line 5--5 of FIG. 4 illustrating a cross-sectional view of the gooseneck hitch.
FIG. 6 is an exploded view of the gooseneck hitch with the mounting plate broken away.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
Referring to FIGS. 1, 2 and 3 of the drawings, the swivel hitch of the present invention is generally referred to as 10 and includes a base plate 12 which has a central bore 20 and a pair of bores 21 and 22 on each side of central bore 20 and a circular perimeter 11. Base plate 12 also has a bore 15 which is on a radius bisecting the semicircular perimeter 11. The base plate 12 is secured to a truck bumper 13 in the three factory-produced bumper bores 14a, 14b and 14c for mounting one or more trailer balls therein. Of course a bumper that does not have such bores could be so modified. A bore hole 29 is provided in bottom wall 17b of housing 17. Housing 17 has a longitudinal slot 27 and coaxially aligned bores 28 and 28a through the top wall 17a and bottom wall 17b of the housing 17. Slot 27 has a semicircular end 27a which is coaxially aligned with bore hole 29 in bottom wall 17b.
The base plate 12 and housing 17 are secured to the bumper 13 by shoulder bolt 18 passing through bores 28 and 28a in housing 17, central bore 20 in base plate 12, and bumper bore 14b and secured by lock nuts 19 which forms a trunnion to allow rotation of the housing 17 relative to the base plate 12. The base plate 12 is further secured to bumper 13 by two additional bolts 21a and 22a through bores 21 and 22 of base plate 12 and bumper bores 14a and 14c.
A draw or slide bar 23 has at opposite ends bores 25 and 26 with an aperture 24 intermediate of said bores 25 and 26. The slide bar 23 is positioned within housing 17 and retained therein by guide pin 30 secured in bore 26 of slide bar 23 and extending upward in slot 27 of housing 17. Welded to the bottom of the forward portion of the housing 17 is a safety bar 31 having an "L" therein. A circular housing 35 is secured to the safety bar 31 at the bottom about the bore hole 32. A rounded end or nose locking pin or locating pin 36 has a spring plate 37 secured to the locking pin 36 such that when the circular spring plate 37 is fully seated against safety bar 31 the rounded end of pin 36 will extend through the bore hole 32 of the safety bar 31, bore 15 in base plate 12, bore 29 in the bottom wall 17b of housing 17, aperture 24 in slide bar 23 and through semicircular end 27a of slot 27 in the top wall 17a of housing 17 thereby locking swivel hitch 10 in towing position. A spring 39 is captured between spring plate 37 and the bottom plate 38 which has a bore 40 slightly in excess of the diameter of pin 36. The spring 39 biases locking pin 36 in the aforesaid aperture, bores and semicircular end. When fully positioned in the aperture, bores, and semicircular slot, locking pin 36 extends below the bore 40 in bottom plate 38 of the circular housing 35. The locking pin 36 has a ring 41 secured therethrough below bore 40 adapted for pulling the locking pin 36 against the bias of spring 39 sufficient to move the pin out of the semicircular end 27a of slot 27 and out of the aperture 24 in the slide bar 23, and the bores in housing 17, base plate 12 and the safety bar 31. With locking pin 36 withdrawn, housing 17 may then be moved laterally about base plate 12 with the safety bar 31 and circular housing 35 traveling along the semi-circular perimeter 11 of the base plate 12 such that throughout its path upward thrust on the housing would be stopped by the engagement of safety bar 31 with the bottom of base plate 12 and downward thrust on the housing 17 would be stopped by the engagement with base plate 12. Thus, there is a nominal amount of tolerance between the base plate 12 and safety bar 31 to permit limited relative vertical movement, but not sufficient movement to damage the housing 17 and cause it to become inoperable. A trailer ball 50 is secured in the bore 25 of slide bar 23 with a washer 51 and a nut 52. Likewise, with locking pin 36 withdrawn, slide bar 23 with trailer ball 50 may be extended from or retracted into housing 17.
The longitudinal travel of slide bar 23 may be increased by moving the "L" shaped safety bar 31 further out on housing 17 and extending coaxially aligned semicircular end 27a of slot 27 further out on housing 17. Also, housing 17 and base plate 12 could be extended with the radius of semicircular perimeter 11 being increased and the radius of the arcuate path of housing 17 described by locking pin 36 being increased.
In a different configuration the bore 20 in base plate 12 could be moved forward so that the housing 24 could be easily rotated approximately 90° in either direction from its forward position.
In operation of the swivel hitch 10, the towing vehicle with the swivel hitch 10 mounted thereon would be backed toward the trailer to be towed until the ball 50 of swivel hitch 10 was within maneuverable range of the mating coupler of the trailer. The ball 50 would then be maneuvered laterally and longitudinally until the hook-up was completed. The pulling vehicle would then be driven forward to align the housing 17 and the slide bar 23 longitudinally and then slowed or stopped causing the slide bar to retract into housing 17 with apertures 24 and bores 29, 15 and 32 becoming aligned such that spring 39 will automatically bias latch pin 36 into and through each such aperture and bores and through semicircular end 27a of slot 27 in the top wall of housing 17.
In FIG. 4, 5 and 6 a different embodiment of the gooseneck hitch is disclosed and parts that are similar to FIG. 1, 2 and 3 are given the corresponding number beginning with one hundred.
The gooseneck trailer hitch 100 is mounted in the bed of a pickup or other suitable towing vehicle 105. The gooseneck trailer hitch 100 has an anchor plate 101 secured in any suitable manner in the bed of vehicle 105, such as by bolts "a" through anchor plate 101 and secured to the frame (not shown) of the vehicle 105. A pair of spacers 104 secures guide plate 112 to anchor plate 101. Anchor plate 101 has an aperture 102 and a mounting bore 103 which includes a counterbore 103a. Guide plate 112 has a semicircular section 111 and a mounting hole 120. The mounting hole 120 is the center of radius for the semicircular periphery 111a of semicircular section 111. Aperture 115 in guide plate 112 is on the radius bisecting the semicircular periphery 111a.
Housing 117 has a top wall 117a and a bottom wall 117b. Top wall 117a has a mounting bore 128 and an aperture 129. Bottom wall 117b has a mounting bore 128a and an aperture 129a. Mounting bores 128 and 128a are coaxially aligned and apertures 129 and 129a are coaxially aligned.
A draw bar 123 has a guide slot 122 at one end and a vehicle coupler or ball 150 at the other end. As illustrated ball 150 has threads 151 and is secured in threaded bore 151a of draw bar 123. The ball 150 maybe welded into threaded bore 151a or it may be attached in any suitable manner. The draw bar 123 has an aperture 124 intermediate guide slot 122 and ball 150.
The tubular housing 117 is attached to anchor plate 101 and guide plate 112 by a trunnion 118 extending through counterbore 103a and bore 103 in anchor plate 101, through mounting bore 128a, through slot 122 of draw bar 123, through mounting bore 128 and through mounting hole 120 in guide plate 112. Trunnion 118 is secured in position by locknuts 119.
A locking mechanism 130 similar to locking mechanism seen in FIGS. 1 and 2 is mounted to safety member or bar 131. The safety bar 131 has an L-shape and is attached atop the housing 117 and has a bore 132 therein. The locking mechanism 130 includes circular housing 135, rounded end or nose locking pin or locating pin 136, a spring plate 137 secured to locking pin 136. A spring 139 is captured in circular housing 135 between spring plate 137 and top plate 138 which has a bore 140 slightly in excess of the diameter of locking pin 136. Locking pin 136 has a ring 141 secured therethrough.
In the locked or towing position the circular spring plate 137 is fully seated against the safety bar 131, and locking pin 136 extends through bore 132 of safety bar 131, aperture 115 in guide plate 112, aperture 129 in top wall 117a of housing 117, aperture 124 in slide bar 123, aperture 129a in bottom wall 117b and into aperture 102 in anchor plate 101 thereby locking the gooseneck hitch in the towing position. It should be noted that locking pin 136 need only extend through bore 132 of safety bar 131, aperture 115 of guide plate 112 and apertures 129 and 129a of housing 117 in order to lock gooseneck hitch 100 in the trailer towing position.
With locking pin 136 withdrawn housing 117 may then be moved arcuately about the semicircular periphery 111a of guide plate 112 with safety member 131 extending above the semicircular section 111, thus limiting any relative vertical movement between housing 117 and guide plate 112. The locking pin 136 rides on the top of guide plate 112 once withdrawn from aperture 115.
Anchor plate 101 is provided to prevent the telescoping draw bar assembly from coming in contact with the bed of the towing vehicle, which could cause damage. Anchor plate 101 is not essential to the gooseneck trailer hitch, for example guide plate 112 may be spaced above and secured through the bed of the towing vehicle into the frame thereof by any suitable means. The guide plate 112 could have a footing or mounting arrangement comprising an L-shaped or channeled bracket welded to the guide plate 112 and bolted through the bed 105 and into the frame of the towing vehicle. In such an arrangement under a sufficiently heavy load safety bar 131 would engage guide plate 112 along the semicircular section 111 and take part of the load. In applications where anchor plate 101 is not used, it would be apparent with sufficient clearance between guide plate 112 and the bed of the towing vehicle that the telescoping draw bar could be attached above guide plate 112 similar to the arrangement illustrated in FIG. 1.
In operation a towing vehicle with the gooseneck trailer hitch 100 mounted thereon would be backed toward the trailer to be towed until the ball 150 of gooseneck trailer hitch 100 was within maneuverable range of the mating coupler of the trailer. The locking pin 136 would be withdrawn from the guide plate 112, housing 117 and draw bar 123, and ball 150 would then be maneuvered laterally and longitudinally until the hook-up was completed. During this hook-up, locking pin 136 rest on the top surface of semicircular section 111 of guide plate 112. The pulling vehicle would then be driven forward to align the housing 117 and the slide bar 123 longitudinally. This alignment causes pin 136 to extend through aperture 115 of guide plate 112 and rest on the top wall 117a of housing 117. The vehicle is then slowed or stopped causing the slide bar to retract into housing 117 with apertures 124 becoming aligned with apertures 129 and 115 and bore 132 such that spring 139 will automatically bias locking pin 136 into and through apertures in the housing 117, the draw bar 123, and anchor plate 101.
It will be appreciated that various modifications and changes will be suggested from the description and disclosure of the preferred embodiment, and such changes and modifications are within the spirit and scope of the present invention which is limited only by the accompanying claims:
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This invention relates to trailer hitches generally and more specifically to a hitch that may be swiveled and extended as necessary to couple a trailer thereto and readily align and lock the hitch in transportation mode. The hitch has a base plate with a partial semicircular perimeter having a trunnion formed at its center of radius, a tubular housing secured at the trunnion atop the base plate to permit arcuate movement relative to the base plate, and tubular housing having a safety member thereunder which protrudes beneath the semicircular perimeter to limit relative vertical movement between the tubular housing and the base plate, a slide bar captured within said tubular housing with a towing ball projecting beyond said housing for limited linear movement therein, and a spring biased locking pin for releasable securing the trailer hitch with the slide bar retracted and the tubular housing centered along the perimeter.
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BACKGROUND OF INVENTION
[0001] This invention relates to an on-line system and method for processing information relating to the wear of turbine components. More specifically, this invention relates to an on-line system and method of processing information relating to the wear of combustion system interface components of a turbine system.
[0002] Turbine systems have been used to generate electricity for many years. As one example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,749,218 issued to Cromer et al. on May 12, 1998, the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference, discloses a gas turbine system for generating electricity. This gas turbine system includes a combustion system having a wear reduction kit. The wear reduction kit improves the wear characteristics at interfaces of various combustion system components which are subjected to wear as a result of combustion noise induced vibrations. The wear reduction kit allows time intervals between consecutive combustion system inspections to be increased by reducing the relative movement and associated wear of interface parts of the combustion system. With reference to FIGS. 1A-1E , the wear reduction kit of the combustion system includes, for example, the following components:(1) U-shaped wear inserts 42 and seals 40 for combustion system transition piece 16 having frame 24 . Wear inserts 42 and seals 40 allow frame 24 of transition piece 16 to be secured to a first turbine stage 18 . The wear resistance of slot 38 in frame 24 of transition piece 16 may be increased by choosing an appropriate material for wear inserts 42 . (See FIGS. 1A and 1B ).
[0003] (2) H-shaped guide blocks 60 and guide finger covers 70 for bullhorn fingers 56 , 58 . The interface between H-shaped guide blocks 60 and bullhorn fingers 56 , 58 including bullhorn guide finger covers 70 allow combustion liner 20 to be secured to transition piece 16 . The materials forming H-shaped guide blocks 60 and guide finger covers 70 are appropriately chosen to form a wear couple which reduces the wear at the interface of the H-shaped guide blocks 60 and bullhorn fingers 56 . (See FIGS. 1A and 1C ).
[0004] (3) A flow sleeve stop 96 having an elongated stem 102 covered by a replaceable U-shaped strip 106 and a liner stop 11 0 . Flow sleeve stop 96 and liner stop 110 form a wear couple which enables combustion liner 20 to be inserted axially within flow sleeve 22 and to limit axial movement of combustion liner 20 within flow sleeve 22 in a direction toward transition piece 16 . (See FIGS. 1A and 1D ).
[0005] (4) A weld deposit material 138 and a combustion liner cap assembly 136 having an annular mounting ring 142 . Weld deposit material 138 is deposited on a radially outer collar 126 of fuel nozzle tip 124 of fuel nozzle 12 . The materials of deposit material 138 and ring 142 form a compatible wear couple so that most of the wear will occur on weld deposit 138 rather than ring 142 of the more complex and costly combustion liner cap assembly 136 . (See FIGS. 1A and 1E ).
[0006] (5) Cross fire tube 156 received within a hole 146 of combustion liner 20 and a cross fire tube collar 148 . An interface is formed where cross fire tube 156 is telescopically received within cross fire tube collar 148 . Cross fire tube collar 148 may be formed of a harder material than the material forming cross fire tube 156 and thus most of the wear experienced at this interface is predictably exhibited on the softer cross fire tube 156 . (See FIGS. 1A and 1F ).
[0007] Other inserts, seals, blocks, covers, liners, stops, strips, rings, caps, tubes and/or collars may be placed at the other interfaces of the turbine system as part of the wear reduction kit. For example, with reference to FIGS. 1A and IG, a wear coating 171 is applied to a hula seal 170 which is arranged between transition piece 16 and combustion liner 20 . A corresponding wear coating 172 is applied to transition piece 16 so that both wear coatings 171 and 172 are arranged between transition piece 16 and hula seal 170 attached to combustion liner 20 . The material forming wear coating 172 may be softer than wear coating 171 so that wear on hula seal 170 itself can be minimized.
[0008] The respective amounts of wear of each of the components of the wear reduction kit (e.g., inserts, seals, blocks, covers, liners, stops, strips, rings, caps, tubes, collars, strips, etc.) at interfaces of the turbine system and other turbine system components are evaluated during inspections by field technicians. In particular, the field technicians may quantifiably measure the amounts of wear (in mils for example) or determine a qualitative wear range category (e.g., high wear, medium wear or light wear) of each of the wear reduction kit components. Data reflecting the wear measurements or wear category determinations is typically recorded by field technicians in individual spreadsheets. These spreadsheets, however, lack the capability to provide centralized access to the collection of data. Technicians who did not perform the wear measurements or wear category determinations would therefore not have prompt access to this and other inspection information. Moreover, the spreadsheets do not prompt the field technicians to enter consistent inputs over numerous inspections. There has thus been no formalized process for consistently capturing and effectively processing inspection information including wear related data made by field technicians.
[0009] Accordingly, there remains a need in the art to efficiently process information relating to the wear of turbine system components including efficiently receiving, managing, monitoring, sorting, searching and displaying data. In particular, there remains a need to provide centralized access to a database of information relating to the wear of turbine system components such as a combustion system's wear reduction kit components. It would therefore be beneficial to enable wear related information to be accessed by and presented in an interactive, easy-to-read interface to enable users to enter, review, sort, edit, update, search, output and/or report the information in an efficient manner and to use the data for various calculations and evaluations. It would also be beneficial to prompt field technicians or other users to enter inspection data such as wear-related data in a consistent manner.
SUMMARY OF INVENTION
[0010] In an exemplary embodiment of the invention, a method comprises storing data relating to wear of a component of at least one turbine system in a database of a system for processing wear related information, generating a displayable menu for an interface containing a plurality of user-selectable links respectively associated with software modules of the system, and receiving an on-line selection through the interface of one of the user-selectable links to enable the associated software module of the system to generate displayable content including information relating to the wear of the component of the turbine system.
[0011] The module associated with the selected link may enable a quantitative amount of the wear of the component to be input and received on-line. The module associated with the selected link may enable a qualitative wear range characterizing the amount of the wear of the component to be input and received on-line. The module associated with the selected link may enable a component type to be input and received on-line and display a component fleet leader corresponding to the received component type using data stored in the database. The module associated with the selected link may enable the displayable content to depict, on-line, an example component having a standardized level of wear. The module associated with the selected link may enable a search criterion to be input and received on-line and retrieve data from the database based on the received search criterion. The wear of the component of the at least one turbine system may comprise the wear of a material in one of following turbine components: transition piece body assembly component, bull horn cover, side seal, AFT frame creep, combustion liner assembly component, flow sleeve, cross fire tube and fuel nozzle.
[0012] In an on line wear monitoring system of another exemplary embodiment of the invention, a method of identifying a component fleet leader from among a plurality of a same type of components in respective turbine systems comprises: processing an on-line user selection of a component type of the turbine system, searching a database of the on-line system based on the on-line user selection, and processing information retrieved from the database as a result of the search including identifying that component from among the plurality of components corresponding to the user-selected component type which has been in operation in its respective turbine system for the longest cumulative time as the component fleet leader. The selected component type may be one of the following turbine component types: transition piece body assembly component, bull horn cover, side seal, AFT frame creep, combustion liner assembly component, flow sleeve, cross fire tube and fuel nozzle.
[0013] In another embodiment of the invention, a method of processing information relating to wear of a component of a turbine system comprises: receiving an on-line user selection of a user-selectable link on a menu, the link being associated with a software module for generating a depiction of an example component of the turbine system having a standardized level of wear, generating displayable content depicting the example component having the standardized level of wear based on the received on-line user selection of the user-selectable link, receiving an on-line user selection of another user-selectable link on the menu, the another usable link being associated with another software module for enabling input of information relating to the wear of the component of the turbine system to be received, and generating displayable content to enable input of the information indicating the wear of the component of the turbine system to be received based on the received on-line user selection of the another user-selectable link, the information received indicating the wear of the component being relative to the example component having the standardized level of wear. The information received indicating the wear of the component may be a quantitative measure of the amount of the wear or a qualitative wear range characterizing the amount of the wear.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS
[0014] FIG. 1A is a side elevation, partly in section, illustrating a combustor (i.e., a combustion system) of a gas turbine system including various interfaces having wear reduction kit components;
[0015] FIG. 1B is a detailed view of a portion of the turbine system illustrated in FIG. 1A showing, for example, U-shaped wear inserts and seals for a transition piece of the turbine system;
[0016] FIG. 1C is a detailed view of a portion of the turbine system illustrated in FIG. 1A showing, for example, bullhorn guide finger covers at the interface between H-shaped guide blocks and bullhorn guide fingers;
[0017] FIG. 1D is a detailed view of a portion of the turbine system illustrated in FIG. 1A showing, for example, a flow sleeve stop having a wear strip and a liner stop;
[0018] FIG. 1E is a detailed view of a portion of the turbine system illustrated in FIG. 1A showing, for example, a weld deposit material on a fuel nozzle and a mounting ring of a combustion liner cap assembly;
[0019] FIG. 1F is a detailed view of a portion of the turbine system illustrated in FIG. 1A showing, for example, an interface of a cross fire tube and a cross tube collar;
[0020] FIG. 1G is a detailed view of a portion of the turbine system illustrated in FIG. 1A showing, for example, wear strips coupled to a hula seal which is arranged between a transition piece and a combustion liner;
[0021] FIG. 2 is a block diagram showing a web-based, on-line, system for processing wear-related information in accordance with an exemplary embodiment of the present invention;
[0022] FIG. 3 is a flow chart showing initial processing operations which occur when a user accesses the wear processing system;
[0023] FIG. 4 is a flow chart showing possible operations performed when a user selects a main link from a navigation pane presented to a user in accordance with an exemplary embodiment of the present invention;
[0024] FIG. 5 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from the selection of the link HOME from the navigation pane of the system of the present invention;
[0025] FIG. 6 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from the selection of the link Input Portal from the navigation pane of the system in accordance with an exemplary embodiment of the present invention;
[0026] FIG. 7 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from the selection of the button Find Turbines from the web page illustrated in FIG. 6 ;
[0027] FIG. 8 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from data entry and selection of the button Find Inspections from the web page illustrated in FIG. 7 ;
[0028] FIG. 9 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from the selection of a particular inspection in the window of the web page illustrated in FIG. 8 ;
[0029] FIG. 10 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from input of a particular turbine serial number in the window of the web page illustrated in FIG. 6 and selection of the button Continue in the web page illustrated in FIG. 6 ;
[0030] FIG. 11 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from the selection of the button Liner Assembly in the web page illustrated, for example, in FIG. 10 , or the selection of an instance of the term Liner Assembly in the web page illustrated in FIG. 9 ;
[0031] FIG. 12 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from the selection of the button Fuel Nozzle Assembly in the web page illustrated, for example, in FIG. 10 , or the selection of an instance of the term Fuel Nozzle Assembly in the web page illustrated in FIG. 9 ;
[0032] FIG. 13 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from the selection of the link Output Portal in the navigation pane of the system in accordance with an exemplary embodiment of the present invention;
[0033] FIG. 14 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from the selection of the button Statistic in the web page illustrated in FIG. 13 ;
[0034] FIG. 15 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from data entry and selection of the button Search in the web page illustrated in FIG. 14 ;
[0035] FIG. 16 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from the selection of the button Fleet Leader in the web page illustrated in FIG. 13 ;
[0036] FIG. 17 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from data entry and selection of the button Search in the web page illustrated in FIG. 16 ;
[0037] FIG. 18 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from the selection of the link Visual Standards on the navigation pane of the system in accordance with an exemplary embodiment of the present invention;
[0038] FIG. 19 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from the selection of one of the icons presented in the web page illustrated in FIG. 18 ; and
[0039] FIG. 20 is an exemplary screen display of the web page resulting from the selection of the link Search Database on the navigation pane of the system in accordance with an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
[0040] FIG. 2 is a block diagram of an exemplary internet-based computer system for processing field inspection information such as wear-related data (hereinafter wear data processing system) in accordance with an exemplary embodiment of the present invention. The computer system includes personal computers (PCs) 310 a- 310 c interconnected via a wide area network (WAN) 312 such as the internet. PCs 310 a- 310 c are operated by users such as turbine field technicians. PCs 310 a- 310 c communicate on-line via WAN 312 with web server 316 . In particular, on-line requests from PCs 310 a- 310 c are routed through WAN 312 to web server 316 . Alternatively, PCs 310 a- 310 c may route a request through a local area network (LAN) rather than a WAN. A web server application is executed on computer 314 . Computer 314 may be, for example, a main frame computer which executes many application programs including the web server application. The web server application executed by computer 314 may thus communicate with web browsers executing at PCs 310 a- 310 c using conventional HTTP protocol. Computer 314 also retrieves and/or stores data in database 318 .
[0041] FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing exemplary initial processing operations of the wear data processing system. A user first accesses an internet browser, such as Netscape® or Microsoft Internet Explorer® using one of PCs 310 a- 310 c (step 320 ). Using the internet browser, a user enters a wear data processing system uniform resource locator (URL) (step 322 ). This URL is received by web server 316 via WAN 312 (step 324 ). A home web page (see FIG. 5 ) is then generated by computer 314 and server 316 for display on the PC originally transmitting the URL (step 326 ). The home web page enables sign-on processing. In particular, the user is prompted to enter his/her login id and password. If the user is not an authorized user (NO in step 328 ), the server application is stopped (step 330 ). If, however, the user is an authorized user (Yes in step 328 ), the computer 314 and web server 316 enable access to software modules of the wear data processing system.
[0042] Each web page generated and displayed by the wear data processing system, except the home web page illustrated in FIG. 5 , includes a navigation pane 350 located on-the left-side of the web page (see FIGS. 6-20 ). The contents of the left-side navigation pane 350 essentially form a menu which includes links that allow the user to click-on or select the type of software module of the system he or she wishes to execute. Some of the web pages also include various buttons and/or input screens to allow the user to control the type of wear-related data that he or she can input, review, edit, sort, search, etc.
[0043] Referring to FIGS. 4-20 , while a web page is currently being displayed on a user's PC 310 a- 310 c, the user may select another link from navigation pane 350 . In particular, the user may select one of the following links from navigation pane 350 (step 334 ) in FIG. 4 : HOME—see FIGS. 4 and 5 , Input Portal—see FIGS. 4 and 6 - 12 , Output Portal—see FIGS. 4 and 13 - 17 , Visual Standards—see FIGS. 4 and 18 - 19 , Search Database—see FIGS. 4 and 20 , and Logout—see FIG. 4 . The user may alternatively select the same link corresponding to the web page that is being currently displayed to refresh the screen.
[0044] By selecting the appropriate link on navigation pane 350 , a user of the wear data processing system may input inspection data such as data relating to the wear of components of a turbine system. In particular, a user (e.g., a field technician) may enter data relating to the wear (e.g., a quantitative measure or a qualitative wear range) of wear reduction kit components of a turbine system. The wear of other components of the turbine system may also be entered. By selecting the appropriate link on navigation pane 350 , a user of the wear data processing system may also review data previously input, edit any data, statistically sort data, identify a fleet leader of a particular turbine system component, obtain a visual standard of a particular level of wear of a certain component type and/or search the database for information relating to a particular component. A description of displayed web pages corresponding respectively to each of the links provided in navigation pane 350 is provided below in conjunction with FIGS. 5-20 .
[0045] As illustrated in FIG. 5 , if a user selects the link HOME from navigation pane 350 , a home web page of the system will be generated and displayed. The home web page allows the user to enter his/her appropriate login id and password in data entry window 336 . For non-registered users, the system allows a guest account to be enabled through selection of Login button 338 .
[0046] FIG. 6 illustrates an exemplary web page generated by the system resulting from a user selection of the link Input Portal from navigation pane 350 . As illustrated in the web page of FIG. 6 , the user has the option of selecting a Find Turbines button 352 to search for existing turbine inspection data or to provide a turbine serial number and inspection date in window 354 to enter new data into the wear data processing system. This newly entered data may relate to, for example, the amount of wear on any of the components of the turbine system such as wear reduction kit components that was determined by a technician during a new field inspection. After entering the turbine serial number and inspection date in window 354 , the user may click-on the Continue button 356 .
[0047] FIG. 7 illustrates an exemplary web page generated by the system resulting from the selection of the Find Turbines button 352 in the web page illustrated in FIG. 6 . As illustrated in FIG. 7 , a window 358 having a drop down select box allows the user to select one of the turbines for which data has been previously entered in the wear data processing system. In particular, a user may select a specific turbine serial number (295816 ( 7 E Standard) in the example illustrated in FIG. 7 ) using the drop down select box in window 358 and then click on the Find Inspections button 360 .
[0048] FIG. 8 illustrates an exemplary web page generated by the system resulting from the input of a particular turbine serial number in window 358 and selection of the Find Inspections button 360 in the web page illustrated in FIG. 7 . As can be seen in FIG. 8 , an inspection report for the particular turbine identified in the web page of FIG. 7 is displayed on the user's PC. The inspection report includes(from left to right in the inspection report) the inspection id formed by a turbine serial number and month and year of inspection, the inspection date, a name of a contact person, a name of the person who created the information relating to that inspection, and the creation date. Upon viewing the inspection report, a user may click on any particular inspection to view and/or edit its details. For example, the first row 362 having inspection id 295816 10 _ 96 can be selected by the user to view and/or edit the details of this particular inspection.
[0049] FIG. 9 is an exemplary web page generated by the system resulting from the selection of one of the rows of the inspection report illustrated in the web page of FIG. 8 . In this particular example, the user has selected the first row 362 of the inspection report having inspection id 295816 10 _ 96 . The web page illustrated in FIG. 9 provides a list of can assemblies for the selected turbine (i.e., the turbine associated with the selected row of the inspection report). For example, the list provided in the web page of FIG. 9 indicates ten cans having respective can numbers 1 - 10 . Each of the cans has a transition piece (TP) assembly, a liner assembly and a fuel nozzle assembly as indicated by the columns (from left to right) on the web page. A user may click on one of the assemblies of one of the cans in order to view and/or edit detailed information for that particular can assembly of the selected turbine. For example, a user may select TP Assembly 364 or Liner Assembly 366 or Fuel Nozzle Assembly 368 of can number 1 from the first row of data presented in the web page of FIG. 9 .
[0050] FIG. 10 is an exemplary web page resulting from the user's selection of the term TP Assembly 364 from the web page illustrated in FIG. 9 . As can be seen in FIG. 10 , the user may view and/or edit inspection data such as wear data of turbine system components which relate specifically to an inspection of the transition piece (TP) assembly of can number 1 of the turbine having serial no. 295816. All of the entered data may be stored in database 318 . After the data is stored, centralized access to this data is available to other users via computer 314 and server 316 .
[0051] In column 370 , the user may view and/or edit the Quantitative Wear of various transition piece assembly components of can number 1 of the turbine system. Specifically, a user may view and/or edit the amount of Quantitative Wear of one or more of the following components of transition piece body assembly: H block, forward (FWD) inner portion of the transition piece body, outer floating seal, inner floating seal, aft frame in mils, and thermal barrier coating(TBC) in sq. ins. The TBC may be a thermal protective ceramic coating applied to high temperature components for reducing thermal stress. In the lower portion of column 370 , a user may also view and/or edit the amount of Quantitative Wear in mils of the following additional transition piece assembly components: Bull Horn Cover, Side Seal, Aft Frame Creep (Left), Aft Frame Creep (Center) and Aft Frame Creep (Right). Aft refers to the rear end and Aft Frame Creep refers to deformation of the rear end of the transition piece via a mechanical strain process referred to as creep. The amount of Quantitative Wear may be measured by a field technician through the use of, for example, a micrometer.
[0052] During an inspection, a field engineer must typically examine the wear of many components of the turbine system. The field engineer may thus not have the time to quantitatively measure the amount of wear for each of these turbine system components. Rather than determine a quantitative measure of the wear of each of these components, a field technician may determine the Wear Range (light amount of wear, medium amount of wear or heavy amount of wear) of each of the turbine system components. The wear range of components of the transition piece assembly may be reviewed and/or edited by a user (e.g., field engineer) in column 372 . For example, the H Block, Outer Floating Seal and Inner Floating Seal of can number 1 of the TP body assembly were entered as having a light amount of wear during the Oct. 1, 1996 inspection of turbine no. 295816. The wear range of the Side Seal was entered as having a medium amount of wear as can be seen in the lower portion of column 372 . Each of the Wear Ranges of the components of the transition piece assembly may be viewed and revised using the appropriate drop down box in Wear Range column 372 .
[0053] There are several components of the turbine system which must be replaced after experiencing a certain amount of wear. For example, the transition piece body assembly, bull horn cover and the side seal of the transition piece assembly must be replaced after a certain amount of wear. In column 374 of the web page illustrated in FIG. 10 , a user may indicate whether or not the TP Body Assembly, Bull Horn Cover and/or Side Seals have been replaced. For example, the web page illustrated in FIG. 10 indicates that the TP Body Assembly and the Bull Horn Cover have not been replaced, whereas the Side Seal has been replaced.
[0054] During an inspection, a field engineer may obtain a picture (e.g., take a digital photograph) of a particular component of the turbine system. For example, the field engineer may photograph any portion of the TP Body Assembly, Bull Horn Cover, Side Seal and Aft Frame Creep. This picture may be uploaded through the selection of column 376 in the web page illustrated in FIG. 10 . After the picture has been uploaded, a user may select an appropriate row in column 376 to view the picture of that particular component.
[0055] A serial number of a particular component of the TP body assembly may be entered and stored in database 318 . A user may review and/or edit the serial number through appropriate data entry in column 378 .
[0056] General Information button 379 , Can Assemblies button 380 , Liner Assembly (Can 1 ) button 382 and Fuel Nozzle Assembly (Can 1 ) button 384 or Next Can button 386 presented in the upper portion of the web page illustrated in FIG. 10 allow the user to efficiently select the next page for viewing. For example, if the user next wished to view and/or edit inspection data of components of the combustion liner assembly for can number 1 of the turbine system, the user may select button 382 . Alternatively, the user may accomplish the same by clicking on the term Liner Assembly 366 in the web page illustrated in FIG. 9 . If the user next wished to view and/or edit inspection data of components of the Fuel Nozzle Assembly of can number 1 , he/she may select button 384 in the web page illustrated in FIG. 10 . Alternatively, the user may click on the term Fuel Nozzle Assembly 368 in the web page illustrated in FIG. 9 . If the user would like to view inspection data relating to can number 2 , he or she can select the Next Can button 386 or the Can Assemblies button 380 in the web page illustrated in FIG. 10 . Selection of the Can Assemblies button 380 may also allow the user to view data relating to other cans (e.g., any one of can numbers 3 - 10 . Viewing data relating to another can number may also be selected by selecting the appropriate can number in the web page illustrated in FIG. 9 .
[0057] FIG. 11 discloses a web page resulting from the selection of Liner Assembly (can 1 ) button 382 in the web page illustrated in FIG. 1 0 or the selection of the term Liner Assembly 366 in the web page illustrated in FIG. 9 . The web page illustrated in FIG. 11 includes the same columns as columns 370 - 378 illustrated in the web page of FIG. 10 . A user may thus enter the quantitative amount of wear or a qualitative wear range characterizing the amount of wear in the columns labeled Quantitative Wear and Wear Range for the following components of the combustion liner of can number 1 of the turbine having serial no. 295816: XFT Collar (Left), XFT Collar (Right), Liner Collar, Liner Stops and Hula Seal. As can be seen in the lower rows of the Quantitative Wear and Wear Range columns, the user may also view and/or edit the quantitative amount of wear or qualitative wear range for the following turbine system components: Flow Sleeve Stop Maximum, X-Fire Tube (Right) and X-Fire Tube (Left). A picture of the cross-fire tube (XFT or X-Fire tube) collar, cross-fire tube and liner stops A-F is provided in window portion 389 to aid the user to identify the appropriate component part.
[0058] In the Replaced column, a user may view and/or edit whether the Liner, Flow Sleeve Stop Maximum, X-Fire Tube (Right) and/or X-Fire Tube (Left) have been replaced. In the Picture (optional) column, a picture (e.g., digital photograph) of any component of or associated with the combustion liner may be viewed or uploaded. In the Serial Number column, a serial number of the combustion liner may be viewed and/or edited.
[0059] While not explicitly illustrated, the web page illustrated in FIG. 11 may include Can Assemblies, TP Assembly (can 1 ), Fuel Nozzle Assembly (Can 1 ) and Next Can buttons to allow the user to efficiently select the next web page for viewing.
[0060] FIG. 12 illustrates the web page resulting from the selection of the term Fuel Nozzle Assembly 368 in the web page illustrated in FIG. 9 or the Fuel Nozzle Assembly (Can 1 ) button 384 in the web page illustrated in FIG. 10 (or FIG. 11 ). As can be seen in the web page illustrated in FIG. 12 , a user may view and/or edit inspection data relating to the Fuel Nozzle Assembly of any can of the turbine system. The columns Quantitative Wear, Wear Range, Replaced, Picture (optional) and Serial Number are similar to columns 370 - 378 illustrated in the web page of FIG. 10 . A user may view and/or edit the amount of quantitative wear of the primary fuel nozzle or view and/or edit a qualitative wear range characterizing the amount of wear of the primary fuel nozzle in the Quantitative Wear and Wear Range columns, respectively. A user may also indicate whether the primary fuel nozzle has been replaced through the appropriate selection in the Replaced column. A picture may be viewed or uploaded through selection of the Picture (optional) column. A serial number of the primary fuel nozzle may also be viewed and/or edited in the Serial Number column. Comments regarding the fuel nozzle assembly may be entered in window 390 . For example, any comments regarding the wear of the fuel nozzle may be viewed and/or edited in window 390 . Rather then allowing a user to edit data in the web page illustrated in FIG. 12 , access can be limited to viewing only.
[0061] Similar to the discussion above in connection with FIGS. 10 and 11 , one of the General Information, Can Assemblies, TP Assembly (Can 1 ), Liner Assembly (Can 1 ) or Next Can buttons located in the upper portion of the web page illustrated in FIG. 12 may be clicked on by the user to select the next page for viewing.
[0062] Turning back to FIG. 6 , new inspection data for a particular turbine can be entered by providing a turbine serial number and inspection date in window 354 and selecting the Continue button 356 . After the Continue button is selected, web pages such as those illustrated in FIGS. 9-12 will be displayed to enable the user to input data relating to the inspection. These web pages prompt users to enter inspection data in a consistent manner. For example, different users are prompted to newly enter, data relating to the Quantitative Wear or Wear Range of the transitional piece assembly, combustion liner and/or fuel nozzle assembly in a consistent manner. This data will be stored in database 318 and processed by the wear data processing system. The data can be immediately viewed by other users having access to the wear data processing system.
[0063] FIG. 13 illustrates an exemplary web page resulting from the selection of the link Output Portal in navigation pane 350 . As can be seen in the web page illustrated in FIG. 13 , upon the selection of the Output Portal link, a user is prompted to select either the Statistic button 400 or the Fleet Leader button 402 . By selecting the Statistic button 400 , a user may perform a statistical sorting of existing inspection data including wear-related data. By selecting the Fleet Leader button 402 , a user may view fleet leader units of the various types of turbine components.
[0064] FIG. 14 is an exemplary web page resulting from the selection of the Statistic button 400 . As can be seen in the exemplary web page of FIG. 14 , a user may enter search criteria as attributes for data sorting. Wild cards such as * and ? may be used by the user where needed. In particular, the user may enter one or more of the following as possible search criteria: the Type of turbine system component such as H Block (TP) as indicated in FIG. 14 , Turbine Serial Number, Turbine Type such as 7 E as illustrated in FIG. 14 , Combustor Type such as Standard, Can Number and Liner Stop Location (for liner stops only). After entering in the appropriate search criteria, a user may click on search button 404 to view data retrieved and sorted on the basis of the search criteria. If the user makes a mistake in one or more of his/her search criteria entries, he/she may click on the Reset button 405 to clear all of the search criteria fields.
[0065] FIG. 15 is an exemplary web page resulting from the input search criteria and selection of search button 404 in the web page illustrated in FIG. 14 . A user may thus efficiently view inspection data that has been sorted based on the search criteria input in the web page illustrated in FIG. 14 . As can be seen in FIG. 15 , one column of information for the selected component is Wear (third column from the right). A user may select WearPlot button 410 to view a graphical plot of the wear data.
[0066] FIG. 16 is an exemplary web page generated by the system resulting from the selection of the Fleet Leader button 402 in the web page illustrated in FIG. 13 . As can be seen in FIG. 16 , the user may view an identified fleet leader through appropriate input of search criteria. A fleet leader of a particular turbine component is that component from amongst the same type of components installed at different turbines which has the most time in operation. By identifying the fleet leader, a user may determine which component of the various turbine installations is most likely to be in need of being replaced. Moreover, information regarding how long a particular component has lasted in operation may be used in marketing information.
[0067] As indicated in the web page of FIG. 16 , a user may enter in the type of fleet leader such as Fleet Leader by Hours, a particular turbine type such as 7 E and/or a certain combustor type such as Standard. Search button 412 may then be selected by the user to enable the fleet leader to be identified based on the input search criteria. The search criteria may be cleared through selection of reset button 414 .
[0068] FIG. 17 is an exemplary web page illustrating the fleet leaders identified based on the search criteria entered in the web page illustrated in FIG. 16 . As can be seen in FIG. 17 , the identification of the fleet leaders involves a ranking of a particular type of turbine system component within various turbines. For example, as can be seen in the window 420 , for a transition piece (TP) of a turbine type 7 E and combustor type Standard, the transition piece installed in the turbine having number 282508 has the longest duration of cumulative operation.
[0069] The transition piece installed in turbine having number 295816 has the second longest duration of cumulative operation as measured by the number of interval fired hours.
[0070] In window 430 , the liner assembly component of turbine type 7 E and combustor Standard that has the highest number of interval fire hours (i.e., the longest cumulative operation time as measured by interval fire hours) is the liner assembly installed in turbine number 295816.
[0071] FIG. 18 is an exemplary web page of the wear monitoring system resulting from the selection of the link Visual Standards from navigation pane 350 . As discussed in detail in connection with FIGS. 10-12 , a user may view and/or edit the Wear Range (e.g., light wear, medium wear or heavy wear). In entering this type of data, a field technician makes a qualitative determination of the amount of wear of a particular turbine system component. For example, the field technician may make a qualitative decision on the amount of wear on the following turbine system components: bull horn cover, hula seal, inner floating seal, liner collar, liner stop, fuel nozzle, side seal, XF tube male, XFT left collar, and XFT right collar.
[0072] In order to determine an accurate qualitative determination of the amount of wear, standards are necessary so that, for example, a light amount of wear can be distinguished from a medium amount of wear and a heavy amount of wear. Users viewing this data subsequent to its entry will also need to be aware of these standards so that they can correctly interpret this wear information.
[0073] Accordingly, a particular turbine system component type may be selected in the web page illustrated in FIG. 18 to obtain a visual standard. That is, a particular turbine system component type may be selected to view a picture (e.g., digital photograph) of a component having a light amount, medium amount and heavy amount of wear by selecting the appropriate icon in column 440 . For example, FIG. 19 illustrates picture 446 forming a visual standard for a liner stop of the turbine system having a heavy amount of wear. Picture 446 may be displayed upon the selection of icon 440 a . Other visual standards for other component types may be obtained through selection of the icon in column 440 corresponding to the appropriate row. Moreover, detailed written notes describing the particular picture forming the visual standard may be obtained by selection of the icon in column 442 corresponding to the appropriate row.
[0074] FIG. 20 is an exemplary web page resulting from the selection of the link Search Database in navigation pane 350 . As can be seen in FIG. 20 , information stored in database 318 can be searched through input of the appropriate search criteria. Wild cards such as * and ? may be used by the user where needed. In particular, the user may input one or more of the following fields as search criteria: Type, Name, Revision, Owner, Vault, State, Created Between, Description, Attachment Preference and Find Limit. The Type field allows the user to search for a particular type of turbine system component. The Name field allows the user to enter in a specific inspection site. The Revision field allows the user to search between different edits of the inspection data relating to the same inspection. The Owner field allows the user to use the person who inputs the data (i.e., the field data engineer) as a search criteria. The Vault field allows the user to search for data among various vaults or servers. The State field allows the user to search for the location state (e.g., New York) where the data was entered. The Created Between field allows the user to search for data that is created during a certain time period. The Description field allows the user to search from among any additional information that may be specific to a particular inspection. The field Attachment Preference allows the user to restrict the attachments that the user may want to view. The Find Limit field allows the user to restrict the number of matching hits that the search criteria will find. The user may then select the Search button in FIG. 20 to enable the search or the Reset button to clear the data input in the search fields.
[0075] While the invention has been described in connection with what is presently considered to be the most practical and preferred embodiment, it is to be understood that the invention is not to be limited to the disclosed embodiment, but on the contrary, is intended to cover various modifications and equivalent arrangements included within the spirit and scope of the appended claims.
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A method comprises storing data relating to the wear of a component of at least one turbine system in a database of a system for processing wear related information, generating a displayable menu containing a plurality of user-selectable links respectively associated with software modules of the system, and receiving an on-line selection of one of the user-selectable links to enable the associated software module of the system to generate displayable content including information relating to the wear of the component of the turbine system. The selected module may enable a quantitative amount of the wear of the component or qualitative wear range characterizing the amount of the wear of the component to be input and received on-line. Alternatively, the selected module may enable a component type to be input and received on-line and display a component fleet leader.
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This application is a continuation, of application Ser. No. 07/143,393, filed Jan. 13, 1988, now abandoned.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a process for producing a chemical analytical slide having a bar code printed on the surface of the slide frame.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Recently, in the field of clinical tests, dry analysis using a chemical analytical slide has widely been utilized because of the superiorities in the simplicity of analytical operation and rapidity of measurement. In general, the chemical analytical slide is composed of a chemical analytical film containing the reagent reacting with a particular component of a liquid sample such as blood and a slide frame to hold the margin of the chemical analytical slide. On the slide frame, a bar code is printed due to the discrimination of products.
As such a conventional chemical analytical slide, it is known that the chemical analytical film was fixed by a combination of a flat slide frame and the other slide frame having a concavity molded by injection molding (Japanese Patent KOKAI 57-63452). Besides, it is also known that the chemical analytical slide having a hinge similar to a transparent positive film slide, the chemical analytical slide using a paper slide frame (Japanese Utility Model KOKAI 61-116350), and the chemical analytical slide of a cartridge type (Japanese Utility Model KOKAI 54-162294). However, in the case of these chemical analytical slides produced by injection molding, since the bar code was printed on each assembled slide one by one, printing speed was low thereby raising manufacturing cost.
Another chemical analytical slide was developed in order to increase the production speed. The frame of this chemical analytical slide was formed by punching a strip sheet. The chemical analytical slide is, as shown in FIG. 5 and FIG. 6, composed of an upper slide frame 1 and a lower slide frame 2 located at the upper position and the lower position respectively, and a spacer 3 and a chemical analytical slide 4 interposed therebetween. Circular openings 5, 6 are formed near the center of the upper slide frame 1 and the lower slide frame 2, and a bar code 7 is printed on a side portion of the upper slide frame 1. A film hole 8 for placing the chemical analytical film 4 is bored in the center of the spacer 3.
As the method of producing this chemical analytical slide, bar codes were printed on a strip sheet at regular intervals, and the strip sheet was successively punched to produce the upper slide frames 1. The lower frames 2 and the spacers 3 were also produced by punching other strip sheets. The chemical analytical film 4 was inserted into the film hole 8 of the spacer 3, and thereafter, the upper slide frame 1 and the lower slide frame 2 were attached by ultrasonic welding or another method to complete the chemical analytical slide (Japanese Patent KOKAI 61-51570).
However, in the case of the above chemical analytical slide, since the strip sheet was printed with each bar code in a size for each slide frame at regular intervals, it was necessary to be punchased so that the bar code came to a prescribed position. Therefore, the strip sheet should be positioned exactly both in the longitudinal direction and in the lateral direction. Furthermore, the thickness of ink in the latter part of printing was different from the thickness in the beginning causing variations in the ink concentration or the width of the lines of each bar code, or in a particular case, causing a shortage of ink. These brought errors in reading.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
An object of the invention is to provide a process for producing a chemical analytical slide where the slide frame having a bar code is easily and accurately punched.
Another object of the invention is to provide a process capable of producing a chemical analytical slide containing a slide frame having a bar code printed in an uniform ink thickness which does not result in erroneous reading of the bar code.
Still another object of the invention is to provide a process for producing a chemical analytical slide containing a slide frame having a bar code excellent in productivity.
Such objects have been achieved by changing the printed bar code with a bar code arranged in the longitudinal direction of the strip sheet to be punched.
Thus, the present invention provides a process for producing a chemical analytical slide comprising forming an upper slide frame and a lower slide frame by punching strip sheets and attaching the upper slide frame and the lower slide frame on both sides of a chemical analytical film, characterized by that at least one of the strip sheets for forming the upper slide frame and the lower slide frame is printed with a bar code pattern arranged in the longitudinal direction, and thereafter, the printed strip sheet is punched to form the upper slide frame or the lower slide frame.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is an exploded perspective view of a chemical analytical slide produced by the process of the invention.
FIG. 2 is a perspective view of the assembled product of the above chemical analytical slide.
FIG. 3 is a perspective view indicating a printing state of a strip sheet for a slide frame of the chemical analytical slide.
FIG. 4 is an exploded perspective view of another chemical analytical slide produced by the process of the invention.
FIG. 5 is an exploded perspective view of a conventional chemical analytical slide.
FIG. 6 is a perspective view of the assembled product of the conventional chemical analytical slide.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
The strip sheet may be various thermoplastic resin sheets, paper sheets, metal foils or the like. Preferable thermoplastic resin sheets include a polystyrene sheet composed of 90 to 10 wt. % of general purpose (GP) polystyrene and 10 to 90 wt. % of high impact (HI) polystyrene and another polystyrene sheet composed of 99.5 to 85 wt. % of polystyrene and 0.5 to 15 wt. % of various synthetic rubbers. The thermoplastic resin including the above polystyrenes may be blended with various additives such as white pigment or metal powder. Examples of the white pigment are titanium dioxide, calcium carbonate, clay and talc. The thickness of the strip sheet may be sufficient to support a chemical analytical film, and for example, in the case of a polystyrene sheet, it is usually 100 μm to 2 mm.
The bar code pattern may be a single pattern or two or more patterns. In the latter case, the respective pattern may be identical with or different from each other.
The printing process of the bar code pattern may be gravure printing, offset printing or letterpress printing. In the case of gravure printing, the press plate roll may be made by intaglio halftone gravure, helio klischo graph method, conventional method or TH process method. In view of printing accuracy, intaglio halftone gravure is particularly preferable. Various printing conditions such as the composition and viscosity of printing ink and printing speed may be varied according to the strip sheet, etc.
The punching process of the upper and lower slide frames and the assembling process may be carried out according to a conventional manner.
The chemical analytical slide may contain other parts such as a spacer interposed between the slide frames.
The kind of the chemical analytical film is not limited, and may be integral multilayer analytical element composed of a transparent support and various layers superposed on it such as spreading layer, reagent layer, registration layer, light-reflecting layer, water absorption layer, binding layer and the like. The component to be analyzed is also not limited, and includes various body fluid components such as glucose, urea, uric acid, cholesterol and the like.
In the process of the invention, since the bar code is made of a continuous line in the longitudinal direction of the strip sheet, precise positioning in the longitudinal direction is not necessary in the punching process. Accordingly, it is enough for the strip sheet to be set in a prescribed position only in the lateral direction. Besides, since the bar code is continuously printed on the strip sheet, the thickness of the printed ink is almost uniform over the whole length of the strip sheet. The ink concentration and the width of the lines of each bar code is also uniform, and the shortage of printed ink does not occur. Therefore, reading errors do not occur. In the case of the process of the invention, productivity is high, and defective products are hardly generated. As a result of these, chemical analytical slides can be produced inexpensively.
EXAMPLES
An example of the process of the invention is hereafter explained referring to FIG. 1 to FIG. 3.
As illustrated in FIGS. 1 and 2, a bar code 10 is printed on the surface of an upper slide frame in the center extending from one edge to the opposite edge. The remaining parts, i.e. the lower slide frame 2, the spacer 3 and the chemical analytical film 4 are the same as the conventional chemical analytical slide shown in FIGS. 5 and 6.
When the above chemical analytical slide is produced, first, the respective parts are separately prepared. Then, the chemical analytical film 4 is placed on the lower slide frame 2, and the spacer 3 is further placed so that the chemical analytical film 4 is fit in the film hole 8 of the spacer 3. Instead, the spacer 3 may first be placed on the lower slide frame 2, and the chemical analytical film 4 is then placed on the lower slide frame 2. The upper slide frame 1 is placed thereon, and these parts are fixed by means of ultrasonic welding.
The upper slide frame 1 was prepared by punching a strip sheet printed with a bar code pattern composed of continuous lines in the longitudinal direction in a prescribed form. The strip sheet 11 was composed of 70 wt. % of GP polystyrene resin, 28.5 wt. % of HI polystyrene resin and 1.5 wt. % of rutile type TiO 2 . It was almost flat, and had a thickness of 300 μm. The bar code was printed by gravure printing as shown in FIG. 3. Circular master patterns of the bar code continued in the circumferential direction were formed on the printing face 13 of the press plate roll 12. The printing face 13 was prepared by etching the master patterns of the bar code by means of intaglio halftone gravure into a plate and joining both sides of the plate to form a cylinder. The circumferential length of the press plate roll was 496 mm, and the facial length (printing width) was 380 mm. The ink 14 used was "LOTOSTAR 94 BLACK" (Toyo Ink Mfg. Co., Ltd., Japan), and its viscosity was 16 sec. by Zahn cup #3. The strip sheet 11 was passed between the rotating press plate roll 12 dipped in the ink bath 15 and a pressure roll 16 at a speed of 80 m/min., and thereby, several kinds of bar code patterns 10 were continuously printed on the strip sheet 11 in the longitudinal direction by the printing face 13 of the press plate roll 12.
The strip sheet 11 printed with the bar code patterns 10 were sent to a puncher (not illustrated). Then, the strip sheet 11 was set in a prescribed position in the lateral direction, and punched to form the upper slide frame 1.
The lower slide frame 2 was prepared by punching another strip sheet embossed having the same composition as the aforementioned strip sheet for the upper slide frame 1 and a thickness of 400 μm.
The spacer 3 was prepared by punching another strip sheet embossed having the same composition as the aforementioned strip sheet for the upper slide frame 1 and a thickness of 900 μm.
The chemical analytical film 4 was prepared in a known method, and consisted of a spreading layer, a light-reflecting layer, a reagent layer and a transparent support superposed in this order.
Another chemical analytical slide produced by the process of the invention is shown in FIG. 4. This chemical analytical slide was an electrolyte type, and also composed of an upper slide frame 1, a lower slide frame 2, a spacer 3 and a chemical analytical slide 4. Each pair of circular openings 5 and square openings 5 were formed in the upper frame 1. The chemical analytical film 4 were composed of two rectangular films, and film holes 8 were bored in the spacer 3 in parallel. The bar code 10 was printed on the surface of the upper slide frame 1 in the center extended from one edge to the opposite edge.
Chemical analytical slides were produced according to three processes embodying the invention and two conventional process, and the results are tabulated in Table.
TABLE 1__________________________________________________________________________ Invention Invention Invention Conventional Conventional Test I II III I II Method__________________________________________________________________________Bar Code Continuous Continuous Continuous JIS JISPrinting Plate Roll Roll Roll Flat Plate RollEngraving Intaglio Helioklischo- Helioklischo- Intaglio Intaglio Halftone graph *1 graph *2 Halftone Halftone Gravure Gravure GravurePrinting Method Gravure Gravure Gravure Pad (Dabber) GravureUpper Slide Punching Punching Punching Injection PunchingFrame Strip Sheet *3 Strip Sheet *3 Strip Sheet *3 Molding Strip Sheet *3Chemical For Glucose For Glucose For Glucose For Glucose For GlucoseAnalytical Film Analysis Analysis Analysis Analysis AnalysisSpacer Punching Punching Punching Injection Punching Strip Sheet *4 Strip Sheet *4 Strip Sheet *4 Molding Strip Sheet *4Lower Slide Punching Punching Punching Injection PunchingFrame Strip Sheet *5 Strip Sheet *5 Strip Sheet *5 Molding Strip Sheet *5Printing Speed 2,000 2,000 2,000 12 2,000(sheet/min.)Generation Rate 0.3 3.2 1.3 13 28 *Aof DefectiveProduct (%)Printing 8 8 8 100 23 *BCost RatioUneveness in Ink None In Some Rare In Some Frequently *CConcentration Degree Degree__________________________________________________________________________ *1 Angle of diamond bit: 130 degrees *2 Angle of diamond bit: 115 degrees *3 GP polystyrene resin 70 wt. % HI resin 28.5 wt. % Rutile type TiO.sub.2 1.5 wt. % Thickness 300 μm *4 The same composition as above Thickness 900 μm *5 The same composition as above Thickness 400 μm ##STR1## B Conventional process I is set as 100 C Visual inspection
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A process for producing a chemical analytical slide including an upper slide frame, a lower slide frame and a chemical analytical film therebetween. The process comprises passing a strip sheet in a longitudinal direction. printing a bar code on the strop sheet by intaglio printing so that lines of the bar code extend in the longitudinal direction, forming the upper slide frame or lower slide frame from the printed strip sheet and forming the chemical analytical slide from the printed upper slide frame or lower slide frame. In a further aspect, a chemical analytical slide is provided which has a code which extends from one edge of the slide frame to the opposite edge.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to school bus seats and more particularly to an injection-molded riser for a modular school bus seat frame which provides a reduced weight, high strength, module.
2. Description of the Problem
School bus seats are built to meet many differing customer specifications. For example, some bus seats must accommodate three point safety belts by providing a compatible upper back rest, other specifications call for a universal child restraint attachment equipped lower frame, while still others provide standard DOT (United States Department of Transportation) seat backs. At the same time customers can specify seats in different widths or heights and can demand various strength requirements be met.
Meeting such diverse specifications have required manufacturers stock substantially or entirely different component sets in order to produce seats. The need to supply such component sets has even occurred relative to completed vehicles that have been put into service where the vehicle has been moved from one state or municipality to another, based on differing requirements of the new jurisdiction. Modularity of the components, that is the ability to use one component to build seats meeting different functionality, can reduce the number of different components required to construct seats adapted to particular customer requirements.
Modular construction of bus seat frames is known, one example being taught in U.S. Pat. No. 6,886,889 to Vits et al. FIGS. 18-20 of the Vits '889 patent teach a modular seat based on four major sub-assemblies. The sub-assemblies include a frame assembly, a floor mount assembly, a passive restraint panel and a seat member. The floor mount assembly in turn comprises one or two pedestals on which frame elements for a seat bench rest. In some embodiments one of the pedestals is replaced by a wall mount bracket shown in FIGS. 26 and 27 of the patent. Vits does not describe fabrication of the pedestals at length.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,303,235 to Fongers described a chair for mounting to a bleacher seat where the chair was an injection molded seat with strategically shaped and positioned strengthening ribs being inherent to the seat elements.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The invention provides a riser assembly for a modular seat assembly for school busses. The riser assembly includes a riser, a support neck reinforcement member for supporting a seat back frame from the riser, floor attachment members, localized reinforcement pieces and a front cross member attachment member. The riser is preferably molded from glass or talc filled polypropylene or nylon. The riser is molded with strengthening ridges disposed in an egg crate pattern, that is, a major face of the riser includes a plurality of strengthening ridges disposed in two mutually orthogonal sets. The riser is molded to conform with the attachment members and reinforcement pieces by providing slots into which some attachment members can be fitted.
Additional effects, features and advantages will be apparent in the written description that follows.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The novel features believed characteristic of the invention are set forth in the appended claims. The invention itself however, as well as a preferred mode of use, further objects and advantages thereof, will best be understood by reference to the following detailed description of an illustrative embodiment when read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, wherein:
FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a school bus seat frame.
FIG. 2 is an exploded view of a seat riser assembly for the school bus seat frame of FIG. 1 .
FIG. 3 is a detail view of molded features of the riser adapted to receive a representative attachment member.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
Referring now to the drawings and in particular to FIG. 1 , an assembled modular school bus seat frame 40 is illustrated. Modular school bus seat frame 40 is installed upright on a bus floor 42 . Modular frame 40 is supported on its inside end from a chair rail 62 of a school bus interior wall 44 and along its opposed end adjacent a center aisle from the floor 42 . Support from the wall 44 is provided by a wall riser 48 . Support from the floor 42 is provided by an aisle riser assembly 46 . Aisle riser assembly 46 and wall riser 48 differ from the aisle risers and floor risers known from the art in that they form part of what would traditionally be considered the frame itself, and are not simply pedestals on which the seat frame is mounted. The aisle riser assembly 46 includes a support neck 50 which provides a base of support for an open, partial perimeter tube 52 used to define the top and sides of a seat back portion of frame 40 . The partial perimeter tube 52 is a C shaped element mounted at opposite ends in necks 50 . Perimeter tube 52 defines the top and sides of the seat back. Suspended on and within the partial perimeter tube 52 is a seat back panel 54 . Extending between and fitted into the aisle riser assembly 46 and the wall riser 48 are front and back latitudinal supports 60 and 56 . Supports 56 and 60 come in varying lengths to support seats of varying widths. Riser assembly 46 includes a riser which is molded and has an interior side (the side facing away from the aisle for a riser assembly installed adjacent the aisle or the side oriented toward the aisle for a riser installed adjacent a side wall of the vehicle) which is formed with a moderately dense egg crate pattern of intersecting reinforcing ribs to add structural strength to the riser.
FIG. 2 illustrates the components of a riser assembly 46 featuring the interior side or major face 75 of riser 76 . The interior side 75 features particularly a plurality of horizontal ribs 78 and vertical ribs 80 which intersect and operate to strengthen the riser 76 . The sets of ribs 80 and 78 should be formed in the molding process to be substantially orthogonal, though it is not essential that they be vertical and horizontal. In addition, various attachment members and reinforcing plates are illustrated. These are provided at points of particular stress, such as the point of attachment of the riser 46 with the floor and the point of attachment of the seat back tube 52 .
A neck member 50 includes a tube section 81 which mates with one end of tube 52 and a gusset 82 which may be joined with the main body of riser 76 by being fitted against the egg crate pattern of ribs 78 , 80 . The tube section 81 of neck member 50 is sized to fit snugly within a riser extension 70 which is an open faced trough. Neck member may also be made of the same material as the riser 76 .
A rear floor mounting member and reinforcement plate 74 reinforces the riser 76 at another point of stress, that is the point of attachment of riser 76 to the floor of a bus at the back of riser 76 . Rear floor mounting member 74 is an L shaped member which fits against an aft, downward extension of the riser 76 , which terminates in a foot 90 . Holes 93 through member 74 may be aligned with holes 95 through the foot 90 for the insertion of fasteners (not shown). Similarly a smaller mounting plate 72 is used with the front foot of the riser 76 .
Riser 76 provides for the attachment of cross members to support a seat using attachment plates such as attachment plate 61 , which fits to the front portion of the riser. Plate 61 includes a right angle bend to accommodate a cross member which extends between the aisle riser assembly and a wall riser assembly.
Referring to FIG. 3 , an attachment member 118 for a seat frame member 150 is illustrated, as well as modifications made along an edge of riser 76 which provide for easy connection of the attachment member to the riser. Riser 76 incorporates an L shaped ridge 102 which in turn defines a slot 103 . A block 104 is formed in the riser 76 below the ridge 102 . Similarly a second ridge 121 is disposed below the block 104 defining a second slot 119 . Attachment member 118 is a C shaped bracket, preferably made of metal which includes tabs 116 and 117 at the ends of upper and lower “arms” of the C. Tabs 116 , 117 mate with slots 103 and 119 , respectively, as part of attaching the member 118 to the riser 76 . A seat frame member 150 , which itself is shaped as a shallow C in cross section, fits snugly inside attachment member 118 and brackets block 104 . Holes 112 through attachment member 118 and holes 106 in block 104 may be aligned for the insertion of fasteners 110 . The use of fasteners avoids the use of welding which can thermally weaken components.
While only a preferred embodiment is described here, the claims are not thus limited but is cover various changes and modifications to that embodiment without departing from the spirit and scope of the claims.
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A modular seat frame for a school bus seat includes riser assemblies for supporting the seat fabricated from a moldable material reinforced locally by attachment and reinforcement members.
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RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] This application is based on Provisional Application Serial No. 60/314,744 filed on Aug. 24, 2001, entitled “Retractable Structures Comprised of Interlinked Panels.”
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0002] Structures that transform in size or shape have numerous applications in many fields. My prior patent, U.S. Pat. No. 5,024,031, hereby incorporated by reference as if fully disclosed herein, teaches methods for constructing transformable truss-structures in a variety of shapes. The teachings therein have been used to build structures for diverse applications including architectural uses, public exhibits and educational toys.
[0003] One particular embodiment disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,024,031 is a retractable structure that expands from a compact ring of links to form a self-supporting structural dome. In its most basic embodiment, such a structure is made entirely of a latticework of links. The structure would be comprised of structural elements only, and the structural dome, when extended, retains a somewhat skeletal appearance. As an extension of that embodiment, a method was also disclosed to incorporate panel elements that may be attached to the outward side of structure, thereby creating a substantially smooth, continuous covering that covers the entire dome in its extended position (See FIGS. 28-33 of U.S. Patent No. 5,024,031).
[0004] Such an arrangement can be improved upon. Since the panel elements are separate pieces from the structural member themselves, they add additional elements that may negatively affect the structural integrity of the structure. Additional elements would also raise the cost to build and maintain such a structure. A further concern is that when building a large structure, the panel elements may catch the wind and cause them to be dislodged from the structural elements.
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0005] In accordance with the present invention, a retractable structure is presented that incorporates an additional useful feature. I have discovered a way to construct such retractable structures whereby the links are themselves panel elements. Thus, the structural members themselves form a continuous surface, leading to a more economical, structurally sound and cleaner design.
[0006] Such links can be assembled to form planer and three-dimensional structures. In their planar embodiments, retractable structures according to this invention may be comprised exclusively of panels hinged together. In their three-dimensional embodiments, whether conical, hemispherical or other shapes, panels are connected to one another via small hub elements.
[0007] This discovery represents a significant improvement over the earlier invention, and offers the promise of building of practical architectural structures with retractable features.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0008] [0008]FIG. 1 shows a typical panel-link with three pivot points.
[0009] [0009]FIG. 2 shows a tongs linkage comprised of eight separate panel-links in its extended position, forming a wedge-shaped surface.
[0010] [0010]FIG. 3 shows the same linkage in a partially retracted position, its edges lying along the lines of a similar angle to that in FIG. 1.
[0011] [0011]FIG. 4 shows the same linkage in a fully retracted position, its edges lying along the lines of a similar angle to that in FIG. 1.
[0012] [0012]FIGS. 5, 6, and 7 show perspective views of the same linkage in its extended, partially retracted and fully retracted positions respectively.
[0013] [0013]FIG. 8 shows a structural arch to which twelve extended tongs-linkages have been attached, said linkages also being joined to one another, to form a semi-circular planar surface.
[0014] [0014]FIG. 9 shows the same structure wherein all twelve tongs-linkages have been fully retracted into the structural arch, thereby providing a large semi-circular opening.
[0015] [0015]FIG. 10 shows a perspective view of the planar arch structure in its extended position.
[0016] [0016]FIGS. 11 and 12 show perspective views of the planar arch structure in its partially retracted and fully retracted positions respectively.
[0017] [0017]FIG. 13 shows two planar tongs-linkages about to be joined to one another by six hub elements.
[0018] [0018]FIG. 14 shows same two linkages joined together by the hub elements.
[0019] [0019]FIG. 15 shows a sectional view revealing an angled relationship between the two linkages.
[0020] [0020]FIG. 16 shows a perspective view of a retractable conical structure comprised of twenty planar tongs-linkages, shown here in its extended position, each linkage being joined to one another by hub elements, thereby forming a complete ring.
[0021] [0021]FIG. 17 shows the same structure in elevation view.
[0022] [0022]FIGS. 18 and 19 show perspective views of the same structure in its partially retracted and fully retracted positions.
[0023] [0023]FIG. 20 shows a plan view of a curved tongs-linkage in its extended position.
[0024] [0024]FIG. 21 shows an elevation view of the same linkage.
[0025] [0025]FIGS. 22, 23 and 24 show perspective views of the curved tongs-linkage in its extended, partially retracted and fully retracted states respectively.
[0026] [0026]FIG. 25 shows a perspective view of a retractable domed structure in its extended position.
[0027] [0027]FIG. 26 shows an elevation view of the domed structure.
[0028] [0028]FIGS. 27 and 28 show the same retractable dome in its partially retracted and fully retracted positions respectively.
[0029] [0029]FIG. 29 shows a panel-link that is constructed of a frame with a sheet material to provide an infill, along with a linear link.
[0030] [0030]FIG. 30 shows a tongs linkage in its extended position, whereby the linkage is comprised of four panel-links and four linear links.
[0031] [0031]FIG. 31 shows the tongs linkage in a partially retracted position, the slide elements having moved along the supporting structure.
[0032] [0032]FIG. 32 shows the tongs linkage in its fully retracted position so that it is fully retracted to within the supporting structure.
[0033] [0033]FIG. 33 shows a semi-circular retractable structure consisting of twelve tongs linkages.
[0034] [0034]FIG. 34 shows a stationary supporting arch and a supporting track.
[0035] [0035]FIG. 35 shows the retractable structure and supporting structure together.
[0036] [0036]FIGS. 36 and 37 show the structure in its partially extended and fully retracted position respectively.
[0037] [0037]FIG. 38 shows an elevation view of the same retractable structure.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
[0038] In FIG. 1 is shown a typical panel-link element 8 which has a polygonal profile. Panel link element 8 has one central pivot 7 and two end-pivots 5 and 9 . A single panel-link element is the most basic element in the structure. Two panel-link elements can be pivotally connected to each other by their central pivots to form a link-pair.
[0039] A plurality of these link-pairs can be pivotally connected to each other by their end-pivots to form a structure that can extend like a pair of extendable tongs (hence, a “tongs linkage”.) FIG. 2 shows such a tongs linkage 20 which is comprised of eight panel-links 2 , 4 , 6 , 8 , 10 , 12 , 14 and 16 . Links 6 and 8 are pivotally joined together via pivot 7 to form a link-pair. Similarly links 2 and 4 are joined, as are links 10 and 12 , as are links 14 and 16 . Each link-pair is itself joined to a neighboring pair via two pivots. Linkage 20 is shown in an extended position whereby a triangle-shaped surface is formed. A line 22 passes through one end-pivot each of all of the panel-links. A second line 24 passes through the other end-pivot of the panel-links.
[0040] In FIG. 3 linkage 20 is shown in a partially retracted position. A line 23 passes through one end-pivot each of the eight panel-links and a second line 24 passes through the other end-pivot. The angle formed between lines 23 and 24 is identical to the angle formed between lines 21 and 22 .
[0041] In FIG. 4 linkage 20 is shown in a fully retracted position. A line 25 passes through one end-pivot each of the eight panel-links and a second line 26 passes through the other end-pivot. The angle formed between lines 25 and 26 is identical to the angle formed between lines 21 and 22 .
[0042] [0042]FIG. 5 shows a perspective view of linkage 20 in an extended position. Link-pair 14 , 16 lies in an offset plane from link-pair 10 , 12 which itself lies in an offset plane from link-pair 6 , 8 . This last link-pair is itself offset from link-pair 2 , 4 . FIG. 6 shows a perspective view of linkage 20 in a partially retracted position. The offsets between adjacent link-pairs allow them to slide over one another without interference. FIG. 7 shows linkage 20 in its fully retracted position whereby all of the panel-links are stacked over one another.
[0043] [0043]FIG. 8 shows a semi-circular retractable structure 60 which is comprised of 12 tongs-linkages 20 , 30 , 32 , 34 , 36 , 38 , 40 , 42 , 44 , 46 , 48 and 50 each one of which is pivotally joined to its neighboring linkage via those end pivots which lie in along a line. Shown in its extended position, structure 60 forms a semi-circular solid wall. Structure 60 is further comprised of a stationary arch 52 which supports the linkages. Linkage 20 is attached to arch 52 via two sliding connections 27 and 28 . Similarly all of the remaining linkages are attached to arch 52 by sliding connections. Structure 60 is further comprised of a linear track 60 which supports tongs linkages 20 and 50 along their unattached edges. FIG. 9 shows structure 60 in its fully retracted position whereby the linkages have retracted to overlap arch 52 thereby providing a semi-circular opening. FIGS. 10,11 and 12 shows perspective views of structure 60 in its extended, partially retracted and fully retracted positions respectively.
[0044] [0044]FIG. 13 shows two tongs-linkages 70 and 71 in proximity to five hub elements 72 , 73 , 74 , 75 and 76 . FIG. 14 shows linkages 70 and 71 joined to one another via those same five hub elements. FIG. 15 shows a sectional view of the joined tongs-linkages revealing an angular relationship between them, said angle being formed by the hub elements. FIG. 16 shows a retractable structure 80 having a conical form which is comprised of twenty tongs linkages 70 , 71 and 81 through 98 (consecutively). Each tongs linkage is connected to two of its neighboring linkages via adjoining hub elements. For example linkage 70 is joined to linkage 71 via hub elements 72 , 73 , 74 , 75 and 76 . Structure 80 is further comprised of a base support 79 . Each tongs linkage is joined to base support 79 via two sliding connections.
[0045] [0045]FIG. 17 shows an elevation view of structure 80 . FIG. 18 shows a perspective view of structure 80 in a partially retracted position. FIG. 19 shows structure 80 in a fully retracted position.
[0046] [0046]FIG. 20 shows a tongs linkage 100 which is comprised of twelve panel-links and 14 hub elements. Linkage 100 is shown in its extended position forming a continuous triangular shaped surface. Link-pair 121 , 122 is joined to link-pair 123 , 124 via hub elements 102 , 112 . Link-pair 123 , 124 is joined in turn to link-pair 125 , 126 via hub elements 103 , 113 . Similarly each successive link-pair is joined to its neighboring pair by a pair of hub elements. Linkage 100 is shown in elevation view in FIG. 21. It may be seen to have a curved profile, this curvature being introduced by the various hub elements. FIG. 22 shows a perspective view of linkage 100 in its extended position. The edges of the panel-links may be seen to lie in planes 140 and 141 . Likewise, the center-planes of the hub elements lie in planes 140 and 141 .
[0047] [0047]FIG. 23 shows linkage 100 in a partially retracted position. The center-planes of the hub elements lie in planes 142 and 143 . The angle formed between planes 142 , 143 is identical to the angle formed between 140 , 141 . FIG. 24 shows linkage 100 in its fully retracted position. The center-planes of the hub elements lie in planes 144 and 145 . The angle formed between planes 144 , 145 is identical to the angle formed between 140 , 141 . FIG. 25 shows a retractable structure 110 , which is a dome, in its fully extended position. Structure 110 is comprised of 24 linkages which are similar to linkage 100 , each linkage being connected to its neighbor by adjoining hub elements. Structure 110 is supported by a base 115 to which each of the 24 linkages are attached by sliding connections.
[0048] [0048]FIG. 26 shows structure 110 in elevation view. FIGS. 27 and 28 show structure 110 in its partially retracted and fully retracted positions respectively.
[0049] [0049]FIG. 29 shows panel-link 123 that is constructed of framing elements 140 that connect the three pivots, and border the polygonal profile. Link 123 is further comprised of an infill 141 which is a sheet material attached to frame 140 . Also shown in FIG. 29 is a linear link 124 which has three pivots.
[0050] [0050]FIG. 30 shows a tongs linkage in its extended position, whereby the linkage is comprised of four panel-links and four linear links. Link-pairs are made up of one panel-link and one linear link respectively. For example panel-link 123 is joined to linear link 124 by their central pivots. In its extended position the four panel-links form a triangular-shaped surface that is one layer thick. The linear links serve to synchronize the motion of the linkage, but do not provide covering themselves. Also shown in FIG. 30 is a stationary supporting structure 134 to which two links 127 and 128 are joined via slide elements 130 and 132 respectively.
[0051] [0051]FIG. 31 shows the tongs linkage in a partially retracted position, the slide elements having moved along the supporting structure. FIG. 32 shows the tongs linkage in its fully retracted position so that it is fully retracted to within the supporting structure. FIG. 33 shows a retractable structure 100 consisting of twelve tongs linkages which are attached to one another by their end pivots. Structure 200 is shown in its extended position whereby a continuous surface is formed having a semi-circular profile.
[0052] [0052]FIG. 34 shows a stationary supporting arch 220 and a supporting track 210 . FIG. 35 shows the retractable structure 200 attached to supporting structure 220 by a series of slide connections. Track 210 supports the edges of those linkages that lie on the border of the semi-circle.
[0053] [0053]FIGS. 36 and 37 show the structure 200 in its partially extended and fully retracted position respectively. Finally, FIG. 38 shows an elevation view of the retractable structure 200 .
[0054] It will be appreciated that the instant specification, drawings and claims set forth by way of illustration and not limitation, and that various modification and changes may be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the present invention.
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This invention discloses tongs-linkage, which, in its extended position, provides an essentially triangular-shaped surface, whereby the links of the tongs-linkage are themselves the panels that form the surface. Such assemblies may be planar, or, by use of intermediate hub elements, may form a surface with curvature. As such an assembly is compressed, the panel-links slide over one another, compressing down to a compact stack. Such tongs-linkages may be joined to similar linkages by pivots lying along their respective edges thereby forming extended structural surfaces. Surfaces that are planar, cone-shaped and doubly-curved surfaces of revolution are disclosed. In each case when the structure is retracted it compresses down to a compact linear element or ring.
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STATEMENT OF GOVERNMENT RIGHTS
This invention was made with Government support under contract F33657-87-C-2000 awarded by the United States Air Force. The Government has certain rights in this invention.
TECHNICAL FIELD OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates generally to the field of measuring devices and more particularly to a target base for a measuring system.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
It is common practice when measuring the surface contour of an object to take measurements of the object using an optical or laser measuring apparatus. One such method includes marking predetermined locations on the object and attaching targets to the object at each location. Conventional target bases generally utilize a magnet or multiple suction cups to attach the target to the object. Conventional target bases may also provide proper spacing of the target from the surface of the object by feet that make point contact with the object. In many applications, it is necessary to keep the targets attached to the object being measured for long periods of time, such as when two or more sub-assemblies are being assembled and their relative positions are being established prior to joining them.
Conventional target bases that utilize small suction cups generally operate by being pressed onto the surface of the object. The air is squeezed out of the suction cups and the suction cups are released whereupon they partially resile and form a vacuum within the suction cup. Suction cups have several disadvantages. For example, the force that the suction cups exert is relatively small, inasmuch as it is a function of the resiliency of the suction cup. Accordingly, even when several suction cups are used on a target, the force holding the target to the object is relatively low, and there is a chance that the target will change position or even become dislodged. In addition, suction cups must be applied with attention to making sure that all of the suction cups are evenly pressed onto the surface of the object, lest there be an uneven suction force among them, thus allowing the target to tilt in the direction of a greater suction force. Furthermore, suction cups are inherently resilient, thereby displacing the target away from the surface. Because of the displacement, or rebound, of the target from the surface of the object, the legs that set the distance of the target from the surface of the object are often not effectively engaged.
The amount of rebound the target experiences is subject to variation that is dependent upon many factors, such as environmental conditions (e.g., temperature and humidity), the orientation of the target (e.g., gravity forces opposing or aiding the suction cups), and the physical condition of the suction cups (e.g. age, wear, and the like). Other problems associated with suction cups may include creep of the sealing lips of the suction cups that allows them to loosen, and leakage that allows the suction cups to lose their vacuum over time.
In short, pressed-on suction cups provide scant assurance that the targets on the object are uniformly positioned at predetermined locations and that the offset distance and the target angle accurately reflects the surface of the object. In addition, it cannot be assured that pressed-on suction cups will not move over time or even be dislodged.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Accordingly, a need has arisen for an improved target base for a measuring system. The present invention provides a target base that substantially eliminates or reduces problems associated with the prior methods and systems.
In accordance with one embodiment of the present invention, a target base for attaching an apparatus to an object includes a substantially rigid body having a mount surface adapted to couple an apparatus or target to the body, and a base surface. A suction cup is affixed to the base surface of the body and has a suction cavity that is defined by a deformable sealing lip at the perimeter of the suction cup. The sealing lip and vacuum cavity in conjunction with the object form a vacuum chamber. A vacuum system communicates a vacuum pressure to the vacuum chamber. The target base also includes one or more contact members which are coupled to the base surface of the body to provide consistent off-set positioning of the target base with respect to the object.
In a particular embodiment, the target base includes a sight system used to accurately position the target base with respect to the object. The sight system may include a hole through the target base, a mounting sleeve assembly housed within the hole, and a reticle mounted within the mounting sleeve assembly in sealed relation. The reticle may include a targeting guide, such as a circle and cross hairs, for precise positioning of the target base over the object.
In another embodiment, a locating system is associated with the mount surface of the target base to ensure accurate mating of the apparatus with the target base in a predetermined position. A simple but highly accurate locating system may consist of two circular cylindrical bosses that project from the mount surface and have different diameters. The base may also include threaded holes in the body opening at the mount surface and adapted to receive screws by which the apparatus is attached to the target body.
In a particular embodiment of the present invention, the contact surfaces of the contact members are located within the suction cavity, primarily to maximize the area of the suction cup. The contact members may include threaded attachment shanks that pass through the suction cup and are threaded into the body and have heads configured to make substantially point contact with the surface of the object. In general, three contact members equidistant from each other and from a center axis perpendicular to a plane created by the mount surface of the target base are used. The sealing lip of the suction cup may be concentric with the center axis. The described configuration of the contact members and sealing lip of the suction cup provides a distribution of forces due to the pressure differential across the suction cup such that the centroid is along the center axis and the reaction forces on the contact members are equal.
One technical advantage of the present invention is to provide a target base for an apparatus, such as a target, to be used in optical or laser measuring systems that will support the apparatus with high accuracy over a point on an object. Another technical advantage is to provide a target base that provides accurate positioning of the apparatus relative to the point to be measured on the surface of the object, regardless of the orientation of that surface to which the target base is attached relative to the horizontal—i.e., the accuracy of the positioning of the target base is not affected by gravitational forces acting on the target base and the apparatus that it supports. Other technical advantages include stable positioning of the apparatus without movement over long periods of time.
A further technical advantage of the present invention is to provide a suction cup that is substantially coextensive with the mount surface to allow a large retention force of the vacuum created within the suction cup. The retention force of the vacuum created within a suction cup of the present invention having a large area is generally greater than that of conventional suction cups having smaller areas. Furthermore, the larger area of the suction cup of the present invention allows the target base to be attached to the object with a lower vacuum than that required for conventional suction cups.
Other technical advantages of the present invention will be readily apparent to one skilled in the art form the following figures, description, and claims.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
For a more complete understanding of the present invention and its advantages thereof, reference is now made to the following description taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, wherein like reference numerals represent like parts, in which:
FIG. 1 is a top plan view of a target base in accordance with one embodiment of the present invention;
FIG. 2 is a side cross-sectional view taken along line 2 — 2 of FIG. 1 of a target base; and
FIG. 3 is a bottom plan view of the target base of FIG. 1 .
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
FIGS. 1 through 3 illustrate various aspects of one embodiment of a target base that may be used for attaching an optical or laser measuring apparatus onto the surface of an object. The target base may include a relatively large suction cup that forms with the object a vacuum chamber. A number of contact members located within the vacuum chamber contact the surface of the object to assure accurate and consistent off-set positioning of the target with respect to the surface of the object.
According to one embodiment of the present invention, illustrated in FIG. 2, a target base 10 includes a body 12 having a mount surface 14 that faces opposite an object 11 being measured, a perimeter wall 16 , and a base surface 18 opposite from the mount surface 14 . The mount surface 14 is configured to mate with an apparatus or target 13 . In a broad sense, the mount surface 14 has a reference plane 15 from the point of view of establishing a position of the target 13 with respect to the body 12 , including distance and orientation, and a center axis 17 that is perpendicular to the reference plane 15 . In a particular embodiment, the mount surface 14 is planar and coincides with the reference plane 15 . In practice, a planar mount surface 14 has the advantage of being easy to form with high accuracy and is preferred for that reason. It will be understood that mount surface 14 may be any surface suitable to mate with target 13 without departing from the scope of the present invention.
Although the body 12 may be fabricated in a single piece, the embodiment, as illustrated, includes an upper piece 20 and a lower piece 22 joined at a split line 24 by countersunk cap screws 25 that are equally spaced apart on a circle near the perimeter of the body 12 . The upper and lower pieces, 20 and 22 , may be annular, each having a circular cylindrical perimeter wall 16 of the same diameter with the upper and lower pieces, 20 and 22 , having a hole 26 , 28 , respectively concentric with the axis 17 .
A locating system 29 may be associated with the mount surface 14 of the body 12 to mate the apparatus or target 13 with the target base 10 such that the target 13 can be mated to the base 10 in only one position. The locating system 29 may include locating elements for positioning the target 13 with the target base 10 . In one embodiment, as shown in FIG. 1, the locating elements include two circular cylindrical bosses 30 and 32 of different diameters spaced apart from each other. It will be understood that the locating elements may be any suitable positioning device or system without departing from the scope of the present invention.
In addition to the locating system 29 , threaded holes 34 at the mount surface 14 of the body 12 receive screws 36 by which the target 13 may be attached to the body 12 after being correctly positioned.
In one embodiment of the present invention, as shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, a sight system 38 may be used to position the target base 10 over the point on the object 11 to be measured. The sight system 38 may include the hole 26 in the upper piece 20 of the body 12 , and the hole 28 in the lower piece 22 of the body 12 . A reticle 40 may be supported by and sealed within a mounting sleeve assembly 42 which is housed within the hole 28 . As shown in FIGS. 1 and 3, the reticle 40 may include a targeting guide 41 having cross hairs for precise positioning of the target base 10 over the point on the object 11 to be measured.
As illustrated in FIGS. 2 and 3, a suction cup 46 may be attached to the base surface 18 of the body 12 by screws 48 , the heads of which bear against a reinforcing disc 68 embedded in the relatively thicker body of the suction cup 46 and the shanks of which are threaded into holes in the lower piece 22 of the body 12 . The sealing lip 64 of the suction cup 46 may be concentric with the axis 17 and forms a suction cavity 62 on the base surface 18 side of the target base 10 . It will be understood that target base 10 may include a plurality of suction cups 46 without departing from the scope of the present invention.
When in place on the object 11 , the sealing lip 64 and cavity 62 form a vacuum chamber 66 . A vacuum pressure is communicated to the vacuum chamber 66 by a vacuum system 44 . The vacuum system 44 may include a first passage 52 extending from the vacuum chamber 66 to a second passage 50 that extends to a port opening 51 in the perimeter wall 16 of the body 12 . An O-ring 53 seals the passage 52 at the split line 24 between the parts 20 and 22 . As shown in FIG. 1, a vacuum pump 54 may be coupled in a sealed manner to the second passage 50 through the port opening 51 . The vacuum pump 54 may include a gage 56 for measuring the air pressure within the vacuum chamber 66 . The vacuum pump 54 may be a hand pump or an automatic pump, such an electric pump. It will be understood that the vacuum pump 54 may be any vacuum pump suitable to form a vacuum within the suction cup 46 without departing from the scope of the present invention.
As shown in FIGS. 2 and 3, one or more contact members 60 establish the off-set spacing and orientation of the reference plane 15 relative to the surface of the object 11 when the target base 10 is in place on the object 11 . In one embodiment, the target base 10 includes three contact members 60 . In this embodiment, the contact members 60 are equally spaced apart from each other and equidistant from the axis 17 . Each contact member 60 may have a rounded head that provides substantially point contact with the surface of the object 11 and may also have threaded shanks that thread into the lower piece 22 of the body 12 . The contact members 60 are installed such that the contact points lie in a plane that is substantially parallel to the reference plane 15 .
The target base 10 of the present invention is attached to the object 11 by a vacuum applied to the suction cup 46 by the vacuum pump 54 . The forming of a vacuum by the pump 54 progressively pulls the target base 10 toward the object 11 until the contact members 60 engage the surface of the object 11 . Any additional vacuum beyond that required to engage the contact members 60 only increases the vacuum force acting between the target base 10 and the object 11 to restrain the target base 10 but does not change the position of the mount surface 14 , as the contact members 60 serve as stops that establish the off-set distance from the mount surface 14 from the surface of the object 11 and the orientation of the mount surface 14 relative to the surface of the object 11 . There is no rebound of the base 10 due to the resiliency of the suction cup 46 . Forming a vacuum by the vacuum pump 54 also permits the retention force to be set to a selected value through the use of a pressure gage 56 that may be associated with the pump 54 . Subject to the possibility of slow leakage, which can be corrected by periodic checking of the gage 56 and additional pumping as required, the vacuum provides a holding force that is sustainable for indefinite periods. The present invention also makes it possible and advantageous to use a suction cup 46 having a relatively large area which, for any given level of vacuum formed in the chamber 66 , provides a correspondingly large retention force.
In use, the target base 10 is first positioned exactly over a target point marked on the object 11 being measured, using the reticle 40 to establish the position and circumferential orientation. The vacuum pump 54 is operated to draw a vacuum in the vacuum chamber 66 of the suction cup 46 . The force due to the pressure difference between the atmosphere and the vacuum pulls the body 12 toward the object 11 and engages the contact members 60 with the object 11 . After the contact members 60 contact the object 11 , the target base 10 can no longer move toward the object 11 , and the mount surface 14 is located at a predetermined off-set distance from and parallel to the plane defined by the contact points of the contact members 60 . With the aid of the gage 56 of the vacuum pump 54 , the user can draw a vacuum of the desired value to ensure retention of the target base 10 on the object 11 with a desired force. After the target base 10 is checked for position using the reticle 40 ,.the target 13 can be aligned on the mount surface 14 using the locating system 29 and fastened in place with the screws 36 .
Ordinarily, the vacuum should hold steady over long periods of time. Prudence suggests that the gage 56 should be checked periodically to ensure that the vacuum is being maintained.
Although one embodiment of the present invention has been described; various changes and modifications may be suggested to one skilled in the art. It is intended that the present invention encompass such changes and modifications as fall within the scope of the present appended claims.
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A target base ( 10 ) for attaching an apparatus ( 13 ) to an object ( 11 ) has a substantially rigid body ( 12 ) with a mount surface ( 14 ) adapted to couple the apparatus ( 13 ) to the body ( 12 ), and a base surface. A suction cup ( 46 ) affixed to the base surface ( 18 ) of the target base ( 10 ) has a suction cavity ( 62 ) defined by a deformable sealing lip ( 64 ) at the perimeter of the suction cup ( 46 ). The sealing lip ( 64 ) and suction cavity ( 62 ) form with the object ( 11 ) a vacuum chamber ( 66 ). A vacuum system ( 44 ) includes vacuum passages ( 50, 52 ) for communicating a vacuum pressure to the vacuum chamber ( 66 ). One or more contact members ( 60 ) are affixed to the body and have contact surfaces which engage the object ( 11 ) to provide consistent off-set positioning of the target base ( 10 ) with respect to the object ( 11 ).
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The new plant of the present invention comprises a new and distinct cultivar of chrysanthemum plant that is a cross of unknown Dendranthema grandiflora parents. The new and distinct cultivar was a seedling resulting from the open pollination among groups of chrysanthemum cultivars maintained under the control of the inventor for breeding purposes. The new and distinct cultivar was discovered and selected as one flowering plant by Rob Noodelijk on a cultivated field in Rijsenhout, Holland in August, 1996. The plant has been asexually reproduced by cuttings in greenhouses at Rijsenhout, Holland. The new cultivar has been found to retain its distinctive characteristics through successive propagations.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is a new and distinct variety of chrysanthemum of a medium sized bloom and yellow color.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The present invention of a new and distinct variety of chrysanthemum is shown in the accompanying drawings, the color being as nearly true as possible with color photographs of this type.
FIG. 1 shows a plant of the cultivar in various stages of bloom.
FIG. 2 shows the various stages of bloom of the new cultivar.
FIG. 3 shows foliage of the new cultivar.
DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
This new variety of chrysanthemum is of the botanical classification Dendranthema grandiflora. The observations and measurements were gathered from plants grown outdoors in Rijsenhout, Holland under natural day length and temperature and planted week 22 in 1997 and 1998. The natural blooming date for this crop was August 1-4 (week 31). The average height of the plants was 20 cms. This new variety produces medium sized blooms with yellow ray and disc florets blooming for a period of 5 weeks.
The following is a description of the plant and characteristics that distinguish Xanthus as a new and distinct variety. The color designations (color designations are from the R.H.S. Colour Chart) are taken from the plant itself. Accordingly, any discrepancies between the color designations and the colors depicted in the photographs are due to photographic tolerances.
______________________________________Botanical ClassificationCULTIVAR Xanthus______________________________________BudSize MEDIUM CROSS SECTION ± 1.3 CM HEIGHT ± 1.5 CMOutside Color YELLOW 3 CBloomSize MEDIUMFully Expanded 5-6 CMBorne (number of blooms UPPER AND LOWER PORTIONper branch) PLURAL BLOOMS PER BRANCH (APPROX. 6 BLOOMS)Length of lateral branch FROM TOP TILL BOTTOM APPROX. 11 CMLateral branch, Attachment MEDIUMBranching Mounding and prolific with 8-10 breaks after pinchingForm SINGLE(DAISY)Performance (on the plant) 5 WEEKSColorDisc florets At an early stage of inflorescence Yellow 3 AColor of the upper surface of the YELLOW 3 Amajority of the ray-floretsColor of the lower surface of the YELLOW 3 Amajority of the ray-floretsTonality from Distance A COMPACT GARDENMUM WITH YELLOW SINGLE FLO- WERSDiscoloration of the ray florets NONEDiscoloration of the disc florets To Yellow 13 APollen YELLOW-ORANGE 14 ARay floretsTexture UPPERSIDE SMOOTH UNDERSIDE SMOOTHNumber ±23-26Cross-section FLATLongitudinal axis of the majority STRAIGHTShape of tip DENTATEFragrance TYPICAL CHRYSANTHEMUMDisc Diameter SMALL, 1 1/2 CMReproductive OrgansStamen (present in disc florets) YELLOW, THIN, ±4 MM IN LENGTHPollen Present, abundantStyles (present in both ray and disc YELLOW, TRINflorets)Style Length ±4 MMStigmas YELLOWStigma Width ±1 MMOvaries ENCLOSED IN CALYXPlantForm A GARDENMUM (POT MUM) MEANT FOR OUTDOOR USEGrowth SHORTHeight (from soil level) ±20 CMStem Color NEAR GREEN 144 AStem Strength STRONGStem Brittleness PRESENTStem Anthocyanin Coloration NONENatural blooming date BEGINNING OF AUGUST (WEEK 31)FoliageColor UPPERSIDE GREEN 137 A UNDERSIDE GREEN 147 BSize SMALL: LENGTH ± 7 CM WIDTH ± 5 CMQuantity (number per lateral 14-16branch)Shape INCURVEDTexture FLESHYRibs and Veins RIBS AND VEINS NOT SO WELL DEVELOPEDEdge LOBEDShape of Base of Sinus Between ROUNDLateral LobesMargin of Sinus Between DIVERGINGLateral LobesShape of Base ASYMMETRICApex MUCRONATE______________________________________
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A chrysanthemum plant named Xanthus characterized by its medium sized blooms with yellow ray and disc florets and mounding prolific branching; early natural season flower date of August 1-4; blooming for a period of 5 weeks.
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CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] This application is a Continuation-in-Part of application Ser. No. 09/522,784 filed Mar. 10, 2000.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0002] Electrostatic coating processes rely on a charge differential between an article to be coated and what is used to coat that article. In such processes, the article is typically grounded whereas the coating to be applied is endowed with a charge. When the article and coating are then brought into contact with one another, the result is that the coating adheres to the article. It is estimated that more than 10,000 facilities for accomplishing this exist in the US alone.
[0003] Most such coating procedures and facilities employ a variety of steps, i.e., a cleaning step, a drying step, a coating step, and a heating step wherein the adhered coating is cured to afford a more desirable and permanent coat. These steps usually take place sequentially using batch operations commonly employed in the art, or else in specialized stations connected by a continuous conveyor line.
[0004] Conveyor lines can be of varying length depending on the facility. Articles to be coated are hung from these lines via spaced electroconductive racks or hangers that serve to ground articles attached thereto. Racks and hangers are popular that have the capacity to hang multiple articles. This is accomplished by multiple hooks, usually spot welded at set distances from one another on the same rack. Such rack and hook configurations vary widely in shape, size, and configuration to support different types and sizes of articles.
[0005] Once attached, the hangers or racks bearing grounded articles are conveyed through a coating station followed by a curing station. Once coating and curing are finished, the coated objects are removed and the process begins anew.
[0006] The hangers and racks of such systems, being expensive, are typically re-used. After passing through the painting station a number of times, that portion or portions of the hanger which contact the article gradually becomes fouled by coating. The net effect is interference with grounding capacity, with consequent poor transfer efficiency and an eventual possibility for spark or fire. This necessitates periodic replacing or cleaning, which is both time-consuming and expensive.
[0007] In the case of recycling, conventional cleaning methods include chemical stripping, molten bath stripping, burning, and mechanical stripping, i.e., sandblasting, hammering, and filing. These processes reduce the useful life and capacity of racks by compromising their structural integrity over time. For example, it is the Applicants' experience that hooks break off fairly regularly, thereby lessening the capacity and desirability of continuing with that rack.
[0008] The art has thus far failed to provide a cost-effective alternative.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0009] The invention provides a surprisingly efficient solution to the long-felt need described above.
[0010] It is an object of the invention to provide an electrically conductive intermediate at an interface or contact point between the hanger and article to be coated. This intermediate may be conveniently replaced or recycled at a comparatively small cost relative to existing procedures and implements.
[0011] In a first aspect, the invention features a system for extending the operating life of hangers or racks associated with electrostatic coating. This is accomplished by use of a relatively cheap, electrically conductive, and preferably pliable, intermediate that is suitable for grounding an article to be coated. The intermediate is interposed at a contact junction of the article and electroconductive hanger.
[0012] In exemplary embodiments, the intermediate slideably engages, wraps, or clamps to the hanger and may even adapt in shape or be engineered to accommodate the particular shape of a hook. In most preferred embodiments the article, via an orifice or recess, envelops at least a portion of the hook and intermediate attached thereto.
[0013] Various embodiments contemplate different conductive materials and configurations, including shape, of the intermediate. By way of materials, rubber, plastic, tape, and metalic foils all exist that are conductive and suitable, depending on the precise application. The intermediate may be a silicone sleeve or cap having a hollow interior for receiving a hook portion of a hanger. The article to be coated then fits over or engages this enveloped portion of the hook, usually via an orifice of sufficient dimension.
[0014] Concentric “layers” of pliable sleeves are also envisioned for some coating applications wherein one sleeve is positioned over another for rapid exposure of fresh contact surfaces as appropriate. A spent layer is simply peeled away or cut off thereby exposing a fresh one. One such embodiment contemplates a tape. Other embodiments contemplate a plurality of hollow tubes, one over the top of the next. These may be slit lengthwise and deposited one over the top of the next, or else constructed in multiplied layers which are then curled and fixed in form to wrap or clamp to a hanger of interest. Of course, the diameter differential associated with this technique must accordingly be accommodated by the article.
[0015] In other embodiments, at least a portion of the hanger itself comprises a nonmetallic material such as a conductive silicone rubber or plastic. This new material can be conductively and integrally fixed during manufacture, e.g., by injection molding. Preferably, the material is pliable or bendable with the hands or other gentle means to quickly release or free unwanted deposits of coating that hinder contact and hence grounding ability. In such embodiments, the sleeve or intermediate is recyclable.
[0016] In still other embodiments, the sleeve intermediate is disposable. Of course, everything including hangers are disposable at a cost, but what distinguishes the present invention is the relatively low cost of the intermediate relative to the cost of replacing or recycling a hanger or rack. In embodiments where the intermediate is integrally a part of the hanger, the novelty resides in the hanger being easily cleaned relative to conventional hangers, e.g., metal ones, and more durable or receptive to cleanings.
[0017] In exemplary embodiments, the intermediate bridges a hanger and an article to be coated. This bridge may occur in a variety of configurations as one of skill will appreciate. It may occur as described above, or else it may occur by a more comprehensive envelopment, not only of the hanger but also of the entire juncture, including a portion of the article itself. U.S. Pat. No. 5,897,709 issued to Torefors describes one such example. However, instead of a conductive bridge, Torefors specifies a non-conductive (“dielectric”) cover. The present invention, by contrast, serves a dual function in further providing a conductive bridge to facilitate grounding and suitable coating, while simultaneously preserving the operative part of the hanger or hook for future use.
[0018] In another exemplary embodiment of the invention, an intermediate member is designed for fitting over a horizontal cross-bar type of workpiece hanger which suspends large size panels or the like for electrostatic coating, and comprises a longitudinal, hollow sleeve of pliable, electrically conductive material having a longitudinal slit extending along its length so that the sleeve can be engaged transversely over a cross bar extending between two vertical hangers via the slit. An article to be coated, such as a large flat panel, can then be suspended from the cross bar via conductive hooks which engage over the sleeve.
[0019] The elongate sleeve may be of any suitable cross-sectional shape, such as circular, square, rectangular, or octagonal. The slit may form a longitudinal gap or slot in the sleeve, or may be a simple linear cut along the length of the sleeve. Alternatively, the sleeve may have opposite longitudinal edges which are overlapped along the length of the sleeve, so that there is no opening in the sleeve after it has been engaged over the cross bar. In another alternative, the sleeve may have no slit, for engagement over hook like hanger.
[0020] In an alternative embodiment, the intermediate may be a sheet or strip of pliable, electrically conductive material which is secured on top of a hanger by an electrically conductive adhesive, such that an article to be coated engages the strip or layer. The pliable strip may have any suitable cross-sectional and peripheral shape, such as square, rectangular, circular, triangular, and the like, and may be solid or may have a through bore. The adhesive may cover all or only part of an inner face of the strip.
[0021] The intermediate may suitably be made of a conductive material, preferably rubber, plastic, tape, foil, or grease that can be conveniently removed, disposed of, replaced, or recycled. The intermediate may have resistance of less than 6 megaohms, or one or less megaohms, or 0.5 megaohms, and in one example has a resistance of about 0.1 megaohms or less.
[0022] In exemplary embodiments, such intermediates are also heat resistant to temperatures up to 600° F., and may be heat resistant in ranges of between about 250° F. and 450° F.
[0023] At present, the favorite known material for the intermediate is conductive silicone, which may be fashioned by mixing different conductive and nonconductive commercially available grades in certain proportions testable by one of skill in the art, using routine experimentation to arrive at a final suitable product. Alternatively, fully conductive commercially available conductive silicone alone can be used that, while more expensive, still represents an improvement in the art.
[0024] The material used, e.g., silicone, may be molded to fit the myriad different sizes and shapes of hooks available, or else a universal piece may be used that fits a variety of hook shapes and sizes by conforming pliably in shape. Preferably, these sleeves or caps pull on and off conveniently with minor effort, but are not too loose as to permit undue amounts of coating to seep inside. Looseness is not known to otherwise disadvantage the system, provided there is some contact through which a ground may be established.
[0025] A second aspect of the invention features methods for electrostatic coating that make use of the above embodiments, either singularly or, where appropriate, combined. One method of providing an electrostatic pliable coating layer on one or more hanger members comprises dipping at least part of at least one hanger member in a bath of liquid electroconductive material, such as conductive silicone, so that the dipped surface is coated with a layer of electroconductive material, and then lifting the hanger member out of the bath and allowing the coating layer to cure in order to form a pliable, electroconductive coating layer. Some or all of the hanger member may be dipped, and entire hanger racks for use in electrostatically coating many parts at once may be dipped and coated with the pliable electroconductive intermediate.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0026] The present invention will be better understood from the following detailed description of some exemplary embodiments of the invention, taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in which like reference numerals refer to like parts, and in which:
[0027] [0027]FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a rack with conductive sleeves according to a first embodiment of the invention;
[0028] [0028]FIG. 2 is an enlarged sectional view taken on line 2 - 2 of FIG. 1;
[0029] [0029]FIG. 3 is a perspective view of a sleeve with rectangular configuration, according to another embodiment of the invention;
[0030] [0030]FIG. 4 is a perspective view of an alternative, cylindrical sleeve;
[0031] [0031]FIG. 5 is a perspective view of a sleeve with a flange for ease of fastening and removal from a hook;
[0032] [0032]FIG. 6 is a side view of the flanged sleeve mounted on a hook;
[0033] [0033]FIG. 7 is a perspective view of a different type of hanger rack and an attached conductive sleeve according to another embodiment of the invention;
[0034] [0034]FIG. 8 is a cross-section on the lines 8 - 8 of FIG. 7;
[0035] [0035]FIG. 9 is a section similar to FIG. 8 illustrating a modified sleeve for use with the rack of FIG. 7;
[0036] [0036]FIG. 10 illustrates another modified sleeve;
[0037] [0037]FIG. 11 is a section similar to FIGS. 8 to 10 illustrating another modified sleeve;
[0038] [0038]FIG. 12 is a view similar to FIGS. 8 to 10 illustrating a modified sleeve shape;
[0039] [0039]FIG. 13 illustrates a sleeve according to another embodiment; and
[0040] [0040]FIG. 14 is a cross-sectional view similar to FIGS. 8 to 13 illustrating yet another modified sleeve.
[0041] [0041]FIG. 15 is a cross-section similar to FIG. 2 illustrating a hanger with an intermediate strip or layer according to another embodiment of the invention;
[0042] [0042]FIG. 16 is a cross-section on the lines 16 - 16 of FIG. 15;
[0043] [0043]FIG. 17 is a cross-section similar to FIG. 16 illustrating an alternative shape for the strip;
[0044] [0044]FIG. 18 is a cross-section similar to FIGS. 16 and 17 illustrating another alternative shape;
[0045] [0045]FIG. 19 is a cross-section similar to FIGS. 16 to 18 illustrating an intermediate strip engaged over a cross bar of the hanger rack of FIG. 7;
[0046] [0046]FIG. 20 is a perspective view of the inner face of an alternative version of an intermediate strip for adhering over a hanger member;
[0047] [0047]FIG. 21 is a cross-section illustrating the stip of FIG. 20 adhered to a hanger with an article suspended over the strip;
[0048] [0048]FIG. 22 is a rear plan view of a intermediate strip illustrating an alternative shape for the strip;
[0049] [0049]FIG. 23 is a rear plan view of a strip similar to that of FIG. 22 but with a different adhesive arrangement;
[0050] [0050]FIG. 24 is a plan view similar to FIGS. 22 and 23 illustrating an alternative shape;
[0051] [0051]FIG. 25 is a plan view similar to FIGS. 22 to 24 illustrating another alternative shape for the strip;
[0052] [0052]FIG. 26 is a perspective rear view of an alternative arcuate strip;
[0053] [0053]FIG. 27 is a schematic side elevational view illustrating a method for coating part or all of a hanger member with a pliable electroconductive cover layer;
[0054] [0054]FIG. 27A illustrates the hanger end of a hanger member coated according to the method of FIG. 27;
[0055] [0055]FIG. 27B illustrates a hanger member fully coated according to the method of FIG. 27;
[0056] [0056]FIG. 28 illustrates an entire hanger rack coated with a pliable electroconductive coating layer according to the method of FIG. 27;
[0057] [0057]FIG. 29 illustrates another type of hanger member partially coated with an electroconductive cover layer according to the method of FIG. 27;
[0058] [0058]FIG. 30 is a cross-section on the lines 30 - 30 of FIG. 29;
[0059] [0059]FIG. 31 is a perspective view of an end cap of pliable electroconductive material according to another embodiment of the invention;
[0060] [0060]FIG. 32 illustrates the end cap of FIG. 31 in use during an electrostatic coating process for an automobile hood or the like;
[0061] [0061]FIG. 33 illustrates a modified, open-ended cap; and
[0062] [0062]FIG. 34 is a perspective view illustrating a pliable electroconductive intermediate according to another embodiment of the invention.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
[0063] The invention makes use of novel intermediate components for use in electrostatic coating processes. The intermediate is conductive and relatively inexpensive in cost and practice, allowing for ready cleaning and/or replacement with a concomitant more efficient operation afforded to the overall system. The object is the preservation of proper grounding and the protection and preservation of more expensive implements used in the process, e.g., hangers, hooks, and racks.
[0064] As used herein, and in the claims, the following terms have the following meanings:
[0065] A “system” includes, but is not limited to, traditional apparatuses used in electrostatic coating processes.
[0066] The term “electrostatic coating” embraces any powder, paint, or electroplating procedure wherein a charge differential is established to facilitate coating of an object to be coated. This includes but is not limited to the use of thermoplastics and teflon-type additions. Those of skill in the art know the broad latitude of the term, which can apply to different charging techniques and systems.
[0067] By “intermediate” refers to an object which interfaces in some fashion with both an article to be coated and an electrically conductive hanger. The shape is not to be construed as limited by the drawings or discussion herein, so long as one or more objects of the invention are otherwise met. The intermediate is typically hollow or capable of being made so, e.g., in the case of foil by wrapping it around a hook to be used in an electrostatic coating process of the invention. In tubular embodiments, this can be a uniform, hollow piece of varying internal and external dimensions, additionally including in some embodiments one or more flanges or grips that allow easy placement and replacement, in addition to providing leverage or mechanical manipulation and recycling. The intermediate can be a sleeve or cap, with the difference being that a sleeve has opposing free ends while a cap does not.
[0068] The terms “suitable for grounding”, “grounding” and “conductive” are to be understood jointly. “Conductive” means capable of passing a charge, e.g., a stream of electrons, and can mean any substance having suitable resistance and capable of fulfilling one or more objectives of the invention. Preferably, the material should have between about 0 and 6 megaohms of resistance, more preferably less than 1 megaohm of resistance, still more preferably less than 0.5 megaohm of resistance, and most preferably having about 0.1 megaohm or lower resistance. The more preferred parameters respect, although are not limited by, National Fire Protection Agency (NFPA) standards and rationale: “To minimize the possibility of ignition by static electric sparks, powder transportation, application, recovery equipment, work pieces and all other conductive objects shall be grounded with a resistance . . . not exceeding one megaohm.” NFPA Bulletin No. 33, Ch. 13, paragraph 13-4c.
[0069] “Ground” or “grounding” is a phenomenon that describes an equilibration of charge approximating that of the earth's surface. It is a reference standard by which more or less charge is gauged. For purposes of the invention, however, ground can also embrace situations where the hanger possesses a charge opposite to that of the coating material such that electrostatic bonding is achieved and promotes good transferability and coating.
[0070] The term “hanger” is not meant to be geometrically or materially limiting and may embrace a variety of structures and compositions known in the art, including but not limited to conventional metal hangers, racks, hooks, combinations of racks and hooks, and any other instrument useful in securing or supporting an article to be electrostatically coated. Of course, the piece must also be electroconductive and otherwise suitable for electrostatic coating processes. Magnetic systems and applications are also envisioned.
[0071] The terms “slideably engages”, “wraps”, and “clamps” are each broad terms descriptive of many potential, not necessarily mutually exclusive embodiments. Besides what are shown in the instant drawings, another non-limiting example of a clamp, for instance, includes that disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,897,709, herein incorporated by reference. Although the clamp described there is nonconductive, the geometry and other functions can be recruited for purposes of the instant invention.
[0072] The terms “silicone”, “plastic”, “tape”, and “foil” similarly have many acceptable permutations that are envisioned to be suitable for the invention, and which are either known in the art, or can be readily determined and implemented without undue experimentation by one of ordinary skill. These are discussed in greater detail below.
[0073] The term “integral with said hanger during manufacture” denotes either the conjoining of multiple individual components during manufacture of the hanger itself, or else embodiments where the hanger itself is made entirely of a homogeneous material, e.g., conductive silicone, which presents durability and cleaning advantages over previous compositions, systems, and methods.
[0074] The terms “disposable” and “recyclable” are meant to demonstrate alternative, not necessarily mutually exclusive, embodiments. Thus, at the discretion of the end-user a disposed of intermediate may also be suitably recycled. In other embodiments, there can be mutual exclusivity, e.g., where the sleeve, cap, etc., is engineered to fulfill its grounding and protective function only once, and then degrades, e.g., during the heating/curing step.
Other Features of the Intermediates
[0075] The conductive intermediates of the invention preferably withstand a temperature in the range of temperatures 200° F. to 600° F., most preferably 450° F., and over course of time about ten (10) or more minutes. Conforming intermediates are preferably pliable adapt in shape to envelop at least that portion of the hanger or rack to which the article to be coated is fastened or hangs. The point of this contact may represent substantially the whole of the exterior surface area of the intermediate, or else may represent any subfraction or portion thereof.
[0076] The intermediate may assume the shape of a prophylactic cap or sleeve, e.g., tubular or hollow, that has one or more exposed hanger or rack portions flanking its point of engagement with the hanger. Also, the shape of the intermediate may appear much different in appearance when affixed to the hanger relative to when not affixed. This owes to the intermediate's pliability and/or ready ability to conform in shape to the shape of the hook or subportion thereof to which the intermediate attaches. However, as noted, in certain embodiments the fit can be engineered to be more or less precise, so that pliability is not as great a consideration.
[0077] A further aspect is that the intermediate may be readily engaged and detached with minimal effort, e.g., peeled, unwrapped, scraped, or slideably disengaged as needed, and conveniently replaced or recycled so as to economically promote proper grounding and coating efficiency. This is, at least in part, because the cost of the intermediate is typically a fraction of the cost of the other system hardware, e.g., the racks, hooks, and hangers.
[0078] The ease with which recycling (where appropriate) is accomplished depends on the physical characteristics of the intermediate. In most preferred embodiments, the intermediate is a conductive silicone having suitable thermal stability. The intermediate is ideally elastomeric or pliable, easily engageable with the hanger, e.g., by sliding over, wrapping, or impaling a surface thereof, and readily disengageable as well.
[0079] A further embodiment, as mentioned, is the layered intermediates, wherein a plurality of intermediates overlaying one another are positioned on the rack and peeled off as needed to expose fresh contact area for new objects to be coated or recoated. This layered effect may result either from tape or from layers deposited one atop another. In tubular formats, multiple tubes may be stretched substantially over one another while the bottom most tube directly contacts the hanger/hook/rack and the subsequent added layers indirectly contact it via electrical conductance across the layers. Assumed is that the means for attachment of the article to the intermediate can accommodate a range of thicknesses supplied by the additional layers, and that sufficient contact and hence conductance between the layers can be maintained.
[0080] Characteristic of preferred recycling embodiments is that by using minimal or mild perturbation the intermediate can be easily regenerated, i.e., freed of unwanted coating deposits. This is especially so for silicone sleeve embodiments, but not advised for metalic foil embodiments. In the latter case, disposal, or recycling by burning or chemical stripping is preferred. Recycling and nonrecyling embodiments, as stated, are not necessarily mutually exclusive and may be at the discretion of the operator using the system. Such intermediate may therefore be suitable for either process.
[0081] It is also anticipated that the inherent benefits of the invention will find additional merit in automation. This will be more or less practicable depending on the specific embodiment used. At present, conductive silicone sleeves or caps are envisioned to best perform the task. They are easily mounted via sliding, clamping, or adhering, and similarly disengageable.
[0082] In summary, prior to the invention racks and hangers in the art required frequent replacement or cleaning which entailed considerable cost and labor. Down-time associated with these processes was unacceptable and/or, in the case of recycling, exacted a heavy toll on one or more of the following factors: structure and usable life of the racks and hangers, labor allocation, environmental impact, and energy consumption. With the teachings of the invention, these concerns are overcome, simplifying the overall coating and manufacturing process. The net result is increased efficiency and profit, which may in turn be passed on to the consumer.
EXAMPLE 1
Determining Suitable Ground and Resistance
[0083] A common device used to measure continuity to ground, and which may be used to further optimize parameters and configurations suitable for the invention, is an ohm meter having a megaohm scale. This can be a volt/ohm meter (VOM) or a Megger. A VOM is adequate for checking electrical circuits, but its low voltage power source makes it less suited for checking the proper grounding of a coating system. The best device is the Megger which has a power source of 500 volts or higher. This higher voltage provides the current required to accurately measure the resistance to ground.
[0084] An exemplary technique for measuring resistance is to start at the end of the process and work backward. The meter is connected between a known building ground and the uncoated part to be tested using a long test lead. This procedure is used to determine that the part is correctly ground through the entire spray booth. The amount of resistance to ground can be read on the meter, as one of skill aware.
[0085] Because the meter is attached to a known ground and to a clean part on the conveyor in the booth, all the devices in between (hanger, conveyor, swivels, etc.) are in the circuit and the resistance to proper ground can be measured. If the reading is less than one megaohm, the grounding is ideal.
[0086] If the resistance reading is greater than one megaohm, one can verify by hooking the lead to the contact point on the hanger and read it again. Then, by repeating the procedure and working back through the system (swivel or conveyor hook, conveyor) until the resistance reads in the proper range. By this method it can be determined which device needs corrective action.
[0087] A similar technique can be used to check for proper grounding of other objects and equipment in the coating area and system.
EXAMPLE 2
Silicone Sleeve or Cap
[0088] A prototype intermediate was designed and built as follows: Three quarter parts conductive silicone rubber compound (Shin-Etsu Chemical Co., Japan; part KE3611U) combined with one quarter part nonconductive silicone paste (Shin-Etsu; part KE961U) was mixed, compression molded, and cured in the form of tubing having a wall thickness of about 0.1 cm and an overall tubing diameter of about 1 cm. With reference to FIG. 2 or 6 , the resulting tubing was then cut to approximately 5 cm in length and the resulting sleeve intermediate 1 slideably coaxed over and along the shaft of a metal conductive hook 2 via a free end 3 of said sleeve intermediate 1 . This was done until the sleeve 1 substantially covered the hook 2 , or at least that portion fated to engage and contact a workpiece or article to be coated.
[0089] The overall concept, e.g., for a multi-hooked rack, is illustrated in FIG. 1, which depicts one configuration of sleeve mounted onto a plurality of hooks of a single rack. Each work-piece hook in FIG. 1 is analogized to the individual configurations demonstrated in FIGS. 2 and 6. With reference to FIG. 1, the article or articles to be coated 4 engage the hooks 1 by virtue of one or more orifices or recesses 6 in said article(s) 4 having suitable dimensions for receiving the intermediate sleeve/hook combination 7 . At the vertically highest point in the figure is another hook 8 to which the overall rack of the Figure is typically grounded. The hanger diameter for this prototype measured approximately 0.6 cm, although the particular dimensions are not limiting and merely illustrative of one workable embodiment. For this particular prototype, the depth of curve of said portion of the hanger measured 6 cm, and the vertical length of the hanger, not including curve, measured about 55 cm. Analogy may be had with reference to FIG. 1 for other rack and hook configurations.
[0090] Coating and curing then proceed as standard in the art. Upon coating, the coated article is removed, an uncoated article added, and the process repeated. Between coatings, typically every 3-5 rounds, the sleeve/finting is examined for paint build-up and manipulated gently to peel away or relieve unwanted coating build-up on the intermediate, thereby re-establishing a suitable ground for the electrostatic process. If desired, the recycling can take place in situ, or else can first entail removal of the rack or hanger from the conveyor. The latter is preferred so that new racks can be added as the intermediates on the old racks are serviced, thereby promoting a more continuous operation. “Used” sleeves may be replaced with unused ones, followed by a resumption of coating operations, or else the individual sleeves can be removed, gently manipulated to recycle them, and replaced.
[0091] For purposes of the prototype, the Applicants formulated the 75:25 mix to decrease costs. Higher ratios of conductive silicone, e.g., 76-100% will also work and still be more economical than previously described art methods, and the Applicants further believe that lower ratios can also be determined without undue experimentation, and using routine procedures.
[0092] As one of skill in the art is aware, however, conductive silicones exist that vary in constituents. This may have a bearing on the relative success of the precise functional ratios used. Moreover, as one of skill is also aware, there can be lot-to-lot variations in silicone performance. However, as stated, one of skill may easily determine suitability using minimal, routine experimentation. Indications of some of the variations that exist and methods for preparation of the same may be found, e.g., in U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,010,646, 6,013,201, 5,217,651, 5,164,443, 5,135,980, 5,082,596, 4,957,839, 4,89,8,689, 4,672,016, 4,571,371, 4,552,688, pertinent disclosures of which are herein incorporated by reference.
[0093] Besides Shin-Etsu, other current commercial vendors of conductive and nonconductive silicones include Dow Corning (Indianapolis, Ind.) and Toshiba (JP). No doubt other vendors also exist and improvements in silicone structures and characteristics are anticipated.
EXAMPLE 3
Flanged Prototype
[0094] Electrostatic coating is performed as per Example 2, except that instead of a uniformly dimensioned sleeve or cap, the sleeve or cap possesses a flange or rib for gripping or otherwise facilitating the process. This is demonstrated by the prototype exhibited in FIG. 5. The dimensions shown (mm) are designed to fit over a wire hook 2.35 mm in diameter. The internal diameter of the tubing is 2.75 mm, the length is 75.00 mm, the diameter of the flange is 13.00 mm, the flange thickness 1.6 mm, and the tube wall thickness 0.8 mm. This particular embodiment demonstrates a cap format wherein a flange exists on an end opposing the capped (closed) end. When positioned onto the wire hook, this flanged cap or sleeve resembles the format shown in FIG. 6.
EXAMPLE 4
Foil Intermediates
[0095] Electrostatic coating is performed as per Example 2, except that instead of using the silicone sleeve fitting, conductive metalic foil, e.g., tin or aluminum, is substituted and wrapped around the bare or otherwise conductive hook to provide an equivalent effect.
EXAMPLE 5
Hybrid Hanger Comprising Conductive Silicone
[0096] In this embodiment, hangers are produced via compression molding that are comprised, at least in part, of conductive rubber, e.g., silicone, as described above. The silicone portion, if a minority, is preferably localized to that portion of the hanger as described for Examples 2 and 3. Thus, sleeve fittings as described above are either eliminated or else rendered redundant to the process, with the latter embodiment also anticipated to have independent advantage.
[0097] [0097]FIGS. 7 and 8 illustrate an intermediate sleeve 40 of electrically conductive, pliable material according to another embodiment of the invention. The sleeve 40 is an elongate, cylindrical, tubular member which is open at both ends and which has a longitudinal slit 42 extending between its opposite ends. It is designed for fitting over a different type of rack 44 for suspending workpieces such as large, flat panels 45 to be electrostatically coated, as illustrated in FIG. 7. The rack 44 has a pair of vertical posts 46 having grounding hooks 48 for attachment to a conveyor or grounding system, and a cross bar 50 extending between the posts and from which the workpiece 45 is suspended via conductive hooks 52 . The elongate conductive sleeve 40 can be fitted over the cross bar 50 via the slit 42 , as indicated in FIGS. 6 and 7. In this example, the slit 42 is defined between opposite longitudinal side edges 54 which are spaced apart to form a gap.
[0098] [0098]FIG. 9 illustrates a modified cylindrical sleeve 56 in which a simple longitudinal slit 58 is cut, with no gap between opposing side edges of the cut. FIG. 10 illustrates another alternative sleeve configuration 60 in which opposite longitudinal side edges 62 of the sleeve are overlapped. Due to the pliable nature of the sleeve material, opposite side edges of the sleeve can be urged apart in both of the embodiments of FIGS. 9 and 10 while the sleeve is inserted transversely over cross bar 50 , and then released to close the slit as in FIGS. 9 and 10, for added security. FIG. 11 illustrates a modified cylindrical sleeve 64 similar to that of FIG. 8 but with a thicker wall.
[0099] FIGS. 12 to 14 illustrate some alternative cross-sectional shapes for the elongate tubular sleeve 40 of FIG. 7. In FIG. 12, the elongate tubular sleeve 66 for fitting over a cross bar 50 is of square, rather than circular, cross-section, and has a longitudinal slit 68 extending along one side of the sleeve. In the embodiment of FIG. 13, the sleeve 70 is of triangular cross-section and has a slit 72 at one apex of the triangle. Finally, in FIG. 14, the sleeve 74 is of octagonal cross-section and has a slit 75 . In each of these cases, the slit may define a gap as in FIG. 8, or no gap as in FIG. 9, or have overlapping side edges as in FIG. 10. Many other alternative cross-sectional shapes may be used if desired.
[0100] Each of the sleeves of FIGS. 8 and 11 to 13 may be provided without any longitudinal slit, for use on racks with hangers having free ends over which the sleeve can be engaged. The sleeve may be closed at one end, as in the embodiments of FIGS. 2 to 6 , or may be open ended.
[0101] [0101]FIGS. 15 and 16 illustrate another alternative embodiment, in which the intermediate comprises a strip or piece 80 of calendared, pliable conductive silicone adhered to an upper surface of a hanger 5 or cross bar 50 of a rack by a backing layer 82 of conductive adhesive. The strip 80 may be secured over only that region of the hanger or support bar which is engaged by the part, or by a hanger or hook 15 or 52 for the part.
[0102] Strip 80 may be of rectangular cross-section, as indicated in FIG. 16. However, any cross-sectional shape may be used, such as a strip 84 of circular cross-section, as in FIG. 17, or a strip 85 of triangular cross-section, as in FIG. 18, or any other shape. FIG. 19 illustrates a pliable strip 86 adhered over the upper face of the cylindrical cross bar 50 of the rack in FIG. 7, in place of sleeve 40 .
[0103] [0103]FIGS. 20 and 21 illustrate a rectangular or square shape strip 90 of pliable electroconductive material such as conductive silicone in which, instead of a backing layer of conductive adhesive extending over the entire inner face of the strip, stripes 92 of adhesive material are provided along the opposite side edges 93 of the strip, each stripe 92 being covered with a peel-off cover layer 94 of paper or the like to protect the adhesive stripe until the strip is to be applied to a hanger member. The strip 90 may be provided in a continuous length for cutting to a desired size by an end user. As illustrated in FIG. 21, after removing the cover layers 94 , the strip 90 may be adhered to a hanger member 5 using the side stripes 92 of adhesive. An article to be coated can then be suspended from the hanger member, with a portion 95 of the article engaging over the center of the strip 90 so as to press the central portion directly against the hanger member, as indicated in FIG. 21. Thus, the conductive silicone strip 90 forms a direct junction between the article 95 and the electroconductive hanger member, with no intervening adhesive. In this case, the adhesive need not be electroconductive.
[0104] The adhesive-backed pliable electroconductive member may have one or more adhesive coating layers covering all or part of its inner surface, and may be of any desired peripheral shape. Some alternative shapes are illustrated in FIGS. 23 to 26 . In FIGS. 23 and 24, an electroconductive member 96 of circular shape is provided. The member 96 has a central stripe 97 of adhesive in FIG. 23, and a peripheral layer 98 of adhesive extends around an annular portion of the periphery of member 96 in FIG. 24. Alternatively, the inner face may be completely coated with an adhesive layer.
[0105] [0105]FIG. 24 illustrates an electroconductive member 100 of alternative, trapezoidal shape with side stripes 102 of adhesive material. In FIG. 25, the electroconductive pliable member is a flat, generally diamond shaped panel 104 coated with an inner layer 105 of adhesive. In each case, the panel or electroconductive member may have an adhesive layer completely or partially coating its inner surface, with the adhesive provided in any desired region or regions. FIG. 26 illustrates an alternative electroconductive strip member 106 which is of rectangular shape but generally arcuate cross-section, for conforming to the outer surface shape of a round bar or rod like hanger. Member 106 is provided with strips 108 of adhesive along its opposite side edges, in a similar manner to the embodiment of FIG. 20, although the adhesive may completely coat the inner surface of member 106 in alternative examples.
[0106] In each of the embodiments of FIGS. 15 to 26 , the adhesive material may be any suitable electroconductive adhesive, such as a silicone base adhesive available from Kirkhill Rubber of Los Angeles, Calif., or a high temperature acrylic adhesive. The alternatives which have only side strips of adhesive may not require the adhesive to be conductive, which will increase the choice of possible high temperature adhesives for use in these embodiments.
[0107] [0107]FIG. 27 illustrates an alternative method of providing an electroconductive pliable intermediate at a junction between an electrically conductive, rigid hanger and an article to be coated. In this method, instead of engaging a pre-formed sleeve, tube or adhesive backed strip on the hanger, part or all of a hanger member 110 is dipped into a bath 112 containing a liquid form 114 of the electroconductive, pliable material. The surface of the hanger member which is submerged in the liquid will be coated with the material, and the hanger member is then removed from the bath into a drying station at a suitable temperature for curing the coating layer of electroconductive pliable material. Where the material is electroconductive silicone, the curing temperature will be at or around room temperature. FIG. 27A illustrates one alternative where the hanger member has been partially dipped in bath 112 , to form a coating layer 116 of pliable electroconductive material on the hanger end of the member only. FIG. 27B illustrates a second alternative where the entire hanger member 110 is submerged in the bath to form a coating layer 118 extending over its entire length.
[0108] Instead of dipping an individual hanger 110 in bath 112 and subsequently hanging the hanger from a coating rack, an entire rack 120 as illustrated in FIG. 28 may be dipped in the bath 112 so that it is completely covered with a layer of the conductive silicone material 114 . Rack 120 comprises a framework of side rails 122 and cross rails 124 , with a plurality of spaced hangers 125 secured on each cross rail. After the rack is dipped and coated, and the coating layer is allowed to cure, an intermediate, pliable coating will cover the entire surface of the rack, forming a conductive bridge between any article hung from the rack and the rigid conductive material of the rack. Because the coating layer is soft and pliable, it can be pinched and kneaded in order to remove any powder build up as a result of the electrostatic coating process. It will be understood that the same procedure may be used for coating racks and hangers of any shape or size.
[0109] [0109]FIGS. 29 and 30 illustrate an alternative, loop-type hanger 126 which has been coated with an outer layer 128 of a pliable electroconductive material such as conductive silicone. As illustrated in FIG. 29, a series of spaced, loop hangers 126 are welded or otherwise secured to a conductive cross bar 130 of a rack or the like. The hangers 126 may be dipped in a bath 112 of liquid electroconductive material in the manner illustrated in FIG. 27, so that each loop 126 becomes coated with a layer of the material, which is subsequently allowed to cure at room temperature to form an electroconductive, pliable coating layer 128 or intermediate.
[0110] [0110]FIGS. 31 and 32 illustrate an electroconductive, pliable cap or sleeve 130 according to another embodiment of the invention. Cap 130 is similar to the embodiment of FIGS. 5 and 6, except that it is of shorter length and of round, rather than rectangular, cross-section. It basically comprises a short tubular portion with one closed end 132 and an annular flange 134 at the opposite end for ease of handling and placement. The cap is formed of an electroconductive pliable material such as conductive silicone. Cap 130 may be placed over the end of a metal conductive hook 135 , as indicated in FIG. 32, with a series of such hooks with caps being used to support a large item 136 to be coated, such as a car hood or body. It has been found that, without such a protective cover, the paintwork of the hood or body may be scratched when it is lifted off the hooks, by the metal ends of the hooks. With this arrangement, the pliable caps 130 will protect the paint from such scratches. FIG. 33 illustrates a modified cap 138 which has a through bore open at both ends and an annular flange 139 at one end. The caps 130 and 138 may be made in various different lengths and diameters, depending upon the application.
[0111] Finally, FIG. 34 illustrates an alternative electroconductive sleeve or tubular member 140 according to another embodiment of the invention. Unlike the sleeves of FIGS. 2 to 6 , sleeve 140 is not of uniform thickness along its length. Instead, the sleeve 140 has a through bore 142 of uniform diameter, but has a stepped outer diameter, with a first end portion 144 of a first diameter and a second end portion 145 of a second, larger diameter, with an annular flange 146 at the end of the larger diameter portion 145 . The sleeve may be closed at its smaller diameter end. The sleeve is of a suitable electroconductive pliable material, for example electroconductive silicone. This version may be used in cases where a stepped diameter hanger or support for electrostatic coating is required. Rather than making the metal hanger or rod of stepped diameter, the pliable cover sleeve is stepped, so that a simple, uniform diameter hanger rod may be used, which will be less expensive.
[0112] Although exemplary embodiments of the invention have been described above by way of example only, it will be understood by those skilled in the field that other embodiments are also possible and that significant modifications may be made to the disclosed embodiments without departing from the scope of the invention.
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The invention relates to an intermediate component for protecting hangers associated with electrostatic coating processes. The component is an electrically conductive, pliable, tubular member, and inexpensive relative to the hanger which it serves to protect. The component lessens the cost associated with traditional hanger cleaning and preserves hanger life and integrity. The tubular member may have a longitudinal slit for installing the member over a cross bar of a hanger.
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CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
This application is a divisional application of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/713,692, filed Nov. 15, 2000, which is incorporated herein in its entirety.
BACKGROUND OF INVENTION
This application relates to the continuous production of aromatic carbonates by reaction of dialkyl carbonates and an aromatic alcohol in the presence of a catalyst.
Aromatic carbonates, such as diphenyl carbonate, are an important reactant in the production of polycarbonate resins. Polycarbonate resins are being used in an ever increasing number of applications. Therefore, the efficient production of diary carbonates has become more significant. Early processes for the production of diaryl carbonates used phosgene as a reagent. However, the toxicity of phosgene prompted the development of a non-phosgene process. As shown in FIG. 1, this non-phosgene process has two-steps. First, a dialkyl carbonate, such as dimethyl carbonate (DMC), reacts with an aromatic alcohol, such as phenol, to produce an alkyl aryl carbonate (e.g., phenyl methyl carbonate, PMC) and an alkyl alcohol (e.g., methanol). Next, two molecules of the alkyl aryl carbonate undergo a transesterification reaction to produce one molecule of diaryl carbonate (e.g., diphenyl carbonate, DPC) and one molecule of dialkyl carbonate (e.g., DMC).
Various methods and apparatus for making diaryl carbonates without using phosgene are known in the art. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,210,268, which is incorporated herein by reference, relates to a process for continuously producing aromatic carbonates. The process is carried out in a distillation column, wherein products are recovered from the bottom of the column, and low boiling by-products are removed from the top of the column. Other processes for production of diaryl carbonates using a series of distillation columns are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,344,954 and 5,705,673.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,705,673; 5,344,954; 5,334,742; 4,182,726, and 5,380,908 describe processes for making diaryl carbonates using apparatus which comprises at least two distillation columns: the first to produce phenyl methyl carbonate, and the second to convert the phenyl methyl carbonate into diphenyl carbonate. No commercially viable apparatus has been disclosed which is capable of producing sufficient yields of diphenyl carbonate in the first column to eliminate the necessity of a second column. A single column design would make the production process more economical. Accordingly, it would be most desirable to find a process wherein the yield of PMC and DPC versus the initial phenol feed is 50% or more, and the amount of DPC produced is maximized versus the total yield of PMC and DPC. Excess production of undesirable by-products such as phenyl methyl ether (i.e., anisole) should also be avoided.
It was discovered the above goals may all be accomplished by the present invention. Specifically, it is possible to obtain a 51% yield of PMC plus DPC with a selectivity to anisole byproduct of less than 0.2%, wherein the selectivity of DPC relative to the sum of PMC and DPC was 30 to 40%. The present invention therefore provides a method for continuous production of diphenyl carbonate which has a high production rate while at the same time providing an energy and raw material efficient process.
SUMMARY OF INVENTION
The present invention provides a method for making aromatic carbonates. In this method, an aryl alcohol is reacted with a dialkyl carbonate in a reactor (e.g., a distillation column) to produce a arylalkyl carbonate and diaryl carbonate. The total yield of arylalkyl carbonate and dialkyl carbonate together is at least 40%. Also, the selectivity of diaryl carbonate versus diaryl carbonate and arylalkyl carbonate together is preferably at least 25%.
In the method according to the present invention, the temperature measured at the bottom of the distillation column is preferably between 220 and 240° C., the DMC to phenol feed ratio is preferably between 4 and 7, the operating pressure measured at the top of the column is between 3 and 6 kg/cm 2 Gauge, and the amount of catalyst used is preferably from 0.5 to 1 molar percent.
In a more specific embodiment, the present invention provides a method for making aromatic carbonates in a distillation column having a lower reactive section and an upper rectification section. In this embodiment, a first reactive stream comprising an alcohol, and optionally a dialkyl carbonate and a catalyst, are fed into the top of the reactive section. A second stream containing a dialkyl carbonate, and optionally an aryl alcohol are fed into the bottom of the reactive section. The two streams are fed in sufficient quantities such that the weight ratio between the dialkyl carbonate and the aryl alcohol is from 4 to 6. The temperature measured at the bottom of the column is between 220° C. and 240° C., and the operating pressure measured at the top of the column is from 3 to 6 kg/cm 2 Gauge.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 shows the two-step reaction of dimethyl carbonate and phenol to produce diphenyl carbonate.
FIG. 2 shows schematic diagram of an apparatus in accordance with the invention.
FIG. 3 shows a graph depicting the relationship between PMC and DPC yield versus reaction temperature and DMC to phenol feed flow ratio.
FIG. 4 shows a graph depicting the relationship between anisole selectivity versus reaction temperature and DMC to phenol feed flow ratio.
FIG. 5 shows a graph depicting the relationship between DPC selectivity relative to total yield of PMC and DPC versus reaction temperature and DMC to phenol feed flow ratio.
FIG. 6 shows a graph depicting the relationship between PMC and DPC yield together with anisole selectivity as a function of reaction temperature and DMC to phenol feed flow ratio.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
For purposes of the present application, the term “distillation column” shall refer to any sort of distillation column or reactive distillation column in which a process of distillation may be carried out.
For purposes of the present invention, the term “reaction mixture” includes the materials fed into the distillation column, which typically includes the aromatic alcohol and the dialkyl carbonate, and optimally a catalyst, arylalkyl carbonate, and other optional substances such as, for example entraining agents and/or solvents.
For purposes of the present application, the term “yield” or “total yield” shall refer to a weight percentage of the desired product(s) (e.g., aryl alkylcarbonates and diaryl carbonates) relative to the total weight of the mixture of products and reactant determined after obtaining a stable continuous operation.
For purposes of the present application, the term “selectivity” in the context of DPC shall refer to the weight ratio of DPC over the sum of the products DPC and PMC.
For purposes of the present application, the term “selectivity” in the context of anisole content shall refer to the weight ratio of anisole over the total weight of the mixture of products and reactants determined after obtaining a stable continuous operation.
For the purposes of the present application, the term “top of the column” is a relative term indicating a location within the upper ⅓ of a distillation column, which would include, but not necessarily be limited to, a position above the uppermost plate in said column.
For purposes of the present application, the term “bottom of the column” is a relative term indicating a location within the lower ⅓ of a distillation column, which would include, but not necessarily be limited to, a position below the lower most plate in said column.
For the purposes of the present application, the term “lower rectification section” shall refer to a lower section of a distillation column below the feeding point of at least one of the reactants wherein the chemical reaction is thought to occur in said section.
For purposes of the present application, the term “upper rectification section” shall refer to an upper section of a distillation column above the lower rectification section, wherein the chemical reaction is generally thought not to occur in said rectification section.
For the purposes of the present application, the term “operating pressure” is meant to refer to an average pressure reading during stable operation of the reaction, which pressure may vary throughout the process and upon start up and shut down.
For the purposes of the present application, technical terms not defined herein should be interpreted according to Grant & Hackh's Chemical Dictionary, 5 th Ed., Roger Grant and Clair Grant, McGraw-Hill, Inc., 1987.
Relevant sections of all U.S. Patents referred to herein are all hereby incorporated by reference.
As shown in FIG. 1, the chemical reaction employed in the present invention is a reaction between an aromatic alcohol and a dialkyl carbonate. The aromatic alcohol and dialkyl carbonate should be selected such that they will undergo an exchange reaction with each other. FIG. 1 depicts a preferred reaction between phenol (an aromatic alcohol) and dimethyl carbonate (a dialkyl alcohol). FIG. 1 further depicts the disproportionation of one of the arylalkyl carbonate product, phenylmethylcarbonate, to form the diaryl carbonate product, diphenyl carbonate.
Suitable aromatic alcohols which are useful in the present reaction include phenol and alkylphenol such as cresol, xylenol, trimethyl-phenol, tetramethylphenol, ethylphenol, propylphenol, butylphenol, diethylphenol, methylethylphenol, methylpropylphenol, dipropylphenol, methylbutylphenol, pentylphenol, hexylphenol, cyclohexylphenol, and alkoxyphenols such as methoxyphenol and ethyoxyplenol. Suitable dialkyl carbonates which are useful in the present reaction include dimethylcarbonate, diethylcarbonate, methylethylcarbonate, ethylpropylcarbonate, dipropylcarbonate, propylbutylcarbonate, dibutylcarbonate, butylpentylcarbonate, dipentylcarbonate, pentylhexylcarbonate, dihexylcarbonate, hexylheptylcarbonate, diheptylcarbonate, heptyloctylcarbonate, dioctylcarbonate, octylnonylcarbonate, dinonylcarbonate, nonyldecylcarbonate, didecylcarbonate. It is also possible to use combinations of two or more aromatic alcohols and/or dialkyl carbonates.
The product diarylcarbonates are useful starting materials for preparing polycarbonates by reacting them with dihydric phenols (e.g., Bisphenol A) via the melt reaction. A very early description of the melt synthesis of polycarbonates is found in U.S. Pat. No. 3,153,008, but the patent literature is replete with further descriptions such as that found in U.S. Pat. No. 4,182,726.
Preferred classes of catalysts for conducting the reaction shown in FIG. 1 include titanium compounds like titaniumtetraphenoxide (Ti(OPh) 4 ), and Titaniumtetrachloride, organotin compounds, lead compounds, compounds of the copper family metals, zinc complexes, compounds of the iron family metals, and zirconium complexes. The catalyst selected should preferably have an activity of greater than 10 moles PMC/mole catalyst, but less than 400 moles PMC/mole catalyst. Typically, about 0.5 to 1.0 molar percent of the catalyst is used, and more preferably about 0.6 to 0.8 molar percent based on the phenol fed into the reaction. The catalyst is typically fed into one or more components of the reaction mixture before introduction into the distillation column, but it may be introduced into the column separately, before or during addition of the reaction mixture. The column may be kept under an inert atmosphere and may be pre-dried if desired.
As shown in the examples, the method according to the present invention is capable of producing very high yields. Under preferred conditions, the method may be used to produce a total yield of aryl alkyl carbonate plus diaryl carbonate of at least 40%, and optimally at least 50%. Also, the method is capable of producing total yields of diaryl carbonates versus total diaryl carbonates and arylakyl carbonates of greater than 25%, or more preferably 30%, or even 40%.
In order to achieve such high yields in a single column, the conditions within the distillation column must be carefully controlled. Specifically, the conditions for reacting DMC and phenol to make DMC and DPC should satisfy requirements (1) and (2) below.
(1) The catalyst should have a catalytic activity such that PMC is produced at a rate of 40 moles PMC per mole of catalyst wherein the reaction temperature is 210° C., the dialkyl carbonate is dimethyl carbonate, the aromatic hydroxy compound is phenol and the dimethyl carbonate/phenol ratio equals 3.2 (kg/kg) in the reaction system. In the case of Ti(OPh) 4, the optimum molar percent of catalyst is 0.7 based on the amount of phenol used. For systems using different reactants, optimum factors can be determined by repeating the experiments described in the Examples below, and by analyzing the data as shown herein.
(2) The reaction should be conducted under conditions satisfying the following relational expressions:
a) PMC+DPC yield (%)=
−197.5−40.9* c+4.07*r+19.4*P
−0.930*T−15.6*c 2 +2.58*c*r
−0.294*c*T−0.085*P*T
where c is the concentration of catalyst in molar percent based on hydroxy compound, r is the ratio of DMC flow rate (g/h) to phenol feed flow rate (g/h), P is the column pressure (in kg/cm2 Gauge) and T is the reaction temperature (in ° C.). FIG. 3 shows this relation for different DMC to phenol flow ratios and reaction temperatures at constant catalyst amount (0.7 mol %) and constant pressure (4.6 kg/cm2 Gauge). The target is a PMC+DPC yield greater or equal than 50%. As shown in FIG. 3, this target requires that reaction temperatures are higher than 220° C. and DMC to phenol feed flow ratios greater than 4 to 5.
b) Anisole selectivity(%)=
119.4−4.10*c+2.59*r−1.13*T
+0.003*T 2 0.143*c*r
+0.023*c*T−0.011*r*T
FIG. 4 shows this relation for different DMC to phenol flow ratios and reaction temperatures and at constant catalyst amount (0.7 mol %). The target anisole selectivity is less than or equal to 0.50%. As can be seen in FIG. 4, this target requires that reaction temperatures be less than 230 to 235° C., and that DMC to phenol feed flow ratios are higher than 4 to 5 (especially at high temperatures).
c) DPC selectivity versus PMC+DPC yield=
−237.5−84.9*c+1.32*r+19.5*P
+1.18*T−12.98*c 2 +3.37*c*r
+0.403*c*T−0.098*P*T
FIG. 5 shows this relation for different DMC to phenol flow ratios and reaction temperatures at constant catalyst amount (0.7 mol %) and constant pressure (4.6 kg/cm2 Gauge). The target is to maximize DPC yield versus PMC+DPC yield. It follows from FIG. 5 that maximum DPC yield versus PMC+DPC yield is obtained at high reaction temperatures and high DMC to phenol feed flow ratios.
Analysis of the above relational expressions reveals the following optimal operation conditions for the reaction of DMC and Phenol to form DPC and PMC:
The amount of catalyst (c): should be 0.5 to 1.0 molar percent, preferably 0.6 to 0.8 molar percent;
The column pressure (P):3 to 6 kg/cm 2 Gauge, preferably 4 to 5 kg/cm 2 Gauge;
The reflux ratio should be between 0.2 and 3, preferably between 0.4 and 1.0;
The reaction temperature and DMC to phenol feed flow ratio are chosen according to the shaded region in FIG. 6 . This region denotes the compilation of reaction temperatures and DMC to phenol feed flow ratios that result in a total yield of PMC and DPC of 50% or higher and in selectivity”s to anisole of 0.5% or less. The shaded region of FIG. 6 was obtained after determining the overlap of total yield of PMC and DPC of 50% or more from FIG. 3, with anisole selectivity”s of 0.5% or less from FIG. 4 . It follows that the marked region consists of reaction temperatures between 220 and 235° C. and DMC to phenol feed flow ratios between 4 and 6. Remarkably, the marked region is also the region in which DPC selectivity relative to the total yield of PMC and DPC is high: between 30 and 45%, as shown in FIG. 5 . Therefore, this region is a truly optimum region that meets the targets of maximizing yield and minimizing by-product formation. Without wishing to limit the invention to any single theory of operation, the reason for the high DPC yield versus PMC+DPC yield is thought to be the combination of high temperature and low to medium pressure. These two conditions result in low concentrations of DMC in the reactor mixture (DMC is a low boiling component) and high concentrations of PMC, so the disproportionation reaction of PMC to DPC and DMC is shifted towards the DPC side.
The present invention is further illustrated in a number of working examples, summarized in Table 1.
TABLE 1
Feed system
Reaction conditions
DMC-to-
Catalyst
Catalyst vs
Temp. at
DMC
Phenol
Phenol
(**)
phenol
Pressure
bottom
Reflux
Nr
(g/h)
(g/h)
(g/g)
(g/h)
(mole-%)
(kg/cm 2 G)
(° C.)
ratio
1
1741
548
3.18
42.7
0.70
4.6
210
0.64
2
1739
549
3.17
42.7
0.70
4.6
210
0.64
3
1753
558
3.14
57.3
0.93
4.6
210
0.46
4
1820
546
3.33
39.3
0.65
4.6
210
0.69
5
1973
420
4.70
29.9
0.64
4.6
237
0.55
6
1890
403
4.69
26.9
0.60
4.6
237
0.57
7
1474
780
1.89
128.0
1.48
4.6
210
0.60
8
1880
417
4.51
76.1
1.65
4.6
210
0.81
9
1880
417
4.51
76.1
1.65
4.6
240
0.32
10
1899
400
4.74
72.9
1.64
4.6
240
0.31
11
1478
777
1.90
128.0
1.49
4.6
240
1.07
12
1485
787
1.89
11.1
0.13
4.6
210
1.24
13
1516
784
1.93
10.8
0.12
4.6
232
0.44
14
1940
390
4.97
5.7
0.13
4.6
210
0.33
15
1940
433
4.48
6.0
0.13
4.6
228
0.72
16
1955
438
4.46
6.1
0.13
4.6
210
0.33
17
1940
438
4.43
6.6
0.14
7.2
210
1.08
18
1431
823
1.74
11.6
0.13
7.2
240
1.46
19
1426
850
1.68
11.5
0.12
7.2
210
1.50
20
1809
444
4.08
6.3
0.13
7.2
239
0.41
21
1808
420
4.31
76.1
1.64
7.2
210
0.49
22
1401
768
1.82
143.0
1.68
7.2
240
0.62
23
1418
801
1.77
131.4
1.48
7.2
210
2.53
24
1830
402
4.55
76.2
1.71
7.2
240
0.95
25
1885
309
6.09
22.7
0.66
4.6
231
0.47
26
1720
401
4.29
28.8
0.65
4.6
231
0.51
27
1876
356
5.27
26.1
0.66
4.6
227
0.47
28
1879
395
4.75
30.8
0.70
4.6
220
0.49
29
1884
369
5.10
20.9
0.51
4.6
227
0.47
30
1877
307
6.12
23.5
0.69
4.6
220
0.47
31
1889
365
5.18
25.2
0.62
4.6
226
0.46
32
2303
451
5.10
33.6
0.67
4.6
220
0.50
Results bottom product (*)
Performance (***)
Bottom
PMC + DPC
DPC yield/
Anisole
flowrate
PMC
DPC
Anisole
yield
PMC + DMC yield
selectivity
Nr
(g/h)
(wt-%)
(wt-%)
(wt-%)
(%)
(%)
(%)
1
972
24.35
3.47
0.035
29.3
9.1
0.19
2
971
24.26
3.49
0.022
29.3
9.5
0.12
3
963
27.13
4.55
0.042
32.2
10.0
0.20
4
948
26.73
4.26
0.028
32.2
11.0
0.16
5
594
39.30
21.25
0.075
57.9
40.5
0.84
6
565
40.04
22.19
0.039
59.1
41.2
0.99
7
1483
18.09
1.81
0.032
17.8
−19.2
0.35
8
831
26.27
4.01
0.040
32.5
0.4
0.22
9
682
40.11
22.62
0.152
66.1
38.6
0.41
10
607
42.12
28.24
0.168
70.0
43.6
1.83
11
1233
27.75
10.28
0.240
35.4
23.1
1.05
12
1287
16.09
1.43
0.001
17.9
8.9
0.01
13
1083
21.86
5.65
0.085
25.0
25.3
0.47
14
692
22.73
2.84
0.041
29.0
14.0
0.26
15
639
26.74
6.37
0.033
32.1
23.9
0.14
16
733
23.72
3.01
0.051
28.4
13.5
0.27
17
1043
19.08
1.25
0.043
30.1
6.7
0.36
18
1282
22.84
3.85
0.232
26.8
17.8
1.39
19
1885
12.25
0.50
0.001
17.3
2.7
0.01
20
718
32.99
8.78
0.158
44.8
26.4
0.56
21
1002
24.21
2.55
0.160
35.3
−1.3
1.25
22
1384
26.82
6.62
0.498
34.9
14.3
3.11
23
1780
16.73
1.16
0.042
19.9
−15.6
0.53
24
774
37.57
12.91
0.314
60.8
26.3
0.97
25
474
41.03
22.21
0.067
66.1
41.2
0.09
26
564
37.59
18.12
0.100
52.4
37.6
0.21
27
530
38.18
14.76
0.049
52.2
32.6
0.10
28
649
33.81
9.57
0.039
45.6
24.7
0.11
29
539
37.91
15.15
0.056
51.2
33.1
0.11
30
484
37.20
11.66
0.039
50.0
27.3
0.09
31
534
37.57
14.50
0.063
50.2
32.3
0.13
32
717
34.22
10.62
0.045
46.0
26.9
0.12
(*) Top product consists only of DMC (90-95 wt-%) and methanol (5-10 wt-%)
(**) Catalyst consists of 40.3 wt-% od litanium tetraphenolate, 36.5 wt % DPC and 23.2 wt % Heavies
(***) PMC yield = moles PMC generated per mole phenol in feed. DPC yield = moles DPC generated times 2 per mole phenol in feed, PMC + DPC yield = PMC yield plus DPC yield Anidole selectivity − moles anisole generated per mole phenol converted
EXAMPLE 1
A pilot distillation column (stainless steel) as shown in FIG. 2 was equipped with 40 perforated plates. The plate diameters were 50 mm for the bottom 20 trays and 40 mm for the top 20 trays. The total height of the column was 3.4 m, with a plate-to-plate distance of 50 mm for the bottom 20 trays and 40 mm for the top 20 trays. The holdup of the bottom 20 trays was 471 ml of liquid, the holdup of the bottom compartment of the column was 460 ml. Heat was supplied at the bottom of the column and to the bottom 20 trays of the column by means of electric heating mantles. The phenol feed (548 g/h) and catalyst feed (Titanium tetraphenolate (40.3 wt−%) dissolved in a mixture of DPC (36.5 wt−%) and heavies (23.2 wt−%), flow rate is 42.7 g/h) were mixed (resulting in a catalyst percentage of 0.70 mole−% versus phenol), preheated to 145° C. and then fed to tray 20 of the column. DMC (1741 g/h) was preheated to 145° C. and fed to the bottom compartment of the column below the first tray. The column was operated at a temperature of 210° C. at the bottom of the column, at a pressure of 4.6 kg/cm 2 Gauge measured at the top of the column, and with a reflux ratio of 0.64. The overhead was cooled to 90° C. in a condenser and part of the overhead was sent back as reflux to the top of the column. To compensate for heat losses to the environment, the bottom 20 trays were heated such that tray 7 (counting from the bottom tray) was kept at 5° C. below the bottom temperature and tray 12 (counting from the bottom tray) was kept at 10° C. below the bottom temperature. Table 1 shows the bottom flow rate and bottom flow composition under steady state conditions. Table 1 also includes the PMC+DPC yield, the DPC yield relative to the PMC+DPC yield and the selectivity for anisole. The top stream always consisted of DMC and methanol and is not included in the Table 1.
EXAMPLES 2 TO 32
Using the same apparatus described in Example 1, experiments were carried out under the reaction conditions indicated in Table 1. Results are shown in Table 1. Examples 25 to 32 correspond to preferred conditions according to the present invention.
EXAMPLE 33
The results shown in Table 1 were analyzed and fitted into a model using a “Custom Response Surface Design” from the software package Minitab ® for Windows, Release 12.2. The commercially available software operates by using a response surface method to determine the relationship between one or more response variables (for instance Yield or Selectivity) and a set of quantitative experimental variables or factors (for instance Temperature, Pressure, reactant concentrations, etc.). The experimental data are fitted into a model. The type of model is chosen by the user. For instance, the user can choose a linear or a quadratic model. The fitting itself is done via a Least Squares method. The computational method is Givens transformations using Linpack routines. The method is described in: Linpack (1979), Linpack User's Guide by J. J. Dongarra, J. R. Bunch, C. B. Moler, and G. W. Stewart, Society for Industrial and Applied Mathematics, Philadelphia, Pa., which is incorporated by reference herein. Other known curve fitting methods could also be used.
Although the present invention has been described in considerable detail with reference to certain preferred versions thereof, other versions are possible. For example, the reaction could be conducted in a type of reactor other than a distillation column. Alternatively, the reaction could be conducted in a reaction column connected to a distillation column. Also, the reaction could be conducted using a fixed catalyst bed rather than using a homogeneous catalysts. Also, many other variations are possible. Therefore, the spirit and scope of the appended claims should not be limited to the description of the preferred versions contained herein.
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The present invention provides a method for making aromatic carbonates. In this method, an aryl alcohol is reacted with a dialkyl carbonate in a reactor (e.g., a distillation column) to produce an arylalkyl carbonate and diaryl carbonate. In one embodiment, the method comprises: feeding to the top subsection of the reactive section of a distillation column, a first stream comprising an aryl alcohol and a catalyst, and feeding to the bottom subsection of the reactive section a second stream containing a dialkylcarbonate, wherein the temperature at the bottom of the column is between 220° C. and 240° C.
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This application is a continuation-in-part of application Ser. No. 12/219,084, filed on Jul. 16, 2008 and issued as U.S. Pat. No. 7,850,321 on Dec. 14, 2010.
BACKGROUND
1. Technical Field
A wafer-scaled light-emitting device and manufacturing method thereof is disclosed, especially is related to a wafer-scaled light-emitting diode with narrow dominant wavelength distribution and a method of enabling convergent distribution of dominant wavelength of the wafer-scaled light-emitting device.
2. Reference to Related Application
This application claims the right of priority based on TW application Ser. No. 098106259, filed “Feb. 25, 2009”, entitled “LIGHT-EMITTING DEVICE WITH NARROW DOMINANT WAVELENGTH DISTRIBUTION AND METHOD OF MAKING THE SAME” and the contents of which are incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.
3. Description of the Related Art
The light-generating mechanism of a light-emitting diode (LED) is that the difference of the energy of electrons moving between an n-type semiconductor and a p-type semiconductor is released through the form of light. This light-generating mechanism of the LED is different from that of incandescent lamps so the LED is titled a cold light source. Besides, LED has advantages like high reliability, long life span, small dimensions, and electricity saving so the LED has been deemed as an illumination source of a new generation.
FIG. 1A to FIG. 1E show a conventional process flow of manufacturing a light-emitting device. As FIG. 1A shows, a substrate 10 is provided. As FIG. 1B shows, a plurality of epitaxial stacked layers 12 is formed on the substrate 10 , and the plurality of epitaxial stacked layers 12 is etched by lithography to form a plurality of light-emitting stacked layers 14 , as FIG. 1C shows. Next, as FIG. 1D shows, electrodes 16 are formed on the plurality of light-emitting stacked layers 14 to form an LED wafer 100 . Finally, as FIG. 1E shows, the LED wafer 100 is diced to form LED chips 18 .
The distribution of the dominant wavelengths of the light-emitting stacked layers 14 , however, is not uniform. The difference of the dominant wavelength can be 15 nm˜20 nm or even more so the difference of the dominant wavelength of the LED chips 18 formed by the light-emitting stacked layers 14 is large as well. The problem of non-uniform distribution of the dominant wavelengths further influences the consistency of characteristics of the products utilizing the LED chips 18 . Taking the conventional blue LED chip with the 460 nm dominant wavelength cooperating with the yellow phosphors to generate white light as an example, if the distribution range of the dominant wavelengths of the blue LED chips on the same LED wafer reaches 20 nm, namely the dominant wavelengths are between 450 nm and 470 nm, the distribution of the color temperatures of the white lights formed by mixing the light from the blue LED chips and the yellow wavelength-converting materials having 570 nm excited wavelength is also influenced.
As FIG. 2 shows, because the wide distribution of the dominant wavelengths of each light-emitting stacked layer on the LED wafer, the color temperatures of the white lights formed by mixing the light from the LED chips and the wavelength-converting materials distribute between 6500K and 9500K. With the difference of the color temperatures, which is about 3000K, the consistency of the quality of the products is affected significantly.
To solve the problem of non-uniform distribution of the dominant wavelength of the light-emitting stacked layers 14 , there are probing, sorting, and binning processes in the conventional manufacturing process of the LED chips 18 to screen out the LED chips 18 having similar dominant wavelengths for various application demanding different wavelengths, as FIG. 3 shows.
Although the probing, sorting, and binning processes can reduce the influence upon the consistence of the quality caused by non-uniform distribution of the dominant wavelength, when the products to which the LED chips 18 are applied strictly require a tight distribution of the dominant wavelength, such as the back-light unit having the LED chips in the large size display, the ratio of the available LED chips 18 on the LED wafer 100 is low. Besides, sorting and binning processes are time-consuming and laborious, and increase the cost and time of manufacturing the LED chips.
SUMMARY
The present application provides an LED wafer with narrow dominant wavelength distribution including a substrate, a plurality of light-emitting stacked layers formed on the substrate, and a wavelength transforming layer formed on the plurality of light-emitting stacked layers to converge and convert the dominant wavelengths emitted from the light-emitting stacked layers.
The present application further discloses a method of converging the dominant wavelength distribution of the LED wafer, including the steps of providing a substrate, forming a plurality of light-emitting stacked layers on the substrate, and forming a wavelength transforming layer on the plurality of light-emitting stacked layers to converge the dominant wavelength distribution of each of the plurality of light-emitting stacked layers on the LED wafer.
The present application also provides a method of manufacturing a light-emitting device, including forming a wavelength transforming layer to converge the variation of the dominant wavelengths of the light-emitting stacked layers to improve the usage efficiency.
Another purpose of the present application is to provide a method of manufacturing a light-emitting device, including forming a wavelength transforming layer to converge the variation of the dominant wavelengths of the light-emitting stacked layers to eliminate sorting and binning processes in the manufacturing process of LED chips.
The foregoing aspects and many of the attendant purpose, technology, characteristic, and function of this application will become more readily appreciated as the same becomes better understood by reference to the following embodiments detailed description, when taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The accompanying drawings are included to provide easy understanding of the application, and are incorporated herein and constitute a part of this specification. The drawings illustrate embodiments of the application and, together with the description, serve to illustrate the principles of the application.
FIGS. 1A-1E illustrate a conventional process flow of manufacturing LED chips.
FIG. 2 illustrates a conventional CIE 1931 chromaticity diagram of a blue LED combining with yellow phosphor powders.
FIG. 3 illustrates a conventional schematic view of probing of the LED chips.
FIGS. 4A-4F illustrate a process flow of manufacturing LED chips in accordance with an embodiment of the present application.
FIG. 5 illustrates a cross-sectional view of the LED chips in accordance with another embodiment of the present application.
FIG. 6 illustrates a CIE 1931 chromaticity diagram in accordance with the embodiment of the present application.
FIG. 7 illustrates a cross-sectional view of the LED chips in accordance with another embodiment of the present application.
FIGS. 8A-8B illustrate cross-sectional views of the LED chips in accordance with other embodiments of the present application.
FIG. 9 illustrates a schematic view of dicing steps in accordance with another embodiment of the present application.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
Reference is made in detail to the preferred embodiments of the present application, examples of which are illustrated in the accompanying drawings. Wherever possible, the same reference numbers are used in the drawings and the description to refer to the same or like parts.
FIGS. 4A-4F illustrate a process flow in accordance with an embodiment of the present application. As FIG. 4A shows, a substrate 20 is provided, wherein the substrate 20 can be an electrical conductive substrate. As FIG. 4B shows, a plurality of epitaxial layers 22 is formed on the substrate 20 , wherein each of the plurality of epitaxial layers 22 at least includes a first conductivity-type semiconductor layer 220 , an active layer 222 , and a second conductivity-type semiconductor layer 224 . The material of the plurality of epitaxial layers 22 can be a material including at least one element of Al, Ga, In, N, P, or As, such as GaN series or AlGaInP series material, for example. The embodiment below takes GaN series material as an example for explanation.
As FIG. 4C shows, a plurality of light-emitting stacked layers 24 is formed on the substrate 20 by etching the plurality of epitaxial layers 22 with lithography. As FIG. 4D shows, a plurality of electrodes 26 is formed on the plurality of light-emitting stacked layers 24 by evaporation, and an LED wafer 200 is formed.
The plurality of light-emitting stacked layers 24 can emit a plurality of first lights 210 , wherein the dominant wavelengths of the first lights 210 are between 390 nm and 430 nm. There is a first difference of the dominant wavelengths between any two first lights 210 , wherein the maximum of the first difference of the dominant wavelengths is a first dominant wavelength variation V 1 .
As FIG. 4E shows, after forming the electrodes 26 , a plurality of wavelength transforming layers 28 is formed to cover the surfaces of the plurality of light-emitting stacked layers 24 , wherein the material of the plurality of wavelength transforming layers 28 contains fluorescent material or phosphor material. In this embodiment, the plurality of wavelength transforming layers 28 can be composed of phosphor powder. The material of the wavelength transforming layer 28 can be blue phosphor powder containing one or more than one materials selected from a group consisting of Si 3 MgSi 2 O 8 :Eu, BaMgAl 10 O 17 :Eu, (SrBaCa) 5 (PO 4 ) 3 Cl:Eu, Sr 3 (Al 2 O 5 )Cl 2 :Eu 2+ and Sr 4 Al 14 O 25 :Eu. The phosphor powder is uniformly or partially spread on the surface of the light-emitting stacked layer 24 so the wavelength transforming layer 28 absorbs substantially the whole first light 210 emitted from the light-emitting stacked layer 24 and converts the first light 210 into a second light 220 . The first light 210 is totally absorbed by the plurality of wavelength transforming layers 28 when the plurality of wavelength transforming layer is formed on the plurality of light-emitting stacked layers emitting the first light.
In this embodiment, the dominant wavelengths of the second lights 220 are between 450 nm and 470 nm which are blue lights of long wavelength. There is a second difference of the dominant wavelengths between any two second lights 220 , wherein the maximum of the second difference of the dominant wavelengths is a second dominant wavelength variation V 2 . Finally, as FIG. 4F shows, the plurality of light-emitting stacked layers 24 is diced to form a plurality of LED chips 30 .
In the above embodiment, the first dominant wavelength variation V 1 is between 15 nm and 20 nm, and the second dominant wavelength variation V 2 is less than 10 nm, preferably less than 5 nm. The difference of the dominant wavelengths of the lights from any two of the plurality of light-emitting layers 24 can be reduced by forming the plurality of wavelength transforming layers 28 on the plurality of light-emitting stacked layers 24 . The distribution of the dominant wavelengths of the plurality of LED chips 30 from the same LED wafer 200 can be convergent to improve the usage efficiency of the plurality of light-emitting stacked layers 24 on the LED wafer 200 . Moreover, the above embodiment can skip sorting and binning processes in the manufacturing process of the LED chips to further reduce the cost of production.
In addition, as FIG. 5 shows, the present application can include the step of forming a wavelength converting layer 32 on the wavelength transforming layer 28 after forming the wavelength transforming layer 28 . The wavelength converting layer 32 includes one or more than one kind of phosphor powders, wherein the phosphor powders include a material selected from a group consisting of yellow phosphor powders including yttrium aluminum garnet (YAG) or alkaline-earth halide aluminate, green phosphor powders including BaMgAl 10 O 17 :Eu, MnBa 2 SiO 4 :Eu, (Sr,Ca)SiO 4 :Eu, CaSc 2 O 4 :Eu, Ca 8 Mg(SiO 4 ) 4 Cl 2 :Eu, Mn, SrSi 2 O 2 N 2 :Eu, LaPO 4 :Tb,Ce, Zn2SiO 4 :Mn, ZnS:Cu, YBO 3 :Ce,Tb, (Ca,Sr,Ba)Al 2 O 4 :Eu, Sr 2 P 2 O 7 :Eu,Mn, SrAl 2 S 4 :Eu, BaAl 2 S 4 :Eu, Sr 2 Ga 2 S 5 :Eu, SiAlON:Eu, KSrPO 4 :Tb, or Na 2 Gd 2 B 2 O 7 :Ce,Tb, and red phosphor powders including Y 2 O 3 :Eu, YVO 4 :Eu, CaSiAlN3:Eu, (Sr,Ca)SiAlN3:Eu, Sr 2 Si 5 N 8 :Eu, CaSiN 2 :Eu, (Y,Gd)BO 3 :Eu, (La,Y) 2 O 2 S:Eu, La 2 TeO 6 :Eu, SrS:Eu, Gd 2 MoO 6 :Eu, Y 2 WO 6 :Eu,Bi, Lu 2 WO 6 :Eu,Bi, (Ca,Sr,Ba)MgSi 2 O 6 :Eu,Mn, Sr 3 SiO 5 :Eu, SrY 2 S 4 :Eu, CaSiO 3 :Eu, Ca 8 MgLa(PO 4 ) 7 :Eu, Ca 8 MgGd(PO 4 ) 7 :Eu, Ca 8 MgY(PO 4 ) 7 :Eu, or CaLa 2 S 4 :Ce. The above phosphor powders are uniformly or partially spread on the wavelength transforming layer 28 .
In this embodiment, the wavelength converting layer 32 includes at least one yellow phosphor powder. The wavelength converting layer 32 can absorb the second light 220 and convert the second light 220 into third light 230 in yellow color, wherein the dominant wavelength of the third light 230 is about 570 nm. Then, the third light 230 of yellow color and the second light 220 which is not absorbed by the wavelength converting layer 32 are mixed to generate a fourth light 240 in white light.
Because the dominant wavelength of the second light 220 is about 460 nm and the second dominant wavelength variation V 2 is less than 10 nm, preferably less than 5 nm. In the embodiment, the distribution range of the second dominant wavelengths is between 455 nm and 465 nm. FIG. 6 illustrates a CIE 1931 chromaticity diagram of the fourth light 240 . As FIG. 6 shows, the color temperature of the fourth light 240 which is generated by mixing the second light 220 and the third light 230 is about between 6500K and 8500K (the intersection point of the black curve and the solid line in FIG. 6 ). The difference of the color temperature of the fourth light 240 is less than 2000K, preferably less than 1000K.
Comparing to the conventional technology that the blue LED whose dominant wavelength is between 450 nm and 470 nm combines with the yellow phosphor powder to generate the white light of which the difference of the color temperature is 3000K (the intersection point of the black curve and the dotted line in FIG. 6 ), the embodiment of the present application significantly increases the uniformity of the light emitted from each light-emitting stacked layer of an LED wafer.
Furthermore, although the LED chip which is a vertical structure is taken as an example in the above embodiment, the scope of the present application is not limited to the LED of the vertical structure. FIG. 7 is a cross-sectional view of another embodiment of the present application. As FIG. 7 shows, an LED wafer 500 includes a substrate 50 , and a plurality of light-emitting stacked layers 52 , a plurality of first electrodes 54 , a plurality of second electrodes 56 , and a plurality of wavelength transforming layers 58 formed on the substrate 50 , wherein each of the plurality of light-emitting stacked layers 52 at least includes a first conductivity-type semiconductor layer 520 , an active layer 522 , and a second conductivity-type semiconductor layer 524 . Each of the plurality of light-emitting stacked layers 52 includes a plane exposing the second conductivity-type semiconductor layer 524 . Each of the plurality of first electrodes 54 and each of the plurality of second electrodes 56 are located on the first conductivity-type semiconductor layer 520 and the second conductivity-type semiconductor layer 524 respectively. The plurality of wavelength transforming layers 58 covers the plurality of light-emitting stacked layers 52 .
Moreover, FIGS. 8A and 8B are cross-sectional views of other embodiments of the present application. The embodiments can further include an electrical connection structure 60 to connect the adjacent light-emitting stacked layers 52 / 52 ′ in series connection. As FIG. 8A shows, the electrical connection structure 60 is a metal wire. The wire bonding technology is utilized to electrically connect the second electrode 56 of a light-emitting stacked layer 52 and the first electrode 54 of another light-emitting stacked layer 52 ′ to form a series connection between different light-emitting stacked layers 52 and 52 ′. As FIG. 8B shows, the electrical connection structure 60 can also include an insulating layer 62 formed between the adjacent light-emitting stacked layers 52 and 52 ′, and a metal layer 64 formed on the insulating layer 62 to electrically connect the second electrode 56 of a light-emitting stacked layer 52 and the first electrode 54 of another light-emitting stacked layer 52 ′. Thus, there is a series connection between different light-emitting stacked layers 52 and 52 ′.
Additionally, as FIG. 9 shows, each of the plurality of light-emitting stacked layers 52 can be diced along the dicing line A to form the LED chip in the step of dicing the LED wafer. The plurality of light-emitting stacked layers 52 and 52 ′ which are connected by the electrical connection structure 60 in series connection are diced along the dicing line B to form an LED array chip 70 . In general, the voltage drop of each of the plurality of light-emitting stacked layer 52 and 52 ′ is about 3.5V. Fourteen light-emitting stacked layers 52 and 52 ′ which are in series connection are diced to form an LED array chip 70 and can be directly applied to the vehicle application which is 48V in the alternating current power supply. Moreover, thirty light-emitting stacked layers 52 and 52 ′ connected in series can also be diced to form the LED array chip 70 and can be directly applied to the household application with 100V in the alternating current power supply. Because there is a wavelength transforming layer on each of the light-emitting stacked layers 52 and 52 ′, the dominant wavelengths of each of the light-emitting stacked layers 52 and 52 ′ are more consistent. Thus, the process of sorting and binning based on the distribution of the dominant wavelengths can be eliminated in the conventional manufacturing process of the LED array chip to reduce the cost of production.
The foregoing description has been directed to the specific embodiments of this application. It will be apparent, however, that other variations and modifications may be made to the embodiments without escaping the spirit and scope of the application.
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This application discloses a light-emitting device with narrow dominant wavelength distribution and a method of making the same. The light-emitting device with narrow dominant wavelength distribution at least includes a substrate, a plurality of light-emitting stacked layers on the substrate, and a plurality of wavelength transforming layers on the light-emitting stacked layers, wherein the light-emitting stacked layer emits a first light with a first dominant wavelength variation; the wavelength transforming layer absorbs the first light and converts the first light into the second light with a second dominant wavelength variation; and the first dominant wavelength variation is larger than the second dominant wavelength variation.
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BACKGROUND
[0001] Natural gas pressure regulators for residential and commercial gas service are typically mounted with their vent lines near ground level. Sometimes a regulator is mounted outside, but are often it is mounted in a basement where a leak could quickly lead to a dangerous buildup of combustible gas. A supply pipe provides natural gas from a source, often a utility company, to the regulator, and an outlet pipe provides natural gas at a regulated pressure to a consumer. A common type of gas regulator is a self-regulating diaphragm-type regulator which includes a two-part housing separated by a diaphragm that uses spring loading to actuate a valve back and forth to control the regulated gas pressure. The housing on one side of the diaphragm is vented to atmosphere allowing the diaphragm to move back and forth as the regulated pressure is controlled in response to consumer demand.
[0002] In current commercially available natural gas regulators, the regulator vent is usually open to atmosphere. Under normal operation, and normal weather conditions, this is not a problem. However, under extreme weather conditions, such as those that cause flooding, there is a risk that the regulator may be submerged in water and that water will enter into the regulator on one side of the diaphragm, impeding the operation of the regulator and possibly rupturing the diaphragm. The results can be dangerous or even catastrophic, including over-pressuring of natural gas equipment in the consumer facility, as well as fire and explosion due to leaking natural gas. Such incidents occur with frequency in flooded conditions. For example, many natural gas regulators failed in New Orleans due to flooding in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.
[0003] Therefore, there is a need to prevent flooding of a natural gas regulator via the vent, while still allowing the regulator to perform its desired function of controlling the pressure of natural gas provided to a consumer.
SUMMARY
[0004] A vent line protection device (which may be alternately referred to herein as a “VLP” device) is provided to protect a vent of a gas regulator from flooding when a level of water external to the regulator is at or higher than a predetermined level. The device includes a generally cylindrical vertically-oriented housing and a generally cylindrical float disposed inside the housing and being movable in a vertical direction within the housing. The housing has an upper portion including a vent line connection and a plurality of atmospheric vent openings circumferentially spaced apart about the housing. The housing also has a lower portion including a water opening. An optional U-shaped tube may connect the housing vent line connection to the gas regulator vent, the U-bend of the U-shaped tube being located vertically above the housing vent line connection and the gas regulator vent. Water entering the housing through the water opening causes the float to rise in the housing. Water exiting the housing through the water opening, combined with gravity acting on the float itself, causes the float to lower. An upper end of the float includes a seal adapted for sealing off the vent line connection. A float stand is mounted to the housing for supporting the float above the water opening. When the water level is lower than the predetermined level, the float is positioned such that gas (including air and/or natural gas) can flow through the housing between the vent line connection and the atmospheric vent opening. When the water level is at or higher than the predetermined level, the float is positioned such that the vent line connection is scaled off by the seal of the float.
[0005] A vent line protection device is provided to protect a vent of a gas regulator from a level of water external to the regulator at or higher than a predetermined level. The device includes a vertically-oriented housing having an upper portion including vent line connection and an atmospheric vent opening, and a lower portion including a water opening. The vent line connection is adapted to connect to the vent of the gas regulator. The device further includes a float disposed inside the housing and being movable in a vertical direction within the housing by water entering the water opening. An upper end of the float includes a seal adapted for sealing off the vent line connection. When the water level is lower than the predetermined level, gas (including air and/or natural gas) can flow through the housing between the vent line connection and the atmospheric vent opening. When the water level is at or higher than the predetermined level, the vent line connection is sealed off by the seal of the float.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0006] The above and other aspects, features and advantages of the vent line protection device described herein will be more apparent from the following more particular description thereof, presented in conjunction with the following drawings wherein:
[0007] FIG. 1 is a schematic showing a vent line protection device attached to a gas regulator, with no water present.
[0008] FIG. 2 is a schematic showing a vent line protection device attached to a gas regulator, with water lifting up the float in the housing toward vent line connection.
[0009] FIG. 3 is a schematic showing a vent line protection device attached to a gas regulator, with water lifting up the float so that an outer seal seals off the vent line connection.
[0010] FIG. 4 is a schematic showing a vent line protection device attached to a gas regulator, with water lifting up the float so that an outer seal is compressed and both the outer seal and an inner seal seal off the vent line connection.
[0011] FIG. 5 is a cross-sectional view showing a vent line protection device attached to a vent tube, with the float in a closed position.
[0012] FIG. 6 is a cross-sectional view showing a vent line protection device attached to a vent tube, with the float in an open position.
[0013] FIG. 7 is a cross-sectional view showing a housing for a float in a vent line protection device.
[0014] FIG. 8 is a cross-sectional view of the housing of FIG. 7 taken through section line 8 - 8 .
[0015] FIG. 9 is a cross-sectional viewing showing a float for use in a vent line protection device.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
[0016] An embodiment of a vent line protection device 10 is shown in FIG. 1 connected to a natural gas pressure regulator 100 by a vent line 80 . The regulator 100 can be a standard self-regulating diaphragm-type pressure regulator, such as for residential or commercial use, which typically has a regulator housing 102 and includes a diaphragm 104 . The housing 102 on one side of the diaphragm 104 is vented by way of a regulator vent 106 disposed in the housing 102 to allow the housing 102 to breath as the diaphragm 104 moves back and forth to regulate the natural gas pressure supplied to a user. The vent line 80 is connected to the regulator vent 106 to provide a passage for air to flow back and forth between the regulator housing 102 and the outside atmosphere as the regulator 100 controls natural gas pressure based on consumption. The vent line 80 also directs the venting of any natural gas that must be discharged should the diaphragm 104 fail. As used herein, the term “gas” is understood to encompass air, natural gas, and any other gaseous fluid that could be present in the housing 102 of the regulator 100 , including but not limited to other combustible gases that may be substituted for natural gas. The physical structure of the device 10 is described with particular reference to FIGS. 5-9 , and stages of operation of the device 10 are depicted in FIGS. 1-4 .
[0017] The device 10 is designed to prevent water from intruding into the regulator 100 due to a flood, such as may be caused by a hurricane. The device 10 allows for full regulator relief of pressure in the housing 102 above the diaphragm 104 through the vent 106 , so that the regulator 100 can operate normally and can be allowed to go into full relief if necessary. The device 10 provides minimal flow restriction and pressure drop when the regulator 100 is in full relief.
[0018] As shown in detail in FIGS. 5-8 , the device 10 includes a housing 20 having a side wall 22 with a top end 32 and a bottom end 34 . In this one embodiment, the side wall 22 has the geometry of a right circular cylinder, it being understood that other geometries, including but not limited to square, hexagonal, and octagonal cylinders, or generally cylindrical with some irregularity can function equally well. In one embodiment, the housing 20 is made from a cast aluminum alloy to resist corrosion and to minimize weight.
[0019] As installed, the housing 20 is disposed in a substantially vertical orientation with the top end 32 facing substantially upward and the bottom end 34 facing substantially downward. The substantially vertical orientation of the housing 20 allows the device 10 to operate properly under the effects of gravity and buoyancy. The housing wall 22 encloses a cavity 28 in which a float 40 is allowed to move upward and downward, toward the top end 32 and toward the bottom end 34 , respectively, as the water level within the cavity 28 changes.
[0020] The housing 20 comprises an upper portion 36 and a lower portion 38 . A plurality of float guides 30 protrude inwardly into the cavity 28 from the wall 22 in the lower portion 38 of the housing 20 , to guide the float 40 and keep the float generally centered within the cavity 28 as the float 40 moves upward and downward. As shown in greater detail in FIGS. 7-8 , each float guide 30 includes an elongate protrusion extending substantially vertically along the wall 22 and projecting radially inward therefrom into the cavity 28 in the lower portion 38 of the housing. Spaces 31 between adjacent float guides 30 allow water and/or air to move or flow around the float 40 within the cavity 28 , i.e., between the float 40 and the wall 22 .
[0021] A vent line connection 26 is located at the top end 32 of the housing 20 for connecting to the vent line 80 . The vent line connection 26 provides a passage for gas (including air and/or natural gas) communication between the housing cavity 28 and the regulator vent 106 . In the embodiment depicted in FIG. 5 , the vent line 80 has an inverted U-shape, with a U-bend 82 being located above both the vent line connection 26 and the regulator vent 106 . The inverted U-shaped vent line 80 provides a pocket of gas in the U-bend 82 that inhibits water intrusion from the housing cavity 28 and helps prevent any water that may intrude into the vent line 80 from reaching the regulator vent 106 . In one embodiment, the height of the U-bend 82 is at least 10 inches above the vent line connection 26 .
[0022] The upper portion 36 of the housing 20 includes one more atmospheric vent openings 24 to provide a communication path for air to flow between the cavity 28 and the external surroundings of the housing 20 . When the vent line connection 26 is open, gas can flow freely from the regulator vent 106 to atmosphere via the vent line 80 , the vent line connection 26 , the cavity 28 , and the vent openings 24 . Accordingly, when the water level is below or above the bottom 34 of the housing, the vent openings 24 provide a pathway to allow air to flow through the housing cavity 28 and into or out of the vent line 80 via the vent line connection 26 .
[0023] The vent openings 24 are located above a predetermined level L on the housing 20 at which rising water causes the float 40 to seal off the vent line connection 26 . In one embodiment, four vent openings 24 are provided equally spaced apart around the periphery of the housing wall 22 . The vent openings 24 can alternatively be located in an upper end wall of the housing 20 . The vent openings 24 may each include a screen 25 to inhibit debris or contaminants from entering the housing through the vent openings 24 . Debris is undesirable because it can compromise the seal between a seal 50 at the top of the float 40 and vent line connection 26 , and can also impair the upward and downward movement of the float 40 within the housing cavity 28 . In one embodiment, a 60-mesh stainless steel screen has been used as the screen 25 .
[0024] The vent openings 24 , in combination with the screens 25 , allow for air to exit the upper portion 36 of the housing 20 as the water level rises, and also allow for both water and air to enter the upper portion 36 of the housing 20 , above the float 40 , as the water level recedes. Water flowing through the vent openings 24 and downward through the housing 20 to the water opening 62 helps the float 40 to release its seal at the vent line connection 26 as the water level recedes. In particular, although in many cases the force of gravity on the float 40 is sufficient to cause the float 40 to drop from the vent line connection 26 as the water level recedes, the soft material of the seal 50 may have a tendency to stick to sealing surfaces 56 and 58 . The action of the downwardly flowing water helps to overcome the tendency of the seal 50 to stick.
[0025] The lower portion 38 of the housing 20 is capped by a base 60 that includes at least one water opening 62 for allowing water to flow into and out of the cavity 28 from below, as the external water level rises or falls, respectively. The base 60 is removably mounted to the housing wall 22 by a conventional mechanism. The base 60 is installed to the housing wall 22 during normal operation, but can be removed for replacement and maintenance of the float 40 , and for cleaning the cavity 28 . The water opening 62 may include a screen 70 to inhibit debris or contaminants from entering the housing through the water opening 62 . In one embodiment, a 40-mesh stainless steel screen has been used as the screen 70 .
[0026] The base 60 includes a float stand 64 for maintaining the float 40 above the bottom 34 of the housing and away from the water opening 62 in the base 60 . The float stand 64 includes a plurality of legs 65 supporting one or more baffles 66 . The baffles 66 slow the flow of water into the housing cavity 28 and are effective at trapping or catching any debris that enters the water opening 62 . In the embodiment depicted in FIGS. 5 and 6 , the float stand 64 includes two baffles 66 a , 66 b offset from each other by the legs 65 in both the lateral and the vertical directions to create a tortuous path for water entering the cavity 28 from the water opening 62 . Any number of baffles 66 may be used. As shown, the baffles 66 a , 66 b each have a curved edge conforming to the shape of the housing wall 22 and a straight edge around which water can flow, but innumerable baffles shapes can be created to accomplish the desired purpose. Alternatively, larger mesh screens can be used in place of, or in combination with, baffles.
[0027] Testing was performed in an embodiment including a screen 70 across the water opening 62 in combination with a float stand 64 having two staggered baffles 66 a , 66 b , as shown. This combination of components was found to be extremely effective at trapping debris that could otherwise impair operation of the float 40 and the sealing off of the vent line connection 26 .
[0028] The float 40 is constructed to have a specific gravity of less than 1, so that it is buoyant or floatable in water. In the embodiment shown in FIG. 9 , the float 40 is hollow and includes a shell 42 enclosing a cavity 46 . In one embodiment, the float shell 42 can be made from an upper half 42 a and a lower half 42 b bonded together in a watertight seal. The float has a bottom end 44 and a top end 48 . The seal 50 is located at the top end 48 . In one embodiment, the float 40 is made from a molded polyethylene material (such as ultra high molecular weight polyethylene, UHMWPE) which is durable, abrasion resistant, and self-lubricating.
[0029] In one embodiment, the float 40 is generally cylindrical in shape, it being understood that a float 40 of another symmetric geometry, including square, hexagonal, and octagonal, could function equally well in the device 10 , including when the cavity 28 in the housing 20 is generally cylindrical, square, hexagonal, or octagonal. The location and number of float guides 30 are selected to correspond to the geometry of the float 40 and the geometry of the housing wall 22 . In non-limiting examples, three float guides 30 equally spaced around the internal circumference of the cavity 28 can guide a round or hexagonal float 40 , and four equally-spaced float guides 30 can guide a round, square, or octagonal float 40 .
[0030] The seal 50 at the top end 48 of the float 40 includes an inner seal 52 and an outer seal 54 surrounding the inner seal 52 and extending upwardly with respect to the inner seal 52 . In one embodiment, as depicted in FIG. 8 , the seal 50 is in the form of a boot that is made removable from the top end 48 of the float 40 to facilitate maintenance and replacement. In one embodiment, the seal 50 is made from a fluorosilicone material that is both durable and resilient. The flexible material of the seal 50 enables the inner seal 52 to form a positive seal and also enables the outer seal 54 to flex as the float 40 moves upward and the seal 50 begins to contact the housing 20 surrounding the vent line opening 26 .
[0031] An annular raised sealing surface 56 is located in the upper portion 36 of the housing 20 surrounding the vent line opening 26 , and an annular recessed sealing surface 58 surrounds the raised sealing surface 56 . As the float 40 rises in the cavity 28 , buoyed by water entering through the water opening 62 in the base 60 , the movement of the float 40 is unencumbered until the float 40 encounters resistance as the outer seal 54 contacts and begins to seal with the recessed sealing surface 58 . As the float 40 continues to rise slightly, the outer seal 54 is compressed until the inner seal 52 contacts and begins to seal with the raised sealing surface 56 . In operation of the device 10 , the inner seal 52 provides a leak-free seal when the float 40 is pressed up against the raised sealing surface 56 surrounding the vent line connection 26 , while the outer seal 54 helps to center the float 40 and provides a backup seal against the recessed sealing surface 58 .
[0032] When gas pressure accumulates in the vent tube 80 , the float 40 may be pushed slightly downward, lifting the inner seal 52 out of contact with the raised sealing surface 56 . In this circumstance, the outer seal 54 maintains a leak-free seal while allowing gas to escape from the vent tube 80 . One or more gas bubbles can exit the vent tube 80 through the vent line connection 26 by squeezing between the outer seal 54 and the recessed sealing surface 58 , while the outer seal 54 substantially prevents water from entering through the vent line connection 26 into the vent tube 80 . The exiting of a gas bubble relieves excess pressure above the float 40 and allows the float 40 to move upward almost instantaneously once gas pressure is relieved, such that by the time the outer seal 54 is flexing to allow a gas bubble to escape, the buoyancy of the float 40 almost immediately returns the inner seal 52 into contact with the raised sealing surface 56 .
[0033] FIGS. 1-4 depict schematics of the device 10 at various stages of operation, and FIG. 5 depicts an enlarged view of the device 10 . In FIG. 1 , the device 10 is shown in a normal, non-flooded operating state. In this state, the water level external to the housing 20 is below the bottom 34 of the housing (and is typically zero), well below the predetermined level L at which the seal 50 first begins to seal off the vent line connection 26 . The level L is indicated in the figures as the threshold external water level that will cause the float 40 to rise enough to cause the outer seal 54 to initiate a seal with the recessed sealing surface 58 . In non-flooded use of the device 10 , the float 40 is at rest on the float stand 64 of the base 60 under the force of gravity. The vent line opening 26 is open so that gas can freely flow to and from the regulator vent 106 via the vent tube 80 and into and through the cavity 28 via the vent line opening 26 and the atmospheric vent openings 24 .
[0034] In FIG. 2 , the device 10 is shown in a state in which the water level is rising but is below the level L required to make an initial seal. Because the float 40 is hollow, it is buoyant in water. The float 40 may also be made from a material having a specific gravity less than 1, making it further buoyant in water. The rising water level lifts the float 40 off the float stand 64 but is not sufficient to lift the float high enough for the seal 50 to seal off the vent line connection 26 .
[0035] In FIG. 3 , the device 10 is shown in a state in which the water level has risen to be approximately equal to the level L required to make an initial seal. At this water level, the outer seal 54 contacts the recessed sealing surface 58 to seal off the vent line connection 26 , but the inner seal 52 has not yet contacted the raised sealing surface 56 . The combination of the outer seal 54 and the recessed sealing surface 58 serves to center and align the seal 50 about the vent line connection 26 , while the float guides 30 continue to keep the float 40 centered in the cavity 28 . If gas pressure (e.g., the pressure of air and/or natural gas) increases in the vent line 80 such that gas needs to escape from the vent line 80 , the excess pressure causes the outer seal 54 to flex slightly until the gas forces its way out between the outer seal 54 and the recessed sealing surface 58 , at which point the outer seal 54 immediately returns to contact with the recessed sealing surface 58 to reestablish the seal.
[0036] In FIG. 4 , the device 10 is shown in a state in which the water level has risen to be above the level L required to make an initial seal. Such a level can include a situation in which the device 10 , including the atmospheric vent openings 24 , is completely submerged. At this water level, the float 40 has risen to compress the outer seal 54 against the recessed sealing surface 58 and to force the inner seal 52 into sealing contact with the raised sealing surface 56 . The interface between the inner seal 52 and the raised sealing surface 56 , which is backed up by the interface between the outer seal 54 and the recessed sealing surface 58 , creates a positive seal sufficient to prevent water intrusion into the vent line 80 even under completely flooded conditions when the entire device 10 is submerged in water. Indeed, as the water level rises higher, the sealing pressure between the inner seal 52 and the raised sealing surface 56 increases.
[0037] In the flooded condition, if gas pressure increases in the vent line 80 such that gas needs to escape from the vent line 80 , the gas pressure increases until it balances the buoyancy force imposed on the seal 50 by the float 40 . The inner seal 52 is forced slightly away from the raised sealing surface 56 , and then the excess pressure causes the outer seal 54 to flex slightly so that one or more gas bubbles can slip out between the outer seal 54 and the recessed sealing surface 58 . Almost immediately, the release of the excess gas pressure causes the outer seal 54 to return to contact with the recessed sealing surface 58 , reestablishing the sealing off of the vent line connection 26 , and the float 40 is buoyed upward so that the inner seal 52 reestablishes sealing contact with the raised sealing surface 56 . Consequently, no water, or at most an inconsequential amount of water, is able to get past the outer seal 54 into the space between the outer seal 54 and the inner seal 52 , or into the vent line connection 26 .
[0038] Any gas bubbles escaping into the upper portion 36 of the housing can be vented via the atmospheric vent openings 24 , even if the openings 24 are submerged. If the atmospheric vent openings 24 are somewhat below the top 32 of the housing 20 a small amount of vented gas will accumulate in the housing 20 before being released.
[0039] When the water level recedes, the device 10 continues to allow the gas regulator 100 to operate normally. In particular, when the water level decreases from higher than the level L to lower than the level L, the float 40 drops with the water level. The inner seal 52 first breaks contact with the raised sealing surface 56 and the outer seal 54 then breaks contact with the recessed sealing surface 58 , thus opening the vent line opening 26 and exposing the vent tube 80 to atmospheric pressure. As the water level continues to recede; the float 40 drops with the water level until the float 40 again rests on the float stand 64 .
[0040] An exemplary embodiment of the device 10 has been manufactured and tested for compliance with 49 C.F.R. §192, subpart H, which relates to Transportation of Natural Gas and Other Gases: Customer Meters, Service Regulators, and Service Lines. The testing was done in conformance with the procedures of ANSI B109.4-1998, 5.3.3-5.3.7 and 5.3.12, which applies to self-operated diaphragm-type natural gas service regulators.
[0041] The foregoing describes the vent line protection device in terms of embodiments foreseen by the inventors for which an enabling description was available, notwithstanding that insubstantial modifications of the device, not presently foreseen, may nonetheless represent equivalents thereto.
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A vent line protection device to protect the vent of a gas regulator from a predetermined water level, including a vertically-oriented housing having an upper portion including vent line connection and an atmospheric vent opening, and a lower portion including a water opening, the vent line connection being adapted to connect to the vent of the gas regulator, and a float disposed inside the housing and being movable in a vertical direction within the housing, an upper end of the float including a seal adapted for scaling off the vent line connection, wherein when the water level is lower than the predetermined level, gas can flow through the housing between the vent line connection and the atmospheric vent opening, and wherein when the water level is at or higher than the predetermined level, the vent line connection is scaled off by the seal of the float.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates generally to computer systems and, more particularly, to a method for interacting with a system that includes physical devices interfaced with computer software.
A user who programs systems including physical devices that interface with computer software needs to test and debug various configurations of each system. Such systems typically include one or more physical devices, e.g., switches, sensors, or actuators, that communicate with a computer or a network of communicating computers. The creation, testing, and debugging of computer software is well known to those skilled in the art, but the emerging domain of mixed virtual/real objects is not as well studied.
One particular problem with systems including physical devices that interface with computer software is that the physical devices can be inconvenient to access. For example, the system may include a large number of physical devices scattered throughout a building. This makes the testing and debugging of various configurations of the system awkward and time consuming.
One technique that facilitates working with physical devices is to represent them on the screen as graphical user interface (GUI) elements. Thus, even if the physical devices are remote from the user, a physical device's virtual proxy can be seen on the screen. The use of virtual proxies for physical, i.e., real, devices poses a question regarding locus of control. If the virtual proxy is used to test the physical device, then the state of the virtual proxy no longer reflects the state of the physical device. Especially when the system includes complex physical devices that have multi-dimensional states, the use of a virtual proxy that allows on-screen interaction can cause the user to become quite confused as to the state of the physical device.
One approach to resolve the problem of representing the state of the physical device while enabling virtual interaction with the virtual proxy is to provide two on-screen GUI elements. The first GUI element is a literal proxy that does not allow on-screen interaction; the literal proxy always represents the state of the physical device. The second GUI element is a purely simulated GUI element that allows only on-screen interaction. The second GUI element starts out with a copy of the state of the physical device, but diverges from that state once the user starts to interact with it. In accordance with this approach, the user can use the second GUI element to test and debug the system, and, once satisfied, can disconnect the second GUI element and connect to the first GUI element to get the physical device into the system.
The use of two GUI elements is often satisfactory, but suffers from a number of disadvantages, especially when used in conjunction with more complex systems. First, it requires at least several GUI gestures to replace one GUI element with the other GUI element. This is time consuming and can become quite tedious if the number of connections to and from these GUI elements is large. The process of connecting and disconnecting the GUI elements also introduces the potential for confusion regarding the proper connections to be made. Second, the use of two GUI elements to represent a physical device requires more on-screen real estate. Third, from an aesthetic standpoint, the use of two GUI elements to represent a physical device prevents the on-screen representation of the physical device from looking like the actual physical device.
In view of the foregoing, there is a need for a method for interacting with a system that includes physical devices interfaced with computer software that enables the state of a physical device to be represented while allowing on-screen interaction with the proxy of the physical device.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Broadly speaking, the present invention fills this need by providing, among other things, a dual-mode graphical user interface element and accompanying methodology that enables a single object to represent both a virtual device and a physical device.
In accordance with one aspect of the present invention, a method for interacting with a system that includes physical devices that are interfaced with computer software is provided. In this method, a graphical representation of a physical device that can be graphically interconnected with a graphical representation of a software module is generated. The graphical representation of the physical device is capable of being represented as either a graphical copy mode representation or a graphical ghost mode representation. On-screen interaction with functionality of the physical device is enabled when the graphical representation of the physical device is in the graphical copy mode representation. A true physical state of the physical device is tracked when the graphical representation of the physical device is in the graphical ghost mode representation. The tracking of the true physical state of the physical device disables on-screen interaction with functionality of the physical device.
In one embodiment, the method for interacting with a system that includes physical devices that are interfaced with computer software further includes switching the graphical representation of the physical device between the graphical copy mode representation and the graphical ghost mode representation based on a user interaction. In one embodiment, the user interaction is provided using a pull down menu, a popup menu, or a mouse click.
In one embodiment, the graphical representation of the physical device in the graphical copy mode representation is rendered in manner that is different from the manner in which the graphical representation of the physical device in the graphical ghost mode representation is rendered. In one embodiment, the graphical representation of the physical device in the graphical copy mode representation is rendered as opaque and the graphical representation of the physical device in the graphical ghost mode representation is rendered as translucent.
In one embodiment, the method for interacting with a system that includes physical devices that are interfaced with computer software further includes defining a graphical representation of a software module. In one embodiment, the software module provides functional processing of an input or inputs from the graphical representation of the physical device.
In accordance with another aspect of the present invention, a dual-mode graphical user interface element for interfacing with a physical device is provided. The dual-mode graphical user interface element includes a graphical copy mode representation of a physical device that enables on-screen interaction with functionality of the physical device, and a graphical ghost mode representation of the physical device that tracks a true physical state of the physical device. The tracking of the true physical state of the physical device disables on-screen interaction with functionality of the physical device.
In one embodiment, the dual-mode graphical user interface element for interfacing with a physical device is switched between the graphical copy mode representation of the physical device and the graphical ghost mode representation of the physical device based on a user interaction. In one embodiment, the user interaction is provided using a pull down menu, a popup menu, or a mouse click.
In one embodiment, the graphical copy mode representation of the physical device is rendered in a manner that is different from the manner in which the graphical ghost mode representation of the physical device is rendered. In one embodiment, the graphical copy mode representation of the physical device is rendered as opaque and the graphical ghost mode representation of the physical device is rendered as translucent. In one embodiment, the graphical copy mode representation of the physical device includes a graphical representation of the true state of the physical device.
In accordance with a further aspect of the present invention, a computer readable medium containing program instructions for interacting with a system that includes physical devices that are interfaced with computer software is provided. The computer readable medium includes program instructions for generating a graphical representation of a physical device that can be graphically interconnected with a graphical representation of a software module, with the graphical representation of the physical device capable of being represented as either a graphical copy mode representation or a graphical ghost mode representation. The computer readable medium also includes program instructions for enabling on-screen interaction with functionality of the physical device when the graphical representation of the physical device is in the graphical copy mode representation. The computer readable medium further includes program instructions for tracking a true physical state of the physical device when the graphical representation of the physical device is in the graphical ghost mode representation, wherein the tracking of the true physical state of the physical device disables on-screen interaction with functionality of the physical device.
In accordance with a still further aspect of the present invention, a computer readable medium containing program instructions for providing a dual-mode graphical user interface element for interfacing with a physical device is provided. The computer readable medium includes program instructions for providing a graphical copy mode representation of a physical device that enables on-screen interaction with functionality of the physical device. The computer readable medium also includes program instructions for providing a graphical ghost mode representation of the physical device that tracks a true physical state of the physical device, wherein the tracking of the true physical state of the physical device disables on-screen interaction with functionality of the physical device.
It is to be understood that the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are exemplary and explanatory only and are not restrictive of the invention, as claimed.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The accompanying drawings, which are incorporated in and constitute part of this specification, illustrate exemplary embodiments of the invention and together with the description serve to explain the principles of the invention.
FIG. 1 is a screen shot of a system that includes virtual devices that represent physical devices that interface with computer software in accordance with one embodiment of the invention.
FIGS. 2A-2C are partial screen shots that illustrate the dual-mode nature of graphical representation 102 of the volume control knob shown in FIG. 1 in accordance with one embodiment of the invention.
FIG. 3 is block diagram that illustrates the functions performed when an object used to represent a virtual device and a physical device needs to be updated in accordance with one embodiment of the invention.
FIG. 4 is a block diagram that illustrates the functions performed in response to a user interface event in accordance with one embodiment of the invention.
FIG. 5 is a block diagram that illustrates the functions performed to keep an object represented in the graphical ghost mode updated when changes to the physical device occur, in accordance with one embodiment of the invention.
FIG. 6 is a partial screen shot of graphical representation 102 of the volume control knob shown in FIG. 1 in which the state of the physical device is shown in the graphical copy mode, in accordance with one embodiment of the invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
Several exemplary embodiments of the invention will now be described in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings.
FIG. 1 is a screen shot of a system that includes virtual devices that represent physical devices that interface with computer software in accordance with one embodiment of the invention. As shown in FIG. 1 , system 100 includes a dual-mode graphical representation 102 , which depicts a real volume control knob that interfaces with the system. Additional details regarding the dual-mode nature of the graphical representation 102 of the knob will be explained below. The graphical representation 102 of the knob is connected to software component 104 , which operates on the output from the knob. In this example, software component 104 allows the user to fine tune the sensitivity of the volume control knob. The connection between the graphical representation 102 of the knob and software component 104 is achieved using a virtual wire 106 - 1 , which extends from output connector 102 a of the graphical representation 102 of the knob 102 to input connector 104 a of software component 104 . Software component 104 is connected to virtual radio 108 by virtual wire 106 - 2 , which extends from output connector 104 b of software component 104 to one of the input connectors 108 a of virtual radio 108 . The output of virtual radio 108 drives a real speaker, which interfaces with system 100 and is represented on the screen as graphical representation 110 . Virtual radio 108 is connected to graphical representation 110 of the speaker by virtual wire 106 - 3 , which extends from output connector 108 b of virtual radio 108 to input connector 110 a of graphical representation 110 of the speaker.
FIGS. 2A-2C are partial screen shots that illustrate the dual-mode nature of graphical representation 102 of the volume control knob shown in FIG. 1 in accordance with one embodiment of the invention. As shown in FIG. 2A , the graphical representation 102 of the volume control knob is in the graphical copy mode. In this mode, on-screen interaction with functionality of the physical device is enabled. In this example, the setting of the volume control knob has been changed (compare the position of the knob shown in FIG. 1 with that shown in FIG. 2A ). As shown in FIG. 2B , the graphical representation 102 ′ of the volume control knob is in the graphical ghost mode. In this mode, the state of the physical device is tracked and on-screen interaction with functionality of the physical device is disabled. The mode switch can be caused by any suitable user interaction. In one embodiment, the user interaction is a special mouse click, e.g., a right mouse click or a middle mouse click, on the graphical representation of the physical device. Alternatively, and by way of further non-limiting example, the user interaction can be provided using a pull down menu or a pop up menu. As shown in FIG. 2C , the graphical representation 102 of the volume control knob is back in the graphical copy mode. When the user switches from the graphical ghost mode to the graphical copy mode, the state of the physical device is copied to the graphical representation 102 of the volume control knob (note that the position of the knob shown in FIG. 2B is the same as that shown in FIG. 2C ). Changes to the physical device are not tracked in graphical copy mode in the embodiment illustrated in FIGS. 2A-2C (an alternative embodiment in which changes to the physical device are tracked in graphical copy mode is described below with reference to FIG. 6 ). Thus, if the state of the physical device changes or the user makes on-screen changes to the graphical representation of the physical device, then the graphical copy mode representation of the physical device will not reflect the true state of the physical device.
To enable the user to distinguish between the graphical copy mode representation of the physical device and the graphical ghost mode representation of the physical device, the manner in which the graphical copy mode representation is rendered should be different from the manner in which the graphical ghost mode representation is rendered. As shown in FIGS. 1 , 2 A, and 2 C, the graphical representation 102 of the volume control knob is rendered as opaque in the graphical copy mode. As shown in FIG. 2B , the graphical representation 102 ′ of the volume control knob is rendered as translucent in the graphical ghost mode. The translucent rendering of the graphical ghost mode representation shown in FIG. 2B is exemplary, and it will be apparent to those skilled in the art that any suitable rendering that is different than that used for the graphical copy mode representation may be used for the graphical ghost mode representation. By way of non-limiting example, the graphical ghost mode representation may be rendered different from the graphical copy mode representation by using a different color, by providing shading, by using an outline representation, or by providing a blinking effect.
FIG. 3 is block diagram 200 that illustrates the functions performed when an object used to represent a virtual device and a physical device needs to be updated in accordance with one embodiment of the invention. In block 202 , a repaint call manager issues a call for a repaint operation. In block 204 , a display method receives the call from the repaint call manager. In block 206 , a determination is made as to whether the object to be updated is in the graphical ghost mode. If the object to be updated is not in the graphical ghost mode, then the object is drawn in graphical copy mode as shown in block 208 , and control is returned to the controlling application. If the object to be updated is in the graphical ghost mode, then the state of the physical device is obtained in block 210 . The state of the physical device may be obtained by an appropriate method that communicates with the physical device. Alternatively, the state of the physical device may be cached, in which case it would not be necessary to invoke the method that communicates with the physical device. Once the state of the physical device is obtained, the object is drawn in graphical ghost mode as shown in block 212 , and control is returned to the controlling application. The controlling application may be the application that enables the graphical interaction with the system, and such controlling application would use the graphical copy/ghost embodiments of the present invention.
FIG. 4 is a block diagram 300 that illustrates the functions performed in response to a user interface event in accordance with one embodiment of the invention. In block 302 , a call is issued by, e.g., a window manager, in response to a user interface event (e). In block 304 , the call is received by a method that will handle the user interface event (e). In block 306 , a determination is made as to whether event (e)'s type calls for ghost mode to be toggled. If event (e)'s type does not call for ghost mode to be toggled, then, as shown in block 308 , a determination is made as to whether event (e)'s type operates the physical device. If event (e)'s type does not operate the physical device, then normal event handling occurs on event (e) as shown in block 310 . Examples of event types that do not operate the physical device include dragging, moving, and resizing the object on the screen. The normal event handling on event (e) will typically end with the object being repainted. Once the normal event handling on event (e) has ended, control is returned to the controlling application. On the other hand, if it determined in block 308 that event (e)'s type operates the physical device, then a determination is made in block 312 as to whether the object representing the physical device is in the graphical ghost mode. If the object representing the physical device is not in the graphical ghost mode, then normal event handling occurs on event (e) as shown in block 310 . On the other hand, if it is determined in block 312 that the object representing the physical device is in the graphical ghost mode, then the functional operation calling for operation of the physical device is ignored, and control is returned to the controlling application. If desired, the user may be signaled, e.g., with a beep, when an attempt to operate the physical device is made while the object representing the physical device is in the graphical ghost mode.
Returning to block 306 , if it is determined that event (e)'s type calls for ghost mode to be toggled, then, in block 314 , the ghost mode variable is made equal to the opposite of what it was, i.e., true is changed to false, and false is changed to true. In block 316 , the object is repainted in the new mode. In other word, if the object was in the graphical copy mode, then the object is repainted in the graphical ghost mode, and vice versa. The repaint operation may be performed by executing the functions shown in FIG. 3 . Once the object is repainted in block 316 , control is returned to the controlling application.
FIG. 5 is a block diagram 400 that illustrates the functions performed to keep an object represented in the graphical ghost mode updated when changes to the physical device occur, in accordance with one embodiment of the invention. In block 402 , a physical device event generator detects that a physical device has been changed and issues a call in response thereto. In block 404 , a device changed method receives the call from the physical device generator. In block 406 , a determination is made as to whether the object that represents the physical device is in the graphical ghost mode. If it is determined that the object that represents the physical device is not in the graphical ghost mode, then the device changed method is not responsible for updating the object (because in this exemplary embodiment the state of the physical device is not shown when the object is in the graphical copy mode), and control is returned to the controlling application. On the other hand, if it is determined that the object is in the graphical ghost mode, then the object is repainted as shown in block 408 . The repaint operation may be performed by executing the functions shown in FIG. 3 . Once the object is repainted in block 408 , control is returned to the controlling application.
In the exemplary embodiments described above and shown in FIGS. 1-5 , the state of the physical device is not shown when the object representing the physical device is in the graphical copy mode. If desired, however, the state of the physical device can always be shown on the object, even when the object is represented in the graphical copy mode. FIG. 6 is a partial screen shot of graphical representation 102 of the volume control knob shown in FIG. 1 in which the state of the physical device is shown in the graphical copy mode, in accordance with one embodiment of the invention. As shown in FIG. 6 , the state of the physical device is indicated by the dotted line indicated by reference number 112 . In one embodiment, the dotted line is rendered as a grayed out representation to further distinguish the state of the physical device from the state shown in the graphical copy mode. It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that any rendering scheme that enables the state of the physical device to be distinguished from the state shown in the graphical copy mode may be used. To implement the inclusion of the state of the physical device in both modes, the functions set forth in the block diagrams shown in FIGS. 3-5 would have to be adjusted to account for the inclusion of the state of the physical device when the object is represented in the graphical copy mode. Upon reviewing this disclosure, those skilled in the art would be capable of adjusting the functions set forth in the block diagrams shown in FIGS. 3-5 so that the state of the physical device is shown at all times, i.e., both when the object is represented in the graphical ghost mode and also when the object is represented in the graphical copy mode.
The method for interacting with a system that includes physical devices interfaced with computer software has been described herein in the context of a relatively simple example in which the physical devices include a volume control knob and a speaker. It will be apparent to those skilled in the art that the method is applicable to any system that includes physical devices interfaced with computer software. By way of non-limiting example, the physical devices may be switches (e.g., light switches), controls to electrical or mechanical devices, sensors (e.g., temperature sensors used in heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems), or actuators that trigger on/off states.
Those skilled in the art will recognize that the order in which the method operations are performed may be varied from that described herein, e.g., by rearranging the order in which the method operations are performed or by performing some of the method operations in parallel. In addition, the present invention may be practiced with other computer system configurations including hand-held devices, microprocessor systems, microprocessor-based or programmable consumer electronics, minicomputers, mainframe computers, and the like.
With the embodiments described herein in mind, it should be understood that the present invention may employ various computer-implemented operations involving data stored in computer systems. These operations are those requiring physical manipulation of physical quantities. These quantities usually, but not necessarily, take the form of electrical or magnetic signals capable of being stored, transferred, combined, compared, and otherwise manipulated. Further, the manipulations performed are often referred to using terms such as producing, identifying, determining, or comparing.
Any of the operations described herein that form part of the present invention are useful machine operations. The invention also relates to a device or an apparatus for performing these operations. The apparatus may be specially constructed for the required purposes, or it may be a general purpose computer selectively activated or configured by a computer program stored in the computer. In particular, various general purpose machines may be used with computer programs written in accordance with the teachings herein, or it may be more convenient to construct a more specialized apparatus to perform the required operations.
The present invention also can be embodied as computer readable code on a computer readable medium. The computer readable medium may be any data storage device that can store data which can be thereafter be read by a computer system. Examples of the computer readable medium include hard drives, network attached storage (NAS), read-only memory, random access memory, CD-ROMs, CD-Rs, CD-RWs, magnetic tapes, and other optical and non-optical data storage devices. The computer readable medium also can be distributed over network coupled computer systems so that the computer readable code is stored and executed in a distributed fashion.
In summary, the present invention provides a method for interacting with a system that includes physical devices interfaced with computer software. The invention has been described herein in terms of several exemplary embodiments. Other embodiments of the invention will be apparent to those skilled in the art from consideration of the specification and practice of the invention. The embodiments and preferred features described above should be considered exemplary, with the invention being defined by the appended claims and equivalents thereof.
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In a method for interacting with a system that includes physical devices that are interfaced with computer software, a graphical representation of a physical device that can be graphically interconnected with a graphical representation of a software module is generated. The graphical representation of the physical device is capable of being represented as either a graphical copy mode representation or a graphical ghost mode representation. On-screen interaction with functionality of the physical device is enabled when the graphical representation of the physical device is in the graphical copy mode representation. A true physical state of the physical device is tracked when the graphical representation of the physical device is in the graphical ghost mode representation. The tracking of the true physical state of the physical device disables on-screen interaction with functionality of the physical device. A dual-mode graphical user interface element for interfacing with a physical device also is described.
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CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
This application is a continuation-in-part of U.S. patent Ser. No. 11/372,947, titled “Breathable Fire Hydrant Rod,” filed Mar. 9, 2006, which is a continuation-in-part of U.S. Pat. No. 7,055,544, titled “Fire Hydrant With Second Valve,” filed Nov. 23, 2004, which is a continuation-in-part of U.S. Pat. No. 6,868,860, titled “Fire Hydrant With Second Valve,” filed Dec. 4, 2002, the entire contents of each of which are hereby incorporated by this reference.
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
Various aspects and embodiments of the present invention relate to retrofitting fire hydrants with a replacement hydrant body having additional valves in order to render more difficult the task of introducing toxins into a water supply.
BACKGROUND
Conventional fire hydrants offer access to a municipal water supply in a manner in which operatives with ill intent may appreciate. Briefly, conventional fire hydrants include at least one nozzle for coupling to a fire hose. A threaded cap closes off the nozzle when the hydrant is not in use. The hydrant also includes a hydrant valve which controls flow of water from the water supply through the hydrant, through the nozzle, and into the fire hose.
Conventionally, the barrel of the hydrant between the nozzle and the hydrant valve, which is in the lower portion of the hydrant, accommodates several gallons of fluid or solids. Accordingly, it is possible to unscrew a nozzle cap, introduce gallons of toxin, reattach the nozzle cap, and open the hydrant valve to allow the toxins to communicate with and flow, by gravity and perhaps at least to some extent by Bernoulli's principle, into the municipal water supply, since water pressure from the water supply can not force the toxins back out of the hydrant because the nozzle cap is attached.
An example of a system and method for preventing toxins from being introduced to a water supply through a hydrant is described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,868,860, entitled “Fire Hydrant With Second Valve,” the entire contents of which are hereby incorporated by this reference. In some examples described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,868,860, a valve structure is introduced between the nozzle and the primary valve that makes it more difficult or impossible to introduce toxins into a water supply through a fire hydrant. The valve structure prevents or substantially prevents the flow of water through the hydrant upon certain conditions and closes off portions of the hydrant barrel when a nozzle is open but the hydrant valve is closed. Generally, the valve structure can include a seat, a restriction member, and a biasing structure.
Retrofitting fire hydrants with secondary valves may be accomplished by removing the hydrant barrel, inserting the secondary valve and affixing the seat to the hydrant body with an adhesive or mechanical means, such as a screw. While this is an effective method for installing the secondary valve, another method is needed to retrofit a fire hydrant with the secondary valve. For example, retrofitting hydrants that include an off-centered actuator rod or a different shaped barrel, such as triangular or cone can be relatively difficult and, in some cases, impossible.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
One or more various structures and embodiments according to the present invention may be utilized to retrofit a fire hydrant with a replacement hydrant body containing an additional valve in order to provide a retrofitting process capable of being applied to a wide range of different hydrant configurations. A structure such as the replacement hydrant body may allow quick installation of an additional valve in a fire hydrant to close off portions of the hydrant barrel when the hydrant valve is closed to prevent the introduction of toxins into a lower barrel portion.
According to some embodiments of the present invention, a replacement hydrant body can be introduced between the cap structure and the primary valve during installation. For example, the hydrant body may be detached from the cap structure and a lower portion of the hydrant, such as at a breakaway structure or primary valve, and a replacement hydrant body, containing a primary valve, can be installed.
According to various aspects and embodiments of the present invention, the replacement hydrant body may include a secondary valve, a weeping valve, and a breathable stem. The secondary valve may include valve seat, a restriction member, and a biasing structure. During installation of a replacement hydrant body, the hydrant body may be removed and the replacement body, containing the secondary valve, installed in its place. In some embodiments of the present invention, the replacement body may include a globe containing the secondary valve. In other embodiments, the replacement body does not include a globe.
It is an object of some embodiments of the present invention to provide a replacement structure having a secondary valve and adapted to be retrofitted into existing fire hydrants in order to reduce the possibility of toxins being introduced into a water supply and provide a quick and efficient method to retrofit existing hydrants with a secondary valve.
It is an additional object of some embodiments of the present invention to provide a replacement structure having a secondary valve and adapted to be quickly installed into a fire hydrant.
It is an additional object of some embodiments of the present invention to provide more efficient drainage of liquids inside the hydrant barrel in order to reduce the possibility of hydrant freezing.
It is an additional object of some embodiments of the present invention to provide a secondary valve structure capable of restricting the flow of water in the hydrant barrel upon certain conditions.
Other objects, features, and advantages of various embodiments of the present invention will become apparent with respect to the remainder of this document.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is a cross-sectional view of a conventional fire hydrant.
FIG. 2 shows toxins being introduced into the hydrant of FIG. 1 .
FIG. 3 shows a nozzle cap replaced on the hydrant of FIG. 1 after toxins have been introduced.
FIG. 4 shows opening of the hydrant valve of the hydrant of FIG. 1 after toxins have been introduced and the nozzle cap replaced.
FIG. 5 shows toxins being introduced into a water supply through the hydrant of FIG. 1 .
FIG. 6 is a cross-sectional view of a hydrant that has been retrofitted with a secondary valve according to one embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 7 shows a hydrant body being detached in a retrofit process according to one embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 8 shows a replacement hydrant body being installed according to one embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 9 shows a hydrant with an installed replacement hydrant body according to one embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 10 shows the hydrant of FIG. 9 in normal operation.
FIG. 11 shows another embodiment of replacing a portion of the hydrant body according to one embodiment of the present invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
FIG. 1 shows a conventional fire hydrant 10 . Hydrant 10 typically includes a hydrant body 11 which consists of a substantially vertical barrel. Water may flow through barrel 12 from a water main 16 to a fire hose given certain circumstances as discussed generally below. At one end of the barrel 12 is a primary hydrant valve 18 , which controllably interrupts fluid flow between the water supply 16 and the barrel 12 . At the upper end of the barrel 12 may be found a cap structure 20 which can include, for instance, a housing cover 22 and an operating nut 24 which rotates within the housing cover 22 . The operating nut 24 includes threads, which receive threads on an actuator rod 26 , which in turn connects to the primary hydrant valve 18 . Not only does the cap structure 20 seal the top portion of the barrel 12 to prevent the flow of water, but operating nut 24 may be used by fire fighters or others to open the primary hydrant valve 18 via actuator rod 26 . Hydrant 10 includes at least one nozzle 28 and can include more nozzles. Each nozzle may be closed with a cap such as threaded cap 30 . The hydrant may also include breakaway structure such as a traffic feature 32 .
In normal operation, the hydrant 10 may be employed as follows to help fight fires, provide refreshing summer breaks for overheated urban citizens and/or their offspring, participants in road races, or for other purposes or beneficiaries. First, a hose (not shown) may be connected to nozzle 28 , usually in a threaded fashion after the cap 30 has been removed. Then, after the hose is connected, operating nut 24 may be rotated with a wrench, or other tool, to cause actuator rod 26 to push down on relevant portions of primary hydrant valve 18 in order to open primary hydrant valve 18 . When the primary valve 18 opens, water flows from the water supply 16 through primary hydrant valve 18 and barrel 12 , out nozzle 28 into the hose and accordingly toward its desired application or destination.
However, hydrant 10 may also be the subject of attention from miscreants who have the temerity to attempt to introduce toxins into a public water supply. Such concerns have heightened since the date known as “9-11” (Sep. 11, 2001) when terrorists activities became the focus of heightened concern. Accordingly, the need for structures to prevent such attempts became more apparent after that bellweather event, even if they were foreseen by the inventor named in this document beforehand. More particularly, a person with ill design can attempt to introduce toxins into a water supply 16 taking advantage of the fact that the barrel 12 of a hydrant 10 between the nozzle 28 and the primary hydrant valve 18 can accommodate several gallons of liquid or solid material and, for some toxins, as little as 0.05 quart can detrimentally affect a water supply. Accordingly, as shown in FIGS. 2-5 , a malefactor can unscrew the nozzle cap 30 as shown in FIG. 1 , introduce toxins as shown in FIG. 2 , screw the nozzle cap 30 back on as shown in FIG. 3 , and open the primary hydrant valve 18 as shown in FIG. 4 . When the nozzle 28 or all nozzles are closed off and the primary valve 18 opened, the liquid or solid toxins in the barrel 12 can communicate with liquid in the water supply 16 in order to foul the water supply 16 , as shown in FIG. 5 , to the potential detriment of all those whose facilities are in communication with such water supply 16 .
A physical structure may be introduced between nozzle 28 and primary hydrant valve 18 that allows water or other fluid to flow only when nozzle 28 and primary hydrant valve 18 are open. Alternatively, or in combination, such structure may close off portions of the barrel 12 below the nozzle 28 in order to deprive miscreants of at least a portion, if not all, of the space available into which to load toxins before closing the nozzle 28 and opening the valve 18 .
An example of such a physical structure is shown in FIG. 6 as a secondary valve 102 contained in hydrant 100 . The hydrant 100 may be an existing hydrant that has been retrofitted to include a replacement hydrant barrel portion 118 that includes a secondary valve 102 according to various embodiments of the present invention. The replacement hydrant barrel portion 118 may also include a enlarged diameter portion 104 . The enlarged diameter portion 104 can accommodate or otherwise contain the secondary valve 102 . The secondary valve 102 may include a seat 106 , a restriction member 108 and a biasing structure 110 . The seat 106 can be the lower portion of the enlarged diameter portion 104 or a separate structure (not shown) attached to a hydrant barrel 112 . The biasing structure 110 is adapted to apply a force on restriction member 108 to form a seal with the seat 106 and at least one gasket 114 to prevent liquids or solids from reaching a lower portion of the hydrant 116 below the secondary valve 102 . Examples of gasket 114 include a quad ring and an O-ring.
Secondary valve 102 may preferably be any shape to correspond generally to the inside surfaces of the hydrant 100 . For example, the secondary valve 102 may be disc-shaped, rectangle, square, or any size and shape in order to cooperate with the seat 106 to obstruct the flow of water. The biasing structure 110 can be disposed to bias the restriction member 108 against gasket 114 and/or seat 106 . Biasing structure 110 may include any of the following, among others: any resilient member such as, for instance, a spring, any form of resilient material shaped or formed as desired, and/or a weight applied to restriction member 108 for biasing via gravity. A restriction platform 111 may be included and is adapted to cooperate with biasing structure 110 to bias the restriction member 108 against seat 106 to close off communication between portions of the hydrant 100 above secondary valve 102 and portions below secondary valve 102 .
The hydrant 100 also includes the primary valve 18 to controllably allow water to flow from the water supply 16 via actuator rod 26 and operating nut 24 and the cap structure 20 to close off an end of a hydrant 100 . When the primary valve 18 is opened, the secondary valve 102 can also open, either from water pressure from water supply 16 or by moving with the actuator rod 26 .
In one embodiment of the present invention, the hydrant 100 in FIG. 6 has been retrofitted with the secondary valve 102 by installing the replacement hydrant body 118 that is a portion of the hydrant 100 . The replacement hydrant body 118 may include the secondary valve 100 disposed in the enlarged diameter portion 104 and a replacement nozzle 120 and replacement nozzle cap 122 . In some embodiments, the original nozzle may be reattached to the replacement hydrant body 118 instead of include the replacement nozzle 120 . In some embodiments, the original nozzle cap may be reattached to the replacement hydrant body 118 instead of including the replacement nozzle cap 122 . The replacement hydrant body 118 , as described in more detail below, may be installed by detaching the original or existing hydrant body and replacing it with the replacement hydrant body 118 .
A retrofitting process according to one embodiment of the present invention is shown in FIGS. 7-10 . The process may begin with an existing hydrant 200 as described above with reference to FIGS. 1-5 . The existing fire hydrant 200 , shown in FIG. 7 , can include a hydrant body 202 that is connected to a cap structure 204 and a breakaway structure, such as traffic feature 206 . The hydrant body 202 may include one or more nozzles, such as nozzle 206 . The hydrant body 202 may be essentially hollow and allow at least a portion of an actuator rod 210 to traverse at least a portion of the hollow area of the hydrant body 202 . The actuator rod 210 may have a first end 212 that is connected to the cap structure 204 and a second end 214 that is connected to a primary valve 216 . A portion of the actuator rod 210 may include a detachable portion 218 at the traffic feature 206 , such that the actuator rod 210 can include a first portion 220 above the traffic feature 206 and a second portion 222 below the traffic feature. In some embodiments, actuator rod 210 may be located essentially in the center of hydrant body 202 . In other embodiments, actuator rod 210 may be located close to, or essentially adjacent to,
FIG. 7 shows one embodiment of a hydrant body 202 being detached from the remaining portions of the hydrant 200 in preparation for installing a replacement hydrant body with a secondary valve. The hydrant body 202 can be detached from the cap structure 204 , such as by using a tool to remove bolts 224 or by otherwise disengaging any structure that connects the hydrant body 202 to the cap structure 204 . Similarly, the hydrant body 202 can be detached from the traffic feature 206 , using a tool to remove bolts 226 or other structure that is connecting the hydrant body 202 to the remaining portions of the hydrant 200 .
In some embodiments, the actuator rod first portion 220 may be disconnected from the actuator rod second portion 222 to detach the cap structure 204 from the rest of the hydrant 200 . Additionally or alternatively, the actuator rod 210 , in some embodiments, may be disconnected from the cap structure 204 . The actuator rod 210 can be removed from the hydrant during some retrofitting processes and a replacement actuator rod can be provided in its place.
After detaching the hydrant body 202 , a replacement hydrant body may be provided, such as replacement hydrant body 240 shown in FIG. 8 . The replacement hydrant body 240 includes a secondary valve 242 and, in some embodiments, may include a replacement nozzle 244 , a replacement nozzle cap 246 , and an enlarged diameter structure 248 . The enlarged diameter structure 248 can contain the secondary valve 242 . In a replacement hydrant body that does not include an enlarged diameter structure, portions of the secondary valve 242 may be affixed to an inner wall of the replacement hydrant body.
The replacement hydrant body 240 may be attached to the remaining portions of the hydrant 200 by using a tool, or otherwise, to connect the cap structure 204 and traffic feature 206 to the replacement hydrant body 240 . In some embodiments, the actuator rod first portion 220 may be reconnected to the actuator rod second portion 222 and/or the actuator rod 210 may be reconnected to the cap structure 204 . After connecting the replacement hydrant body 240 , an assembled hydrant, as shown in FIG. 9 , may be formed.
The replacement hydrant body 240 , according to some embodiments, may optionally include a check valve 250 above the secondary valve 242 , and a pump-out valve 252 below the secondary valve 242 . After using hydrant 200 via normal operation, some water may become trapped within the hydrant 200 above the secondary valve 242 . In some climates where hydrants are used, water that remains in those hydrants can, over time, damage the hydrant by freezing or evaporating creating pressure on the internal hydrant components. The check valve 250 can be optionally included in replacement hydrant body 240 to allow water that may remain in the hydrant 200 after use to drain out of the portion of the hydrant 200 above the secondary valve 242 . Check valves according to some embodiments of the invention may be conventional check valves that allow fluids to flow one way, such as out of the hydrant 200 , but prevent fluids or other materials from flowing other ways, such as from outside of the hydrant 200 .
Hydrant 200 may also include a weep hole 254 located near a primary valve 216 to allow fluids trapped in hydrant 200 below the secondary valve 242 and above the primary valve 216 to exit the hydrant. As stated above, water remaining in hydrants may damage internal hydrant components due to changing form after exposure to certain temperatures and/or pressures. The weep hole 254 allows the water to be released from the hydrant and prevents, or substantially diminishes, the possibility of water remaining in the hydrant 200 after use.
The weep hole 254 , however, must be properly maintained to allow it to properly release water remaining in the hydrant 200 after use. In some applications of hydrant 200 , persons responsible for maintaining the hydrant may fail to ensure the weep hole 254 is functioning properly. For example, the weep hole 254 may become plugged or otherwise blocked, thereby preventing water from leaving the hydrant via weep hole 254 . Previous methods to combat a plugged weep hole included inserting a hose through a hydrant nozzle to pump the water out or inserting anti-freeze or some other chemical into the hydrant after use to prevent or reduce liquids freezing in the hydrant. Such methods, however, may unknowingly introduce toxins into the water supply or otherwise contaminant the water supply through the hydrant. Replacement hydrant bodies, such as replacement hydrant body 240 , may include the pump-out valve 252 to facilitate removal of water that may become trapped in the area of the in hydrant 200 below the secondary valve 242 and above the primary valve 216 to exit the hydrant, even if the weep hole 254 fails to function properly. The pump-out valve 252 may be a check valve that can pump water out of the area of the hydrant 200 below the secondary valve 242 and above the primary valve 216 and not require the insertion of hoses or chemicals to prevent water remaining in the hydrant 200 after use.
In some embodiments of the present invention, a breathable stem (not shown) may be included with the replacement hydrant body 240 . The breathable stem may allow air from the area above the secondary valve 242 to reach the portion of the hydrant 200 below the secondary valve 242 . The breathable stem may facilitate water removal via the weep hole 254 or pump-out valve 252 by allowing air to reach the area of the hydrant below the secondary valve and decrease a likelihood that a vacuum might form in that area. The breathable stem can also include a check valve to prevent fluids or solids from flowing toward the primary valve 216 .
After installation, the hydrant 200 includes the secondary valve 242 to prevent toxins from being introduced into the water supply through the hydrant 200 . The hydrant 200 can resume normal operation, as shown in FIG. 10 . The replacement nozzle cap 246 is removed and an operating nut 258 is rotated causing the actuator rod 204 to open the primary valve 216 and secondary valve 242 and allowing water from the water supply 16 to exit the hydrant 200 through replacement nozzle 244 .
Replacement hydrant bodies according to various embodiments of the present invention may be any sized or shaped structure adapted to replace at least a portion of an existing hydrant and contain a secondary valve. For example, some replacement hydrant bodies may not include a hydrant nozzle and only replace a portion of the hydrant below the nozzle and above the primary valve. Other replacement hydrant bodies may be configured to replace the entire hydrant structure between a hydrant cap structure and a water supply conduit. FIG. 11 shows one embodiment of a hydrant 300 with a replacement hydrant body 302 that includes a secondary valve 304 , a replacement nozzle 306 , and a breakaway structure 308 . The replacement hydrant body 302 is adapted to be installed between a cap structure 310 and water supply conduit 312 . For example, and as shown in FIG. 11 , a hydrant body extending between the cap structure 310 and the water supply conduit 312 has been removed and the replacement hydrant body 302 is about to be connected to the cap structure 310 and water supply conduit 312 . The replacement hydrant body 302 may be connected to the cap structure 310 and water supply conduit 312 using bolts or other attachment structure.
Any desired physical structure may be employed in order to provide a replacement hydrant portion with a structure to preclude introduction of undesired materials into fire hydrants. Components of embodiments according to the present invention are preferably durable materials but may be of any desired material. It is conventional for many components of fire hydrants to be cast iron, bronze, and at least some or all of metallic components of structures according to various embodiments of the present invention may be formed of bronze or other conventional or even unconventional materials. For example, in some embodiments, at least some of the components, such as the replacement hydrant body, secondary valve and/or the seat, may be formed from iron and dipped in, plated, or coated with a liquid material, such as rubber, plastic, or metal such as nickel. Alternatively, in some embodiments, iron components may be encapsulated in SBR rubber or powder coated. Such processes may protect the iron components from corrosion or other types of decay. Such processes may also facilitate the seal between the valve and the seat, potentially obviating the need for a separate gasket.
O-rings or quad rings may be formed of conventional materials used in fire hydrants, or unconventional materials. Suitable resilient structures such as springs which may form biasing structures may be formed of any desired material having requisite modulus of elasticity, durability, costs, and other properties.
Modifications, adaptations, changes, deletions, and additions may be made to various embodiments of the present invention as disclosed in this document without departing from the scope or spirit of the invention.
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The present invention relates to methods and devices for retrofitting fire hydrants with additional structure for reducing the potential that those with ill intent can foul municipal water supplies by introducing toxins or other materials into fire hydrants. Various embodiments include a replacement hydrant body having an enlarged diameter portion that can be installed to replace an existing hydrant body. The replacement hydrant body can include a secondary valve comprising a seat, biasing structure, and a restriction member to close off portions of the hydrant otherwise available for receipt of toxic or other materials when the fire hydrant nozzle cap is unscrewed and open.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a method and apparatus for forming a web having a predetermined grammage profile in its transverse direction.
When forming a web of particulate material such as wood or synthetic fibers, it is known to use air to transport the particles in a forming head to an air-permeable wire on which the particulate material is collected and forms a web while the air passes through the web and the wire and is drawn off via a suction box by means of a slight subatmospheric pressure generated by a fan system. The wire is driven forward at a controlled speed so that a web having a certain weight per unit area is formed. In order to reduce variations in the grammage (i.e. weight per unit area) which may occur during forming, at least in the manufacture of thicker webs, a scalper roll is used which cuts excess material from the upper side of the web. The position of the scalper roll in relation to the wire can be controlled by measuring equipment located after the roll for measuring grammage. This equipment may comprise a weighing plate or some other type of grammage meter. This procedure enables a web to be produced with uniform grammage in its longitudinal direction.
Substantially uniform grammage is also desired in the transverse direction of the web. In certain cases it is even desirable to be able to vary the grammage across the web, the edge portions of the web having greater grammage than the central portion, for instance, since experience has shown that a certain squeeze effect will occur at the edge portions of the web during subsequent treatment of the web. In the manufacture of fiberboard, for instance, air is squeezed out from the edge portions in the subsequent belt pre-compression and hot compression steps. If the web has been formed with suitably increased grammage in the edge portions, the final result will then be that the finally pressed board will be substantially uniform in grammage and density transverse to the direction of forming, which is important if it is to be acceptably strong at the edge portions. A web with initially uniform grammage in its cross direction, though, will have lower grammage and density at the edge portions in the final board. The edge portions of the board will therefore have low strength properties. The properties of the edge portions will determine if the product is to be classed as first or second quality. Therefore, the choice is between increasing the average grammage in order to obtain acceptable properties in the edge portions, or sawing off the unacceptable part of the edge portions. Both alternatives result in extra material consumption and increased manufacturing costs.
To control the grammage across the web, it is known when using air carried fibers to give the fiber flow entering the distribution chamber of the forming head an oscillating movement transverse to the direction of movement of the web. This oscillation can be achieved either mechanically as is described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,071,822 or pneumatically as described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,099,296 (substantially corresponding to SE No. 7510795-3).
The distribution of fibers across the web in apparatuses using pneumatically controlled fiber distribution has not been satisfactory in that it has been necessary in practice to apply rolls or loaded sliding shoes to press down the edge portions of the fiber web in an attempt to achieve increased grammage at the edge portions. The use of rolls or sliding shoes has considerable drawbacks. For one thing, the load distribution must be varied for varying grammage in order to achieve an acceptable result, and for another, there is a considerable risk that the upper surface of the fiber web will be rolled up, roughened or otherwise destroyed.
Apparatuses using mechanically controlled fiber distribution such as the apparatus described in the aforementioned patent do not succeed in achieving the desired grammage profile across the web and there, too, it has been necessary in practice to use rolls (or sliding shoes similar to those described above, in order to improve the result.
In other applications it has been necessary to camber the scalper roll to a certain extent in order to at least improve the grammage profile across the width of the web. This has the obvious drawback that the desired grammage profile across the width of the web can only be obtained at a nominal grammage.
In apparatuses using mechanical oscillation, control systems are known having a hydraulic cylinder with simple hydraulics and with mechanically actuated limit positions defining the end positions of the oscillation. Such an apparatus has considerable limitations in controlling the particulate flow in the direction transverse of the direction of movement of the web, thus preventing the desired variation in grammage across the web.
The object of the invention is to minimize the problems mentioned above and to provide a method and an apparatus for forming a web in such a manner and using such means that a predetermined grammage profile can be continuously obtained, so that desired variations in grammage across the web can be controlled and adjusted automatically in a reliable manner.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The invention relates to a method of forming a web having a predetermined grammage profile in its transverse direction, comprising the steps of introducing a composite flow of particulate material suspended in air into the distribution chamber of a forming head through an oscillating nozzle, depositing the material onto the upper surface of an air permeable belt moving through the distribution chamber to form a web on a surface of the belt, and controlling the grammage profile automatically by detecting changes in the upper surface of the web downstream of the distribution chamber and generating signals in response to any such change, comparing the signals with set point signals, and generating an output control signal, and controlling the pattern of movement of the oscillating nozzle in response to the output control signal so that the particulate material is distributed over the belt while forming a web having the predetermined grammage profile in its transverse direction.
According to a preferred embodiment of the invention the frequency of the nozzle is also controlled by means of measured value signals from sensors imparting information as to the speed of the wire, in order to achieve a web having a uniform grammage profile in its longitudinal direction.
The invention also relates to an apparatus for forming a web having a predetermined grammage profile in its transverse direction, said apparatus comprising a forming head with a distribution chamber, a nozzle through which particulate material suspended in air is introduced into the distribution chamber and deposited onto a horizontal air permeable belt mounted for movement through the distribution chamber, and a feedback control system including nozzle oscillating means for oscillating the nozzle, web sensor means downstream of the distribution chamber for detecting changes in the upper surface of the web and for generating signals in response to any change, controller means for comparing the signals with set point signals and for generating an output control signal, and oscillator control means actuated by control signals from the controller means for controlling the pattern of movement of the nozzle so that the particulate material is distributed over the belt to form a web having the predetermined grammage profile in its transverse direction.
DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The invention will be described further in the following detailed description with reference to the accompanying drawings in which:
FIG. 1 is a side view schematic of an apparatus for forming a web according to an embodiment of the invention;
FIG. 2 shows a vertical cross section through the forming head of the apparatus according to FIG. 1;
FIG. 3 is a side view schematic depicting an oscillating nozzle in the apparatus according to FIG. 1, including means for oscillating the nozzle;
FIG. 4 is a side view schematic of the oscillating nozzle depicting an alternative form for the means for oscillating the nozzle;
FIG. 5 is a schematic view of a feedback control system for automatically controlling the position of the nozzle in the apparatus according to FIG. 1;
FIG. 6 shows four different examples of control sequences which can be pre-programmed and selected in an electronic control system according to the invention;
FIGS. 7a and 7b are schematic views depicting parts of the nozzle and wire in perspective from the side;
FIG. 8 is a top schematic view of the distribution chamber and wire depicting the movement of the nozzle across the forming web;
FIGS. 9a, 9b, 9c, 9d and 9e are side view schematics illustrating the precipitation of layers of particles during movement of the wire through the distribution chamber, FIGS. 9b-9e showing the result if the speed of the wire and the frequency of the nozzle are not adjusted to each other; and
FIG. 10 illustrates a web formed when the speed of the wire and the frequency of the nozzle are matched to each other in accordance with the invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
With reference to FIG. 1 it is schematically shown therein parts of an apparatus for forming a web of a particulate material such as wood or synthetic fibers, said apparatus comprising a forming head 1 with distribution chamber 2 and a nozzle 4 oscillating about a shaft 3 and with its orifice positioned in the upper part of the distribution chamber 2 and communicating with a container (not shown) via a supply pipe 5 for supplying the particulate material in a carrier air stream.
An air permeable endless belt or wire 6 runs in a loop around a plurality of rolls 7, the, roll 7a being the driving one. The wire 6 is arranged to run horizontally through the distribution chamber 2, with its surface exposed in order to continuously receive particles flowing down through the distribution chamber 2. The forming head 1 also includes a suction box 8 located below the wire 6 and the distribution chamber 2, with which the suction box 8 is aligned. The suction box 8 has an outlet 9 with fan 10 arranged to generate a suitable subatmospheric pressure in the suction box 8 to remove the carrier air drawn into the suction box 8 from the distribution chamber 2 through the wire 6.
As seen in FIG. 1, the distribution chamber 2 has a horizontal outlet 13 in connection to the wire 6 through which the wire 6 and web 14 of particulate material formed thereon pass.
The apparatus shown in FIG. 1 is also provided with an adjustment means 15 located downstream of the forming head 1 and including a hood 16 fitted above the wire with a horizontally rotating scalper roll 17, arranged at a predetermined distance from the wire 6 in order to cut excess material from the web 14 passing beneath the roll 17. The hood 16, forming a vertically movable unit with the scalper roll 17, communicates by way of a sliding connection with an upper outlet 18 in which a fan 19 is arranged to suck off the excess material removed by the scalper roll 17. Between the forming head 1 and the adjustment means 15 are web sensor means depicted as three sensors 20 for level measurements, distributed across the width of the web 14 and secured to the hood 16 by support arms 21. Each sensor 20 is provided with a pivotable element 22, arranged to lie in contact with the web 14 to sense the level of the upper surface 23 of the web 14 in relation to a reference plane, and thus react to any changes in this level. These changes are recorded in a suitable manner via a connecting arm 24. Said recorded levels thus form the thickness profile of the web 14 prior to contacting the scalper roll 17. Signals from all three sensors 20 are processed and the average value is compared with a set point for the desired thickness of the web 14. When differences are recorded, signals are generated which actuate the discharge of particulate material supplied from a store (not shown), the amount of particles supplied to the distribution chamber 2 increasing or decreasing depending on the value of the control signal, until the desired thickness is set on the web.
When the web 14 has passed the adjustment means 15 it is transferred from the wire 6 to a conveyor belt 48 of a subsequent pressing station.
The grammage profile transverse to the longitudinal direction or direction of movement of the web 14 is primarily controlled by the pattern of movement for the oscillating nozzle 4, as will be explained below.
FIG. 3 depicts an embodiment of a nozzle oscillating means in the form of a double-action hydraulic turning piston device 25 which is mounted on a bracket 45 secured to the forming head 1 and arranged to encompass and cooperate with shaft 3 to turn the shaft 3 backwards and forwards with equivalent oscillation of the nozzle 4. Nozzle position sensor means 26 is arranged close to the shaft 3 to indicate the angle position of the shaft 3 and in turn the nozzle 4. A linear position indicator with associated lever may alternatively be used for this indication.
FIG. 4 depicts an alternative embodiment of the nozzle oscillating means for driving the nozzle 4. In this embodiment a hydraulic cylinder 27 is used, which is articulately attached to the forming head and preferably has a through piston rod 28 which angularly activates a lever 29 rigidly attached to the shaft 3. As in the embodiment first described, suitable nozzle position sensor means 26 is provided to indicate the angle position of the shaft 3.
The nozzle oscillating means forms part of a special feedback control system for automatically controlling the oscillation pattern of the nozzle 4 depending on certain operating parameters. FIG. 5 depicts a form of such a control system which includes nozzle oscillating means 25 according to FIG. 3, oscillator control means comprising a hydraulic setting device 12, and controller means 33 preferably equipped with a closed electronic control system. The hydraulic setting device 12 is provided with a hydraulic pump 30 and a tank 31 to serve a servo-valve 32. The hydraulic setting device 12 also includes other hydraulic components of known construction, such as an overflow valve, filter, and an accumulator to absorb pressure shocks, etc. The closed electronic control system of controller means 33 comprises an electronic unit connected by wires 34 and 35 to the sensor 26 and servo-valve 32 of setting device 12, respectively. The electronic control system of controller means 33 actuates the servo-valve 32 and is arranged to regulate the pattern of movement, acceleration and speed of the nozzle 4. The servo-valve 32 is in connection with two pressure chambers 43, 44 of the nozzle oscillating means 25 via hydraulic conduits 36, 37, respectively. The hydraulic conduits 36, 37 between servo-valve 32 and nozzle oscillating means 25 should be as short as possible to give the control system high rigidity. Accordingly, the servo-valve 32 is preferably mounted directly on the nozzle oscillating means 25.
The electronic control system of controller means 33 operates with a closed control circuit in which a signal concerning the current angular position of shaft 3 and nozzle 4 is continuously reported via wire 34 from the nozzle position sensor means 26 and compared with a set point in the electronic equipment of controller means 33. The difference signal is processed therein and results in an output control signal which is transmitted via wire 35 to the servo-valve 32 of the hydraulic setting device 12 in order to correct this. The set point may consist of information programmed in earlier as control sequences in the electronic equipment, an external control signal transmitted via a wire 38, or a combination of these.
FIG. 6 shows four different examples of control sequences which can be programmed in advance in controller means 33 and selected. The x-axis indicates time and the y-axis the deflection angle α of the nozzle from neutral or central position. All the examples show that the nozzle is imparted a pattern of movement which includes a dwell time at the opposite turning positions of the nozzle. With the exception of the first example, there is also a period of rest in the neutral position of the nozzle between the two turning positions. Other control sequences may be used if desired.
The use of the feedback control system according to the invention enables oscillation of the nozzle 4 to be controlled in such a manner that a desired grammage profile across the width of the web is achieved. The closed control system with servo-valve 32 and electronic equipment of controller means 33 permits an extremely accurate control of the movement of the oscillating nozzle 4 and it is thus possible to achieve a desired variation in grammage as mentioned in the introduction, i.e. the edge portions having higher grammages than central portions of the web so that a uniform grammage profile in transverse direction is obtained in the finished web of material after pressing.
When three sensors 20 are used as a web sensing means for level measurements as in the embodiment shown in FIG. 1, the following control signals can be generated and transmitted to the electronic equipment of the controller 33 via the wire 38.
EXAMPLE 1
The signal from the righthand sensor 20 is compared with the signal from the lefthand sensor 20 seen in the direction of movement of the web. In the event of a difference between the signals from the two measuring points, e.g. the signal from the righthand sensor is larger than that from the lefthand sensor seen in the direction of movement of the web, this difference signal will be processed in the electronic equipment of the controller 33 and passed on to the servo-valve 32 as a control signal to move the entire pattern or schedule of movement of the nozzle 4 slightly further to the left until an equalization has occurred and, thus, the difference signal has become zero.
EXAMPLE 2
The average value of the signals from the righthand sensor 20 and the lefthand sensor 20 is compared with the signal from the middle sensor 20. In the event of a difference between these values, e.g. because there is too much material in the edge portions of the web, the angle α of deflection of the nozzle or alternatively the period of rest of the nozzle in or at the end positions may be decreased by the nozzle oscillating means in accordance with a selection programmed in advance until the web acquires the correct grammage profile.
With aid of the feedback control system according to the present invention it is also possible to control the oscillation frequency of the nozzle 4 so that it matches the speed of the wire 6 in order to achieve a desired uniform grammage profile in the longitudinal direction of the web as well. The control system then includes a sensor 46 which, via a wire 47, transmits information as to the speed of the wire 6. The sensor 46 may, for instance, sense the speed of rotation of a roller 7 about which the wire 6 runs, and emit measured value signals to the controller 33. The frequency of the nozzle 4 is then controlled by actuation of the servo-valve 32 and the nozzle oscillating means 25.
FIGS. 7a and 7b illustrate the distribution area of the nozzle 4 if the wire 6 were stationary. When the nozzle has completed a full oscillation movement, a layer 39 of the web will have been built up. Due to the fact that the nozzle is somewhat shorter than the length of the distribution chamber 2 in longitudinal direction of the wire 6 and due to the shape of the nozzle 4, an edge effect will be achieved so that the layer 39 will have a decreasing thickness to zero in the direction towards the edges 40, 41.
FIG. 8 illustrates the distribution chamber 2 and wire 6 seen from above. If a rod or line 42 is imagined lying transversely to the direction of movement of the wire 6, and this rod is allowed to accompany the wire 6 through the distribution chamber 2, the nozzle 4 will reach its lefthand end position five times during passage of the rod through the distribution chamber at a certain speed of the wire 6 and certain oscillation frequency of the nozzle 4. At each moment when the nozzle reaches this end position, i.e. t=0, 1, 2, 3 and 4, a new layer of particles has been deposited at this end position of the nozzle on the layer already deposited, starting from one end of the imaginary rod 42 and back to this one end.
FIGS. 9b, 9c, 9d and 9e illustrate the deposition of layer after layer on the movable wire 6 counted from a starting position, t=0, according to FIG. 9a when a first layer 39 has already been deposited on the wire 6. FIGS. 9b, 9c, 9d and 9e then illustrate the formation of a web when the ratio between the wire speed and the nozzle frequency is not correctly adjusted, thereby resulting in an uneven grammage profile in the longitudinal direction (FIG. 9e).
FIG. 10 illustrates a web formed in accordance with the present invention by matching the speed (v) of the wire 6 and frequency (f) of the nozzle 4 to each other so that a uniform grammage profile in longitudinal direction is achieved. The control system then includes a sensor 46 for the wire speed, as mentioned earlier.
If (B) in FIG. 7b denotes the length of the distribution chamber 2 along the wire 6, (a) is the length of the decreasing material area at each edge, (n) is the number of turning positions (on the same side of the neutral or middle position) of the nozzle 4 after a certain moment, (m) is the distance between two end positions, (L) is the distance between the first end position and the last end position, and (T) is the time for each oscillation, the following equations apply, whereby (v) (m/min) and (f) (osc/min) have the significance explained above:
L=B-a
m=L/n
T=m/v
F=1/T=v/m=n·v/L
By forming a web of particulate material with uniform thickness in the longitudinal direction one obtains the essential advantage that the amount of excess material which is removed by the scalper roll can be reduced to a minimum. Recirculation of particles is thus reduced to the same extent. Furthermore, the most uniform grammage profile possible is achieved in longitudinal direction since the thickness of the web will be substantially constant so that the suction of air through the web will be uniform as seen in the longitudinal direction thereof (cf. FIGS. 9e and 10).
In the drawings and specification, there has been set forth a preferred embodiment of the invention, and although specific terms are employed, they are used in a generic and descriptive sense only and not for purposes of limitation.
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A method and apparatus for forming a web having a predetermined grammage profile in its transverse direction is provided. The method includes the steps of introducing a flow of particulate material into the distribution chamber of a forming head through an oscillating nozzle and depositing the material on an air permeable belt to form a web while changes in the upper surface of the web are detected downstream of the distribution chamber, signals are generated in response to any change which are compared with predetermined set points, and an output control signal is generated as a result of the comparison. The pattern of movement of the nozzle is controlled in response to the output control signal to provide the predetermined grammage profile for the web. In addition, the speed of the web may be measured and used to control the frequency of the nozzle so that a web having uniform grammage in the longitudinal direction is also provided. An apparatus for accomplishing each of the steps of the method is additionally provided.
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RELATED APPLICATIONS
This application is a Continuation-In-Part of U.S. application Ser. No. 08/941,356 filed Sep. 30, 1997 (now U.S. Pat. No. 6,053,056), which claims priority to U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/029,624 filed on Oct. 25, 1996, the teachings of which are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety.
BACKGROUND
In a medical setting, oxygen can be delivered to a patient from a cryogenic vessel, high pressure gas storage vessel or other controlled pressure delivery sources, such as a hospital delivery system. Such an oxygen delivery system includes an adjustable flow regulator to select a flow rate of oxygen to the patient. Adjustable flow regulators typically include a circular orifice plate having a plurality of apertures of varying sizes through which the oxygen can flow.
In order to create an aperture that allows a certain flow rate, users of prior art techniques typically create an undersized aperture using a hand tool, measure the flow rate, and subsequently increase the aperture size and measure the flow rate until gas flows at the desired rate. Other prior art methods utilize needle valves, stamping or compression of a large aperture, fabrication and assembly of discrete components, blockage of a flow conduit by a ball or tapered pin, photoetching of a thin metal disk that is subsequently attached to a thicker plate, or other largely manual methods.
To obtain an accurate flow rate, a real-time flow measurement is therefore made of each aperture during fabrication. Because this is largely a manual process, accurate registration is difficult to achieve, sometimes yielding a secondary aperture proximate to the main aperture to produce the proper flow rate. If the flow rate of a particular aperture is greater than a desired flow rate, then the entire part is rejected.
SUMMARY
Prior art techniques suffer from at least two disadvantages. First, they are time-consuming and labor intensive processes. Second, they do not take full advantage of the fact that flow rates are proportionally related to hole sizes.
Orifice plates can be manufactured having flow apertures that are formed to have accurate dimensions. As such, real-time measurement and repair is unnecessary. Consequently, every orifice plate can be identically fabricated, within allowed tolerances, using automated machinery. In addition, a complete flow control device can be manufactured from a single piece of material—the orifice plate.
An orifice plate can include a rigid circular plate of material, such as brass or other soft metal, having a first (bottom) surface and a second (top) surface. A counter bore can yield a domed support structure in the material at each flow aperture location. Specifically, the domed support structure can have a partial ellipsoidal, or conical shape. In accordance with one aspect, the domed support structure has a semi-spherical shape. The counter bore thus defines a support structure having an open base at the first (bottom) surface and an apex proximate to the second (top) surface. Prior art attempts at piercing thin-walled orifice plates have failed due to the lack of such a support.
A flow aperture can then be formed through the material from the second (top) surface and registered to the apex of the support structure. In particular, there may be a plurality of apertures, each aperture having a respective size and registered to an apex of a respective support structure.
The support structures and the apertures can be created by a computer-controlled machine. In particular, the computer can control a piercing tool which is automatically registered to the apex of the support structure and inserted through the thinned material to form the flow aperture. By using a computer-controlled process, orifice plates can be repeatedly reproduced to be substantially identical, within permitted tolerance.
In accordance with a particular embodiment of the invention, the orifice plate can be used in a flow regulator. In a flow regulator, an inflow conduit provides oxygen or another gas at a substantially constant pressure and an outflow conduit provides the gas at a specific flow rate. The orifice plate is coupled between the inflow conduit and the outflow. In particular, the flow regulator can adjustably control the flow of medical oxygen from a supply vessel to a patient. In such an application, the flow apertures vary in size from about 0.0007 square millimeters or less to about 0.8 square millimeters and the thickness of plate material at the apex of the dome structure is about 0. 1 millimeter. Flow rates of {fraction (1/32)} liters per minute (lpm) can be reliably achieved from a 50 pounds per square inch (psi) oxygen supply. Other dimensions can be used for other applications.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The above and other features of the method of fabricating a flow control device, including various novel details of construction and combination of parts, will now be more particularly described with reference to the accompanying drawings and pointed out in the claims. It will be understood that the particular methods of fabricating a flow control device embodying the invention are shown by illustration only and not as a limitation of the invention. In the accompanying drawings, like reference characters refer to the same parts throughout the different views. The drawings are not necessarily to scale, emphasis instead being placed upon illustrating the principles of the invention. The principles and features of the invention may be embodied in varied and numerous embodiments without departing from the scope of the invention.
FIGS. 1A-1B are a simplified perspective view of a typical cryogenic and high pressure supply vessel, respectively.
FIG. 2 is a bottom-side perspective view of a particular orifice plate.
FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram of a particular orifice plate embodied in an illustrative flow regulator.
FIGS. 4A-4B are cross-sectional diagrams of a support structure having a first and second flow aperture of FIG. 2, respectively.
FIGS. 5A-5D are process flow diagrams of a particular method of forming the flow apertures of FIG. 2 .
FIG. 6 is a cross-sectional diagram of another embodiment of a support structure.
FIG. 7 is a cross-sectional diagram of yet another embodiment of a support structure.
FIG. 8 is a cross-sectional diagram of still another embodiment of a support structure.
FIG. 9 is a perspective view of a particular embodiment of the invention employing a pyramidal piercing tool.
FIG. 10 is a cross-sectional diagram of a formed flow aperture showing a particulate matter trap.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
FIGS. 1A-1B are a perspective view of a typical cryogenic and high pressure supply vessel, respectively. The vessel 2 , 2 ′ can be an oxygen supply vessel. An adjustable flow regulator 6 , 6 ′ is coupled to a supply conduit 4 from the vessel 2 , 2 ′. Within the flow regulator 6 , 6 ′ is a circular orifice plate (described below), which can have a plurality of discrete flow settings. Each flow setting is registered to a respective flow aperture. Each aperture supports a specific flow rate through an outflow conduit 8 , 8 ′, as indicated by the setting of an adjusting dial 5 .
FIG. 2 is a bottom-side perspective view of a particular orifice plate 10 . As illustrated, the orifice plate includes eleven flow apertures 12 a - 12 k corresponding to eleven discrete flow settings. Each flow aperture 12 a - 12 k has a respective flow area corresponding to a preselected flow rate. An optional mounting hub 18 can be utilized to register the orifice plate 10 to the adjusting dial 5 (FIG. 1 ). Although eleven flow apertures are illustrated, corresponding to eleven selectable flow rates, a greater number or a smaller number of flow apertures 12 can be provided, depending on the intended application.
In some applications, only one flow aperture 12 may be required. In such applications either a fixed flow rate is specified or the flow rate may be adjusted by varying the supply pressure of the gas. In any event, the flow control device may be fabricated integrally with the regulator body—without a separate, rotatable orifice plate.
FIG. 3 is a schematic diagram of a particular orifice plate 10 embodied in an illustrative flow regulator 6 . The orifice plate 10 separates a supply conduit 4 supplying gas at an essentially constant operating pressure from an outflow conduit 8 . It will be understood that the orientation of the orifice plate can be reversed from that shown. The illustrated orientation, however, offers particular advantages. First, the piercing tool deflects the orifice plate material into the counter bore 14 . That deflected material tends to create a particular matter trap, as will be discussed below.
It will also be understood that the orifice plate 10 can be adapted for use in any flow regulator which uses a prior art orifice plate. Particular embodiment of flow regulators having an orifice plate as described herein are commercially available from Inovo, Inc. of Naples, Fla. Specific examples of Inovo regulators are described in U.S. application Ser. No. 09/342,953 (filed Jun. 29, 1999), U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/091,127 (filed Jun. 29, 1998), U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/119,745 (filed Feb. 9, 1999), U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/124,704 (filed Mar. 15, 1999), and U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/127,961 (filed Apr. 6, 1999), the teachings of which are all incorporated herein by reference in their entirety.
Returning to FIG. 2, each flow apertures 12 a - 12 k is centered relative to a respective counter bore 14 a - 14 k . As viewed from the bottom side, the counter bores 14 a - 14 k create a domed support structure from the plate material. As the term is used herein, a domed structure is a three-dimensional structure having an open base and a wall tapering to an apex. Examples of dome wall shapes include partial ellipsoidal shapes, such as semi-spheres and elliptic paraboloids, and conical shapes. A cross-section taken through the apex reveals an arched-shape support wall, which can include semicircular, semi-oval, or triangular shapes. Other suitable shapes may be found by routine experimentation.
FIGS. 4A-4B are cross-sectional diagrams of a first and a second flow aperture 12 a , 12 b of FIG. 2, respectively. As illustrated, both flow apertures 12 a , 12 b have a circular flow area and the first flow aperture 12 a has a smaller diameter than the second flow aperture 12 b . As illustrated, the principle axis of each flow aperture 12 a , 12 b is registered to a respective apex of a domed structure 14 a , 14 b having a semi-spherical wall 15 a , 15 b . Precise registration between the flow apertures 12 a , 12 b and the apex of the domed structures 14 a , 14 b , however, is not critical.
A primary purpose of the domed support is to allow rapid, automatic piercing of apertures to provide a specified flow rate, such between at least about 0.03 millimeter (0.001 inch) and 1 millimeter (0.039 inch) in diameter. The predictability of the disclosed method is particularly important for forming the smaller apertures for the lowest flow rates. The smaller diameter apertures are especially useful in pediatric medical oxygen regulators, where low flow rates may be desired. Using the disclosed fabrication method, small aperture sizes, and thus low flow rates, can be obtained that cannot be realized using other known methods. For example, oxygen flow rates of less than ¼ lpm, at least down to {fraction (1/32)} lpm, can be reliably obtained from an operating pressure of 50 psi, using the disclosed method. Precision flow apertures with tight tolerances ensures that the most vulnerable patients, including premature infants, can receive an appropriate and accurate dosage of oxygen.
When a tapered tool is employed, the computer controls the size of the aperture by controlling the depth of the pierce. This eliminates the need for hand-piercing and real-time flow calibration, which are necessary without the use of domed supports. Instead, the flow apertures 12 can be fabricated using automated piercing machinery.
Although prior art techniques have included counter bores, they used relatively large cylindrical-shaped counter bores. Those counter bores were used to thin a region of the plate material and a flow aperture was then formed through this thinned material. Because of the relatively large target area of the thinned material (i.e., an area of a substantially constant thickness), precise alignment between a piercing tool and the bore was not required. Due to flex and rebound of the relatively thin material being pierced, however, the size of each aperture, and therefore its flow rate, could not be accurately achieved. The machining of the relatively large cylindrical-shaped counter bores also tends to warp and weaken the extended thinned area of material, which also affects the size of the flow apertures.
It should be noted that the domed support structure 14 , however, can have a flat ceiling. That is, there can be a thinned region of relatively constant thickness between the top of the counter bore and the top surface of the plate. That flat ceiling, however, is limited in size so as to inhibit warping during machining and significant flexing and redounding during the piercing operation. In fact, as the area of the flat ceiling approaches the area of the flow aperture, tapering of the walls may be unnecessary. Those dimensions can vary depending on the thickness of the thinned material and the size of the desired flow aperture. This implies that the counter bores may not be identical. Each counter bore dimension would ideally accommodate one (or a few) flow aperture dimension.
FIGS. 5A-5D are process flow diagrams for creating a particular flow aperture in accordance with the invention. The area of material 16 being pierced should be sufficiently thin to allow a tool to make a hole without breaking the material or a piercing tool 20 . To facilitate that task, the orifice plate is made of brass or another soft metal. The thinned material may be less than about 0.3 millimeter (0.01 inch) thick. To achieve this thickness, as illustrated in FIG. 5A, a counter bore 14 having a diameter D of about 3.2 millimeters (0.125 inch) is applied to the orifice plate 10 of greater thickness. The distance z between the apex of the wall 15 and the opposite surface 16 of the orifice plate 10 is then thinned to about 0.1 millimeter (e.g., 0.0035 inch). It will be understood that the exact dimensions are a design choice of the user and can depend on the materials used for the orifice plate 10 and the piercing tool 20 .
Referring to FIG. 5B, the piercing tool 20 is placed in position under the control of an automated machine 30 . Specifically, the central axis of the piercing tool 20 is registered with the apex of the semi-spherical void 14 . The piercing tool 20 can have a conical, pyramidal or other shape suitable for piercing the orifice plate 10 . As illustrated, the piercing tool 20 is tapered at an angle, which can be chosen by the user. For example, the angle can be suitably chosen to be about 7-10 degrees.
Referring to FIG. 5C, the piercing tool 20 is forced into the orifice plate 10 . As the piercing tool 20 goes deeper, a larger hole is created. By using a semi-spherical support, there is little or no flex or resulting rebound from applying the piercing tool 20 to the structure. Downward forces are dispersed down the wall into progressively thicker material.
Referring to FIG. 5D, a circular flow aperture 12 having a diameter d has been created using a conical piercing tool 20 . For example, the flow aperture 12 can have a diameter d of 1 millimeter±0.006 millimeter (e.g., 0.003 inch±0.0002 inch). By using a semi-spherical support, the required tool depth to achieve a given aperture diameter is predictable, which permits the automated fabrication of flow apertures. Although the aperture 12 is illustrated as having a circular flow area, the actual shape of the aperture 12 depends on the shape of the piercing tool 20 . Accordingly, the flow aperture 12 can have a circular, oval, polygonal or any other suitable shape.
In accordance with a particular embodiment, both the counter bores 14 and the flow apertures 12 are formed using a single Computer Numerical Control (CNC) machine. Sample orifice plates are selected for quality control inspection, which includes off-line flow rate measurements.
FIG. 6 is a cross-sectional diagram of another embodiment of a support structure. As illustrated, a counter bore 14 ′ yields an ellipsoidal-walled support structure 15 ′ in the plate material 10 . Note that as the diameter of the counter bore 14 ′ approaches the diameter of the flow aperture 12 , the tapered section of the wall will be destroyed by the piercing tool.
FIG. 7 is a cross-sectional diagram of yet another embodiment of a support structure. As illustrated, a counter bore 14 ″ yields a conical-walled support structure 15 ″ in the plate material 10 . Such an embodiment may be particularly useful for supporting extremely small flow apertures.
FIG. 8 is a cross-sectional diagram of yet another embodiment of a support structure. As illustrated, two opposing counter bores 141 , 142 are formed in the plate material 10 . The flow aperture 12 is formed by piercing the thinned plate material between the apexes of the counter bores 141 , 142 . Although the counter bores 141 , 142 are illustrated as having semi-circular walls 151 , 152 , any of the aforementioned shapes or combinations can be substituted.
FIG. 9 is a perspective view of a particular embodiment employing a pyramidal piercing tool 20 ′. As illustrated, the piercing tool 20 ′ yields a triangular aperture 12 ′ in the plate material 10 . The aperture 12 ′ is centered on the apex of a respective counter bore 14 (shown in phantom). Although the pyramidal piercing tool 20 ′ is shown as having three sides, it will be understood that the piercing tool 20 ′ can have a greater number of sides.
FIG. 10 is a cross-sectional diagram of a formed flow aperture showing a particulate matter trap. The piercing operation does not necessarily remove material. Instead, the piercing tool 20 ruptures the thinned material 10 to form the flow aperture 12 . This operation forces shards of material 40 downward into the void 14 . Those shards of material 40 project outward from the wall 15 to create pockets 45 . When the gas flow is from the bottom to the top, as shown, the pockets 45 operate to trap particulate matter that may be in the gas flow, thereby inhibiting the transfer of such particulate matter through the flow aperture 12 .
An added advantage of forming the flow aperture 12 —instead of machining it—is that the top surface 16 of the orifice plate is smooth. A machined (e.g. drilled) aperture would have burrs. Without such a sharp boundary, the orifice plate described herein does not require additional finishing and can directly interface with o-rings in an assembled regulator—without damaging the o-ring. That advantage further reduces part counts and manufacturing steps.
EQUIVALENTS
While the method of fabricating a flow control device has been particularly shown and described with reference to particular embodiments, it will be understood that those skilled in the art that various changes in form and detail can be made without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims. For example, the method of fabricating a flow control device made in accordance with the invention can be used in other gas or liquid flow devices.
These and all other equivalents are intended to be encompassed by the following claims.
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Semi-spherical supports are used in the piercing of small, consistently sized holes in a soft metal. In particular, a flow control device, such as an orifice plate, can be fabricated with small, consistently sized flow apertures to regulate flow in a gas flow regulating device. By using semi-spherical supports, the need for hand-punching and real-time flow calibration can be avoided and automated machinery with a tapered piercing tool can be used to fabricate the flow control device.
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CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
Not applicable
STATEMENT REGARDING FEDERAL SPONSORED RESEARCH OR DEVELOPMENT
Not applicable
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an aluminum frame glass jalousie or security window. More specifically, this invention relates to a glass aluminum security window having numerous improvement features in structure, sealing capability, ease of operation and improved overall appearance.
2. Description of Related Art
Numerous prior U.S. patents disclose jalousie window constructions including some of the general overall structural components of the jalousie or security window of the instant invention. Cerny U.S. Pat. No. 2,228,439 discloses a frame enclosed jalousie window operating mechanism as well as various different seal strips. Fink U.S. Pat. No. 3,116,057 discloses a window operating mechanism within the window frame opening and including peripheral seals on each pivotal sash. Pappas U.S. Pat. No. 3,159,909 discloses peripheral seals on each pivoted window frame or sash. Beards U.S. Pat. No. 3,205,541 discloses seals between jalousie window slat ends and the adjacent jamb members. And, Dufrene U.S. Pat. No. 3,350,814 discloses a jalousie window operating mechanism concealed within outwardly opening jamb channels.
Further, Kahn et al. U.S. Pat. No. 3,484,990 discloses adjacent slat longitudinal edges provided with overlapping seals. Grahm U.S. Pat. No. 4,038,781 discloses slat panel end edge seals. Magill et al. U.S. Pat. No. 4,256,143 discloses frame jamb seals for cooperation with slat end edges, but with the slat end edges slidingly contacting the jamb seals inducing excessive wear. Jordal U.S. Pat. No. 4,813,183 discloses a frame head seal and slat longitudinal edge seals as well as jamb seals and an operating mechanism concealed within an outwardly opening jamb channel. Man U.S. Pat. No. 4,889,040 discloses jalousie slat longitudinal edge seals, and Vaida U.S. Pat. No. 5,267,414 discloses jamb seals as well as slat longitudinal edge seals.
Finally, there is a prior art jalousie window construction on the market over which the present invention represents a substantial improvement. This prior window construction is described hereinafter in connection with FIGS. 9, 10 and 11 of this application.
However, none of the prior art jalousie or security window constructions have the specific improvement features of the present invention, including (1) improved air sealing at the slat ends, (2) improved sealing between the uppermost slat and the header of the frame, (3) improved sealing at the pivot location for each of the slat support shaft assemblies, (4) increased frame structural strength, (5) less friction for the slat support shaft journal assemblies, (6) concealed slat operating mechanism and (7) upper header and lower sill members which allow interlocked stacking of two or more multiple glass slat jalousie windows.
SUMMARY OF THE INSTANT INVENTION
The security window of the instant invention incorporates a reinforced frame construction which not only reinforces each frame in which a plurality of slats are mounted, but which may also serve as reinforcement between vertically stacked multiple slat window construction frames. In addition, the security window also affords more complete air sealing along all four edges of the pivotal slat construction of the window and further is constructed in a manner such that the more complete air sealing may be readily accomplished upon pivotal movement of the window slats to the closed position.
The security window further incorporates a smoother, reduced friction pivot construction for each of the slat assemblies and also provides a pivotal mounting for each slat assembly which is of increased strength against unwanted entry.
Finally, the security window of this invention encloses the multiple slat actuating mechanism thereof within one of the outwardly opening vertical channel member jambs of the window. As so constructed, the actuating mechanism is concealed from view thus improving the overall appearance of the window.
In accordance with the foregoing, an object of this invention is to provide a jalousie window construction incorporating a frame of increased structural strength and which is specifically designed to enable vertical stacking of a plurality of the window constructions without sacrificing the increased structural strength feature thereof and in a manner which can securely lock the plurality of stacked window constructions together as a single unit.
Another object of this invention is to provide a jalousie window construction with more complete air sealing between adjacent slat assemblies and with the vertical jamb and the horizontal header sections of the window construction frame.
Still another object of this invention is to provide more complete air sealing in accordance with the preceding object and in a manner enabling such more complete air sealing to be more readily accomplished.
Yet another object of this invention is to provide a jalousie window construction with smoother and reduced friction pivot connections between the slat ends and the jalousie window frame jambs.
Still yet another object of this invention is to provide mounting and pivot shafts for the slats of the jalousie window construction which offer greater structural strength and thus increase resistance to unwanted entry therepast.
A final object of this invention to be specifically set forth herein is to provide a jalousie window construction in accordance with the preceding objects and which will conform to conventional forms of manufacture, be of simple construction and easy to install and use so as to provide a device that will be economically feasible, long lasting and relatively trouble free in use and operation.
These together with other objects and advantages which will become subsequently apparent reside in the details of construction and operation as more fully hereinafter described and claimed, reference being had to the accompanying drawings forming a part hereof, wherein like numerals refer to like parts throughout.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is an outside elevational view of a pair of stacked security windows constructed in accordance with the present invention, the upper portion of the upper window being broken away;
FIG. 2 is a right side elevational view of the window construction of the present invention illustrating the slat actuating mechanism with the slats in a coplanar closed position;
FIG. 3 is a right side elevational view similar to FIG. 2 but illustrating the slat operating mechanism in position with the slats in a vertically spaced, parallel open position;
FIG. 4 is an enlarged fragmentary vertical sectional view taken upon the plane indicated by the section line 4--4 of FIG. 1 and with the lower sill and upper header of the upper and lower stacked window constructions in slightly exploded position;
FIG. 5 is a fragmentary enlarged inside elevational view of the left jamb (looking out) of the window construction of the present invention illustrating two of the shaft disk bearings in position but with the other components of the slat support shaft assembly and glass slats omitted;
FIG. 6 is an enlarged horizontal sectional view taken substantially upon the plane indicated by the section line 6--6 of FIG. 5;
FIG. 7 is an enlarged horizontal sectional view taken substantially upon the plane indicated by the section line 7--7 of FIG. 5 with the shaft assembly included;
FIG. 8 is an enlarged fragmentary vertical sectional view of the glass slat supporting pivot assembly and adjacent glass slats;
FIG. 9 is a fragmentary perspective view of a prior art louver assembly purportedly being manufactured and similar to the structure disclosed in FIGS. 4-6 of Vaida U.S. Pat. No. 5,267,414;
FIG. 10 is an enlarged fragmentary vertical sectional view of the prior art structure illustrating the manner in which the uppermost slat supporting shaft structure is devoid of a flexible seal for closing against a depending flange of the upper header; and
FIG. 11 is an enlarged fragmentary horizontal sectional view illustrating the manner in which the slat end seals of the prior art structure project into the window opening from opposite sides thus impeding movement of the slats toward their fully closed position.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
In describing the preferred embodiment of the present invention as illustrated in the drawings, specific terminology will be resorted to for the sake of clarity. However, the invention is not intended to be limited to the specific embodiment illustrated and terms so selected; it being understood that each specific term includes all technical equivalents which operate in a similar manner to accomplish a similar purpose.
Referring now more specifically to FIG. 1 of the drawings, the numeral 10 generally designates a security window construction of the instant invention. The security window construction 10 includes a pair of top-to-bottom mirror image vertical side jamb sections 12 and 14 interconnected at their upper ends by a header section 16 and at their lower end by a sill section 18. Each jamb section 12 and 14 includes a pair of laterally spaced front and rear outwardly directed flanges 17 and 19, see FIGS. 6 and 7, interconnected at their inner ends by sides 20. Each inner jamb channel 12 and 14 also includes an outwardly facing counter channel 22 which is defined by front and rear side flanges 23 interconnected by a bight portion 25. The side flanges 23 include and inwardly projecting longitudinal tongues 24 extending along the full length of the side flanges 23.
In addition, each jamb section 12 and 14 receives a top-to-bottom outer inwardly opening channel 26 having a bight portion 28 and opposite side flanges 30 defining outwardly opening longitudinal grooves 32. The outer channels 26 are slid longitudinally into the counter channels 22 of jamb section 12 and 14 with the tongues 24 snugly received within the grooves 32. Longitudinally spaced fasteners 34, see FIG. 5, are secured through the bight portions 25 and 28 to lock the channels 22 and 26 together against relative longitudinal movement. The utilization of the outer channels 26 interlockingly engaged with the counter channels 22 greatly increases the structural strength of the jamb sections 12 and 14.
The header and sill sections 16 and 18 include full length partial cylindrical extrusion sections 36 and 38, see FIG. 4. Threaded fasteners (not shown) are secured through the upper and lower ends of the jamb sections 12 and 14 and threaded into the extrusion sections 36 and 38 in order to securely fasten the header and sill sections 16 and 18 between the upper and lower ends of the jamb sections 12 and 14.
The outer channels 26 include longitudinally spaced openings 40 or bores formed therethrough aligned with longitudinally spaced openings 42 or bored formed in counter channels 22, see FIG. 7. A bearing disk 43 is journalled through each pair of aligned openings 40 and 42. The bearing disks 43 are made of plastic, nylon or other material suitably rotatable in the aluminum of jamb sections 12, 14 and 26 or other material of which they are made. Each disk 43 includes a central bore 46 having a flat cord side 48 and a diametrically reduced and axially shouldered outer end 44 which is properly journalled in opening 40 of outer channel 26. The axial shoulder of outer end 44 thus faces the opposed surface of the bight portion 28 of the outer channel 26 and rotates thereagainst with movement of the disk 43.
Each window construction 10, as illustrated, includes three glass slats 50, although any reasonable number can be included in the frame construction of the present invention. As shown in FIG. 4, each glass slat includes one longitudinal edge 52 received and secured in a laterally opening channel 54 of an extruded support bar, generally designated by the numeral 56. Support bar 56 also includes a lengthwise bore 58 extending longitudinally therethrough including a flattened side 60 and opening slot 61. A shaft 62 including diametrically opposite flats 64 is slidingly received through the bore 58 with one of the flats 64 engaged with the flat side 60 of the bore 58. The opposite ends of the shaft 62 are received through a pair of corresponding bearing disks 43 with one of the flats 64 mating with flat sides 48 of the central bores 46 thus locking the disks 43 for rotation with the shaft 62. The extreme ends of the shafts 62 have operating levers 66 mounted thereon. the operating levers 66 have openings formed therethrough of the same cross-sectional shape as the shaft 62 for rotation therewith between washers 68 and keeper pins 69. The keeper pins 69 are passed through diametric bores formed in the terminal ends of the shaft 62 for retaining the operating levers 66 on the shaft ends.
The support bars 56 each also includes a laterally projecting and longitudinally extending arm 67 that has a longitudinal groove 71 in which an outwardly facing seal strip 70 is longitudinally slidably received. The seal strip 70 includes an outer cylindrical seal portion 72 which is flattened in the manner illustrated at 74 in FIG. 8 when the glass slats 50 are rotated to their coplanar closed position. In this position, seal portion 72 of strips on the middle and lowermost support bars 56 seal against the lower or free swinging marginal edges 90 of the middle and uppermost glass slats 50, see FIGS. 2 and 8. At the same time, when the uppermost support bar 56 is rotated to the closed position, arm 67 thereon pivots forwardly into close proximity with an abutment flange 76 formed in the header section 16. The engagement of seal portion 72 of seal strip 70 with abutment flange 76 forms an airtight seal between the arm 67 and the header section 16 when the upper glass slat 50 is swung to the closed position, as illustrated in FIG. 4.
Each jamb section 12 and 14 includes a seal strip groove 86 extending longitudinally thereof opening through the abutment surface 84 of front side flange 23, see FIG. 6. The abutment surface 84 of the jamb channel pair 12, 14 thus forms vertical coplanar seal strip supporting flanges against which the ends of slats 50 align when closed. Further, as shown in FIG. 5, the vertical surfaces 84 are interrupted as at 85 to allow bearing disks 43 to rotate when the slats 50 are opened. A seal strip 88 preferably having the same configuration as seal strip 70 is disposed in groove 86. When the glass slats 50 are in their closed position, the seal strips 88 serve to seal the major extent of each end of the slats 50. In addition, each bearing disk 43 includes a flattened side 78 having a seal strip groove 80 formed therein for receiving a seal strip 82 which is always in sealing engagement with slat 50 and corresponds to the seal strips 88 in each front side flange 23. The flat side 78 of each bearing disk 43 forms a cord surface which is coextensive with the abutment surface 84 of the front side flange 23 of counter channel 12 or 22 when the corresponding glass slat 50 is in the closed position. Thus, seal strips 82 and 88 are coextensive and form a continuous seal downwardly along each side jamb section 12 and 14 which the slats 50 are closed for sealing with the end edges of the glass slats 50.
As shown in FIG. 4, it will be noted that the channels 54 are spaced laterally an appreciable distance from the center of the shaft 62, with the spacing between the center of the shaft 62 and the near side of the channel 54 being slightly more than twice the width of the channel 54. In addition, the effective length of the arm 67 is such that the seal strip 70 is approximately four times the width of the channel 54 from the center of shaft 62. Also, it is to be noted that the center axis of the shaft 62 is generally half way between planes containing the closed end of the channel 54 and the open end of the channel 54 from which the glass slat 50 projects. All of this ensures that the seal strips 72, 82 and 88 are also substantially fully compressed or flattened as at 74 in FIG. 4 when the glass slats 50 are in the coplanar closed positions. Further, as may be seen from the upper portion of FIG. 4, a seal strip 92 corresponding to the seal strips 70 seals against the lower longitudinal edge 90 of the lower glass slat 50 when the glass slats 50 are in the closed positions.
From the foregoing, it will be seen that the free margins of the arms 67 are sealed relative to the abutment flange 76 and the lower margins 90 of each of the glass slats 50 spaced above the lowest glass slat 50 and that the seal strip 92 forms a seal with the lower margin 90 of the lowermost glass slat 50, when the slats 50 are rotated to the closed position. In addition, as may be seen to best advantage in FIG. 5, the seals 82 and 88 are provided to seal against the end edges of the glass slats 50 when in the closed position. Thus, when the glass slats 50 are in their closed position, the outside perimeter of the slats 50 is effectively sealed on all sides, and thus the window construction 10 is substantially fully sealed against the passage of air into the inside of or through the window construction.
From FIGS. 2 and 3 it may be seen that each set of levers 66 includes free ends pivotally connected to an operating bar 96 and that each operating bar 96 has one end of an actuating lever 98 pivotally connected thereto for acting upon by any suitable form of slat operating mechanism (not shown).
With attention now invited more specifically to FIG. 7, it will be noted that minimal clearance between the shaft 62 and the center bore 46 provides an extremely stable connection between the bearing disk 43 and the shaft 62 due to the long axial extent of the connection between the disk 43 and shaft 62. Furthermore, the bearing disk 43, at axially spaced locations, is journalled through the openings 40 and 42 to provide even more stable support for the shaft 62 and this greater support is provided in a manner leading to a smoother operation and minimal friction as the shaft 62 is rotated with bearing disks 43 in jamb channels 12 and 14. Also, because the extrusion comprising the support bar 56 is of appreciable thickness in two directions angularly displaced approximately 90° relative to each other (horizontal and vertical as shown in FIG. 4), the overall strength of the support bar 56 against lateral deflection is greatly increased. Thus, with relatively closely spaced support bars 56 that strongly resist lateral deflection, and the inclusion of reinforced jamb section 12 and 14 between which the support bars 56 extend, a jalousie window construction offering greater strength and security against unwanted passage therethrough is provided.
Turning now back to FIGS. 1 and 4, it will be seen that two or more security window constructions 10 can be stacked in the manner illustrated in FIG. 1. As shown in FIG. 4, the upper corners of front and rear surfaces 102 and 104 of the header section 16 are joined to the upper surface 106 by notches 105 defined by front and rear pairs of right angulated upwardly and outwardly facing surfaces 107 and 108. Each pair of surfaces 107 and 108 defines a seat in which to receive the front and rear depending flanges 109 of the sill section of a window construction 10 to be disposed in stacked relation relative to a lower window construction 10. Further, although each of the stacked window constructions 10 includes a single pair of inner jamb sections 12 and 14, such stacked window constructions 10 may include a single outer channel 26 extending between and interconnecting each set of corresponding jamb sections 12 and 14. Thus, the inner channels 26 on each side of the stacked window construction 10 illustrated in FIG. 1 can extend the entire height of the window assembly and interconnect all of the stacked window constructions 10 thereof. Of course, each window construction 10 may include more or less than three glass slats 50 as previously stated.
In operation, starting with the glass slats 50 in the closed position, an operator (not shown), such as a crank handle journalled from one of the jamb sections 12, 14 and operably connected to the operating lever 98, is rotated resulting in a downward pull on the operating lever 98 from the position thereof illustrated in FIG. 2 to the position illustrated in FIG. 3.
As the operating lever 98 is pulled downward, the operating levers 66 are rotated counterclockwise from the position illustrated in FIG. 2 to the position illustrated in FIG. 3, thus rotating shafts 62, bearing disks 43 and support bars 56. As bars 56 are rotated in the counter-clockwise direction, the glass slats 50 are swung from the vertical position illustrated in phantom lines in FIG. 2 to the horizontal positions illustrated in solid lines in FIG. 3. At the same time, seal strips 70 are swung inwardly away from the abutment flange 76 and the plane containing the inner surfaces of the glass slats 50 when the latter are in the closed positions. Also, the end edges of the glass slats 50 swing outwardly from the seal strips 88 (the seal strips 82 remaining in contact with the glass slats 50 as they swing to the open positions).
When it is desired to close the glass slats 50, the aforementioned operator (not shown) is turned in the opposite direction to exert an upward force on the operating lever 98 causing the operating levers 66 to swing in a clockwise direction to move slats 50 from the parallel open position thereof illustrated in FIG. 3 to the coplanar closed position illustrated in FIG. 2. Shafts 62, bearing disks 43 and support bars 56 are similarly rotated in the clockwise direction. As the glass slats 50 approach the closed position, the ends of the glass slats 50 compress the seals 88 while the uppermost seal 70 approaches and compresses against the abutment flange 76, and the seals 70 below the uppermost seal 70 swing forward (outward) toward and flatten against the rearward swinging lower marginal edges of the glass slats 50 disposed above the lowermost glass slat 50. Upon rearward swinging of the lower margin 90 of the lowermost glass slat 50, the seal strip 92 is engaged and flattened. In this manner, a complete seal is formed about the exposed margin of each glass slat 50 when the glass slats are swung to the closed position. Thus, improved sealing against the movement of air through the security window construction 10 is afforded. In addition, due to the considerable lateral offset of the channels 54 from the centers of the associated shafts 62, the glass slats 50 may be swung to open positions which are substantially horizontal and allow maximum air flow therebetween.
With attention now invited more specifically to FIGS. 9-11, a prior art window construction generally referred to by the reference numeral 110 is illustrated. Window construction 110 is currently being manufactured and sold by Industrias Metallicas Marva, purportedly under Vaida U.S. Pat. No. 5,267,414. In the window construction 110, the top of channel 154 corresponding to the channel 54 of the structure disclosed in FIGS. 1-8 is vertically spaced below shaft 162 corresponding to the shaft 62, when the glass slat 150 corresponding to the glass slat 50 is in the closed position, see FIG. 10. Further, although the abutment flange 176 corresponding to the abutment flange 76 is opposed by a slotted arm portion 167 corresponding to the arm 67, the arm portion 167 does not include a seal strip corresponding to the seal strip 70. Furthermore, the free end of the arm portion 167, the shaft 162 and the channel 154 are all generally aligned vertically when the glass slat 150 is in the closed position, thus increasing the overall height of the support bar 156 and narrowing the view through the window construction 110. In addition, as may be best seen from FIG. 11, the operating bar 196 corresponding to the operating bar 96 is disposed within the window opening, and the side seals 188 corresponding to the seals 88 extend laterally inwardly from the jamb sections 114. Still further, with attention invited more specifically to FIGS. 9 and 10, the glass slats 150 are only ever-so-slightly offset from the center axis of the shaft 162; thus, the contact as at 155 between the arm portion 166 and the connecting lever 196 limits swinging movement of the glass slats 150 to the open position thereof, in which open position the glass slats 150 are inclined approximately 25° below horizontal positions. This is in sharp contrast to the construction of the present invention in which the glass slats 50 can be opened to substantially the full horizontal position.
Also, inasmuch as the end portions of shaft 162, see FIG. 11, of the window construction 110 are journalled directly through the bight portions 120 of the jamb sections 114 and include inner and outer washers 168 corresponding to the washers 68, there is considerable opportunity for air leakage past the opposite end edges of the glass slats 150 as at 151 and through the jamb section openings in which the ends of shaft 162 are journalled.
The foregoing is considered as illustrative only of the principles of the invention. Further, since numerous modifications and changes will readily occur to those skilled in the art, it is not desired to limit the invention to the exact construction and operation shown and described, and, accordingly, all suitable modifications and equivalents may be resorted to, falling within the scope of the invention.
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A jalousie window construction includes reinforced side jamb sections, full perimeter sealing for the window slats when the slats are closed and stackability of a plurality of the window constructions with the side jamb section reinforcement also functioning as reinforcement between adjacent stacked window constructions. The jalousie window construction further provides improved smooth and reduced friction pivoting of the plurality of slats thereof as well as reinforcement of the pivot shaft assemblies from which the slats are supported. The window construction also affords improved unobstructed viewing therethrough and includes a concealed mechanism for changing the angle of the pivotable slats.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates in general to magnetically actuated clutches and in particular to an improved structure for a magnetic flux breaker for minimizing the adverse effects of residual magnetism on the operation of a solenoid which controls the engagement and disengagement of a wrap spring clutch.
Clutches are well known devices which are frequently employed in machinery to selectively connect a source of rotational power to a rotatably driven mechanism. Typically, a clutch includes an input shaft, an output shaft, and some mechanism for selectively connecting the input shaft to the output shaft. When the clutch is engaged, the input shaft is connected to the output shaft so as to rotatably drive the driven mechanism. When the clutch is disengaged, the input shaft is disconnected from the output shaft.
One well known type of clutch is a wrap spring clutch. A basic wrap spring clutch includes an input hub or shaft, an output hub or shaft, and a coiled drive spring for selectively causing the input hub to rotatably drive the output hub. To accomplish this, the input hub and the output hub are provided with adjacent, axially aligned cylindrical surfaces. Portions of the drive spring are disposed about each of these cylindrical surfaces. The drive spring has a relaxed inner diameter which is slightly smaller than the outer diameter of the cylindrical surfaces of the input and output hubs. Thus, as is well known in the art, when the input hub is rotated in a first direction, the drive spring is wrapped tightly about the co-axially oriented cylindrical surfaces. As a result, the output hub is driven to rotate in the first direction with the input hub. When the input hub is rotated in a second direction, however, the drive spring is expanded about the co-axially oriented cylindrical surfaces. As a result, the output hub is not driven to rotate in the second direction with the input hub.
To control the engagement and disengagement of the wrap spring clutch efficiently, the drive spring is usually formed having a control tang at one or both ends thereof. The control tang is formed integrally with the drive spring and is provided for facilitating the expansion and contraction of the drive spring about the cylindrical surfaces of the input and output hubs. The control tang is fixed within a hollow cylindrical control collar disposed about the drive spring for rotation therewith. The external surface of the control collar is provided with one or more stops which are selectively engaged by a pivot arm. When the control collar is engaged by the pivot arm, the control tang is moved such that the drive spring expands about the input and output hubs, resulting in disengagement of the wrap spring clutch. When the control collar is not engaged by the pivot arm, the drive spring contracts about the input and output hubs, resulting in engagement of the wrap spring clutch. Movement of the pivot arm, therefore, determines whether the wrap spring clutch is engaged or disengaged.
A solenoid is usually connected to the pivot arm for moving it as described above to cause engagement and disengagement of the wrap spring clutch. As is also well known, the solenoid includes an armature which is axially movable in response to electrical current passed through an electromagnetic coil. When no electrical current is passed through the electromagnetic coil, the armature is urged toward a first position by a spring or other resilient return mechanism. When the electromagnetic coil is energized, the armature is drawn toward a second position against the urging of the spring. As a result, the pivot arm can be selectively moved into and out of engagement with the control collar to control the operation of the wrap spring clutch.
In some applications for wrap spring clutches, the speed of the machinery used in conjunction with the clutch is limited by the speed of movement of the armature when the electromagnetic coil is engaged. In order to increase the speed at which the armature is moved when the electromagnetic coil is energized, it is known to provide the solenoid with a core member formed from a magnetically permeable material. The core member is positioned axially adjacent to the electromagnetic coil and forms a focused path for magnetic flux generated by the energized electromagnetic coil. As a result, the intensity of the magnetic field generated by the energized electromagnetic coil is increased in the vicinity of the armature, and the armature is quickly moved when the electromagnetic coil is energized.
One impediment to rapid movement of the armature has been found to be residual magnetism created in the core member and armature. This residual magnetism is caused by the slight permanent magnetization of the core member and the armature by the magnetic field generated by the electromagnetic coil, especially when the coil is energized by a direct electrical current. The resultant slight magnetic attraction between the armature and the core member inhibits free relative movement therebetween, thus slowing the movement of the armature when the electromagnetic coil is deenergized. Also, because the armature repeatedly impacts the core member at high speeds, deformation of the inner axial end of the armature can occur, impairing or preventing operation of the solenoid.
To minimize the effects of residual magnetism and prevent the armature from impacting the core member, prior wrap spring clutch solenoids have provided articles referred to as flux breakers between the inner axial ends of the armatures and the adjacent core members. These prior art flux breakers have been embodied as relatively thin discs having outer diameters which are slightly less than the inner diameters of the associated electromagnetic coils. Prior art flux breakers have been formed from relatively soft, non-magnetically permeable materials, such as rubber, mylar, and bronze. By relatively soft, it is meant that the materials used to form the flux breaker were softer than the materials used to form the armature and the core member.
Flux breakers formed from these prior art materials having functioned satisfactorily for minimizing the effects of residual magnetism and limiting impact damage to the armature. Unfortunately, it has been found that such prior art flux breakers themselves were prone to deformation and damage as a result of repeated impacts by the armature. As a result, prior art flux breakers had to be replaced frequently, resulting in undesirable effort and expense for maintenance. Thus, it would be desirable to provide an improved structure for a magnetic flux breaker for minimizing the adverse effects of residual magnetism on the operation of a solenoid for controlling the engagement and disengagement of a wrap spring clutch which extends the useful life thereof.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates to an improved structure for a solenoid for controlling the engagement and disengagement of a wrap spring clutch. The solenoid includes an electromagnetic coil having a core member disposed adjacent one axial end thereof. An armature is provided within the electromagnetic coil for selective axial movement in response to the energization and deenergization of the electromagnetic coil. The armature is connected to an actuator for the wrap spring clutch such that movement of the armature controls the engagement and disengagement thereof. The core member and the armature are both formed from relatively soft, magnetically permeable materials. A flux breaker is disposed within the electromagnetic coil between one axial end of the armature and the core member. The flux breaker is formed from a relatively hard, non-magnetically permeable material, such as stainless steel. The flux breaker prevents the armature from contacting the core member when attracted thereto by energization of the electromagnetic coil. The flux breaker is provided for minimizing the adverse effects of residual magnetism on the operation of a solenoid. By forming the flux breaker from a material which is harder than the materials used to form the core member and the armature, the useful life of the flux breaker is extended beyond that of prior art flux breakers.
Various objects and advantages of this invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art from the following detailed description of the preferred embodiment, when read in light of the accompanying drawings.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a wrap spring clutch including a solenoid actuator assembly in accordance with this invention.
FIG. 2 is a front elevational view, partly in cross section, of the wrap spring clutch illustrated in FIG. 1, wherein the solenoid actuator assembly is shown in a de-energized condition and the actuator arm is shown in a first position.
FIG. 3 is a front elevational view similar to FIG. 2, wherein the solenoid actuator assembly is shown in an energized condition and the actuator arm is shown in a second position.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
Referring now to the drawings, there is illustrated in FIG. 1 a wrap spring clutch and actuator assembly, indicated generally at 10, in accordance with this invention. The assembly 10 includes a wrap spring clutch, indicated generally at 11, which is conventional in the art. The wrap spring clutch 11 includes an input hub 12, an output hub 13, and a helical drive spring 14. The input hub 12 is adapted to be connected to a source of rotational power, while the output hub 13 is adapted to be connected to a driven load. The helical windings of the drive spring 14 are wrapped about co-axially oriented cylindrical surfaces provided on both the input hub 12 and the output hub 13.
The relaxed inner diameter of the drive spring 14 is slightly smaller than the outer diameter of the cylindrical surfaces of the input hub 12 and the output hub 13. Thus, when the input hub 12 is rotated in a first direction (clockwise when viewing FIG. 1), the drive spring 14 is wrapped tightly about the co-axially oriented cylindrical surfaces. As a result, the output hub 13 is driven to rotate in the first direction with the input hub 12. When the input hub 12 is rotated in a second direction (counterclockwise when viewing FIG. 1), the drive spring 14 is expanded about the co-axially oriented cylindrical surfaces. As a result, the output hub 13 is not driven to rotate in the second direction with the input hub 12.
Means are provided for selectively releasing the engagement of the output hub 13 by the drive spring 14 when the input hub 12 is rotated in the first direction. In the illustrated embodiment, this means for selectively releasing includes a rotatable control collar assembly 15 which is disposed concentrically about the drive spring 14. The control collar assembly 15 is connected to one tang or end (not shown) of the drive spring 14. The outer surface of the control collar assembly 15 has one or more ramp-shaped stops 15a (only one is illustrated) formed thereon for a purpose which will be explained below.
The wrap spring clutch 11 further includes an angled actuator arm 16 which is pivotably mounted on a pivot pin 16a. The pivot pin 16a is, in turn, secured to a support plate 16b upon which the other components of the wrap spring clutch 11 are mounted. The pivot pin 16a divides the actuator arm 16 into an upper leg and a lower leg. The upper leg of the actuator arm 16 is provided for effecting pivoting movement thereof, as will be described in detail below. The lower leg of the actuator arm 16 is provided for selectively engaging one of the stops 15a formed on the control collar assembly 15 when the input hub 12 is rotated in the first direction. When the actuator arm 16 is moved to a first position so as to engage one of the stops 15a as shown in FIG. 2, the drive spring 14 is expanded as discussed above to release the engagement between the input hub 12 and the output hub 13. When the actuator arm 16 is moved to a second position so as to not engage any of the stops 15a as shown in FIG. 3, the drive spring 14 contracts as discussed above to engage the input hub 12 and the output hub 13. The upper end of the upper leg of the actuator arm 16 is formed having a slot 16c for a purpose which will be explained below.
The wrap spring clutch 11 further includes an anti-overrun spring 17, an anti-backup spring 18, and a brake hub and spring assembly 19, all of which are conventional in the art. The structure and operation of the wrap spring clutch 11 and associated components thus far described are so well known in the art that a detailed discussion thereof is unnecessary. However, reference may be made to U.S. Pat. No. 4,321,992 to Gallo, owned by the assignee of this invention, for additional information regarding the basic structure and operation of wrap spring clutches. The disclosure of that patent is incorporated herein by reference.
Means are provided for moving the pivotable actuator arm 16 between the first position illustrated in FIG. 2 and the second position illustrated in FIG. 3. This means for moving the actuator arm 16 includes a solenoid actuator assembly, indicated generally at 20. The assembly 20 includes a housing 21 which is preferably formed from a relatively soft, magnetically permeable material, such as soft or mild steel. Within the housing 21, an electromagnetic coil 22 is disposed. The electromagnetic coil 22 is preferably formed from multiple windings of a single electrically conductive wire, the ends of which are connected to terminals (not shown) to facilitate connection to a source of electrical power. As is well known in the art, a magnetic field is generated by the electromagnetic coil 22 when electrical current is passed therethrough. The housing 21 is mounted on the support plate 16b by any conventional means.
A first opening 23 is formed through one axial end of the housing 21 which is remote from the actuator arm 16. Within that first opening, a core member 24 is mounted. The core member 24 is also preferably formed of a relatively soft, magnetically permeable material, such as iron, and is immovably secured to the housing 21. This can be accomplished by initially forming the core member 24 having an end portion which is smaller in diameter than the diameter of the first opening 23. Then, the reduced diameter end portion of the core member 24 is inserted through the first opening 23. Lastly, the exposed end portion is staked or otherwise enlarged to immovably secure the core member 24 to the housing 21 as illustrated. A second opening 25 is formed through the other axial end of the housing 21 adjacent to the actuator arm 16.
An axially movable armature 26 is provided within the solenoid actuator assembly 20. The armature 26 is disposed within the electromagnetic coil 22 contained within the housing 21 for free axial movement. One axial end of the armature 26 extends through the second opening 25 formed through the axial end of the housing 21 and is provided with an axially extending flat tab portion 26a. The flat tab portion 26a of the armature 26 extends through the slot 16c formed through the upper end of the upper leg of the actuator arm 16. A retaining pin 27 is press fit into an aperture formed through the flat tab portion 26a of the armature 26 on the side of the actuator arm 16 opposite to the housing 21.
A coiled spring 28 or other resilient device is disposed about the armature 26 between the axial end of the housing 21 containing the second opening 25 and the actuator arm 16. The spring 28 reacts against the axial end of the stationary housing 21 to urge the upper end of the actuator arm 16 away from the housing 21 into engagement with the retaining pin 27. Thus, the upper end of the actuator arm 16 is effectively connected to the armature 26 for movement therewith. The spring 28 is also effective to urge the armature 26 and the actuator arm 16 toward respective first positions illustrated in FIG. 2. In this position, the lower end of the actuator arm 16 is moved into a location wherein it will be engaged by one of the stops 15a provided on the control collar 15 when the wrap spring clutch 11 is rotated. When this occurs, the drive spring 14 is expanded as discussed above to release the engagement between the input hub 12 and the output hub 13. All of this occurs so long as the electromagnetic coil 22 is de-energized.
The armature 26 is formed from a relatively soft, magnetically permeable material, such as iron. If desired, the armature 26 may be formed from the same material as the core member 24. Thus, as well known in the art, when electrical current is passed through the electromagnetic coil 22, the magnetic field generated thereby attracts the armature 26 toward a position of minimum magnetic reluctance. This second position is illustrated in FIG. 3, wherein the armature 26 is moved axially within the electromagnetic coil 22 against the urging of the spring 28. Inasmuch as the upper end of the actuator arm 16 is effectively connected to the armature 26 for movement therewith, the actuator arm 16 is also pivoted toward a second position illustrated in FIG. 3. In this position, the lower end of the actuator arm 16 is moved into a location wherein it cannot be engaged by any of the stops 15a provided on the control collar 15. Thus, the drive spring 14 is permitted to contract as discussed above to cause engagement between the input hub 12 and the output hub 13. Accordingly, it will be appreciated that selectively energization and deenergization of the electromagnetic coil 22 causes engagement and disengagement of the wrap spring clutch 11.
A flux breaker 30 is disposed within the electromagnetic coil 22 between the inner axial end of the armature and the core member 24. The flux breaker 30 is embodied as a relatively thin disc having an outer diameter which is slightly less than the inner diameter of the electromagnetic coil 22. The flux breaker 30 is preferably not affixed to the either the core member 24 or the armature 26. Rather, the entire solenoid actuator assembly 20 is tilted slightly with respect to the horizontal plane such that the flux breaker 30 is maintained in a position adjacent to the core member 24 by gravity. It will be appreciated, however, that the flux breaker 30 may be affixed to either the core member 24 or the armature 26 by any conventional means if desired. The flux breaker 30 is formed of a non-magnetically permeable material which is relatively harder than the materials from which the core member 24 and the armature 26 are composed. In the preferred embodiment, the flux breaker 30 is formed from stainless steel.
As shown in FIG. 2, a small air gap 31 is defined between the inner axial end of the armature 26 and the flux breaker 30 when the electromagnetic coil 22 is de-energized and the spring 28 urges the armature 26 to the first position. The outer diameter of the flux breaker 30 is relatively large relative to the axial distance defined by the air gap 31. As a result, the flux breaker 30 is prevented from tilting or becoming otherwise misaligned within the air gap 31 when the armature 26 is moved by the spring 28 to the first position.
In operation, the solenoid 18 is initially de-energized. As a result, the spring 28 reacts between the axial end of the housing 21 and the upper leg of the actuator arm 16 to urge such upper end away from the housing 21. Also, the armature 26 is moved to the position illustrated in FIG. 2, wherein the inner axial end thereof is spaced apart from the core member 24. At the same time, the lower end of the actuator arm 16 is moved into a position wherein it can be engaged by the stops 15a on the control collar 15 when the input hub 12 is rotated by the source of rotational power. When this occurs, the control collar 15 is prevent from rotating with the input hub 12. As discussed above, the control tang on the drive spring 14 is connected to the control collar 15 such that rotation thereof is also prevented. The relative rotation between the control tang and the input hub 12 functions to partially unwind and expand the drive spring 14, causing the input hub 12 and the output hub 13 to be uncoupled. When it is desired to engage the wrap spring clutch 11, electrical current is supplied to coil 22. The electromagnetic field generated by the energized coil 22 attracts the armature 26 toward the core member 24 until the inner axial end of the armature 26 engages the flux breaker 30, as shown in FIG. 3.
In addition to forming part of the magnetic circuit about the electromagnetic coil 22, the core member 24 functions as a backstop to limit axial movement of the armature 26. As discussed above, the flux breaker 30 is formed from a material, such as stainless steel, which is harder than the material used to form both the core member 24 and the armature 26. As a result, the flux breaker 30 is not significantly deformed when it is engaged by the armature 26, unlike prior art flux breakers.
The armature 26 and the core member 24 are susceptible to becoming slightly permanently magnetized by the electromagnetic field generated by the coil 22. The magnitude of the resultant magnetic attraction between the armature 26 and the core member 24 increases as the two components are moved closer together. The interposed flux breaker 30 minimizes this effect by providing a minimum distance between the armature 26 and the core member 24 when the armature 26 is fully retracted within the electromagnetic coil 22. The flux breaker 30, being formed of a non-magnetically permeable material, effectively reduces the magnetic attraction between the armature 26 and the core member 24. The armature 26 is thus free to rapidly move to the extended position under the urging of the spring 28 when the coil 22 is subsequently de-energized.
It will be appreciated that because the flux breaker 30 is relatively harder than the armature 26 or the core member 24, it will not significantly deform when compressed therebetween. Therefore, the minimum distance separating the armature 26 and the core member 24 will remain essentially constant as the electromagnetic coil 22 is repeatedly energized and de-energized over time.
In the embodiment of the invention described and illustrated herein, the drive spring 14 is expanded to release the engagement between the input hub 12 and the output hub 13 and is contracted to engage the input hub 12 and the output hub 13. It will be appreciated, however, that the wrap spring clutch 11 may be configured to operate in the opposite manner, wherein the drive spring 14 is contracted to release the engagement between the input hub 12 and the output hub 13 and is expanded to engage the input hub 12 and the output hub 13. Such a modification would be easily within the grasp of any person having ordinary skill in the art and is contemplated to be within the scope of this invention.
In accordance with the provisions of the patent statutes, the principle and mode of operation of this invention have been explained and illustrated in its preferred embodiment. However, it must be understood that this invention may be practiced otherwise than as specifically explained and illustrated without departing from its spirit or scope.
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A solenoid for controlling the engagement and disengagement of a wrap spring clutch includes an electromagnetic coil having a core member disposed adjacent one axial end thereof. An armature is provided within the electromagnetic coil for selective axial movement in response to the energization and deenergization of the electromagnetic coil. The armature is connected to an actuator for the wrap spring clutch such that movement of the armature controls the engagement and disengagement thereof. The core member and the armature are both formed from relatively soft, magnetically permeable materials. A flux breaker is disposed within the electromagnetic coil between one axial end of the armature and the core member. The flux breaker is formed from a relatively hard, non-magnetically permeable material, such as stainless steel. The flux breaker prevents the armature from contacting the core member when attracted thereto by energization of the electromagnetic coil. The flux breaker is provided for minimizing the adverse effects of residual magnetism on the operation of a solenoid. By forming the flux breaker from a material which is harder than the materials used to form the core member and the armature, the useful life of the flux breaker is extended beyond that of prior art flux breakers.
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CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
This application is a divisional application of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/970,076, filed on Oct. 3, 2001, now U.S. Pat. No. 7,074,913, issued on Jul. 11, 2006, which claims the benefit of U.S. provisional application Ser. No. 60/25 1,481, filed on Dec. 5, 2000. Both U.S. patent application Ser. No. 09/970,076 and U.S. provisional application Ser. No. 60/251,481 are hereby incorporated by reference.
STATEMENT REGARDING FEDERALLY SPONSORED RESEARCH OR DEVELOPMENT
Not applicable.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Bacillus anthracis , the spore-forming causative agent of anthrax, generally infects herbivores (Hanna, 1998). Human infection, while rare, can result in a generally benign, self-limiting cutaneous disease or a systemic disease that rapidly leads to death in a high percentage of cases. The cutaneous disease can arise when spore particles from soil or animal products are introduced into cuts or skin abrasions. In contrast, the systemic disease can arise when B. anthracis spore particles are inhaled (LD 50 ≈10,000 spore particles). The high mortality rate and the ability to readily prepare and deliver B. anthracis spore particles as an aerosol have made B. anthracis a dreaded agent of biowarfare and bioterrorism.
The causative agent of the systemic disease is anthrax toxin (AT), which itself comprises a pair of binary, AB-type toxins—lethal toxin and edema toxin (Leppla, 1995). Each is assembled at the surface of mammalian cells from proteins released by B. anthracis . Lethal toxin, assembled from Protective Antigen (PA, 83 kDa) and Lethal Factor (LF, 90 kDa), is primarily responsible for lethality (Friedlander, 1986; Hanna et al., 1992; Hanna et al., 1993). Edema toxin, assembled from PA and Edema Factor (EF, 89 kDa), causes edema at the site of injection (Leppla, 1982). EF has calmodulin-dependent adenylate cyclase activity. LF is a Zn ++ -dependent protease that cleaves certain proteins involved in signal transduction and cell cycle progression (MAPKK1 and MAPKK2) (Duesbery et al., 1998).
In these AB-type toxins, PA is the receptor-binding B moiety that delivers either EF or LF, as alternative enzymic A moieties, to the cytosol of mammalian cells (Leppla, 1995). Initially, PA binds specifically, reversibly, and with high affinity (Kd≈1 nM) to a cell-surface AT receptor (ATR). After binding to the receptor, PA is cleaved by a member of the furin family of proprotein convertases, which removes a 20 kDa fragment, PA20, from the N-terminus (Klimpel et al., 1992; Novak et al., 1992). The complementary fragment, PA63, remains receptor-bound and spontaneously self-associates to form heptameric ring-shaped oligomers (Milne et al., 1994) that avidly and competitively bind EF and/or LF (Leppla, 1995) to form EF/LF-PA63 complexes. These complexes are trafficked to an acidic compartment by receptor-mediated endocytosis. In the acidic compartment, the PA63 heptamers (the “prepore”) are inserted into the membrane, forming transmembrane pores (Gordon et al., 1988). Concomitantly EF and LF are translocated across the membrane to the cytosol. Consistent with the pH dependence of translocation, toxin action is inhibited by lysosomotropic agents and bafilomycin A1 (Mendard et al., 1996).
EF translocation causes a large increase in intracellular cAMP concentration (Gordon et al., 1988; Gordon et al., 1989). Increased cAMP levels cause edema, and in neutrophils, inhibit phagocytosis and oxidative burst (O'Brien et al., 1985). By protecting the bacteria from phagocytosis, edema toxin apparently aids in establishing bacterial infection and proliferation in the mammalian host.
Treatment of primary macrophages and certain macrophage cell lines with lethal toxin causes cell lysis (Friedlander, 1986). Macrophage-depleted mice are resistant to treatment with lethal toxin, suggesting that macrophages are the primary targets of lethal toxin (Hanna et al., 1993). Low doses of lethal toxin induce the production of interleukin-1 and tumor necrosis factor (Hanna et al., 1993). Thus, it has been suggested that hyperproduction of cytokines causes death of the host by inducing systemic shock. How these or other proteins lead to cytokine production and macrophage lysis remains unclear.
In the past few years considerable progress has been made toward a detailed understanding of the structure and function of PA. Crystallographic structures of PA and the PA63 heptamers have been determined (Petosa et al., 1997). The prepore undergoes a major conformational change under acidic conditions to form a 14-strand transmembrane β-barrel pore (Benson et al., 1998; Miller et al., 1999). The pore structure and the detailed mechanism by which LF and EF are translocated across membranes are under intensive investigation.
The ATR structure is heretofore unknown, but is present in all cell lines that have been tested. Studies on CHO-K1 cells had indicated that PA binds to a proteinaceous receptor that is present in about 10 4 copies/cell (Escuyer and Collier, 1991). The paucity of knowledge about the ATR represents a major gap in the understanding of how AT acts. Identification and cloning of the ATR will provide more treatment strategies for anthrax.
A cDNA clone (Genbank Accession Number NM 032208) known as tumor endothelial marker 8 (TEM8) is known (St. Croix, 2000). TEM8 is upregulated in colorectal cancer endothelium, but heretofore the function of TEM8 was not known.
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present application discloses structures of complete and partial anthrax toxin receptors from a mammal, namely a human. The complete anthrax toxin receptor includes an extracellular domain, a transmembrane domain, and a cytoplasmic domain that can vary in length, as is disclosed herein. It is disclosed herein that PA binds to the anthrax toxin receptor at a von Willebrand factor A (VWA) domain in the extracellular domain.
In one aspect, the invention is summarized in that an anthrax toxin receptor is a polypeptide having an amino acid sequence selected from SEQ ID NO:2, SEQ ID NO:6, SEQ ID NO: 8, SEQ ID NO:10, a PA-binding fragment of any of the foregoing, and a PA-binding variant of any of the foregoing polypeptides having conservative or non-conservative amino acid substitutions or other changes relative to the disclosed sequences. The various forms of the receptor encoded by SEQ ID NO:2, SEQ ID NO:6, SEQ ID NO: 8, and SEQ ID NO:10 apparently differ as a result of alternative splicing.
In a related aspect, the invention further relates to an isolated polynucleotide that encodes any of the above-mentioned polypeptides and their complements, and a polynucleotide that hybridizes under moderately stringent or stringent hybridization conditions to any of the foregoing.
In still another related aspect, the invention encompasses a cloning vector and an expression vector comprising any of the foregoing polynucleotides, whether or not the polynucleotide is operably linked to an expression control sequence that does not natively promote transcription or translation of the polynucleotide.
By identifying the polypeptides and polynucleotides of the invention, the applicant enables the skilled artisan to detect and quantify mRNA and ATR protein in a sample, and to generate atr transgenic and atr knock-out animals using methods available to the art.
Further, the invention includes a host cell comprising any such vector in its interior. Also within the scope of the present invention is a host cell having a polynucleotide of the invention integrated into the host cell genome at a location that is not the native location of the polynucleotide.
In yet another aspect, the invention is a method for producing an anthrax toxin receptor polypeptide that includes the steps of transcribing a polynucleotide that encodes an anthrax toxin receptor polypeptide, operably linked to an upstream expression control sequence, to produce an mRNA for the receptor polypeptide, and translating the mRNA to produce the receptor polypeptide. This method can be performed in a host cell when the polynucleotide is operably linked to the expression control sequence in an expression vector, and wherein the expression vector is delivered into a host cell, the expression control sequence being operable in the host cell. Alternatively, at least one of the transcribing and translating steps can be performed in an in vitro system, examples of which are well known in the art and commercially available. In either case, the polypeptide can be isolated from other cellular material using readily available methods.
In still another aspect, the invention is a method for identifying an agent that can alter the effect of AT on the host cell or organism. The method includes the steps of separately exposing a plurality of putative agents in the presence of AT to a plurality of cells having on their surface at least a portion of the ATR that binds to AT or a component thereof, comparing the effect of AT on the cells in the presence and absence of the agent, and identifying at least one agent that alters an effect of AT on the cells. In a related aspect, the present invention encompasses an agent that alters binding of AT to the ATR.
The present invention also encompasses a method for reducing or preventing AT-related damage in vivo or in vitro to human or non-human cells having an ATR on an outer cell surface, the method comprising the step of exposing the cells to an agent that reduces binding of AT to the ATR. Similarly, the invention relates to a method for reducing or preventing damage in vivo or in vitro to human or non-human cells caused by AT by exposing AT to an agent that reduces binding of the AT to the ATR.
The present invention is also a method for identifying a mutant of the extracellular ATR domain or fragment thereof having altered (increased or reduced) binding affinity for AT.
It is an object of the invention to identify polypeptides that encode a mammalian anthrax toxin receptor, as well as fragments, mutants, and variants thereof and polynucleotides encoding same.
It is a feature of the invention that a soluble PA-binding polypeptide can reduce or eliminate toxicity associated with anthrax toxin.
Other objects, advantages and features of the invention will become apparent from the following specifications and claims.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 shows sequence alignment of various ATR polypeptide sequences with the I domain of integrin α2 and with the von Willebrand factor A domain consensus sequence. The top sequence in the alignment, labeled α2-I in FIG. 1 , is provided in the sequence listing as SEQ ID NO:4. The second sequence from the top in the alignment, labeled VWA-CON in FIG. 1 , is provided in the sequence listing as SEQ ID NO:3. The third sequence from the top in the alignment, labeled TEM8 in FIG. 1 , is provided in the sequence listing as SEQ ID NO:6. The bottom sequence in the alignment, labeled ATR in FIG. 1 , is provided in the sequence listing as SEQ ID NO:2.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
An isolated polynucleotide and an isolated polypeptide, as used herein, can be isolated from its natural environment or can be synthesized. Complete purification is not required in either case. Amino acid and nucleotide sequences flanking an isolated polypeptide or polynucleotide that occurs in nature, respectively, can but need not be absent from the isolated form.
Further, an isolated polynucleotide has a structure that is not identical to that of any naturally occurring nucleic acid or to that of any fragment of a naturally occurring genomic nucleic acid spanning more than three separate genes. The term includes, without limitation, (a) a nucleic acid molecule having a sequence of a naturally occurring genomic or extrachromosomal nucleic acid molecule but which is not flanked by the coding sequences that flank the sequence in its natural position; (b) a nucleic acid molecule incorporated into a vector or into a prokaryote or eukaryote genome such that the resulting molecule is not identical to any naturally occurring vector or genomic DNA; (c) a separate molecule such as a cDNA, a genomic fragment, a fragment produced by polymerase chain reaction (PCR), or a restriction fragment; and (d) a recombinant nucleotide sequence that is part of a hybrid gene, i.e., a gene encoding a fusion protein. Specifically excluded from this definition are nucleic acids present in mixtures of clones, e.g., as these occur in a DNA library such as a cDNA or genomic DNA library. An isolated nucleic acid molecule can be modified or unmodified DNA or RNA, whether fully or partially single-stranded or double-stranded or even triple-stranded. A nucleic acid molecule can be chemically or enzymatically modified and can include so-called non-standard bases such as inosine.
Reference herein to use of AT is understood to encompass use of an ATR-binding component thereof, especially PA.
Anthrax Toxin Receptor
The applicants have identified and determined the nucleic acid sequence (SEQ ID NO:1) of a cDNA clone that of a 368 amino acid long polypeptide (SEQ ID NO:2, ATR), and show herein that the polypeptide is a surface-bound anthrax toxin receptor (ATR) on human cells. Based on known structural analysis methods, the polypeptide is predicted to encode a 27 amino-acid-long signal peptide (amino acids 1-27 of SEQ ID NO:2), a 293 amino-acid-long extracellular domain (amino acids 28-320 of SEQ ID NO:2), a 23 amino-acid-long putative transmembrane region (amino acids 320-343 of SEQ ID NO:2), and a 25 amino acid long cytoplasmic domain (amino acids 344-368 of SEQ ID NO:2).
It is disclosed herein that Protective Antigen (PA) of anthrax toxin (AT) binds to the anthrax toxin receptor at a von Willebrand factor A (VWA) domain located in the portion from amino acid 44 to 216 in the extracellular domain of SEQ ID NO:2. VWA domains are present in the extracellular portions of a variety of cell surface proteins, including matrilins and integrins (designated as I domains). A VWA domain consensus sequence, VWA-CON, developed by comparing 210 related sequences, is presented as SEQ ID NO:3. These domains are important for protein/protein interactions and constitute ligand binding sites for integrins (Dickeson, 1998). The I domain of integrin α2 (α2) is presented as SEQ ID NO:4. Ligand binding through I domains requires an intact metal ion-dependent adhesion site (MIDAS) motif (Lee, 1995) which appears to be conserved in the ATR extracellular domain, as is detailed below.
Comparison of SEQ ID NO:1 and SEQ ID NO:2 to existing databases revealed other versions of those sequences. Human cDNA TEM8 (SEQ ID NO:5; Genbank accession number NM 032208) encodes a 564 amino-acid-long form (SEQ ID NO:6) of the human ATR. SEQ ID NO:6 has not previously been identified as an anthrax toxin receptor, and indeed no function has yet been ascribed to the protein. Like SEQ ID NO:1, SEQ ID NO:5 was a PCR amplification product from HeLa cells and human placenta cDNA libraries. Whereas the cytoplasmic tail of SEQ ID NO:2 is only 25 amino acids long, that of SEQ ID NO:6 is predicted to be 221 amino acids long (amino acids 344-564), presumably as a result of differential splicing of a primary mRNA transcript. The proteins are otherwise identical. Upstream of the coding sequences, SEQ ID NO:1 and SEQ ID NO:5 are also identical.
Also presented are IMAGE CLONE 4563020 (SEQ ID NO:7; Genbank Accession Number BC012074) and the predicted polypeptide encoded by the clone (SEQ ID NO:8). SEQ ID NO:8 is identical to amino acids 1-317 of ATR, but differs thereafter at the C-terminus. Similarly, human cDNA FLJ10601, clone NT2RP2005000 (SEQ ID NO:9; Genbank Accession Number AK001463) and the predicted polypeptide encoded by the clone (SEQ ID NO:10) are presented. This polypeptide is identical to a portion of SEQ ID NO:2 from amino acid 80 to amino acid 218. As with TEM8 and the protein it encodes, no function is known for any of these polynucleotide and polypeptide sequences, nor has there been any prior indication that the polypeptides are complete or partial anthrax toxin receptors.
It is of interest to note that the product of the mouse homolog of ATR/TEM8 (Genbank accession number AK0013005) is highly related to the human clones, sharing greater than 98% amino acid sequence identity within the reported extracellular domain. This suggests that the anthrax toxin receptor is conserved among species. Furthermore, consistent with the observation that the anthrax toxin receptor is found in a variety of cell lines, ATR is expressed in a number of different tissues including CNS, heart, lung, and lymphocytes.
In addition to the full-length and partial ATR polypeptide sequences presented in SEQ ID NO:2, SEQ ID NO:6, SEQ ID NO:8 and SEQ ID NO:10, other polypeptide fragments shorter than those sequences that retain PA-binding activity, and variants thereof are also within the scope of the invention. The entire receptor is not required for utility; rather, fragments that bind to PA are useful in the invention.
A skilled artisan can readily assess whether a fragment binds to PA. A polypeptide is considered to bind to PA if the equilibrium dissociation constant of the binary complex is 10 micromolar or less. PA-binding to the ATR (or a fragment of the ATR) can be measured using a protein-protein binding method such as coimmunoprecipitation, affinity column analysis, ELISA analysis, flow cytometry or fluorescence resonance energy transfer (FRET), and surface plasmon resonance (SPR). SPR is particularly suited as it is highly sensitive and accurate, operable in real time, and consumes only minute amounts of protein. SPR uses changes in refractive index to quantify macromolecular binding and dissociation to a ligand covalently tethered to a thin gold chip in a micro flow cell. Besides the equilibrium dissociation constant (Kd), on-and off-rate constants (ka and kd) can also be obtained. A BlAcore 2000 instrument (Pharmacia Biotech) can be used for these measurements. Typically, a protein is covalently tethered to a carboxymethyl dextran matrix bonded to the gold chip. Binding of a proteinaceous ligand to the immobilized protein results in a quantifiable change in refractive index of the dextran/protein layer. SPR can also be used to determine whether the interaction between PA and its receptor is sensitive to low pH, which is relevant to toxin endocytosis. This technique has been used to study protein-protein interactions in many systems, including the interactions of PA63 with EF and LF (Elliott, 1998).
The invention also relates to polypeptides that are at least 80%, preferably at least 90%, more preferably at least 95%, still more preferably at least 97%, or most preferably at least 99% identical to any aforementioned PA-binding polypeptide fragment, where PA-binding is maintained. As used herein, “percent identity” between amino acid or nucleic acid sequences is synonymous with “percent homology,” which can be determined using the algorithm of Karlin and Altschul (Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 87:2264-2268, 1990), modified by Karlin and Altschul (Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 90:5873-5877, 1993). Such an algorithm is incorporated into the NBLAST and XBLAST programs of Altschul et al. (J. Mol. Biol. 215:403-410, 1990). BLAST nucleotide searches are performed with the NBLAST program, score=100, wordlength=12, to obtain nucleotide sequences homologous to a nucleic acid molecule of the invention. BLAST protein searches are performed with the XBLAST program, score=50, wordlength=3, to obtain amino acid sequences homologous to a reference polypeptide (e.g., SEQ ID NO:2). To obtain gapped alignments for comparison purposes, Gapped BLAST is utilized as described in Altschul et al. (Nucleic Acids Res. 25:3389-3402, 1997). When utilizing BLAST and Gapped BLAST programs, the default parameters of the respective programs (e.g., XBLAST and NBLAST) are used. See http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov. A variant can also include, e.g., an internal deletion or insertion, a conservative or non-conservative substitution, or a combination of these variations from the sequence presented.
Soluble fragments are of great interest as these can competitively inhibit anthrax toxin binding to the ATR and thereby can protect cells from AT intoxication in vivo and in vitro. A fragment is soluble if it is not membrane-bound and is soluble in an aqueous fluid. The extracellular ATR domain is a soluble fragment of the ATR, as are fragments of that domain. Even though the VWA domain is formally identified as extending from amino acid 44 to 216 in the extracellular domain, more or fewer natively adjacent amino acids can be included in the fragment without compromising solubility or PA-binding. For example, a PA-binding fragment having the sequence of SEQ ID NO:2 beginning at any amino acid in the range from 27 to 43 and ending at any amino acid in the range from 221 to 321. A preferred soluble, PA-binding fragment extends from amino acid 42 to 222. Another preferred soluble PA-binding fragment includes a fragment of the ATR from amino acid 27 through amino acid 321. Likewise, any polypeptide fragment of these preferred fragments that retains PA-binding activity is within the scope of the invention. ATR in soluble form is effective in a monomeric form, as well as in multimeric forms such as dimeric, tetrameric, pentameric and higher oligomeric forms.
PA-binding polypeptides can include, therefore, SEQ ID NO:2, SEQ ID NO:6, SEQ ID NO:8, SEQ ID NO:10, a PA-binding fragment of SEQ ID NO:2, a PA-binding fragment of SEQ ID NO:6, a PA-binding fragment of SEQ ID NO:8, a PA-binding fragment of SEQ ID NO:10, a PA-binding polypeptide at least 80% identical to any of the foregoing fragments. The PA-binding polypeptides can also be provided as fusion proteins comprising any of the foregoing that can comprise still other non-natively adjacent amino acids for detecting, visualizing, isolating, or stabilizing the polypeptide. For example, PA binds to a soluble fusion protein of a hexahistidine tag, a T7 tag, and amino acids 41-227 of ATR.
Likewise, isolated polynucleotides having an uninterrupted nucleic acid sequence that encodes the aforementioned polypeptides and polypeptide fragments are also useful in the invention. The sequences that encode soluble, PA-binding polypeptide fragments of ATR are immediately apparent to the skilled artisan from the description of the relevant portions of the polypeptides, supra. An isolated nucleic acid containing the complement of any such polynucleotide is also within the scope of the present invention, as are polynucleotide and oligonucleotide fragments for use as molecular probes. The polynucleotides of the invention cannot encode SEQ ID NO:6, SEQ ID NO:8 or SEQ ID NO:10.
The present invention also relates to an isolated polynucleotide and its complement, without regard to source, where the polynucleotide hybridizes under stringent or moderately stringent hybridization conditions to SEQ ID NO:1, SEQ ID NO:5, SEQ ID 7, or SEQ ID NO:9 or to a fragment of any of the foregoing that encodes a soluble polypeptide that can bind to PA. As used herein, stringent conditions involve hybridizing at 68° C. in 5×SSC/5× Denhardt's solution/1.0% SDS, and washing in 0.2×SSC/0.1% SDS ±100 μg/ml denatured salmon sperm DNA, at room temperature. Moderately stringent conditions include washing in the same buffer at 42° C. Additional guidance regarding such conditions is readily available in the art, for example, by Sambrook et al., 1989, Molecular Cloning, A Laboratory Manual, Cold Spring Harbor Press, N.Y.; and Ausubel et al. (eds.), 1995, Current Protocols in Molecular Biology, (John Wiley & Sons, N.Y.) at Unit 2.10.
In a related aspect, any polynucleotide of the invention can be provided in a vector in a manner known to those skilled in the art. The vector can be a cloning vector or an expression vector. In an expression vector, the polypeptide-encoding polynucleotide is under the transcriptional control of one or more non-native expression control sequences, such as a promoter not natively adjacent to the polynucleotide, such that the encoded polypeptide can be produced when the vector is delivered into a compatible host cell that supports expression of an polypeptide encoded on a vector, for example by electroporation or transfection, or transcribed and translated in a cell-free transcription and translation system. Such cell-based and cell-free systems are well known to the skilled artisan. Cells comprising an insert-containing vector of the invention are themselves within the scope of the present invention, without regard to whether the vector is extrachromosomal or integrated in the genome.
A skilled artisan in possession of the polypeptides and polynucleotides of the invention can also identify agents that can reduce or prevent the effect of AT on a host having on the cell surface at least a portion of the ATR. The effect altered can relate, for example, to (1) susceptibility of the host cell to AT damage, (2) integration of ATR into the cell membrane, (3) binding between ATR and PA, (4) PA heptamerization, (5) uptake of PA and ATR complex into cells, and (6) the translocation of toxin into host cell cytoplasm. The method includes separately exposing a plurality of putative agents in the presence of AT to a plurality of cells, comparing the effect of AT on the cells in the presence and absence of the agent, and identifying at least one agent that alters an effect of AT on the cells.
The skilled artisan can readily evaluate the typical effects of AT and can observe variations in those effects in the presence of a putative altering agent. For example, susceptibility to AT damage can be evaluated by exposing host cells to AT. Integration of newly formed ATR into the host cell membrane can be evaluated by labeling newly synthesized proteins in the host cell and immunopreticipating ATR from the cellular membrane fraction of the host cell. Binding of wild-type ATR to PA can be evaluated with fluorescent labeled anti-PA antibody. PA heptamerization can be evaluated by several techniques including native polyacrylamide gel electrophoresis, gel filtration, and western blotting. Uptake of PA-ATR complex can be evaluated by binding PA to ATR at 4° C., increasing the temperature to 37° C. to allow endocytosis, shifting the temperature back to 4° C., and incubating cells with fluorescent labeled anti-PA antibodies. Toxin translocation into the host cell cytoplasm can be evaluated as described in Wesche et al, 1998, which is incorporated herein by reference as if set forth in its entirety.
The agents screened can be, for example, dominant negative mutant ATRs (encoded by a mutant polynucleotide sequence, which can be provided in an expression vector), a high molecular weight molecule such as a polypeptide (including, e.g., a mutant AT, a soluble ATR, a mono- or polyclonal antibody to an ATR, to PA, or to an ATR/PA complex), a polysaccharide, a lipid, a nucleic acid, a low molecular weight organic or inorganic molecule, or the like. Antibodies can be produced by administering to a non-human animal an immunogenic, PA-binding fragment of a polypeptide which can be, e.g., SEQ ID NO:2, SEQ ID NO:6, SEQ ID NO:8, SEQ ID NO:10, a polypeptide at least 80% identical to any of the foregoing and a fusion protein comprising any of the foregoing, and then obtaining the desired antibodies using known methods.
Chemical libraries for screening putative agents, including peptide libraries, are readily available to the skilled artisan. Examples include those from ASINEX (i.e. the Combined Wisdom Library of 24,000 manually synthesized organic molecules) and from CHEMBRIDGE CORPORATION (i.e. the DIVERSet™ library of 50,000 manually synthesized chemical compounds; the SCREEN-Set™ library of 24,000 manually synthesized chemical compounds; the CNS-Set™ library of 11,000 compounds; the Cherry-Pick™ library of up to 300,000 compounds) and linear library, multimeric library and cyclic library (Tecnogen (Italy)). Once an agent with desired activity is identified, a library of derivatives of that agent can be screened for better agents. Phage display is also a suitable approach for finding novel inhibitors of the interaction between PA and ATR.
Another aspect of the present invention relates to ATR ligands other than PA and methods for identifying ATR ligands. As ATR is expressed in many cell types, it likely has other natural ligands. To identify these other ligands, a polypeptide that contains an ATR VWA domain, preferably an entire extracellular domain can be provided in soluble or tethered form, e.g., in a chromatographic column. Preferably, the ectodomain of ATR can be provided as a fusion protein that also a contains rabbit IgG constant region, a GST domain or a hexahistidine tag. This fusion protein can be immobilized on a chromatographic column using known methods. A cell extract can be passed over the column. A ligand is identified when binding is observed between the ectodomain and a compound present in the cell extract. The identified ligand can be used in methods for identifying agents that alter an effect of AT, to identify an agent that selectively inhibits PA-ATR binding. It is also desirable to use the other ligands and the ATR in comparative high throughput screening methods for identifying small molecules that do not interfere with natural ligand binding to ATR, but which do prevent or reduce binding of ATR to anthrax toxin.
The present invention also relates to reducing cellular damage caused by AT, which can be achieved by administering an agent for reducing the ATR level, inhibiting the binding between ATR and AT, or by reducing downstream ATR activity after AT binding. For example, an antisense oligonucleotide can reduce or prevent expression of atr using delivery methods known to the skilled artisan, thus reducing the cellular ATR level. An ATR-anthrax binding inhibition agent can inhibit the binding between ATR and AT. Dominant negative ATRs can block downstream ATR activities required for AT toxicity. The agents used for reducing AT damage to cells can be administered to a human or non-human animal, preferably in a standard pharmaceutical carrier, in an amount effective to reduce or eliminate anthrax toxicity.
A 20-25 mer antisense oligonucleotide can be directed against 5′ end of the atr message with phosphorothioate derivatives on the last three base pairs on the 3′ end and the 5′ end to enhance the half life and stability of the oligonucleotides. A carrier for an antisense oligonucleotide can be used. An example of a suitable carrier is cationic liposomes. For example, an oligonucleotide can be mixed with cationic liposomes prepared by mixing 1-alpha dioleylphatidylcelthanolamine with dimethldioctadecylammonium bromide in a ratio of 5:2 in 1 ml of chloroform. The solvent will be evaporated and the lipids resuspended by sonication in 10 ml of saline. Another way to use an antisense oligonucleotide is to engineer it into a vector so that the vector can produce an antisense cRNA that blocks the translation of the mRNAs encoding for ATR. Similarly, RNAi techniques, which are now being applied to mammalian systems, are also suited for inhibiting ATR expression (see Zamore, Nat. Struct. Biol. 8:746:750 (2001), incorporated herein by reference as if set forth in its entirety).
The present invention also relates to a method for detecting atr mRNA or ATR protein in a sample. Such detection can be readily accomplished by using oligonucleotide or polynucleotide probes for atr mRNA, or antibodies for ATR protein. In a related aspect, the antibodies made and identified as being able to bind to ATR can also be used to separate ATR from a sample.
The present invention also relates to a cell line that does not contain ATR from a parent cell line that contains ATR, and methods for making same. The present invention provides that it is possible for cells lacking ATR to survive. In the example described below, a cell line that does not contain ATR was created using mutagenesis and screening. Now that the atr cDNA sequence is identified in the present invention, many other methods for generating a cell line that does not express atr become feasible, such as homologous recombination. In addition to these methods, the cell lines generated, including the one described in the example below, are themselves within the scope of the present invention.
The invention also provides molecules and methods for specifically targeting and killing cells of interest by delivering, e.g., AT or LF to the cell. Soluble ATR molecules can be coupled to a ligand or to a single chain antibody selected for targeting to the cell of interest (e.g., a ligand that binds a receptor presented on a tumor cell surface). The coupling is most readily accomplished by producing a fusion protein that encodes both the ATR binding portion and the ligand or single chain antibody molecule. The ligand or single chain antibody domains simply serve to attach the toxin to cells with the cognate surface markers. The toxin or factor is preloaded onto the ATR portion before exposing the coupled molecules to the targeted cells. This is similar in principle to the previously described for retroviral targeting using soluble retroviral receptor-ligand bridge proteins and retroviral receptor-single chain antibody bridge proteins. See Snitkovsky and Young, Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 95:7063-7068 (1998); Boerger et al. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA 96:9687-9872 (1999) and Snitkovsky et al., J. Virol. 74:9540-9545 (2000), and Snitkovsky et al., J. Virol. 75:1571-1575 (2001), each incorporated herein by reference as if set forth in its entirety.
The invention will be more fully understood upon consideration of the following non-limiting examples.
EXAMPLES
Methods
Mutagenesis and Characterization of CHO-K1 Cells
A mutant cell line lacking the receptor was generated, so that this defect could be genetically complemented. About 5×10 7 cells of the hypodiploid CHO-K1 cell line were treated at 37° C. for 7 hr with medium containing 10 μg/ml ICR-191 (Sigma), a DNA alkylating agent that induces small deletions and frameshift mutations in genes, then washed twice. This treatment led to approximately 90% cell death.
The surviving mutagenized cells were then challenged with 8 μg/ml PA and 10 ng/ml LF N -DTA, a fusion protein composed of the N-terminal 255 amino acids of LF linked to the catalytic A chain of diphtheria toxin. This recombinant toxin can kill CHO-K1 cells (in contrast to LF and PA) and it exploits the same LF/PA/receptor interactions that are required for the binding and entry of the native LF and EF proteins. After 4 days, surviving cells were replated and incubated for 3 days with medium containing PA and LF N -DTA. Ten single-cell colonies (designated as CHO-R1.1 to CHO-R1.10) that survived toxin treatment were isolated 14 days later. In control experiments performed with non-mutagenized CHO-K1 cells, no toxin-resistant cell clones were detected.
One of the mutagenized clones (CHO-R1.1) was chosen for further analysis. CHO-R1.1 cells were found to be fully susceptible to killing by diphtheria toxin (DT) by measuring 3 H-leucine incorporation into cellular proteins after exposure to the toxin, thus ruling out the possibility that resistance to PA/LF N -DTA was due to a defect in the pathway of DT action. To test directly whether CHO-R1.1 cells lacked the receptor, flow cytometric analysis was performed after the cells were incubated at 4° C. for 2 hr in medium containing 40 to 80 nM PA-K563C coupled at mutated residue 563 to Oregon Green maleimide (Molecular Probes) (“OGPA”). The treated cells were washed twice with medium and analysed using a Becton Dickinson FACSCalibur flow cytometer. CHO-R1.1 cells were significantly impaired in their ability to bind to OGPA as compared to the parental cell line, suggesting that these mutagenized cells had lost expression of the putative PA receptor gene. Similar analysis of the other nine mutant CHO-R1 clones demonstrated that they were also defective in binding to OGPA.
cDNA Complementation
In an attempt to complement the PA binding defect of CHO-R1.1 cells, the cells were transduced with a retrovirus-based cDNA library (Clontech) prepared from human HeLa cells that express the PA receptor. This cDNA library is contained in a murine leukemia virus (MLV) vector that is packaged into pseudotyped virus particles (MLV[VSV-G]) containing the broad host-range G protein of vesicular stomatitis virus (VSV-G). Retrovirus-based cDNA libraries are useful for genetic complementation approaches since they can deliver a limited number of stably expressed cDNA molecules per cell. These molecules can be rapidly re-isolated by PCR amplification using MLV vector-specific oligonucleotide primers.
Approximately 5×10 5 CHO-R1.1 cells were transduced with about 10 7 infectious units (complexity of library=2×10 6 independent clones) of the pLIB-based cDNA library (Clontech; cat.# HL8002BB) produced in the 293GPG packaging cell line. Three days later, cells were incubated with medium containing 80 nM OGPA and the top 0.1% of fluorescent cells were then isolated by sorting using a Becton Dickinson FACSVantageSE instrument. Cells were sorted based on their binding of OGPA in combination with an anti-PA polyclonal serum and an allophycocyanin (APC) conjugated secondary antibody. To isolate those that contained the putative PA receptor cDNA clone, these cells were expanded and subjected to four additional rounds of sorting using OGPA as above, as well as a 1:500 dilution of a rabbit anti-PA polyclonal serum along with a 1:500 dilution of an APC-conjugated secondary antibody (Molecular probes). OGPA-single positive (round 2) or OGPA/APC-double positive (rounds 3-5) cells were recovered (the top 20%, 1%, 5%, and 50% of fluorescent cells for rounds 2, 3, 4, and 5 respectively) and expanded after each round of sorting.
This led to the isolation of a cell population in which greater than 90% of the cells bound OGPA. This complemented cell population contained at least seven unique cDNA inserts that were obtained by the PCR amplification method described above. Each cDNA was gel purified, subcloned back into the parent pLIB vector and packaged into MLV(VSV-G) virions so that it could be tested for its ability to complement the PA-binding defect of CHO-R1.1 cells. One cDNA clone of approximately 1.5 kb (designated as ATR) restored PA binding to CHO-R1.1 cells. This clone also dramatically enhanced the binding of PA to parental CHO-K1 cells.
Furthermore, the ATR cDNA clone fully restored LF N -DTA/PA toxin sensitivity to CHO-R1.1 cells. In this test, CHO-R1.1 cells and CHO-K1 cells were either not transduced or transduced with the MLV vector encoding ATR; these cells were treated with 10 −9 M LF N -DTA and various concentrations of PA; medium containing 1 μCi/mL 3 H-leucine was then added to cells for 1 hr, and the amount of 3 H-leucine incorporated into cellular proteins was determined by trichloroacetic acid precipitation and liquid scintillation counting.
CDNA Characterization
cDNA inserts were recovered from these cells by PCR amplification of genomic DNA samples using oligonucleotide primers specific for the MLV vector according to the manufacturers instructions (Clontech). Each cDNA was subcloned between the NotI and SalI restriction enzyme sites of pLIB and the resulting plasmids were co-transfected into 293 cells with MLV gag/pol and VSV-G expression plasmids pMD.old.gagpol and pMD.G. Resulting pseudotyped virus particles were used to infect CHO-R1.1 and CHO-K1 cells followed by OGPA staining and FACS analysis as above.
Sequencing of the ATR cDNA clone revealed a single long open reading frame, encoding a 368 amino acid protein. FIG. 1 shows sequence alignment of ATR (SEQ ID NO:2) with the von Willebrand factor A domain consensus sequence (SEQ ID NO:3; VWA-CON), the I domain of integrin α2 (SEQ ID NO:4; α2), and TEM8 (SEQ ID NO:6). The secondary structural elements are based on the crystal structure of the α2 I domain. Conserved amino acids are boxed and identical amino acids are indicated by shaded boxes. The putative signal sequence is underlined. The five residues that form the MIDAS motif are indicated with asterisks. The putative transmembrane domains of ATR and TEM8 are indicated with a shaded box. Potential N-linked glycosylation sites in ATR and TEM8 are indicated by hatched boxes. The alignment was made using the programs ClustalW and ESPript 1.9.
The ATR protein is predicted to have a 27 amino acid long signal peptide, a 293 amino acid long extracellular domain with three putative N-linked glycosylation sites, a 23 amino acid long putative transmembrane region, and a short cytoplasmic tail. A BLAST search revealed that the first 364 amino acids of ATR are identical to a protein encoded by the human TEM8 cDNA clone (Genbank accession number NM 032208). The C-terminal ends of ATR and the TEM8 protein then diverge, presumably as a consequence of alternative splicing, such that ATR has a cytoplasmic tail of only 25 amino acids whereas TEM8 is predicted to have a 221 amino acid long cytoplasmic tail. The most notable feature of ATR is the presence of an extracellular von Willebrand Factor type A (VWA) domain, located between residues 44 and 216.
The cytoplasmic tail of ATR contains an acidic cluster (AC motif) (EESEE) that is similar to a motif found in the cytoplasmic tail of furin which specifies basolateral sorting of this protease in polarized epithelial cells. This may be significant because the PA receptor localizes to the basolateral surface of polarized epithelial cells and it is expected that the receptor and the protease needed to bind and activate PA would be co-localized to allow for efficient entry of anthrax toxins.
Cloning and Expression of T7-ATR 41-227
A fusion protein having a hexahistidine tag, a T7 tag, and amino acids 41 to 227 of ATR (the I domain) was constructed, expressed and purified from E. coli cells as follows. A DNA fragment encoding amino acids 41-227 of ATR was cloned into the BamH1 and EcoR1 sites of pET28A (Novagen) to generate pET28A-ATR 41-227 . BL21 (DE3) cells (Stratagene) containing pET28A-ATR 41-227 were grown at 37° C. to an OD 600 of 0.6, induced with 1 mM isopropyl-β-D-thiogalactopyranoside for 4 hr and harvested by centrifugation. The cells from 1.5 L of culture were resuspended in 25 mL of 50 mM Tris-HCl pH 8.0, 2 mM dithiothreitol (DTT), 1 mM phenylmethylsulfonyl fluoride and were passed through a French press. One milligram of DNAse I (Roche) was added to the cell lysate, which was then sonicated for 1 min and centrifuged at 21,000 g for 20 min. The pellet was resuspended in 25 mL of 50 mM Tris-HCl pH 8.0, 2 mM DTT and centrifuged at 21,000 g for 20 min. This wash step was repeated once. T7-ATR 41-227 was solubilized and folded essentially as described previously.
When mixed with wild-type PA (on ice for 30 min), this construct was precipitated with polyclonal anti-PA serum (analyzed by SDS-PAGE and Western blot using anti-T7 antibody conjugated to horseradish peroxidase). The interaction between PA and T7-ATR 41-227 was impaired by the presence of EDTA (2 mM), demonstrating that the involvement of divalent cations in the interaction, and suggesting that the ATR MIDAS motif is involved in binding PA.
Interaction Between PA and ATR
PA-N682S, a mutant form of PA isolated as described below and having an impaired ability to bind and intoxicate cells, did not bind to T7-ATR 41-227 . The DNA encoding Domain 4 of PA was mutagenized using error-prone PCR. Clones were expressed in E. coli , and lysates derived from these clones were added to CHO-K1 cells in combination with LF N -DTA. Clones corresponding to lysates that did not kill CHO-K1 cells were sequenced and the N682S mutant clone was further characterized as having Ser in place of Asn at position 682.
PA-N682S was shown to have an impaired ability to bind cells as follows. CHO-K1 cells were incubated with 2×10 −8 M trypsin-nicked PA (wild-type or N682S) for 1 hr, washed with PBS, resuspended in SDS sample buffer and run on a 4-20% polyacrylamide SDS gel, and PA was visualized by Western blotting. In the experiment in which PA-N682S was shown to have an impaired ability to intoxicate cells, CHO-K1 cells were incubated with LF N -DTA (10 −9 M) and various concentrations of wild-type PA or PA-N682S mutant, and cell viability was determined.
To confirm that PA binds directly to ATR, co-immunoprecipitations (using a polyclonal serum specific for PA and protein A agarose) were performed with an extracellular fragment of ATR and either the wild-type or a receptor binding-deficient mutant form of PA. A mixture of 5 μg PA (WT or N682S) and 2 μg T7-ATR 41-227 (in 20 mM Tris-HCl pH 8.0, 150 mM NaCl, 0.1 mg bovine serum albumin per mL) was incubated on ice for 30 min in the presence or absence of 2 mM EDTA. Anti-PA polyclonal serum (10 μL) was added to this solution and incubated on ice for an additional 1 hr. Protein A agarose (Santa Cruz Biotechnology) was added and the solution was rotated at 4° C. for 1 hr, then washed four times with 20 mM Tris-HCl pH 8.0, 150 mM NaCl. Approximately one third of the mixture was subjected to SDS-PAGE, transferred to nitrocellulose and probed with anti-T7 antibody conjugated to horseradish peroxidase (Novagen).
In addition, a fusion protein containing GST and the PA receptor-binding domain (D4) (GST-D4) bound T7-ATR 41-227 , while GST did not. DNA encoding amino acids 595 to 735 of PA (domain 4) was cloned into pGEX-4T-1 (Pharmacia Biotechnology). This vector encoded the GST-D4 fusion protein. GST-D4 was coupled to glutathione sepharose at a concentration of 4 mg GST-D4 per mL according to manufacturer's instructions (Pharmacia Biotechnology). GST or GST-D4 coupled to glutathione sepharose was mixed with 2 μg of T7-ATR 41-227 and 250 μg of E. coli extract in a volume of 250 μL for 1 hr at 4° C. The beads were washed 4 times with 20 mM Tris-HCl pH 8.0, 150 mM NaCl. One half of the suspension was subjected to SDS-PAGE, transferred to nitrocellulose, and probed with anti-T7 antibody coupled to horseradish peroxidase.
Taken together, the experiments described above demonstrate a direct and specific interation between the VWA/I domain of ATR and the receptor-binding domain of PA. Given this direct interaction, we reasoned that ATR 41-227 might protect CHO-K1 cells from killing by PA and LF N -DTA. This idea was tested by incubating (37° C. for 4 hr) CHO-K1 cells with an increasing amount of T7-ATR 41-227 in the presence of a constant amount of PA (10 −10 M)/LF N -DTA (2.5−10 −11 M), and then measuring the subsequent effect on protein synthesis. T7-ATR 41-227 was an effective inhibitor of toxin action, inhibiting toxin activity by 50% and 100% at concentrations of 80 nM and 500 nM respectively. T7-ATR 41-227 did not, however, inhibit diphtheria toxin.
The present invention is not intended to be limited to the foregoing, but encompasses all such modifications and variations as come within the scope of the appended claims.
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The present invention relates to mammalian anthrax toxin receptor polypeptides and polynucleotides encoding same as well as related polypeptides and polynucleotides, vectors containing the polynucleotides and polypeptides, host cells containing related polynucleotide molecules, and cells displaying no anthrax toxin receptor on an exterior surface of the cells—minus cell lines and animals. The present invention also relates to methods for identifying molecules that bind the anthrax toxin receptor and molecules that reduce the toxicity of anthrax toxin. Finally, the present invention provides methods for treating human and non-human animals suffering from anthrax.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates to a carrier for use in electrophotographic two-component developers comprising the carrier as a component together with a toner component. In particular, the present invention relates to a coated carrier having excellent durability in the magnetic brush developing process of electrophotography.
In one of the electrophotographic methods, a dry, two-component developer comprising a toner component in combination with a carrier component is used in the magnetic brush developing process to develop a static image formed latently on a light sensitive substrate. Commonly, the developer comprises toner particles having sizes in a relatively fine range and carrier particles having sizes in a relatively coarse range. The static attraction between the opposite polarites generated by contact of these particles holds the fine toner particles on the surface of the coarse carrier particles. When the thus statically charged developer is brought into contact with a latent static image which has been formed on a light sensitive substrate, part of the charged toner particles are statically attracted and transferred to the latent image to produce a corresponding visible image. Therefore, the toner particles should have an appropriate triboelectric property so that they hold a sufficient charge to ensure the precisely selective transfer thereof to the latently imaged area.
When the conventional dry, two-component developers are used for a period of time in the electrophotographic developing process, there has been a tendency that the toner or dust thereof soils the surface of the carrier particles to eventually form a stiff continuous film of toner material on said surface due to repeated contacts and impingements between the carrier and toner particles and between these particles and mechanical parts of the developing apparatus. Once such a film has been formed, the accumulation of toner material on the respective carrier particles becomes gradually heavier. Then, the triboelectric charge of developer which has been generated by contact of the bare surface of the carrier particles with the toner particles is replaced by the triboelectric charge which is now generated by contact of the toner-coated surface of the carrier particles with the toner particles, i.e. by toner-toner contact. Thus, the triboelectric property obtained by the fresh developer is seriously impaired. Consequently, the quality of the final reproduced copies becomes poor due to the soiling of the background with a significant amount of toner resulting from the impaired triboelectric property.
Hitherto, it has been proposed to remove or partly obviate the above difficulties by modifying the carrier, for example, by coating the surface of the carrier particles (or the core material) with a resin having low surface energy. With the proposed techniques, the undesirable soiling and accumulation of the toner material on the surface of the carrier particles are inhibited considerably. However, in the product carrier coated with such a resin, generally the coating layer has poor adhesion to the core materials, such as iron powder. Also, the coating layer exhibits mechanical strength insufficient to withstand well the friction and shock to which the developer is subjected during the use. Therefore, in a continuous operation for a long period of time, the resin layer coated on the surface of cores becomes worn out or detached from the cores. Thus, the cores with the bare surfaces are exposed to the toner. Then, the initial triboelectric charge which has been generated by contact of the resin-coated core particles with the toner particles is replaced gradually by the triboelectric charge generated by contact of the bare core particles with the toner particles. Accordingly, the initial triboelectric property of the fresh developer again can not be maintained at a constant level during prolonged use and the resulting variation in the triboelectric property will adversely affect the quality of reproduced copies.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is directed to an improved electrophotographic carrier which obviates or substantially mitigates the difficulties experienced with the prior art carriers.
It is an object of the present invention to provide an improved electrophotographic carrier on the surface of which a stiff film of toner material is not formed during the use in developing.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide an improved electrophotographic carrier which comprises an iron powder core material coated with a resinous layer having high mechanical strength and adhering strongly to the core.
It is a still further object of the present invention to provide an improved electrophotographic carrier which generates with the toner particles substantially a constant triboelectric charge throughout a long operable life thereof.
We have found that these and other objects of the present invention can be achieved with an electrophotographic carrier prepared by coating a core material with a resinous composition comprised essentially of an epoxy-hydroxy hydrocarbon resin and an acrylic resin. It has been also found that the coated carrier has surprisingly improved durability.
Though the resinous coating compositions which may be used in the present invention are comprised essentially of the specified two resin components, the coating compositions may contain, if desired, additionally one or more optional ingredients such as other resins and/or additives and/or modifiers which are well known in the art.
The present carrier may be prepared by
(a) either immersing a core material iron powder in a resinous solution of an epoxy-hydroxy hydrocarbon resin, an acrylic resin and, if desired, an optional ingredient dissolved in a solvent, such as toluene, a xylene, methylethyl ketone, ethyl acetate, or
spraying such a resinous solution over a fluidized bed of the core material and
(b) heating and drying the thus coated core material at an appropriately elevated temperature.
Though the total concentration of the resins in the coating solution may be varied over a wide range, where the solution is sprayed, the concentration is preferably in the range of about 2-10% by weight of the solution in view of the flowability suitable for handling the solution and of the acceptable efficiency obtained in the heating-drying step.
The epoxy-hydroxy hydrocarbon resins which may be used in the present invention include ones derived from polymers of diene compounds through the expoxidation and hydroxylation thereof. A preferred example of the epoxy-hydroxy hydrocarbon resins is a normally solid polymer which is prepared by cationic polymerization of 1,3-pentadiene and subsequent introduction of epoxy and hydroxyl groups into the polymeric intermediate. Preferably, the product resin has a hydroxyl equivalent of about 500-1200 and an epoxy equivalent of about 400-1000.
Commercially available epoxy-hydroxy hydrocarbon resins suitable for use in the present invention include those which are sold under trade names of "LPHX 1060", "LPHX 2060" and "LPHX 2100" by Asahi Denka Kogyo Co., Ltd. (Japan).
A wide range of acrylic resins may be used in the resinous coating composition. Commercially available acrylic resins suitable for use in the present coating composition are, for example, "Dianal" BR-50, -51, -52, -60, -64, -70, -75, -77, -80, -83, -85, -100 and -101 (ex Mitsubishi Rayon Co., Ltd., Japan); "Himer" SBM-73, -3700, -600, -700 and -82 (ex Sanyo Chemical Industries Ltd., Japan); and "Pliolite" ACL, AC and VTACL (ex Goodyear).
In order to provide a coating layer of an appropriate thickness on the surface of the core particles, the proportion of the resinous coating composition applied to the core material should be preferably about 0.05-2% by weight, more preferably about 0.1-1% by weight of the core material (on dry basis).
The proportion of the epoxy-hydroxy hydrocarbon resin in the resinous composition is preferably 1-30% by weight (on dry basis). More preferably the epoxy-hydroxy hydrocarbon is used at a level of 2-10% by weight in the composition, since the resulting layer exhibits a significantly strong adhesion to the core particles and has maximum mechanical strength within the range. Where the epoxy-hydroxy hydrocarbon resin is present at a level less than 2% in the composition, the coating layer tends to exhibit a slightly decreased adhesion to the core. On the other hand, when the epoxy resin is present at a level greater than 10% by weight, though the adhesion is satisfactory, the mechanical strength decreases slightly.
The core material used in the present invention is preferably an iron powder having a particle size in the range of about 30-200 microns. Examples of the iron powders suitable for use in the present invention include pure metallic iron powders, such as chemically reduced iron powder, atomized iron powder and electrolytic iron powder; iron alloy powders; and partially oxidized iron powders produced by oxidizing the iron powders in the surface region of the respective particles.
The toner which is used in combination with the present carrier may be selected from the wide range of conventional toners which comprise a binder (a naturally occurring and/or synthetic polymer), a colorant (a dye and/or pigment) and any optional modifier and/or additive as well known in the art.
In the present carrier, the coating layer is bonded to the surface of the iron powder core particles and exhibits improved mechanical properties. Thus, the present carrier resists wear and other physical damage during use and can maintain the initial smooth surface for a prolonged period of time. This means that the carrier is freed from the formation of any stiff film of toner material on the surface thereof and that the triboelectric charge generated between the carrier and toner particles remains substantially constant for a long period of use.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
The present invention will be described further with reference to the following Examples which should not be considered as limitations on the present invention. It will be appreciated that modification of the illustrated embodiments is possible in many aspects without departing from the scope of the invention as defined in the attached claims. In the Examples, all "parts" are "parts by weight" unless otherwise indicated.
EXAMPLE 1
A coating liquid was prepared by dissolving 50 parts of an acrylic resin (ex Mitsubishi Rayon, BR-50) and 5 parts of an epoxy-hydroxy hydrocarbon resin "LPHX 2100" (ex Asahi Denka, epoxy equivalent: 850, hydroxyl equivalent: 610) in 900 parts of toluene.
A core material comprising iron particles in flake-like irregular form in the size range of 44-149 microns and having an apparent density of 2.60 grs./cm 3 (10,000 parts) was immersed in the above prepared solution. While stirring the mixture, the solvent was allowed to evaporate to dryness so as to give an electrophotographic carrier according to the present invention.
A developer was prepared by mixing 1000 parts of the carrier and 40 parts of a commercially available toner for magnetic brush development (designated to be used in Toshiba "BD 3504" electrophotographic machine) in a 1 liter polyethylene bottle for 1 hour at 75 r.p.m.
When the developer was used to develop a latent static image on an Se light sensitive plate, the reproduced visual images were free from fog density and had a high resolution. Even after reproduction of 50,000 copies, the initial quality of copy was well maintained. The triboelectric charge of the developer was measured periodically during the above reproduction test. The results are shown below.
______________________________________Copies Triboelectric charge μe/g______________________________________0 (initial) 21.310,000 20.020,000 21.230,000 20.450,000 21.8______________________________________
Apparently the triboelectric charge was very stable during the test.
EXAMPLE 2
A coating liquid was prepared by dissolving 7 parts of an acrylic resin (ex Mitsubishi Rayon, BR-80) and 0.5 parts of an epoxy-hydroxy hydrocarbon resin "LPHX 2060" (ex Asahi Denka, epoxy equivalent: 430, hydroxyl equivalent: 980) in 200 parts of methylethyl ketone.
An iron powder (2000 parts) comprising particles in flake-like irregular form in the size range of 44-149 microns and having an apparent density of 2.40 grs./cm 3 was charged to a fluidized-bed coating apparatus. The above prepared coating liquid was sprayed into the fluidized bed of iron powder to produce a carrier according to the present invention.
A developer was prepared using 1000 parts of the carrier and used for developing a latent static image on an Se light sensitive plate by the procedure as described in Example 1. The reproduced copies were found to be free from fog density and to have a high resolution. The initial quality of copy was well maintained even after reproduction of 50,000 copies.
EXAMPLE 3
The procedure of Example 1 was repeated except that the iron powder material was replaced by an iron powder comprising particles in flake-like irregular form which had been subjected to partial oxidation to an extent of an oxygen content of 1.2%.
The results were similar to those obtained in Example 1. Again, even after reproduction of 50,000 copies, the initial copy quality was maintained.
EXAMPLE 4
A coating liquid was prepared by dissolving 50 parts of styrene-acrylic resin (Himer SBM-700, ex Sanyo Chemical Industries) and 5 parts of an epoxy-hydroxy hydrocarbon resin "LPHX 2100" (ex Asahi Denka, epoxy equivalent: 850, hydroxyl equivalent: 610) in 900 parts of toluene.
An iron powder (10,000 parts) comprising particles in rounded irregular form in the size range of 74-149 microns and having an apparent density of 2.91 grs./cm 3 (said iron powder having been subjected to partial oxidation) was immersed in the above prepared liquid. While stirring the mixture, the solvent was allowed to evaporate to dryness so as to give a carrier according to the present invention.
A developer was prepared using 1000 parts of the carrier and used for developing a latent static image on an Se light sensitive plate by the procedure as described in Example 1. The reproduced copies were found to be free from fog density and to have a high resolution. The initial copy quality was well maintained even after reproduction of 50,000 copies.
COMPARATIVE EXAMPLES
A carrier was produced in accordance with the procedure as described in Example 1 except that the epoxy-hydroxy hydrocarbon resin was omitted from the coating liquid. The carrier was used to give a developer which was tested for developing a latent static image on an Se light sensitive plate as in Example 1.
Though, initially the copies were reproduced with a clear resolution, the density and resolution of copies became unacceptably low after reproduction of about 20,000 copies.
Carriers were produced by repeating the respective procedures of Examples 2, 3 and 4 except that the epoxy-hydroxy hydrocarbons were omitted from the respective coating liquids. The resulting carriers used to prepare developers in accordance with the procedures of Examples 2, 3 and 4, respectively. The results of the developing tests conducted with the developers showed that the developers had deteriorated unacceptably after reproduction of about 15,000-20,000 copies and the triboelectric charge had increased remarkably in each of the cases.
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A carrier for use as a component in electrophotographic two-component developers which is improved in durability of the triboelectric property by coating the surface of the iron core particles of carrier with a resinous composition comprised essentially of an epoxy-hydroxy hydrocarbon resin and an acrylic resin.
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BACKGROUND AND SUMMARY
[0001] The present invention relates to a method for calibrating a system for controlling thrust and steering of a drive arrangement in a watercraft, said system comprising an operating device adapted for indicating a requested direction of travel of said watercraft, the operating device being connected to a control unit for providing corresponding thrust and steering commands to said drive arrangement.
[0002] The invention also relates to an arrangement for calibrating a system for controlling thrust and steering of a drive arrangement in a watercraft, wherein said system comprises an operating device adapted for indicating a requested direction of travel of said watercraft, the operating device being connected to a control unit for providing corresponding thrust and steering commands to said drive arrangement.
[0003] When controlling a watercraft, for example in the form of smaller ships and leisure boats, there is a general need for arrangements which allow a precise control of the thrust and steering of the watercraft. In particular, there is a need for a arrangements providing accurate control of the watercraft during docking. In this regard, the term “docking” refers to a manoeuvre in which a watercraft is propelled towards a harbour, marina or pier in order to be landed and secured.
[0004] In certain situations, the docking manoeuvre can be quite difficult for the driver of the watercraft, for example when the watercraft must be landed with one of its sides towards the harbour, for example in a space between two other boats. Such a situation can be simplified if the watercraft is arranged to be propelled in the sideways direction, i.e. in a direction which is generally transverse to the longitudinal direction of the watercraft.
[0005] Such a sideways movement of a watercraft can be carried out if the watercraft is provided with two drive arrangements which are separately controllable, i.e. independently of each other. The drive arrangements can for example be in the form of conventional combustion engines which are connected to propellers. By shifting one of the engines into reverse and operating the other engine in forwards drive, while at the same time carefully adjusting the steering angles of the two propellers, the watercraft can be brought to move in a direction which is essentially transverse to its longitudinal direction.
[0006] A similar type of docking manoeuvre can also be obtained in watercraft provided with bow thrusters or stern thrusters. A bow thruster comprises a propeller which is mounted in the bow, generally transverse to the longitudinal direction of the watercraft, in order to generate a side force on the bow. In this manner, the watercraft can be more easily controlled when docking or maneuvering at low speeds. A similar arrangement, a so-called stern thruster, can be provided in the stern of a watercraft.
[0007] The patent document U.S. Pat. No. 4,519,335 discloses a device for controlling the direction of movement of a watercraft by separately controlling two steerable propellers. For example, the watercraft can be given a thrust in a lateral direction.
[0008] However, a docking manoeuvre requires a careful control of the steering and thrust of the engines. It should also be noted that the movements of a watercraft during docking are, to a large extent, determined by the position of the centre of rotation of the watercraft. The centre of rotation is an imaginary point which can be calculated for each watercraft and which defines a vertical axis about which the watercraft may rotate. The fact that the centre of rotation may vary for a certain watercraft means that a control command for steering the watercraft in a certain direction may not always correspond exactly to the direction of the operating device on which the control command is carried out. This problem is further emphasized through the fact that the efficiency for a twin-engine drive arrangement is different in the forwards drive of a propeller as compared with reverse operation.
[0009] Consequently, a problem with previously known control systems for watercraft is that they do not allow a steering, for example during docking, in which the movements of a manually operable steering control device correspond precisely to the actual direction of movement of the watercraft. In some cases, a manipulation of a steering control device along a direction which is transverse to the longitudinal direction of the watercraft may in fact lead to a curve-shaped course of travel of the watercraft.
[0010] It is desirable to provide a method and arrangement for calibrating an operating device for a watercraft, by means of which the above-mentioned problems can be solved, and which in particular gives an accurate and precise command over the direction of movement of a watercraft.
[0011] A method according to an aspect of the present invention comprises the following steps: receiving an activation command in the control unit, for beginning said calibration, detecting any movements of said operating device, storing values corresponding to said movements in the control unit together with corresponding thrust and steering values, and repeating said detecting step and said storing step until a termination command is received in the control unit, thereby using said stored values in subsequent operation of the operating device for indicating said direction of travel of the watercraft.
[0012] In an arrangement according to an aspect of the present invention, said control unit is adapted for receiving an activation command from said operating device, indicating a beginning of said calibration, and that said control unit is also adapted for detecting movements of said actuator, for storing values corresponding to said movements in the control unit together with corresponding thrust and steering values, and for repeating said detecting step and said storing step until a termination command is received in the control unit, thereby using said stored values in subsequent operation of the operating device for indicating said direction of travel of the watercraft.
[0013] By means of an aspect of the present invention, certain advantages are accomplished. For example, a docking function with the watercraft will be easier to be carried out by its driver, and will be perceived as more accurate. Also, the control unit may control this accurate docking function without having to make complicated calculations as regards the position of the centre of rotation of the watercraft.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF DRAWINGS
[0014] In the following, the invention will be described with reference to the appended drawings, wherein:
[0015] FIG. 1 is a simplified top view of a watercraft being arranged in accordance with the present invention;
[0016] FIG. 2 is a perspective view of a steering control device according to a preferred embodiment of the invention;
[0017] FIG. 3 is a schematical top view showing an example of movements of a lever forming part of the control device;
[0018] FIGS. 4 a - c are schematical illustrations of a calibration procedure according to the invention, and
[0019] FIG. 5 is a schematical view of an alternative type of watercraft in which the invention can be used.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
[0020] FIG. 1 shows a simplified top view of a watercraft 1 in which the present invention can be used. Generally, the invention can be used in any type of watercraft, such as larger commercial ships, smaller watercraft such as leisure boats and other types of water vehicles or vessels. The invention is particularly useful for small leisure boats, but it is nevertheless not limited to such type of water vehicle only.
[0021] As indicated schematically in FIG. 1 , the watercraft 1 is designed with a bow 2 and a stern 3 . In the stern 3 , two drive arrangements 4 , 5 are mounted. More precisely, the watercraft 1 is provided with a first drive arrangement 4 arranged at the port side and a second drive arrangement 5 arranged at the starboard side. The drive arrangements 4 , 5 are generally of conventional kind, for example in the form of combustion engines or any other type of drive units suitable for marine applications. In this embodiment, the drive arrangements 4 , 5 are in the form of combustion engines, wherein the first drive arrangement 4 is arranged for driving a first propeller 6 and the second drive arrangement 5 is arranged for driving a second propeller 7 .
[0022] The two drive arrangements 4 , 5 are independently steerable, which means that they are connected to and controllable by means of a control unit 8 , which is suitably in the form of a computerized unit for receiving commands from control and steering units, which are indicated schematically by means of reference numeral 9 . Such control and steering units are preferably constituted by throttle levers for the engines 4 , 5 and a steering wheel. Such units are previously known as such, and for this reason they are not described in detail here. Based on received information from the control and steering units 9 , the control unit 8 is arranged to control the first drive arrangement 4 and the second drive arrangement 5 in a suitable manner to propel the watercraft 1 with a requested direction and thrust.
[0023] When driving the watercraft 1 under normal operating conditions at sea, i.e. cruising at a given speed, the control unit 8 will receive control commands from the control and steering units 9 . However, the driver of the watercraft 1 also has the option of controlling the watercraft 1 by means of a separate operating device 10 , preferably in the form of a so-called joystick, which constitutes a second control and steering unit for controlling thrust and steering of the watercraft 1 , i.e. the steering angles and engine speeds of the drive arrangements 4 , 5 . The operating device 10 is primarily intended to be used during docking of the watercraft 1 , i.e. during a manoeuvre in which the driver of the watercraft 1 intends to steer it towards a given position at a harbour 11 for the purpose of landing the watercraft 1 . In particular, the operating device 10 is useful during a docking manoeuvre in which the watercraft 1 is to be steered in a sideways direction, as will be described below in greater detail.
[0024] The invention is generally not limited to be used with an operating device 10 in the form of a joystick, but can be used with other operating devices which are used to receive some form of input signal to indicate a requested course of travel.
[0025] The operating device 10 according to the embodiment will now be described in detail with reference to FIG. 2 . As mentioned above, the operating device 10 comprises a housing 12 which holds a manually operable lever 13 , or a similar activation device. The lever 13 is freely movable in two directions x, y as indicated by means of broken lines in FIG. 2 . The x direction is defined as being perpendicular to the y direction. The operating device 10 is electrically connected to the control unit 8 (see FIG. 1 ) for the purpose of controlling the course and thrust of the watercraft 1 . This means that a given position of the lever 13 in the x and y directions is set by the driver of the watercraft 1 in order to choose a particular requested direction of movement of the watercraft 1 and a certain thrust of the watercraft 1 . More precisely, the direction to which the lever 13 points corresponding to the desired direction of movement of the watercraft 1 , and the inclination of the lever 13 correspond to the thrust provided by the drive arrangements 4 , 5 .
[0026] Furthermore, according to the embodiment shown in FIG. 2 , the lever 13 is arranged with an outer, rotatable section, which is indicated by means of reference numeral 13 a in FIG. 2 . This section 13 a is arranged to be rotatable independently of the position and inclination of the lever 13 . The rotational movement takes place in a longitudinal direction defined as the z direction, i.e. a movement about an imaginary axis which is defined as an extension of the longitudinal direction of the lever 13 . The z direction is indicated in FIG. 2 by means of a curved arrow.
[0027] Preferably, the rotatable section 13 a can be rotated in either direction and is preferably also spring-biased so as to return to a neutral position when it is not rotated.
[0028] The control unit 8 is generally arranged to convert detected values corresponding to the actual position of the lever 13 (i.e. in the x and y directions) and the rotational position of the rotatable section 13 a (i.e. in the z direction) into suitable control commands for a steering angle a and engine speed n for each of the drive arrangements 4 , 5 .
[0029] In the embodiment shown in FIG. 2 , the longitudinal direction of the operating device 10 corresponds to the y direction, and also to the longitudinal direction of the watercraft 1 , as indicated by means of an arrow in FIG. 2 . The x direction of the lever 13 corresponds to a direction which is generally transverse to the longitudinal direction of the watercraft 1 .
[0030] According to the described embodiment, the operating device 10 is intended to be used primarily during a docking manoeuvre. For this purpose, the operating device 10 is provided with a first activating device 14 , for example in the form of a push button, which will activate a mode of operation in which the operating device 10 is used (instead of the control and steering units 9 mentioned above). Consequently, by pushing the activating device 14 , the control unit 8 is set in “docking mode”, i.e. an operating mode in which the drive arrangements 4 , 5 are controlled by means of the operating device 10 only. By pushing on the first activating device 14 once again, the “docking mode” is terminated and the control and steering units 9 are used for operating the watercraft 1 .
[0031] In accordance with the embodiment, the operating device 12 is also provided with a second activating device 15 , preferably also in the form of a push button or a similar device. As will be described in greater detail below, the second activating device 15 is used during a calibration procedure according to the invention, i.e. for entering a “calibration mode”.
[0032] With reference to FIG. 1 again, a docking manoeuvre with the watercraft 1 will now be described. In particular, it will be described that the watercraft 1 is to be docked by steering it sideways towards the harbour 11 , i.e. in a direction generally transverse to the longitudinal direction of the watercraft 1 . This direction is indicated by means of an arrow in FIG. 1 . Before carrying out the docking manoeuvre, the corresponding activating device 14 (see FIG. 2 ) must be pressed so that “docking mode” is entered. This normally corresponds to a phase when the watercraft approaches its intended position at the harbour.
[0033] During docking as shown in FIG. 1 , the drive arrangements 4 , 5 should be set in an operating condition in which the first drive arrangement 4 is operated in forwards drive with a certain engine speed rvt, whereas the second drive arrangement 5 is operated in reverse with a certain engine speed n 2 . Here, it should be noted that the watercraft 1 has a particular imaginary vertical axis which constitutes the centre of rotation 16 of the watercraft 1 . During docking, the steering angles of the drive arrangements 4 , 5 are set so that each direction of force extends through the above-mentioned centre of rotation 16 . As indicated in FIG. 1 , the first drive arrangement 4 is arranged with a certain angle ai with reference to the longitudinal direction of the watercraft 1 , whereas the second drive arrangement is also arranged with a certain angle a 2 with reference to the longitudinal direction of the watercraft 1 . This means that the direction of force from each drive arrangement extends through the centre of rotation 16 , however with opposite directions as indicated with the broken lines in FIG. 1 extending through the centre of rotation 16 .
[0034] The docking movement is obtained by manipulating the lever 13 (see FIG. 2 ) on the operating device 10 in generally the same direction as the requested direction of movement of the watercraft 1 , i.e. to the right as regarded in FIG. 1 and as indicated by an arrow in FIG. 1 . This corresponds to movement of the lever 13 along the x direction as shown in FIG. 2 . By operating the drive arrangements 4 , 5 in opposite directions and with their respective force acting along a direction extending through the centre of rotation 16 , the watercraft 1 will now move sideways towards the harbour 10 . This is the direction which corresponds to the resulting force acting from the drive arrangements 4 , 5 .
[0035] FIG. 3 shows in a simplified view, regarded from above, the pattern of movement of the lever 13 . When inclined towards either side, the lever 13 will be positioned within either a left side zone 17 or a right side zone 18 , which are delimited by means of broken lines in FIG. 3 . When being positioned within any of these side zones 17 , 18 , the rotatable section 13 a can be rotated independently of the position of the lever 13 .
[0036] As an example only, FIG. 3 shows the position of the lever 13 , when tilted to the right and slightly downwards, i.e. within the right side zone 18 . It should be mentioned that the left and right zones 13 , 14 can be defined in other suitable ways than shown in FIG. 3 .
[0037] According to the preferred embodiment, the lever 13 is used in the following manner during docking. Firstly, the operating device 10 is preferably used so that when moving the lever 13 in the x and y directions towards any of the sides (left or right), the engine speeds n 1 , n 2 of each of the drive arrangements 4 , 5 are affected only, i.e. the angles a 1 , a 2 of the drive arrangements 4 , 5 are not affected. Secondly, when the rotatable section 13 a is rotated, the angles a 1 , a 2 are affected whereas the engine speeds n 1 , n 2 are not.
[0038] Consequently, the control unit 8 is arranged to control the engine speeds n 1 , r\ 2 to suitable values depending on the direction of the lever 13 in the x and y directions, and also to control the angles a 1 , a 2 to suitable values depending on the degree of rotation of the rotatable section 13 a . This means that during docking, the control unit 8 is arranged to convert the position of the lever 13 and its rotatable section 13 a to suitable steering angles a and engine speeds n of the two drive arrangements 4 , 5 to obtain a direction of travel of the watercraft 1 which corresponds to the actual physical direction of the lever 13 . However, as mentioned initially, the actual direction of travel of the watercraft 1 does not always correspond to the same direction of movement of the lever 13 . There are several reasons for this. Firstly, the centre of rotation 16 of the watercraft 1 may change continuously, for example depending on the load imposed on the watercraft 1 and the weight distribution along the watercraft 1 as a result thereof. Also, as regards the drive arrangements, the efficiency is normally different during operation in the forwards direction as compared with reverse operation. These factors may contribute to a situation in which the watercraft 1 will in fact not travel in the same direction as the direction to which the lever 13 points. For this reason, a calibration of the control unit 8 together with the operating device 10 and the drive arrangements 4 , 5 can be carried out. This will now be described in detail with reference to FIGS. 4 a - 4 e.
[0039] With reference initially to FIG. 4 a , which shows a schematical top view of the operating device 10 , a calibration procedure according to the invention is initiated by pressing on the second activating device 15 (see FIG. 2 ) for a predetermined time period, for example a few seconds. As a result, the system will enter the “calibration mode”. Although not shown in the drawings, the operating device 10 can optionally be provided with some type of indicator, for example an light emitting diode, in order to indicate to the driver that the “calibration mode” has been entered.
[0040] At this initial stage, the lever 13 is shown in an unaffected condition, which means that it is positioned in the centre of its range of movement, in which x=y=0. Also, the rotatable section 13 a is not affected at this stage.
[0041] The purpose of the calibration is to ensure that a movement of the lever 13 in a direction as shown in FIG. 4 b , i.e. straight to the right as indicated by an arrow, also corresponds to movement of the watercraft 1 in the same direction, i.e. straight to the right as shown FIG. 1 . Since the operating device 10 has now entered the “calibration mode” after pushing on the second activating device 15 , the watercraft 1 is controlled by means of the lever 13 with the aim of steering the watercraft 1 in the intended direction (i.e. straight to the right, in this particular case). For this reason, the driver now starts the actual calibration by manually setting the lever 13 as shown in FIG. 4 b , i.e. straight to the right. The watercraft now starts to move in generally the same direction.
[0042] The driver of the watercraft 1 now has to adjust the steering and thrust commands in order to compensate due to variations in the centre of rotation 16 , due to differences in efficiency of the drive arrangements 4 , 5 in forwards drive as compared with reverse drive, etc. Normally, this means that the lever 13 must be adjusted with small corrections as regards its inclination and direction during a certain time period. Also, the rotation of the rotatable section 13 can be adjusted during this stage.
[0043] As an example, shown in FIG. 4 c , it can be assumed that during the calibration, the driver of the watercraft notices that the watercraft starts to rotate slightly. This movement of the watercraft can be counteracted by rotating the rotatable section 13 . In particular, since the amount of rotation of the rotatable section 13 affects the steering angles, such a rotation will cause the angles a 1 , a 2 of the drive arrangements 4 , 5 to be changed. The control unit 8 is arranged so as to change these angles a 1 , a 2 to suitable values so that the rotations is eliminated. Preferably, the control unit 8 is arranged to change the angles a 1 , a 2 with the same amount, for example by increasing the first angle a 1 from 15° to 20°, and by increasing the second angle a 2 also from 15° to 20°. The invention is of course not limited to such an example only. In principle, the control unit 8 can be programmed in any suitable manner so that the drive arrangement angles respond to movement of the rotatable section 13 in the desired manner so that rotation of the watercraft is eliminated.
[0044] After having eliminated the rotation of the watercraft, it may for example be assumed that the driver notices that the watercraft moves slightly diagonally, i.e. not straight to the right as desired. In such case, the lever 13 should be manipulated with a suitable direction and inclination in order to eliminate this tendency of diagonal movement. This is shown in FIG. 4 d , which indicates that the lever has been moved by the driver in a certain direction as indicated as an example by means of a broken line. This is carried out while maintaining the rotation of the rotatable section 13 a . As mentioned above, the control unit 8 is arranged so that the movements of the lever in the x and y directions causes corresponding changes of the engine speeds n 1 , n 2 . Preferably, the control unit 8 is arranged to control the difference in engine speed, i.e. ?n=n 1 −n 2 , instead of the actual speeds n 1 , n 2 of each drive arrangement. The reason for this is that, normally, the drive arrangements present different efficiency in forward gear as compared with reverse gear.
[0045] Consequently, when the driver wishes to eliminate the diagonal movement of the watercraft, the lever 13 is moved in a suitable direction and, as a result, the control unit 8 will change the difference ?n in engine speed of the drive arrangements. For example, during movement of a watercraft straight to the side it may be suitable with an engine speed difference ?n which is of the magnitude 100-200 rpm. When the course is to be changed during calibration, as a result of any occurring, undesired, diagonal movement, it may be suitable to increase this difference ?n=n 1 −n 2 , which forces the watercraft to move forwards, or alternatively to decrease the difference ?n=n 1 −n 2 , which forces the watercraft rearwards.
[0046] Eventually, the driver has compensated for the various above-mentioned factors and has achieved a movement of the watercraft 1 which is more or less exactly along the course as originally intended. At this stage, the second activating device 15 is once again depressed. This is shown in FIG. 4 e . This informs the control unit 8 of the fact that the course of the watercraft 1 is correct and that “calibration mode” is now terminated. During the course of the “calibration mode”, data from the operating device 10 regarding its position is transmitted to the control unit 8 and is also stored in the control unit 8 . In particular, values indicating the inclination and the direction of the lever 13 , and also values indicating the rotational position of the rotatable section 13 a , are stored in a generally continuous manner, suitably at a number of times per second. For each time these values are stored, further values are stored which correspond to the steering angles ai, a 2 of the drive arrangements 4 , 5 . Also, values related to the engine speeds n 1 , n 2 of the drive arrangements 4 , 5 are stored. According to a preferred embodiment of the invention, the difference in engine speed, i.e. ?n=n 1 −n 2 is also calculated as mentioned above.
[0047] The calibration process is maintained until the driver has obtained a direction of travel for the watercraft 1 which corresponds to the direction of the lever 13 . This means that a number of “adjustments” of course and speed are stored during this process. This means that each position of the lever 13 , including the rotatable section 13 a during the “calibration mode”, and values representing the steering angles a 1 , a 2 and the engine speed difference ?n, are stored in the control unit 8 . The “calibration mode” is terminated by pressing on the second push button 15 . After that, the control unit 8 will use the stored information at subsequent occasions when docking is to be carried out. In particular, the next subsequent time the driver of the watercraft 1 activates the operating device 10 (by pressing on the first activating device 14 ), any movement straight to the right of the lever 13 will cause the control unit 8 to use the previously stored values of the steering angles a 1 , a 2 and the engine speed difference ?n which reflect the above-mentioned “adjustments” of the course. In this manner, a movement of the lever 13 in the correct direction will correspond exactly to the movement of the watercraft 1 .
[0048] It should be noted that the main cause of the problem on which the invention is based, i.e. that the direction of the actuator may not correspond to the direction of travel of the watercraft, is due to changes in the centre of rotation of the watercraft. However, by means of the invention, there is no need to actually calculate and update the position of the centre of rotation, which is a complicated matter. Instead, the necessary information related to the centre of rotation is provided in an experimental manner during the “calibration mode”. This is an important advantage of the invention.
[0049] Preferably, the control unit 8 is arranged to calculate suitable engine speeds and drive arrangement angles in the case when a subsequent docking is to be carried out in another direction than that direction in which the calibration process was carried out. This means that calibration only has to be carried out in one single direction. Data from that calibration process can be converted to new control commands (engine speeds, drive angles) which corresponds to any subsequent steering direction to be indicated by means of the lever 13 .
[0050] In FIG. 5 , an alternative embodiment of the invention is described. This embodiment relates to a watercraft 1 ′ of the type which comprises a so-called bow thruster 19 , i.e. a drive arrangement with a propeller 20 which is mounted in the bow 2 in a manner which is generally transverse to the longitudinal direction of the watercraft. Suitably, the bow thruster 19 and its propeller 20 is mounted in a tunnel 21 which extends transverse to the longitudinal direction of the watercraft 1 ′. The purpose of the bow thruster 19 is to generate a side force on the bow 2 during docking. In this manner, the watercraft can be more easily controlled when docking or maneuvering at low speeds.
[0051] According to a further embodiment, which is not shown in the drawings, a similar arrangement can be provided in the stern of a watercraft, a so-called stern thruster.
[0052] The present invention can be implemented in watercraft comprising a bow thruster or a stem thruster, or in watercraft comprising both a bow thruster and a stern thruster.
[0053] As shown in FIG. 5 , the watercraft 1 ′ is provided with a bow thruster 19 and also with a rear-mounted single drive arrangement 6 ′. Such an arrangement can also be used for docking at a harbour 11 . However, with this particular drive system, the docking can only be carried out while travelling along a slightly diagonal direction, as shown in FIG. 5 . This is due to the fact that the drive arrangement 6 ′ cannot normally be positioned to propel the watercraft in a direction straight to the side.
[0054] The above-mentioned principles relating to docking and the maneuvers during the “calibration mode” apply also to the embodiment shown in FIG. 5 .
[0055] In particular, it can be noted that the rotatable section 13 a of the lever 13 is used to control and counteract any tendency of rotation of the watercraft 1 ′, which is suitably carried out by controlling the speed of the propeller 20 of the bow thruster 19 . Also, a movement of the lever 13 in the x and y direction is used to control and counteract any undesired diagonal movement of the watercraft 1 ′, which is suitably obtained by controlling the angle of the rear drive arrangement 6 ′.
[0056] The present invention is not limited to the above-mentioned embodiment, but can be varied within the scope of the appended claims. For example, the invention is suitable for all watercraft which are provided with at least two independently controllable drive arrangements. Also, the operating device 10 can be implemented in other ways than as a joystick. Furthermore, the activating devices 14 , 15 can be implemented by means of other components than push buttons.
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In a method for calibrating a system for controlling thrust and steering of a drive arrangement in a watercraft, the system includes an operating device adapted for indicating a requested direction of travel of the watercraft, the operating device being connected to a control unit for providing corresponding thrust and steering commands to the drive arrangement. The method includes receiving an activation command in the control unit, for beginning the calibration, detecting any movements of the operating device, storing values corresponding to the movements in the control unit together with corresponding thrust and steering values, and repeating the detecting step and the storing step until a termination command is received in the control unit, thereby using the stored values in subsequent operation of the operating device for indicating the direction of travel of the watercraft. An arrangement for calibrating a system for controlling thrust and steering of a drive arrangement in a watercraft is also provided.
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CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] This application is one of seven related co-pending U.S. utility patent applications, which are all filed on the same day as the present application. The other six patent applications, which are each incorporated in their entireties by reference herein, are listed by attorney docket number and title as the following:
190250-1640—“Generation of Automated Recommended Parameter Changes Based on Force Management System (FMS) Data Analysis”; 190250-1660—“Agent Scheduler Incorporating Agent Profiles”; 190250-1670—“Method and System for Predicting Network Usage in a Network Having Re-occurring Usage Variations”; 190250-1680—“Resource Assignment in a Distributed Environment”; 190250-1730—“Efficiency Report Generator”; and 190250-1740—“Force Management Automatic Call Distribution and Resource Allocation Control System”.
TECHNICAL FIELD
[0008] The present disclosure is generally related to management of workforces and, more particularly, is related to a system and method for managing agents in call centers.
BACKGROUND OF THE DISCLOSURE
[0009] A modern telephony system includes a switch that routes incoming calls to individuals, agents, usually located in a call center, or a remote office, and a control center that receives information from the switch. The control center includes a call-supervisor who is trained to review the information from the switch and trained to monitor the call traffic patterns to maintain a balance between call demand and the workforce. The call-supervisor is responsible for making certain that the workforce has a sufficient number of agents working at any given time to serve customer demand.
[0010] In a modern telephony system, the agents are frequently distributed in remote locations to handle subscriber services. Typically, the agents are assigned to specific workforces, where a given workforce handles specific types of calls such as directory assistance, or billing assistance, etc. Normally, the work schedules for the agents in a workforce are planned approximately one to several weeks in advance. What is sought is a method and a system for automatically providing workforce recommendations to the call-supervisor such that the call-supervisor can dynamically allocate agents that are scheduled to work the current day, responsive to customer demand for the current day, such that the workforce has a desired number of agents that should match customer demand.
SUMMARY OF THE DISCLOSURE
[0011] Embodiments, among others, of the present disclosure provide a system and method for dynamic allocation of agents.
[0012] Briefly described, in architecture, one embodiment of the system, among others, can be implemented as follows. A dynamic agent allocator system includes logic adapted to receive network data for a given time interval, determine a desired number of agents to work during another time interval based at least in part on agent-profiles for agents that worked in the network during the given time interval, and assign a group of agents to work during the other time interval, where the number of agents in the group is equal to the desired number.
[0013] One embodiment of the present disclosure can also be viewed as providing methods for dynamic allocation of agents. In this regard, one embodiment of such a method, among others, can be broadly summarized by the following steps: receiving network data for a given time interval, where the network data is related to calls between users of the network and agents that worked during the given time interval, where the agents have associated agent-profiles; determining a desired number of agents to work during another time interval based at least in part on the profiles of the agents that worked in the network during the given time interval; and assigning a group of agents to work during the other time interval, where the number of agents in the group is equal to the desired number.
[0014] Other systems, methods, features, and advantages of the present disclosure will be or become apparent to one with skill in the art upon examination of the following drawings and detailed description. It is intended that all such additional systems, methods, features, and advantages be included within this description, be within the scope of the present disclosure, and be protected by the accompanying claims.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0015] Many aspects of the disclosure can be better understood with reference to the following drawings. The components in the drawings are not necessarily to scale, emphasis instead being placed upon clearly illustrating the principles of the present disclosure. Moreover, in the drawings, like reference numerals designate corresponding parts throughout the several views.
[0016] FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a telephony system.
[0017] FIG. 2 is a block diagram of a portion of a telephony system.
[0018] FIG. 3 is a block diagram of a database.
[0019] FIG. 4 is a block diagram of a daily log of the telephony system.
[0020] FIG. 5 is a block diagram of accumulated statistics of the telephony system.
[0021] FIG. 6 is a block diagram of an agent-profile.
[0022] FIG. 7 is a block diagram of a projected agent line.
[0023] FIG. 8 is a flow chart illustrating steps for creating a projected agent line.
[0024] FIG. 9 is a block diagram of the projected agent line and an adjusted agent line.
[0025] FIG. 10 is a flow chart illustrating steps for creating an adjusted agent line.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
[0026] The present disclosure is described in terms of managing resources in call centers for a telephone system. However, this description is for illustrative purposes only and is a non-limiting example of the present disclosure. The present disclosure can also be implemented in any organization, among others, having workforces that respond to variable workloads such as, but not limited to, a group of agents receiving calls through an automated call distribution process including private branch exchange (PBX) and switching configuration. Thus, the present disclosure is intended to cover any network.
[0027] Any process descriptions or blocks in flow charts should be understood as representing modules, segments, or portions of code which include one or more executable instructions for implementing specific logical functions or steps in the process, and alternate implementations are included within the scope of preferred embodiments in which functions may be executed out of order from that shown or discussed, including substantially concurrently or in reverse order, depending on the functionality involved, as would be understood by those reasonably skilled in the art of the present disclosure.
[0028] Referring to FIG. 1 , a telephone system 10 having a central office 12 , a plurality of remote offices 14 , and a control center 16 , are all connected to a telephone network 18 . A subscriber uses a telephone 20 , which is connected to the central office 12 via a communication link 22 , to access services of the telephone system.
[0029] The central office 12 includes a switch (not shown) that routes the subscriber's call to the telephone network 18 , which includes general telephony circuitry such as central offices, trunks, end-offices, etc., known to those skilled in the art.
[0030] Typically, the remote offices are call centers from which agents make or receive calls, which handle, among other things, incoming subscriber service calls such as, but not limited to, “Directory Assistance Type” calls and “Billing Type Calls”. Responsive to the subscriber's call being a service call, the central office 12 routes the call through the network to one of the remote offices 24 , via a communication link 24 , where an agent handles the call. The communication links 22 and 24 can be any communication link: wired, wireless, optical fibers, etc., known to those skilled in the art.
[0031] Typically, the telephone system 10 must meet performance requirements established by a regulatory body, and the control center 16 is responsible for, among other things, providing the necessary human resource, e.g., agents, to the remote offices 14 to meet the performance requirements. The control center 16 includes supervisory personnel, call-supervisors, (not shown) and a computer system 26 having a force management system (FMS) 28 included therein. Generally, a computer network 44 (see FIG. 2 ) connects the central office 12 , remote centers 14 , and the control center 16 such that the FMS 28 and other computer services are available to authorized personnel at any of the locations.
[0032] In one embodiment, among others, schedulers employ the FMS 28 to generate, among other things, agent lines, which are explained in detail hereinbelow, and tours (work shifts) for agents. The schedulers may be remotely located but are usually located in the control center 16 .
[0033] Referring to FIG. 2 , the central office 12 includes a switch 30 , which receives telephone calls from subscribers via communication link 22 and, among other things, routes the calls to workforces 32 and super workforce 34 . For the purposes of this disclosure, a workforce is comprised of a set of agents assigned to handle a specific type of call. Typically, associated information facilitates the agent in handling the call efficiently. For example, workforce 32 ( 1 ) is a directory assistance (DA) workforce; and workforce 32 ( 2 ) (not shown) is a billing workforce of the telephone system 10 . Other workforces include workforces that call out instead of receiving incoming calls, an example of which is a telemarketing workforce. Each workforce 32 may be distributed throughout multiple remote offices 14 .
[0034] A super workforce 34 is comprised of agents assigned to handle multiple types of calls. For example, agents of the super workforce 34 might be assigned to handle both directory assistance calls and other types of incoming calls for subscribers speaking a language other than English. The super workforce 34 may also be distributed through multiple remote offices 14 . For the purposes of this disclosure, a super-workforce shall be treated as if it were a “workforce.”
[0035] In one preferred embodiment, the switch 30 is an automated computerized system such as, but not limited to, Northern Telecom DMS 200, Northern Telecom Meridian, Rockwell ISS-3000, and Lucent 5E into which agents log in. To log-in, each agent provides a user-name and a password, which in some embodiments may be optional. The switch 30 is in communication with a database 36 via a communication link 38 . The database 36 includes agent-profiles 54 (see FIG. 6 ), and each agent-profile 54 provides, among other things, information regarding the training and efficiency of the agent. When an agent logs onto the switch 30 , the switch 30 uses the agent-profile 54 for that agent to determine, among other things, the agent's workforce. The switch 30 also determines, during the log-in procedure, from which console/terminal (not shown) the agent is working. When an agent is logged into the switch 30 , the switch 30 monitors call traffic to the agent and whether the agent is logged into the switch 30 and provides this system information, among other information to the database 36 . Generally, the agent logs out of the switch 30 for breaks and training so that the switch 30 knows that the agent is not available to handle calls. The log-out times are also included in the system data.
[0036] Among other things, for certain types of calls the switch 30 attempts to handle incoming calls automatically. If the switch 30 cannot handle the incoming calls automatically, the switch 30 routes the incoming calls to an agent in an appropriate workforce 32 . The switch 30 includes a plurality of buffers 40 and an automated call-handling module (ACHM) 42 . The ACHM 42 includes in some embodiments, tone and voice recognition logic for interfacing with subscribers and, if possible, providing the necessary services. For example, when the ACHM 42 receives a “Directory Assistance Type” call, the ACHM 42 delivers a series of questions to the caller such as: “what state?”, “what city?”, “what listing?”. The ACHM 42 checks the database 36 , and attempts to determine the requested information. The database 36 includes subscriber information such as name and telephone numbers of subscribers, addresses, etc. If the ACHM 42 cannot totally handle the incoming call, the call is placed in the appropriate buffer 40 . In one preferred embodiment, the switch 30 associates information in the database 36 with information provided by the caller. When the call is taken out of the buffer 40 and provided to an agent, the switch 30 then provides the associated information to the agent via the computer network 44 . Typically, associated information facilitates the agent in handling the call efficiently. For example, in one embodiment, the associated information includes information collected from the customer by the ACHM 42 , i.e. city and listing, and typically, the associated information is then played to the agent without some of the initial silence before, between and after the customer verbal input.
[0037] Each one of the buffers 40 is associated with one of the workforces 32 , and typically, multiple buffers, sometimes referred to as queues, are associated with a single workforce. For example, the buffers 40 ( 1 )- 40 ( 3 ) are associated with the directory assistance workforce 32 ( 1 ). Thus, when the switch 30 receives an incoming directory assistance call that the ACHM 32 cannot handle, the switch 30 places the incoming call into one of the buffers 40 ( 1 )- 40 ( 3 ). Typically, the directory assistance agents handle these calls based upon geographic regions because the directory assistance agents can normally handle calls faster for regions with which they are familiar. So, in one embodiment, the buffers 40 ( 1 )- 40 ( 3 ) are associated with different geographical regions, so that all of the “Directory Assistance Type” calls from a particular region are sent into the same buffer, and directory assistance agents who are familiar with that region handle those calls.
[0038] In addition, the buffers for a workforce 32 can be prioritized. In one embodiment, high priority calls are put into one buffer and lower priority calls are placed in a different buffer. Typically, switch 30 handles the calls for a workforce 32 on a quasi first-in-first-out basis. For example, in one embodiment, the higher priority calls are prioritized by adding a “fictitious wait time” (FWT) to them, and then the switch 30 takes calls out of the buffer based upon a “pseudo-wait time” (PWT), which is the sum of the FWT and the real wait time (RWT), where RWT is the actual amount of time that the call has been in the buffer. For example, the FWT for buffer 40 ( 1 ) is zero seconds, and the FWT for buffer 40 ( 2 ) is two seconds. Thus, the RWT and PWT for calls in buffer 40 ( 1 ) are the same, whereas, the PWT is two seconds ahead of the RWT for calls in buffer 40 ( 2 ). The PWT for call 1 in buffer 40 ( 2 ) is 3.2 seconds while its RWT is only 1.2 seconds. Based upon the PWT for calls in buffers 40 ( 1 ) and 40 ( 2 ), the switch 30 will take calls “1” and “2” from buffer 40 ( 2 ) before taking call “I” from buffer 40 ( 1 ).
[0039] The switch 30 provides system data to the force management system 28 and database 36 . Various switch configurations typically use either scans or time stamps to determine how long calls wait for service. For this discussion, switch 30 receives counts and directs calls to the buffers and scans the buffers 40 every 10 seconds or so and determines how long each call has been in one of the buffers, i.e., the RWT for each of the calls. The switch 30 may then determine an average RWT for the calls in each buffer and provide an instantaneous buffer count and average RWT for each buffer, or the switch 30 may average the results from several scans together. However, for a given time span, the system data includes, but is not limited to, the number of calls received by the switch over the given time-span, the number of calls handled by the ACHM 38 over the given time-span, the average number of calls in each buffer 40 over the given time-span, and the average RWT for calls in each buffer over the given time-span. Typically, the system data is reported from the switch to the FMS 28 and database 36 approximately every 10 seconds or so. However, in alternative embodiments, the switch 30 may report system data more frequently or less frequently.
[0040] The switch also monitors agents in the workforces 32 and the super workforce 34 . Before discussing the system data that is related to the agents in more detail, it is helpful to define some terms. For the purposes of this disclosure, a “tour” is defined as the time-spans that an agent is scheduled to work, and a “switch-tour” is defined as the time-spans that an agent is scheduled to be logged into the switch 30 . On any given day, an agent's tour and switch-tour can differ due to scheduled training or other reasons. “Compliance” is defined as the percentage of an agent's switch-tour that the agent is logged into the switch. “Personal-occupancy” is defined as the percentage of an agent's switch-tour that the agent spends handling calls. The system data reported by the switch 30 includes personal-occupancy and compliance for each of the agents logged into the switch 30 . The system data also includes personal average work time (AWT) for each of the agents, where average work time is the average amount of time that an agent spends handling a call. Because the switch 30 monitors, among other things, who is logged-in, when they logged-in and logged-out, how many calls the agents received, how long the calls lasted, etc., the system data reported by the switch 30 can include other quantities not described hereinabove. The average-work-time, occupancy, compliance, etc. can be calculated by the FMS 28 on a per-agent (personal) basis and/or calculated for the entire workforce.
[0041] Referring to FIG. 3 , the FMS 28 includes a memory 46 having a statistical analysis/forecasting module 48 , a call-statistics database 50 , and agent-profiles 52 . The call statistics database 50 includes accumulated statistics 54 and daily logs 56 . The accumulated statistics 54 and daily logs 56 are broken down into workforces 32 . Among other things, the statistical analysis/forecasting module 48 processes data in the call-statistics database 50 to generate, among other things, the accumulated statistics.
[0042] FIG. 4 illustrates one exemplary daily log 56 for workforce 32 ( 5 ), and FIG. 5 illustrates exemplary accumulated statistics 54 for workforce 32 ( 5 ). The quantities calculated and tabulated in the daily log 56 and the accumulated statistics 54 are generated by the switch 30 and FMS 28 .
[0043] Referring to FIG. 4 , exemplary daily log 56 includes the date of the log and quantities such as, but not limited to, daily call volume, daily work volume, daily average work time (AWT), daily average time-to-answer (ATA) and daily occupancy (OCC). The daily call volume is simply the number of calls received by workforce 32 ( 5 ) during the day associated with the daily log, which in this example is Aug. 21, 2003.
[0044] The daily AWT is the average amount of time that an agent in workforce 32 ( 5 ) spends working a call on that day. The daily ATA is the average amount of time a call spends in a buffer on that day. The daily occupancy (OCC) is a measure of the amount of time that the agents in workforce 32 ( 5 ) work incoming calls on that day. The daily OCC is the average of the personal-occupancy for the agents in the workforce on that day.
[0045] The daily work volume is the amount of time in CCS (Centum Call Seconds) or XCS, a measurement of time where 1 XCS equals 10 seconds where the product of the daily call volume and AWT divided by 100. Generally, the different workforces handle calls of different complexity, and the time to handle a call is generally proportional to the complexity of the call. For example, calls to the billing workforce will require more time to handle than calls to the directory assistance workforce, and therefore, the AWT for the billing workforce is greater than the AWT for the directory assistance workforce. The work volume provides a way to compare the workforces 32 regardless of the type of calls that the different workforces handle.
[0046] Typically, the daily log 56 is kept in the statistical database 50 for a predetermined period of time such as six (6) months. The daily logs 56 are used for, among other things, spotting trends, scheduling agents, and refining workforce lines, as will be explained hereinbelow. In one embodiment, the daily log might be broken down into segments of time such as, but not limited to, morning, afternoon, evening, and night, and the statistics for each segment of time are then calculated.
[0047] Referring to FIG. 5 , the accumulated statistics 54 include, among other things, averages of daily statistics. Thus, in one embodiment, the accumulated statistics 54 are averages of statistics that are found in the daily log that have been accumulated over a period of years. Typically, the accumulated statistics are based upon what is known as an average business day (ABD). Thus, Saturdays and Sundays, and holidays, are not included in the accumulated ABD statistics 54 . However, call statistics are also accumulated for non-ABD days such as Saturdays and Sundays, and those accumulated call statistics are used in projecting call volume. Typically, accumulated statistics 54 are used by the force management system 28 for, among other things, scheduling agents for a workforce 32 and/or super workforce.
[0048] The accumulated statistics can be averaged over a long period of time such as the entire time span over which the telephone system 10 has records of daily logs or shorter time-spans such as the last six years, or last six months, etc. One advantage of averaging over a long period is that the daily fluctuations are “washed” out of the average, but a disadvantage is that trends may also be lost. For example, assume that the ABD work volume for eight of the last ten years had remained at an approximate constant (X), in year nine the ABD work volume was 1.125X and in year ten it was 1.5X. In that case, the average ABD work volume of the last ten years is then 1.0625X, which obscures the rate of growth over the last two years.
[0049] In one preferred embodiment, the statistical analysis/forecasting module 48 fits the work volume data to a predetermined parameterized function, and then uses the parameterized function to extrapolate work volumes for a subsequent week. Those skilled in the art are familiar with algorithms, such as, but not limited to, least-square-fit for fitting data and all such algorithms are intended to be within the scope of the disclosure. Furthermore, as those skilled in the art will recognize, by fitting the data to a parametric function, derivatives including first order and higher order derivatives of the function can be taken to help extrapolate the data. In one embodiment, the statistical analysis/forecasting module 48 also includes logic to apply probabilistic algorithms such as, but not limited to, Erlang C to, among other things, forecast work volume and operator lines, which will be explained in detail hereinbelow.
[0050] An exemplary agent-profile 52 is illustrated in FIG. 6 and the agent-profile includes, an agent identifier 58 , a workforce identifier 60 , an office identifier 62 , language skills identifiers 64 , and work skills identifier 66 . The agent associated with the exemplary agent-profile 52 currently works in remote office 5 in workforce 32 ( 16 ). The agent associated with the exemplary agent-profile 52 (A) is bilingual (English and Spanish) and has been trained in both directory assistance and billing. The agent-profile 52 includes skill ratings for each area that the agent has been trained, such as a directory assistance rating 68 and a billing rating 70 . Each rating includes, among other things, statistics related to the agent's efficiency. The agent has an average work time (AWT) of 2.5 seconds for directory assistance and 5.5 seconds for billing. The skill ratings 68 and 70 also include the agent's error rate, tour compliance, switch-tour compliance, and years of experience. Switch-tour compliance is defined as the percentage of time that the agent is “logged into” the switch 30 per the workable amount of time per tour. Tour compliance is the probability that the agent will actually report to work for a tour that they are scheduled to work. Other quantities can also be included in the agent-profile 52 . In an alternative embodiment, quantities can be broken down into time segments. For example, AWT can be broken down into the first half of a tour, and a second half of a tour, or for every fifteen minutes, or other time intervals. In one embodiment, the agent-profile for a new agent, or an agent who is new to a workforce, is given an agent-profile that has default values, among other things, for the skill ratings. After the agent has been trained and in the position for a set period of time, the default values are replaced by calculated values related to the agent's record.
[0051] Referring to FIG. 7 , among other things, the FMS 28 generates an agent line 72 for a workforce 32 . The agent line 72 shows the number of agents in a workforce that are projected to be needed for every fifteen minutes of an upcoming day. For the purposes of this disclosure, each fifteen-minute time span of the agent line 72 is an agent line segment 74 . For a directory assistance workforce, the agent line 72 covers a 24-hour day, whereas the agent line for a billing assistance workforce may only cover ten hours of a day such as from 8:00 a.m. through 6:00 p.m. The agent line 72 is established by the FMS 28 using, among other things, historical information stored in the database 36 .
[0052] Referring to FIG. 8 , the steps 76 shown in FIG. 8 include exemplary steps taken by the FMS 28 to generate the agent line 72 for a day in an upcoming week. Typically, the upcoming week is approximately two weeks in the future. The projected agent line 72 is forecasted approximately two weeks in advance so that the agents in the workforce having the projected agent line can be properly scheduled.
[0053] In step 78 the FMS 28 forecasts the ABD work volume for the upcoming week. The forecasted ABD work volume is based upon historical information and the database 36 such as the historical ABD work volume. Other factors may include, but are not limited to, historical trends in the ABD work volume. For example the statistical analysis/forecasting module can fit the work volume data to a parameterized function and then uses the parameterized function to forecast the work volume for the upcoming week. In one embodiment, a predetermined number of terms from a Taylor series expansion of the parameterized function is used to extrapolate the ABD work volume for the upcoming week.
[0054] In step 80 , the daily work volume for each day of the week for the upcoming week is forecasted. Generally, the daily work volume follows historical trends. For example, the daily work volume on a Sunday is 75% of the work volume for an ABD. Table 1 shows a historical daily work volume per ABD work volume for an exemplary call center.
TABLE 1 Day Sun. Mon. Tues. Wed. Thurs. Fri. Sat. Work 0.75 1.01 1.02 0.99 0.97 1.01 0.90 Volume/ ABD
[0055] In step 82 , the FMS 28 generates a forecasted daily call distribution for every fifteen minutes for each day of the upcoming week. Each forecasted daily call distribution is based at least in part upon historical information and database 36 . Specifically, the database includes historical call distributions for each day of the week.
[0056] In step 84 , the FMS 28 uses adjustable parameters such as desired agent occupancy and desired AWT to generate forecasted agent lines for each day of the upcoming week based upon the forecasted call statistics. In one embodiment, the FMS 28 employs the statistical analysis/forecasting module 48 to apply algorithms such as Erlang C to calculate probabilities to determine agent requirements to meet a desired standard such as, but not limited to, average-time-to-answer to forecast the operator line. In step 86 , the FMS 28 provides the forecasted results to a scheduler.
[0057] In step 88 , the scheduler approves or disapproves the forecasted agent lines. If the scheduler disapproves, then in step 90 , the scheduler provides new adjustable parameters to the FMS 28 , and then the FMS 28 returns to step 84 . On the other hand, if the scheduler approves, then in step 92 , the FMS 28 allocates shifts to the offices. For example, based upon an agent line, the FMS 28 determines that five agents need to start their shifts at 6:00 a.m., nine agents need to start their shifts at 7:00 a.m., and three agents need to start at 7:30 a.m. The FMS 28 then determines the number of shifts at each starting time that should be allocated to the offices based at least in part upon the following criteria: the physical capabilities of each office and the number of agents available in each office. Offices having larger physical capabilities (more terminals/consoles) and a large number of agents will receive more shifts than smaller offices.
[0058] In step 94 , the FMS 28 matches the allocated shifts to individual agents. Generally the matching of shifts to agents is done at least upon seniority or other work place rules and agent preference.
[0059] In the preferred embodiment, the call-supervisors in the control center 16 use the FMS 28 to adjust the forecasted agent line 72 . Sometimes the actual work volume for a workforce falls outside of a tolerance for the forecasted work volume for that workforce, and when that occurs, the call supervisor of that workforce will adjust the agent line by adding or subtracting agents.
[0060] FIG. 9 illustrates a portion of a projected agent line 98 and a portion of an adjusted agent line 100 for a specific workforce 32 such as a directory workforce. The projected agent line 98 illustrates the number of agents scheduled to work during the agent line segments of the current day, and the adjusted agent line 100 illustrates the actual number of agents that have worked and are currently working the current day up to and including the current time, which is between 12:00 and 12:15. The projected agent line 98 was generated by the FMS 28 approximately two weeks ago. Whereas, the adjusted agent line 100 is generated by the FMS 28 responsive to, among other things, the work volume to the specific workforce. In one embodiment, the adjusted agent line 100 is generated by call-supervisors in response to recommendations by the FMS 28 .
[0061] The projected agent line 98 and the adjusted agent line 100 differ in that at 11:45 a.m. and 12:00 p.m. the number of agents in the adjusted agent line is greater than the number of agents in the projected agent line. The agent line segment 74 starting at 12:15 p.m. has not yet been adjusted. If no adjustment is made, the projected agent line is the default. So if the FMS 28 and/or call-supervisors determine that no adjustment is necessary, then the thirty agents scheduled to work the 12:15 p.m. agent line segment 74 will work that agent line segment.
[0062] Typically, if one or more agents are added to the adjusted agent line 100 , this is accomplished by re-scheduling breaks, or training sessions, or quitting times, etc. of one or more agents that are currently logged into the switch 30 . For example, an agent who is currently logged into the switch 30 may be scheduled to take lunch at 12:00 p.m., but in response to the new adjusted agent line 100 , that agent may have the start of their lunch time rescheduled to 12:30 p.m. Alternatively, agents who are working in another workforce might be temporarily re-assigned to the workforce that needs additional agents. Generally, agents are re-assigned from workforces that make outgoing calls. If on the other hand, one or more agents are removed form the adjusted agent line 100 , this is also accomplished by advancing scheduled breaks, or training sessions, or quitting times, etc. and/or temporarily re-assigning agents to other workforces.
[0063] Referring to FIG. 10 , steps 102 illustrate exemplary steps taken by the FMS 28 to generate the adjusted agent line 100 . In step 104 , the FMS 28 determines call statistics such as work volume, average time-to-answer, and/or average wait time for recent agent line segments including the current agent line segment, which in the case illustrated in FIG. 9 is the agent line segment starting at 12:00 p.m. In one embodiment, the FMS 28 determines call statistics for only the current agent line segment 74 , and in another embodiment, the FMS 28 determines call statistics for at least one previous agent line segment such as the agent line segment that precedes the current agent line segment.
[0064] In step 106 , the FMS 28 forecasts the call statistics for the subsequent agent line segment, which for the situation illustrated in FIG. 9 starts at 12:15 p.m. In step 108 , the FMS 28 processes the forecasted call statistics with agent-profiles for the agents that are already projected to work the subsequent agent line segment.
[0065] In step 110 , the FMS 28 uses the agent-profiles of the projected agents along with the forecasted call statistics to determine the “desired” number of agents for the subsequent agent line segment. Based at least upon the forecasted call statistics, the FMS 28 can determine that the number of projected agents will be sufficient to handle the calls for the subsequent agent line segment. Alternatively, the FMS 28 can also determine that the projected agents will not be sufficient (or overly sufficient) to handle the calls for the subsequent agent line segment. It should be remembered that the number of forecasted agents calculated in step 110 is not merely a function of the forecasted call statistics which were calculated in 108 . The number of forecasted agents is also a function of the agent-profiles of the projected agents. The FMS 28 determines which agents are currently logged into the switch 30 and which agents will be logged into the switch 30 at the start of the subsequent agent line segment. The switch 30 then uses the agent-profiles to calculate whether adjustments to the agent lines are necessary. For example, consider the situation where the forecasted call statistics project an increase in work volume for the subsequent agent line segment, but at least one of the currently working agents is scheduled to log out of the switch 30 at the end of the current agent line segment, and at least one new agent will log into the switch 30 . Thus, even though the work volume is forecasted to increase in the subsequent agent line segment, the FMS 28 may decide that no adjustments to the agent line are required based upon the agent-profiles of those currently working and the agent-profiles of those scheduled to work the subsequent agent line segment. Similarly, the FMS 28 may decide to increase or decrease the number of agents based at least in part upon the agent-profiles of those currently working and the agent-profiles of those scheduled to work the subsequent agent line segment.
[0066] In one embodiment, the FMS 28 determines the desired number of agents using quantities such as each agent's AWT rating. For example, the FMS 28 determines for the subsequent agent line segment 74 the projected work volume and call volume using the forecasted call statistics. The FMS 28 then determines the number of calls that each of the agents who are currently scheduled to work in the subsequent agent line segment 74 can handle. The number of calls that an agent can handle over the subsequent agent line segment is the product of the duration of the agent line segment times the personal-occupancy of the agent divided by agent's AWT rating. For example, if an agent had a personal-occupancy of 90% and an AWT rating of 24, i.e., can handle one call per 24 seconds, then in 15 minutes (900 seconds) the agent can handle (900(seconds)*0.90/24(seconds/call)) 33.75 calls. In another example, the FMS 28 employs probabilistic methods such as, but not limited language, Erlang C to determine the projected number of calls to be serviced by an agent. The FMS 28 determines the adjusted agent line by putting agents into the adjusted agent line and summing the number of calls that each of the agents in the adjusted agent line can handle and comparing the summed number of calls with the projected number of calls. When the sum of the number of calls that the agents in the adjusted agent line can handle equals or exceeds the number of projected calls, then the adjusted agent line is set.
[0067] In step 112 , the FMS 28 adjusts the agent line based upon the desired number of agents calculated in step 110 , which may be the same or different from the number of agents determined approximately two weeks ago. In one embodiment, the FMS 28 provides the forecasted desired number of agents to the call-supervisors in the control center 16 and the call-supervisors then make the ultimate decision regarding whether to add or subtract agents from the subsequent agent line segment. The FMS 28 , which comprises an ordered listing of executable instructions for implementing logical functions, can be embodied in any computer-readable medium for use by or in connection with an instruction execution system, apparatus, or device, such as a computer-based system, processor-containing system, or other system that can fetch the instructions from the instruction execution system, apparatus, or device and execute the instructions. In the context of this document, a “computer-readable medium” can be any means that can contain, store, communicate, propagate, or transport the program for use by or in connection with the instruction execution system, apparatus, or device. The computer readable medium can be, for example but not limited to, an electronic, magnetic, optical, electromagnetic, infrared, or semiconductor system, apparatus, device, or propagation medium. More specific examples (a non-exhaustive list) of the computer-readable medium would include the following: an electrical connection (electronic) having one or more wires, a portable computer diskette (magnetic), a random access memory (RAM) (electronic), a read-only memory (ROM) (electronic), an erasable programmable read-only memory (EPROM or Flash memory) (electronic), an optical fiber (optical), and a portable compact disc read-only memory (CDROM) (optical). Note that the computer-readable medium could even be paper or another suitable medium upon which the program is printed, as the program can be electronically captured, via for instance optical scanning of the paper or other medium, then compiled, interpreted or otherwise processed in a suitable manner if necessary, and then stored in a computer memory. In addition, the scope of the certain embodiments of the present disclosure includes embodying the functionality of the preferred embodiments of the present disclosure in logic embodied in hardware or software-configured mediums.
[0068] It should be emphasized that the above-described embodiments of the present disclosure, particularly, any “preferred” embodiments, are merely possible examples of implementations, merely set forth for a clear understanding of the principles of the disclosure. Many variations and modifications may be made to the above-described embodiment(s) of the disclosure without departing substantially from the spirit and principles of the disclosure. All such modifications and variations are intended to be included herein within the scope of this disclosure and the present disclosure and protected by the following claims.
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Systems and methods for dynamic allocation of agents for a network, which in one embodiment among many, can be broadly summarized by a representative method of receiving network data for a given time interval, where the network data is related to calls between users of the network and agents having agent-profiles that worked during the first time interval; determining a desired number of agents to work during another time interval based at least in part on the profiles of the agents that worked in the network during the given time interval; and assigning a group of agents to work during the other time interval, where the number of agents in the group is equal to the desired number. Another embodiment can be described as a dynamic agent allocator system that has logic configured to receive network data for a given time interval, where the network data is related to calls between users of the network and agents having agent-profiles that worked during the first time interval; logic configured to determine a desired number of agents to work during another time interval based at least in part on the profiles of the agents that worked in the network during the given time interval; and logic configure to assign a group of agents to work during the other time interval, where the number of agents in the group is equal to the desired number.
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RELATED APPLICATIONS
This application is a national stage filing under 35 U.S.C. §371 of International Application No. PCT/US2007/009883, filed on Apr. 23, 2007, which claims the benefit of the filing date of U.S. Provisional Application No. 60/794,269, filed on Apr. 21, 2006. The teachings of the referenced Applications are incorporated herein by reference in their entirety. International Application No. PCT/US2007/009883 was published under PCT Article 21(2) in English.
BACKGROUND
(a) Field
The present invention relates to apparatus, systems and methods for performing in situ measurements, and, more particularly, to apparatus, systems and methods that can isolate a sample from a bulk fluid to measure characteristics of same without unwanted effects of perturbation in the bulk fluid.
(b) Description of the Related Art
In situ measurement and the use of probes in implementing the same are subjects of much current interest due to their tremendous variety of applications. Whether it be for the monitoring of a cell culture, aquatic systems, or ecosystems, the accurate measurement of parameters in the system is useful for detecting natural, spatial, and/or temporal variations.
This type of undertaking is ideally performed in situ as the conventional approach of sample removal from the system, storage, and/or transport heightens the risk for contamination and inaccurate measurement of system conditions. In bioreactor processes, for instance, the ability to monitor cellular physiological states and system parameters is essential to control and maintain the system at desired conditions.
In the cell culture context, the tracking of metabolic states is very important for, e.g. designing feeding strategies, process scale-up, and calculation of optimal harvest time, etc. A commonly used indicator of metabolic activity in cells is the oxygen uptake rate or OUR.
One conventional method of measuring OUR, known as the dynamic method, requires stopping all gas supply then monitoring the oxygen consumption over time. This creates a harsh and significant disturbance to the cells, which consequently impacts cell proliferation, results in potentially erroneous readings, and does not allow for an extended period of continuous, real-time monitoring.
Another conventional method, illustrated in FIG. 1A , involves drawing a sample from the bioreactor and transferring it to an external vessel equipped with a monitoring and control system. Conditions, such as pH, temperature, aeration, etc., in the external vessel must be adjusted and controlled to mirror those of the bioreactor in order to obtain accurate and reliable readings. Duplicating these conditions, however, is challenging and time-consuming. In light of the above, apparatus and methods for in situ measurements that reduce the effects of system perturbations are highly desirable.
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
According to one embodiment of the present invention, an apparatus for in situ measurements is disclosed having a body, a separator, a holder, and one or more probes. The body is configured for insertion into a bulk fluid and includes an interior and one or more apertures for fluid communication between the interior and the bulk fluid. The separator is received in the body interior and movable between an open position remote from the one or more apertures and a closed position adjacent to the one or more apertures. The holder, which is mounted within the separator, includes a chamber wall. The chamber wall, separator, and body interior together define a sample chamber. One or more probes are received by the holder with the end(s) extending into the sample chamber.
In another embodiment of the present invention, a system for in situ measurements comprises the aforementioned apparatus, a vessel containing the bulk fluid, and a retraction assembly mounted on the vessel.
In yet another embodiment of the invention, a method of performing in situ measurements is disclosed, which involves first contacting the body of the apparatus of the invention with the bulk fluid when the separator is in the open position then measuring one or more parameters of the bulk fluid using one or more probes.
In still another embodiment of the invention, the method of performing in situ measurements includes contacting the body of the apparatus of the invention with the bulk fluid when the separator is in the open position; isolating a sample of the bulk fluid within the sample chamber by moving the separator to the closed position; and measuring one or more parameters of the sample using one or more probes.
In another embodiment of the invention, the method of performing in situ measurements includes contacting the body of the apparatus in the system disclosed herein with the bulk fluid when the separator is in the open position and measuring one or more parameters of the bulk fluid using one or more probes.
In yet another embodiment of the present invention, the method of performing in situ measurements includes contacting the body of the apparatus in the system disclosed herein with the bulk fluid when the separator is in the open position; isolating a sample of the bulk fluid within the sample chamber by moving the separator to the closed position; and measuring one or more parameters of the bulk fluid using one or more probes.
The methods and apparatuses of the present invention have other features and advantages which will be apparent from or are set forth in more detail in the accompanying drawings, which are incorporated herein, and the following Detailed Description of the Invention, which together serve to explain certain principles of the present invention.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 provides conceptual views of a conventional method of measuring OUR, shown on the left as FIG. 1A , juxtaposed with an exemplary embodiment of the in situ method of the invention, shown on the right as FIG. 1B .
FIGS. 2A and 2C illustrate an exemplary embodiment of the present invention in exploded view and assembled view, respectively, whereas FIGS. 2B and 2D illustrate an exemplary embodiment of the present invention with a commercially available retraction housing in exploded view and assembled view, respectively.
FIG. 3 is an enlarged view of various components of an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 4 is a front perspective view of an exemplary embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 5 provides detailed schematic of an exemplary embodiment of the present invention. FIG. 5A is a front cross-sectional view whereas FIG. 5B and FIG. 5C side cross-sectional views of a sample chamber portion of the invention in open and closed position, respectively.
FIG. 6 is a side cross-sectional view of an apparatus of the invention as mounted in a port of a vessel wall and equipped with a linear stage and stepper motor.
FIG. 7 is an enlarged view of exemplary components used in conjunction with the apparatus of the present invention.
FIG. 8 provides side cross-sectional views of an apparatus of the invention, whereas FIG. 8A shows the apparatus mounted in place through a vessel wall and FIG. 8B shows the apparatus retracted from the vessel wall.
FIG. 9 is an external side view of an apparatus of the invention in the closed position.
FIG. 10 is an external side view of an apparatus of the invention in open position.
FIG. 11 is an external side view of an apparatus of the invention as it would appear in the process of being retracted.
FIG. 12 is an external side view of an apparatus of the invention with an autoclave cap.
FIG. 13 is a graph of four oxygen uptake rate measurements taken during the perfusion process at a cell density of 18×10 6 cells/mL.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
Reference will now be made in detail to various embodiments of the present invention, examples of which are illustrated in the accompanying drawings and described below. While the invention will be described in conjunction with exemplary embodiments, it will be understood that present description is not intended to limit the invention to those exemplary embodiments. On the contrary, the invention is intended to cover not only the exemplary embodiments, but also various alternatives, modifications, equivalents and other embodiments, which may be included within the spirit and scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims. While the invention will be described with reference to an apparatus having features suitable for use with cell culture, it will be appreciated that the apparatus and system can be used for in situ measurement of any fluid environment outside of the bioreactor context.
As used herein, the term “bulk fluid” refers to a volume of fluid from which a sample can be isolated and analyzed.
Embodiments described herein provide apparatus, systems, and methods for in situ measurements that isolate a sample of a bulk fluid, such as that in a reactor, aquatic system or ecosystem. Characteristics of the sample can then be measured without noise from perturbation of the bulk fluid.
Referring to FIG. 1A , which shows a conceptual view of conventional measurement of OUR, a sample of fluid in the reactor is typically removed from the system and transferred to an external vessel, where parameters such as OUR are measured. Other parameters that can be measured include, without limitation, nitrification rate, denitrification rate, etc. Conditions in the external vessel, such as temperature, agitation, and aeration, etc. must be precisely controlled to correspond to conditions in the reactor. As previously discussed, removal from the system presents various challenges and drawbacks. The present invention offers a solution by providing apparatus, systems, and methods for in situ measurement that obviate the need for removal and transfer to a separate controlled system. It achieves this by isolating a sample of the media or bulk fluid in a compartment within the reactor by means of an apparatus that will be described below. Because the sample fluid remains in the reactor, additional controls are not necessary. The apparatus of the invention can also be shifted to the closed position, which enables it to function as a conventional sensor, detecting parameters such as pH, temperature, dissolved oxygen, etc. and measuring changes in the reactor media.
In exemplary embodiments, as shown in FIG. 2 , an apparatus of the invention includes a body 30 , a separator 32 , a probe holder 33 , and one or more probes 35 . In some embodiments, the apparatus can further include a linear stage and actuator 37 which controls the separator movement, a stepper motor and gear box 39 that controls the holder movement, an end cap 40 that attaches to one end of the body, and/or a retraction housing 42 . The body is configured with one or more apertures 44 that, when unobstructed, allow fluid communication between the interior of the housing and its surrounding environment. In the illustrated embodiment, the body includes three apertures, however, one will appreciate that one or more apertures of various geometries and dimensions may be used. The body, separator and holder may be constructed of a gas and/or liquid-impermeable material such as a metal, alloy, elastomer, plastic, polyurethane or composite. One will appreciate that these components may be constructed of any combination of these materials and/or other suitable materials. The body may be a single monolithically formed body or may comprise multiple parts fitted together, as exemplified in FIGS. 2B and 2D , showing a screw-on or otherwise removable end cap 40 at the distal end of body 30 . While a body with a removable end cap 40 such as that shown in FIG. 2 may be easier to make for machining considerations than one that is formed integrally, the present invention is not limited to any particular construction and one will appreciate that the body and other components may have various configurations.
Referring to FIG. 2-5 , a separator 32 is provided in the interior of and movable within the body 30 . In the illustrated embodiment, separator 32 moves axially between an open position, as shown in FIGS. 5B and 10 , and a closed position, as shown in FIGS. 5C and 9 . When the separator is in the open position, the body interior is in fluid communication with the bulk fluid, as illustrated by the arrow indicating fluid movement through the apertures 44 . When the separator is in the closed position, the apertures are sealed such that the body interior is fluidly isolated from the bulk fluid, as illustrated by the curved arrow at the upper aperture in FIG. 5C .
Therefore, in some embodiments, the apparatus has two modes or positions: an open mode, as shown in FIG. 5B , and a closed mode, as shown in FIG. 5C . The apparatus can be used in either mode depending on whether fluid isolation of the sample from the bulk fluid is desired for the particular data that are being collected. Referring also to FIG. 1B , for example and without limitation, the open mode may be suitable for measuring dissolved oxygen (DO), dissolved carbon dioxide, temperature, pH or cell density while the closed mode is suitable for measuring OUR or nitrification. In either mode, shown in FIGS. 5B and 5C , a sample chamber 46 (indicated by the phantom lines) is defined by a chamber wall 47 of the holder, which will be described below, an interior of the body, and the separator.
Referring again to FIGS. 2A-5C , an exemplary embodiment of the apparatus also includes a holder 33 such as the illustrated holder tube, which houses one or more sensing probes 35 interior to the separator 32 . To collect data on the sample, the one or more probes extend into the sample chamber 46 which may or may not be fluidly isolated from the bulk fluid depending on whether it is in the closed or open position. The one or more probes used with the present invention may be a customized probe or any commercially available probe, for example and without limitation, a fluorescence-based optical probe, an electrochemical probe, a dissolved oxygen probe, a dissolved carbon dioxide probe, or a combination of any number thereof. Probes for other metabolites such as glucose, glutamine, glutamate, lactate, or ammonia, and other gases may also be employed.
As illustrated in FIGS. 4 and 5A , one or more probes 35 may be mounted off-center with respect to a central axis of the holder, the separator, and/or the body. FIG. 4 illustrates two probes, provided symmetrically around a center. FIG. 5A illustrates a single off-center probe. It should be appreciated by those of ordinary skill in the art that the present invention is not limited to any number or disposition of probes. Referring also to FIG. 6 , the body may be connected to a stepper motor 39 and gear box 49 , such that the holder is rotatable around a central axis. In the case of the one or more off-center probes, the probe(s) can be used to stir, agitate or otherwise manipulate the sample in the sample chamber. This feature of the invention provides the advantages of keeping cells or other sample components in suspension and prevent gaseous, e.g. O 2 , CO 2 , etc. or metabolite concentration gradients from forming. In some embodiments, any number of stirrers such as paddles or the like may be attached to one or more of the probes or otherwise mounted within the sample chamber. It should be appreciated by those of ordinary skill in the art that stirrer(s) may be provided regardless of the number of probes or whether the probes are mounted on- or off-center.
In some embodiments, as illustrated in FIGS. 6 and 8 , the separator is attached to a linear stage and actuator, which provide the axial movement of the separator between the open position/mode of FIG. 10 , and the closed position/mode of FIG. 9 . The linear stage may be made of various materials, including without limitation, e.g. steel, non-reactive metals, polymers, etc.
Referring now to FIGS. 8B and 11 , the inventive apparatus can be adapted for use with a retraction system 51 . The retraction system may include the inventive apparatus, a vessel 53 containing the bulk fluid, and a retraction assembly mounted onto the vessel. The retraction assembly includes retraction housing 42 , wherein body 30 is configured for removal and sealing insertion through the retraction housing into the bulk fluid. As illustrated in FIG. 9-11 , the retraction housing may include one or more steam ports 54 , through which steam can be injected for sterilization purposes.
Referring to FIGS. 3 and 9 , in some embodiments, the apparatus is detachable from the linear stage and actuator and stepper motor and gear box or any other mechanism by which movement of the separator and holder is achieved, leaving an exposed opening on one end of the apparatus. An autoclave cap 56 can then be placed on the exposed end of the apparatus for autoclaving or sterilize-in-place (SIP) procedures. In some embodiments, the cap can be placed on the body on a portion distal from the apertures. The cap may be made of steel, glass or any other material known in the art for its heat or pressure-resistance.
Any custom or commercially available retraction assembly can be used, including but not limited to, the Mettler Toledo InTrac® retraction assembly and others known in the art. The adaptability of the present invention for use with a retraction system is particularly advantageous for long-term perfusion processes that typically run for durations of three months or longer. The retraction aspect of the invention allows for swapping, adjustment, maintenance or replacement of probes, e.g. to remove defective/broken probes or test for a different parameter of the sample, without significant process interruption.
In some embodiments, the apparatus may include one or more O-rings to provide a mechanical or fluidic seal at any interface between two or more components of the invention. An O-ring can be positioned between end cap 40 and body 30 , between separator 32 and the end of body 30 proximal to aperture(s) 44 , or between separator 32 and holder 33 .
Although the body, separator, holder, and one or more probes are illustrated in the accompanying drawings as tubular structures, those of ordinary skill in the art should recognize that these components may take any shape or form as can their cross-sections, e.g. regular: elliptical, circular, polygonal, etc. or irregular.
In use, the apparatus is inserted into a bulk fluid such as a culturing media in a bioreactor. In the illustrated embodiment, the apparatus is inserted through a port of the reactor or vessel wall, however, one will appreciate that the apparatus may be configured for insertion directly into a bulk fluid such as a river, lake or marsh, aquatic culture tanks, agricultural water supplies and seawater. After insertion into the bulk fluid, the separator can be placed in either the open position ( FIG. 5B ) or closed position ( FIG. 5C ). When the separator is in the open position, a portion of the bulk fluid will flow through the apertures into the sample chamber, allowing measurement of parameters such as pH, temperature, dissolved oxygen, etc. in the bulk fluid. For some uses, the data is collected while the separator is in the closed position, thereby fluidly isolating a sample in the sample chamber from the bulk fluid. The data collected by the probes in the closed mode may be suitable for assessing the physiological state of cells in the reactor and measuring parameters such as nitrification or oxygen uptake rate of culturing cells.
The present invention has a number of applications, including the use of a dissolved carbon dioxide probe and dissolved oxygen probe, simultaneously or in turn, to determine the respiratory quotient of cells in culture. The dissolved carbon dioxide probe measures pCO 2 over time to calculate the carbon dioxide evolution rate (CER). The CER can then be employed in conjunction with the OUR determined by the dissolved oxygen probe to determine the respiratory quotient (RQ).
The invention can also be used for monitoring cell health and physiological states in culture. For instance, cell density should remain relatively constant in processes run in steady-state. The oxygen consumption rate should likewise remain constant. Under such conditions, a detected flux in the oxygen consumption rate can signal an unexpected or undesired change in cell density and thereby allow correction measures to be taken. Under other conditions, where a change in cell density is expected, a detected stasis in cell density by OUR measurement might be an indication of other problems and warrant a more thorough investigation of the cause. Since the apparatus of the invention has an open mode, it can be used as an enhanced sensor in reactors for mammalian cell culture, prokaryotic and eukaryotic fermentation, aquatic systems, ecological studies, or any other contexts.
EXAMPLE
The following is offered to illustrate the operation of an embodiment of the present invention and not by way of limitation.
Experimental: Appropriate probes were selected and installed in the system, the condition of all O-rings and parts checked and the autoclave cap attached to the system, which was processed in the autoclave. After autoclaving, the autoclave cap was removed from the apparatus and a motor mount installed in its place. The apparatus was then installed onto a vessel/fermentor along with additional control equipment as needed (pH probes, temperature probes, etc.). Probe(s) were connected to the appropriate transmitters, i.e. the DO transmitter, and their signals sent to a data acquisition or SCADA system (FermWorks™ 2.1 by Jova Solutions, San Francisco). Stepper motors that move the probes and the separator were connected to a stepper motor controller (2× TIMS 0201™, Jova Solutions, San Francisco) and the control software initialized. In the setup, TIMS 0201 was connected via USB to the process control computer running the fermentor and the control program in a plug-in for FermWorks™.
The appropriate parameters for system operation were set. These parameters included oscillation/mixing frequency, open and closed position of the separator, measurement frequency (in number of measurements per hour in auto mode). The DO probes of the system were then calibrated, 0% and 100% air saturation being achieved by respectively sparging the reactor with nitrogen and air. Fermentation procedures were performed: adding the medium and cells to the reactor and starting the SCADA control loops for critical parameters, including dissolved oxygen (DO), pH, temperature, and agitation. Parameters/conditions were allowed to stabilize before measurement in the closed mode to avoid otherwise skewed readings. Measurement in closed mode was initiated by moving the separator and closing the sample chamber via the control program. Sample mixing was implemented by the stepper motor control software, causing the probe holder to spin clockwise or counterclockwise as desired and turn the probe(s). Changes in probe signals, e.g. oxygen consumption, were recorded over time.
The sample chamber was opened and the sample released back into the bulk fluid once the probe signal reaches a predetermined threshold. Rotation of the holder was ceased and the probe(s) readings allowed to stabilize before another measurement was taken. Additional measurements were timed by the control software. The oxygen uptake rate was calculated from the oxygen consumption over time as measured relative to the actual cell density.
All measurements were taken during a four-week period of a perfusion process, the conditions of which are provided in Table 1. The results plotted in FIG. 13 show good reproducibility of measurements by the present invention. Table 2 shows the calculated OURs as measured on thirteen days during the test period and the relative error associated with each measurement. The average relative error is 5.5%.
For comparison, the global mass balancing (GMB) method known in the art was used to estimate the OUR for one of the experiments at a cell density of 15.5×10 6 cells/mL. The GMB method resulted in an estimated OUR of about 2.2 pmol/cell·d as compared to an OUR of about 2.0 pmol/cell·d measured by the in situ apparatus of the present invention.
TABLE 1
Parameter
Value
pH
6.8
Temperature
35.5
DO
50%
Medium
Protein-free
Cell Line
Baby Hamster Kidney (BHK)
Cell Specific Perfusion Rate (CSPR)
variable
Cell Density
3-20 × 10 6 cells/mL
TABLE 2
Cell Density
CSPR
OUR
Error
1 × 10e 6 cells/mL
condition
(pmol/cell · d)
(%)
Datasets
3.26
B
2.7
6.7
2
9.55
C
2.47
1.6
4
10.3
A
3.14
4.7
4
11.17
A
2.74
4.7
4
12.13
A
2.81
2.5
2
13.46
A
2.51
10.8
3
13.58
A
2.45
6.5
4
13.76
A
3.9
4.6
3
15.26
B
2.17
0.0
2
15.5
B
2
9.5
4
17.11
C
2.64
14.4
3
17.77
B
2.14
3.0
5
20.2
A
2.28
3.5
2
While this invention has been described in connection with what is presently considered to be practical exemplary embodiments, it is to be understood that the invention is not limited to the disclosed embodiments, but, on the contrary, is intended to cover various modifications and equivalent arrangements included within the spirit and scope of the appended claims.
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The present invention relates to apparatus, systems and methods for performing in situ measurements, and, more particularly, to apparatus, systems and methods that can isolate a sample from a bulk fluid to measure characteristics of same without unwanted effects of perturbation in the bulk fluid.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0001] 1. Field of Invention
[0002] The present invention relates generally to systems and methods for tracking the location of Vehicles, such as Trucks/Trailers, buses, Aircrafts, Trains, containers, cargo, pallets/packages and personnel, and more particularly to an improved system and method for tracking the location of a plurality of Trucks/Trailers, buses, pallets/packages or personnel at a particular location or a site to ascertain the exact location at which any vehicle, and it's content is located, as well as to ascertain when the proper pallet/package or personnel is being dropt off or picked up at exact given address. Locations at which relatively large number of vehicles, pallets/packages and personnel are present, the problem of determining exactly where each vehicle, pallet/package or personnel is. And even whether or not a particular vehicle, pallet/package or personnel located at a particular location when the business has several different sites, vehicles, pallets/packages and personnel. This problem is particularly common to large and small Trucking companies, Railroad, freight companies, Delivery companies, rapid transit Public transportation, airlines, school bus service, Utility companies, Rental car agencies, Leasing companies, distribution wherehouses, Retail stores, office buildings, schools Etc. In addition, such businesses must also deal with the theft of vehicles and it's content, theft of goods in wherehouses, employee job attendance and schools must deal with child school attendance.
[0003] A number of different methods have been used in the past to deal with the problem of tracking the location of a large number of vehicles; It's drivers, content delivery, or wherehouse pallets/packages along with employee attendance, or school bus and child school attendance. The oldest of these methods is by keeping an inventory register of each vehicle and it's content and it's delivery records in a paper journal of some kind, or more recently, in a hand held computerized database. Inventory register depend on each individual operator may move a pallet/package for any reason, recording that move, as well as the vehicle's new location. Ultimately, this system will not accurately reflect the location of all vehicles, pallets/packages and personnel simply because not all employees at a location will enter each move of vehicle, pallet/package, personnel or student.
[0004] As might be expected, a variety of different approaches have been taken to attempt to solve the problem of monitoring large numbers of vehicles, pallets/packages and or personnel at a location or in a vehicle. These approaches vary widely, encompassing both increase security measures, proper global flow of distribution of goods, Fix and mobile inventory control, track vehicles with it's content and personnel. With regard first to increase security measures of particular application to vehicle it's content at a location or at a wherehouse site, the measures taken commonly include security fences or compounds, the use of video monitoring of area in which vehicles and cargo is stored, the use of motion sensor alarm in such areas, and the use of security guards to patrol such areas. While such approaches may reduce the incident of theft somewhat, they are not useful in the addressing the primary problem contemplated by the present invention, namely how to keep track of the location of number of vehicles, it's content, and securely deliver and pick up of pallets/packages at a given address. And securely monitor the presence of pallets/packages and personnel in a warehouse, Truck/trailer, retail stores schools, and in school buss. Etc.
[0005] Electronic Tracking Tag, U.S. Pat. No. 6,144,301 to Frieden, discloses an Electronic Tracking Tag attached to various assets to assist in asset identification. Using a plastic visual label display Tag with a receiving cavity to mechanically lock an RFID transponder. The Tag body with the electronic transponder may be secured to the asset by screw. Alternatively, one or more flexible strap may extend in the tag body for strapping the tag body to the physical asset.
[0006] Frieden Electronic tag, does not provide tamper proof pressure sensing tamper switch with protective metal “O” ring, neither utilizes optical conductivity sensing nylon strap for strapping the tag on to a pallet or object. One can easily remove said tag and remove the asset undetected.
[0007] Radio tag system and method with improved tag interference avoidance U.S. Pat. No. 6,034,603 to Steeves, teaches a data transmission system includes a reader transceiver. The reader transmits an activation signal to a tag. The tag selectively transmits a response signal to reader at a specific time. The detector operates in a low-power standby state until the time it receives the activation signal.
[0008] Steeves radio tag system with improved tag interference avoidance system, reads multiple tags within range of a set radius, and the tag operates all the time at low power standby mode until activation signal causes the tag to operate. Steeves system fails to locate the presence of an object in a area with many partitions, or example; where there are many building at a given site, within communication range of a site transceiver and tag units. The present art uses RFID Reader within building/partition or at vehicle entry/exit points. The Tag used in the art comprises of RFID transponder and RF transceiver. The object carrying RFID-RF transceiver tag upon interrogation with a magnetic field, (generated by RFID reader) powers on the tags RF transceiver circuitry, (tag using energy only when it's powered on) and transmits the tag RFID signal to the computer. The computer upon receipt of signal, logs coded tag data in a slut with a zone number, and creates a communicates with tag RF transceiver at time interval, to indicate particular tag presence within designated (zone) area in the building or partition. When tag is moved away from communicating range, the tag power shot's down. Thus tags using energy only when object is within an area where there is presence of gate reader with RF computer interface unit.
[0009] Use of mutter mode in asset tracking for gathering data from cargo sensors, U.S. Pat. No. 5,686,888 to Welles, al et. Teaches goods are monitored while in transit using local area network of tracking assets. Electronic sensors are situated in proximity to the cargo. The sensors communicate with asset tracking unit affixed to the container. The tracking unit has the ability to relay the cargo sensor data to central station.
[0010] Welles teaching sensors affixed to the container does not use tamper proof sensors. Which one can easily remove and defeats the purpose of usage. Sensor's transmitting periodically creates collision problem. And sensor's used in Welles system has to be programmed into tracking unit in order to poll sensor data. Additionally welles system cannot differentiates presence of a goods are around or within container. And finally Welles system does not generate an alarm system if goods removed from the vehicle without authorization entry and does not activate stolen tag RF transmitter to transmit an alarm condition signal, so one could locate an stolen asset.
[0011] The present art uses tamper proof pressure sensing tag's with protective metal “O” ring, uses mounting screws or adhesive tape, and or tamper proof optical nylon conductive strap for strapping the tag to the goods, which eliminates sensor tampering. Since present art uses Transponder read unit in the vehicle or container doorway, When tag goes through vehicle doorway, automatically programs tag's ID into vehicle tracking unit, contrary to Welles method, and ascertains the good's location is being within the designated vehicle or container.
[0012] Electronic anti-shoplifting system employing RFID tag, U.S. Pat. No. 5,874,896 to Lowe, et al. teaches an Electronic ant-shoplifting system monitors articles of merchandise. The transponder tags connected to articles of merchandise and tag exciter is positioned at exit. If customer carries an article through exit without removal authorization, the transponder tag is activated by generating a surveillance response signal that triggers an alarm.
[0013] Tag's used in Lowe's teaching does not have RFID transponder with built-in RF transceiver with power on circuitry, to account real time presence of an object affixed with a tag in a shopping area. And tag's used in Lowe system does not use tamper sensing tags, One can removed the merchandise tag and walk away unnoticed, And one can move tagged merchandise out of a store, other then of tag exciter location without being noticed.
[0014] Asset Location System. U.S. Pat. No. 6,069,570 to Herring, discloses an asset location system includes a pager, a control processor, a GPS receiver and a cell phone. During normal operation, the equipment on board the tracked asset is in a low power or sleep mode. Upon receiving a location queerer from a call center, a control processor is powered up. The latitude and longitude information is put in a transmittable form by a cellular phone modem to a monitoring station.
[0015] Herring system using a pager to receive queerer from a call and a cellular phone modem for transmitting data is not economically practical, one has to consider a minimum monthly service fee to be paid by user for pager and cell communication, makes usage of prior art not to appealing to end user. And since prior art does not use a tamper resistive GPS/Cell modem, the GPS unit can be easily removed and defeat it's purpose. According to the invention, the new art uses a low power consumption two-way pager for receiving queerer and responding to said queerer through pager network, thus eliminating the unnecessary monthly fee for cell service. In addition the method used in the art uses a GPS/modem and an RF transceiver affixed to a cargo, communicating with a site computer interface unit, when said cargo unauthorized removal from the site (wherehouse or a trailer) said where house computer will automatically initiate an RF signal to power up said GPS/modem from its sleep mode, so stolen cargo could be located. And finally, the new art teaches unauthorized removal of temper sensing GPS/modem tag from cargo, will initiate an alarm signal to a monitoring station..
[0016] Method and Apparatus for Providing a Personal locator, Access control and asset Tracking service using an building telephone network U.S. Pat. No. 5,363,425 to Muffi, et al. describes a system where users carry an ID badges containing an RF transmitters can be located across the telephone network for receiving incoming calls. The receiver units in or near telephone sets instruct the system of the identifying of the user located near the telephone set. In addition tags are used on assets, which communicates with receiver units near telephone sets in a building for tracking asset movement across the building. Muffi tag's does not provide Metal “O” ring protection around the tamper sensor switch; neither provides optical nylon conductive belt body worn or asset mount tags. Muffi tamper sensing asset tags easily can be removed by sliding a flat object (knife. Envelop opener) beneath the tag and hold the pressure sensor switch and deffeat it's purpose, and personnel ID tags can be easily removed . And usage of building phone line limits the personnel and asset monitoring to building application only.
[0017] Personnel Monitoring Tag. U.S. Pat. No. 5,745,037 Guthrie, et al. discloses a method for accounting for plurality of persons based on random interval monitoring system to report information regarding the presence of both desired and undesired condition affecting a person. The method includes a first step of transmitting information signal based upon random times from individual tag worn by person corresponds to whether a tag is being worn and to certain activity of person, by use of pressure and motion sensor.
[0018] Guthrie et al. tags does not contain combination of RFID and RF transceivers. The tag's RF transceiver does not automatically activate by entry way magnetic interrogation, neither uses tag receiver push to weak up activation switch, and the tag mounting strap used in the Guthrie art is not of optical conductive nylon. The communication technique used in the Guthrie system cannot identify location of a tag in a specific room or a patrician in a building or even in trailers due to fact RF transceivers used in the Guthrie method could easily overlap each other. And long-term random transmission from large number of tags in an area will create a communication collision due to fact long term tag transmitter RTC will change, and additionally when new personnel tag appearance in the system easily causes collision. And usage of spread spectrum communication in a site with large number of tags it has it's limitation, and spread spectrum technique consumes higher energy and its expensive, means requires larger size battery which increases tags size and cost. Again pressure sensor switch and the strap used in Guthrie teaching could be defeated by sliding a flat object under the tag for holding the tamper switch, and conductive strap could be jumped by poking with an sharp edged external conductive material and cut the belt and enlarge the overall diameter of the strap and then tag can be easily removed.
[0019] Global Security System. U.S. Pat. No. 5,497,149 to Fast, describes a system for determining the position of an object to be protected using a local or global positioning system and issuing messages to a monitoring center at predetermined times and or a times when the object to be protected is under an alert condition, such as being outside an allowed position zone during a defined time period.
[0020] Fast method does not apply for person or object mount GPS/modem or pager transceiver unit to power up and transmit object location information when an object leave a designated site such as a building or a vehicle at any given time. The present invention GPS tag unit uses a modem or a pager and in addition an RF transceiver unit to communicate with a site RF transceiver devise. When RF transceiver within GPS unit does not communicate with site transceiver unit due to object carrying the GPS devise departs from said site. Or RFID tag within the GPS unit passes the doorway RFID reader without given computer operator entry. The GPS unit will power up and automatically transmit its lactation data to a monitoring station server.
[0021] Decentralized tracking and routing system wherein packages are associated with active tags. U.S. Pat. No. 5,627,517 to Theimer, et al. describes in freight tracking and touting system, each package is provided with a tag physically attached. The tag includes a radio or infrared transceiver. Location transceivers broadcast signals representative of their location. The microprocessor, in response to receiving a desired destination signal, emits a signal commanding external equipment to take the package so that it remains at the desired location. The tags are also capable of electronically queried, or can emit distress signal when they do not reach a particular location at a particular time.
[0022] Theimer system although is useful in determining a package destination. But the location transceiver does not send package information from a distribution center to a Vehicle or an aircraft mount GPS based unit in order to track package location, prompt delivery or pick-up, based on (longitude altitude) exact given address, neither use tamper resistive Tags to avoid package theft.
[0023] Asset monitoring system and associated method illustrated. U.S. Pat. No. 5,917,433 to Keollor et al. describes asset monitoring system providing remotely located central station with information relating to a container, both during tethered periods in which the energy reservoir of asset monitoring electrically is connected to an external power source, such as a truck. Or using untethered mode during when trailer energy source is disconnected. The controller includes power management means for placing the asset monitoring in an active mode during tethered periods and energy conservation mode during untethered periods.
[0024] Although Keollor energy serving method is useful, so as the trailer door sensors, however it does not provide secure asset monitoring. Keoller teaching does not provide tamper sensing GPS/modem transceivers unit, which upon tamper detection immobilizes the vehicle (truck/trailer) and transmit GPS tamper detection signal to a monitoring station. And additionally does not provide trailer door electronic lock mechanism which enables a remotely operated (key fob) unit for operator to be able to open trailer door at a given (Longitude/latitude) address. And finally Keollor teaching does not provide Electronic RFID trailer gate readers to electronically log in and out pallets or packages there shall for trailer content cannot be monitored.
[0025] Security for Transport Vehicles and Cargo. U.S. Pat. No. 5,969,595 to Schipper et al. teaches a method and apparatus for providing security vehicles and for cargo transported on a vehicle. A cargo unit carries a transceiver or transmitter that transmits a selected signal which is examined as to signal intensity, signal coding and or time of receipt. If the receiving signal violates a selected condition, vehicle location is compared with an approved cargo location. If the vehicle is not near the cargo destination, or if no selected signal received at the receiver, an alarm signal is transmitted, to a monitoring station which may include the vehicle location, and to a selected cargo transceiver unit to activate a become signal. The method further comprising the steps of locking said cargo unit when said vehicle leaves a selected location or to unlock the cargo carrying volume only at least one of the following locations is within selected distance from one approved cargo destination.
[0026] Schipper et al. is perhaps the most detailed of such apparatus for providing secure cargo transport on a vehicle illustrates both the benefit and the limitation of such system. While the Schipper et al. system is highly useful and represents a significant improvement in the art, it does not address the problem addressed by the present invention namely no tamper sensing GPS/modem unit being used which upon tamper detection immobilizes the vehicle and report to central station. No vehicle (trailer, Railcar) Electronic gate lock being used which opens only by operator key-fob, at given vehicle address location (longitude latitude). No vehicle gate Tag RFID reader is been provided to ascertain cargo being within the vehicle, and no use of RFID Reader, which automatically power up the tags upon entry to communicate with vehicle transceiver unit for real time presence authentication. The cargo tags are not equipped with pressure sensing protective “O” ring tamper switch, neither uses tags with tamper sensing optical nylon conductive strap for mounting the tags on cargo. The Schipper system cannot secure the vehicle and its cargo content, thus one easily can remove the vehicle mount GPS/modem unit and drive away with the vehicle and steal the cargo content without being tracked. The cargo tags can be removed and dropped near or within the vehicle, and cargo can be taken away without being tracked. Unlocking of cargo container by distance at an approve destination used in Schipper teaching, cannot secure the cargo at an approved destination. One will assume in a approved destination center, upon cargo arrival the cargo lock opens near warehouse distribution center. Any one at distribution center can open the cargo door detach the tags and remove the cargo without being noticed or detected. In the new art since only driver can open the cargo gate at authorized location, there for only authorized personnel have access the cargo, and the new art is capable of tracking driver/loaders information.
[0027] Programmable Vehicle Monitoring and Security System having access verification Devices U.S. Pat. No. 5,986,543 to Johnson teaches a security system having two ways communication with a central monitoring station. Control communication connected to intrusion detection devises. The control unit in response to detection of an intrusion establishes a communication leak with monitoring station. The control and communication devise is operable to receive commands from a handset electrically connection.
[0028] Johnson disclosure of a detecting intrusion is a useful art, however since Johnson does not use tamper detection GPS/modem unit, neither tamper sensing cellular or GPS antenna. One can disconnect or break the GPS or cell antenna found in Johnson system or access the vehicle disconnect the GPS modem and drive away with the vehicle. In the present art upon tamper detection the GPS/modem unit will immobilizes the vehicle and sends tamper detection signal to a monitoring station, with information containing to immobilized vehicle last known location. Which helps authorities easily locate the vehicle.
[0029] Method for retrieving vehicular collateral U.S. Pat. No. 6,025,774 to Forbes describes a method of securing vehicle for a loan. The method provides for installing a transmitter within the vehicle, the transmitter is capable of transmitting location data regarding the vehicle. A data link is established from a base terminal to the transmitter of the vehicle. The loan status is being monitored for default from a monitoring station. Upon occurrence of the default, the location of the vehicle is determined, and the vehicle is confiscated.
[0030] Forbes method is very useful but not dependable for securing vehicle loan. If one forfeits the loan and had no intention to return the vehicle, could easily defeat the GPS antenna or the entire GPS/Cellular modem and drive away with the vehicle. Even ship the vehicle out of the country without being tracked.
[0031] It is accordingly the primary objective of the present invention that it provide an secure Electronic vehicle, cargo, and personnel tracking information system which will track the present location of each of plurality of vehicles, pallets, and personnel at a location such as, for example, On the road, railways, Trailers, trucks, aircraft, buses, in warehouses, retail stores, offices, homes, schools. Etc.
[0032] It is a related objective of the present invention that the monitoring of vehicles, cargo, and personnel location at the location be performed completely automatically via GPS/modem, pager or satellite and RF wireless data communication, with use of computer network, intranet or internet. It is a further objective of the electronic vehicle, cargo, personnel tracking information system of present invention that it be capable of automatically determining when each vehicle arrive and departs from a site and be able determine which cargo, or personnel (passenger, student) securely got pick up or delivered by a vehicle at a given site address. It is a further objective of the invention that is capable to determine when each cargo or personnel entered or exit a site and provide real time secure presence inventory or attendance count, at mobile or fixed sites. It is further objective of present invention to provide security by immobilizing vehicle upon equipment tamper, use site and vehicle gate RFID readers, provide electronic vehicle (Truck/Trailer) gate lock unlock operated by driver remote key fob responsive only at given address, and tamper resistive communication devises on vehicles, cargo, and personnel. It is further the objective of the invention to determine vehicle driver and loader authentication and access recording. And finally to track and locate stolen vehicle and cargo or lost or kidnapped personnel.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0033] In the present invention The Electronic Vehicle, cargo and personnel Monitoring system wherein a vehicle is capable of electronically login it's product content (pallets, products) ID. Its driver or passenger(s) ID in to an on board vehicle CPU and said CPU will communicate with an RF signal containing information to said vehicle, cargo (product) and Driver/passenger, with a base station(s) computer or computer network which indicates the presence or absence of a vehicle at a site, it's cargo Content and it's driver/passenger ID at a predetermine site, Comprising:
[0034] A Base or site station computer connected to a RF Transceiver unit to communicate with a vehicle mount RF Transceiver CPU, and cargo Tags or driver/passenger tags.
[0035] A vehicle Mount tamper proof RF transceiver CPU with an RFID tag reader installed within the vehicle doorway, in which when tagged object goes through vehicle door, the tag read unit will read the tag and send said tag information to vehicle RF transceiver unit, and vehicle Transceiver unit communicates with base or site station computer unit, with information relating to Vehicle content, such as vehicle cargo and driver/passenger equipped with a RFID tags.
[0036] In a preferred embodiment an RFID transponder with RF tamper proof transceiver tag units installed in or outside of cargo with adhesive tape, mounting screws or an optical nylon (string) conductive strap, to communicate in time interval with vehicle mount transceiver CPU unit and base station computer transceiver unit.
[0037] A RFID Tamper proof transceiver tag unit with an optical nylon conductive strap is mounted on a person wrist or ankle to communicate with vehicle mount transceiver CPU unit and base station computer interface transceiver unit.
[0038] The system operates as follows:
[0039] A product or a person carrying an RFID tag its data information is logged manually or by a tag read unit and downloaded into a base station PC. Which will indicate a particular product or person(s) presence (part of inventory) at a site, for example. A Factory, where house, retail store, School site, ext. The site gate(s) is equipped with RFID tag read unit connected to said site computer interface transceiver unit, when a product or a person carrying RFID tag passes through said gate. The gate read unit reads the ID tag and said site computer indicates particular product or person departure from said site. (No longer part of inventory). If the product or person passes through said gate without computer-authorized access code the computer would generate an alarm signal to the operator and autodials to a central monitoring station or to a pager system indicating a security violation.
[0040] A vehicle (Truck, trailer, Aircraft, Railroad car, bus etc.) is equipped with a RF transceiver CPU when said vehicle arrives at a particular site, sending RF signals periodically containing information of a particular vehicle to said site PC or by means of a use of a switch, such as. A push button switch, Ignition switch, or door switch or emergency brake switch, when applied by the operator the site computer interface unit receiver receives the signal from the particular vehicle. The site station computer unit indicates the presence of a particular vehicle at that particular site. Or upon receipt of signal, the computer creates a communication slot (transmitting air time) in its database Memory to communicate at time intervals (once a minute) with said particular vehicle transceiver CPU unit with an RF signal containing data information of the particular vehicle RF transceiver CPU, to verify particular vehicle presence at a particular site. Additionally the vehicle is equipped with an RFID Tag read unit(s) example: mounted at vehicle doorway(s), or gate(s) connected to vehicle mount RF Transceiver CPU. When a product or a person carrying RFID tag unit(s) enters the particular vehicle, The vehicle RFID Tag read unit reads the Tag ID of the particular product(s) or person(s) and logs the information data in to the vehicle CPU, and the CPU transmits the particular vehicle, product or person(s) tag ID to said site computer interface unit, and said site computer interface signals to said Vehicle CPU with a RF coded signal indicating to driver acknowledgment of Wright product or driver/passenger entered the particular vehicle and stores said information in a central Server.
[0041] In a preferred embodiment of the invention the vehicle CPU upon receiving signals from site computer transceiver, transmits the vehicle CPU. ID, product and or person(s) ID information data to the site computer interface unit, which indicates a particular vehicle ID, containing particular product(s) and particular person(s) at a particular site at a set time and date. The base station computer interface unit gives live update to the operator(s) periodically by communicating, example: (once a minute) with the vehicle transceiver CPU unit to confirm the presence of a particular vehicle and it's content at a particular location.
[0042] If a product or a passenger boarded in a wrong vehicle, the site station upon communicating with the vehicle CPU. The computer initiates a alarm signal, and sends a signal to the vehicle CPU, which generates a audible alarm signal indicating to the driver, boarding of a wrong product or passenger into that particular vehicle. When the vehicle departs and is out of communication range. The base station computer indicates the absence of the particular vehicle at that particular site. If unauthorized (without computer access code) departure of vehicle take place from said site and said vehicle transceiver CPU becomes out of communication range or said communication becomes interrupted 2 interval times with the site computer transceiver unit, the site computer initiates a security violation signal and sends said data information to monitoring station.
[0043] In a preferred embodiment of the invention, the vehicle uses a tamper sensing RF transceiver CPU, GPS cellular modem or 2-way pager with tamper sensing antenna. The units are equipped with pressure sensing tamper switch on its case; the tamper switch mount case side is being installed against the vehicle body or window. The vehicle Transceiver CPU or GPS/modem and the antenna unit is communicating with digital data with said vehicle Fuel Pump or starter relay circuitry, to operation the vehicles Fuel Pump or Starter. When an unauthorized attempt is being made to remove or disconnect the vehicle RF transceiver, GPS/modem or antenna. The RF transceiver or GPS/modem processor sees sending (or sending intermittent) digital data to the vehicle Fuel pump or starter relay, thus slowing down the vehicle speed and immobilizing the vehicle or immobilizing the vehicle starter circuitry, and transmit a RF or cellular or pager “tamper” signal to a monitoring station, containing information to the particular vehicle unit with a “tamper” detection signal along with location information. Same process takes place when the vehicle RF Transceiver CPU and GPS/modem or antenna cable is being interupted by an unauthorized person or when units gets abused or damaged, becomes inoperative.
[0044] When the vehicle arrives a predetermined destination to unload it's product(s), the vehicle CPU communicates with an RF signal with the particular site computer transceiver unit, the site computer upon receiving said signal logs the particular vehicle ID presence into that site computer and sends a unique RF coded signal to the vehicle CPU which will generate a signal to vehicle door locks mechanism to open, by use of drivers key fob, and permit driver to unload particular product at that particular site. Each one of said product carrying RFID Tag departing from said vehicle is scanned by said vehicle gate tag RFID read unit and said information is log in to vehicle CPU unit. The logged data is transmitted into a site computer interface by means of RF communication, which indicates a particular product drop off at that particular site. If unscheduled product drop off at the wrong site takes place the site computer will create an alarm warring signal and sent a RF signal to the vehicle CPU that will notify the driver by means of an alarm signal.
[0045] When a bus arrives a predetermined destination to unload its passenger(s), the person carrying RFID tag departs (exit) from the vehicle is scanned by the vehicle door Tag RFID read unit and said information is log in vehicle CPU. The logged data is transmitted into said site computer by means of RF communication and the site computer upon receipt of said vehicle signal, signals bus CPU unit and to a base station computer unit to confirm the vehicle dropped the right person(s) at the right site.
[0046] When the vehicle arrives a predetermined destination to load product(s) or person(s)
EXAMPLE
[0047] Storefront, House Etc. the vehicle CPU communicates with the particular site computer transceiver unit, the site computer upon receiving said signal logs the particular vehicle ID presence into that site computer which indicates by a Audio visual signal the presence of a particular vehicle at a particular site. When a product(s) or person carrying RFID Tag unit enter the vehicle, the vehicle Tag reader unit upon reading each of said Tag unit, Tag read unit being connected to the vehicle transceiver CPU, the CPU transmits a RF signal containing information both to said vehicle ID and said product or person Tag ID, into the site computer transceiver unit. When the site computer transceiver unit receives the signal, transmits the vehicle's ID and the product or person ID information to a central station computer and sends a RF Data signal to the vehicle Transceiver CPU, which upon receipt of signal produces confirmation signal to the driver indicating the boarding of a right product or person at a site.
[0048] In a preferred embodiment of the invention each one of said tamper proof RFID transponder Tags additionally is equipped with a RF transceiver unit powered by a battery. When a product (pallet) or person carrying said RFID/RF Transceiver tag, enters a site (building) equipped with RFID Tag Read unit at it's gate(s) or door(s) Etc. the tag reader reads entered tags and sends the information to the site computer. The computer upon reading the tags RFID Information, the computer creates a particular slot (communication air time) in it's data base memory, to communicate at time intervals (once a minute) with said tag transceiver with a RF signal, to indicate presence of a particular Tag unit at that particular site, at a set time. The product RFID RF Transceiver is equipped with a pressure sensing tamper switch and is installed in or out side of a product, the tamper sensing switch side being faced to the product, and mounted on by use of double sided adhesive tape, or magnet or mounted by screw(s) Etc. Additionally a conductive strap could be utilized over under and across a product (pallet) connected to The RFID RF transceiver tags to avoid product (pallet) temperament. And additionally an RFID RF transceiver unit is mounted with a conductive strap on a person wrist or ankle to be monitored. If unauthorized removal of any tag occurs, the tag tamper switch senses removal of tag from the product or person. And if the conductive strap is being cut, in both cases the tag RF transceiver unit transmits a tamper signal. The site computer transceiver and Vehicle CPU unit upon receiving said signal, issues a tamper alarm signal to monitoring station to alert security personal. If a product or a person exit the Site through a gate with computer controlled clearance code, the RFID RF transceiver unit when goes out of site communication range, within predetermine time the RFID RF transceiver stops transmitting time interval signal to save energy. If unauthorized attempt is been made (without computer clearance) to remove the product (Pallet) or the person walks away from the site gate, the site gate Tag read unit upon reading the product or person RFID-RF Transceiver signals, the site computer indicates a security violation, and the computer transceiver unit initiates a security violation RF coded signal to the particular product RFID-RF Transceiver Tag unit, which upon receipt of said security violation signal, starts transmitting a RF signal containing information to the particular product with security violation code. In another embodiment of invention, if a product or person becomes (without computer clearance) out of computer communication range or communication between the site computer and a particular RFID Transceiver Tag becomes interrupted (after 2 communication attempts) The site computer will initiate an alarm signal, and sends a signals to a central station, via public phone or paging network. For quick recovery a hand held, patrol car or chopper mount RF scanner unit used to locate stolen product.
[0049] Séance a vehicle CPU unit requires a product unloading clearance signal from a site computer transceiver, If and when a vehicle gets car jack or driver decides to unload some or all of its product(s) or pallets in a an authorizes location site, without receiving clearance signal. When said product passes through said vehicle gate Tag read unit, the vehicle CPU sends a RF signal to the particular product RFID-RF Transceiver tag, and tags RFID RF transceiver unit upon receiving the signal, transmits an RF signal containing information to said particular RFID-RF tag along with security violation code. In a preferred embodiment of the invention the vehicle (truck/trailer) gates open (for loading or unloading product) with the use of electronic gate locks (Solenoid Dead bolt) the gate lock will lock or unlock only after receiving a gate open or close RF signal from a particular base station or site computer transceiver unit. If an unauthorized attempt being made to open the gate without base station signal, the vehicle CPU transceiver unit will transmit an RF signal containing information of that particular vehicle with a security violation code to a base station or monitoring station computer.
[0050] It is an objective of the present invention to utilize a GPS/modem or pager unit to communicate with a monitoring station or a site station, to be able to monitor vehicle location, its driver authentication and personnel (passengers, students) information, by connecting said vehicle GPS unit to a vehicle gate or door entryway installed RFID tag reader, which log in and out tagged cargo or personnel within said vehicle. It is another objective of the present invention to provide proper flow of product and personnel distribution, by comparing product and personnel tag data read by vehicle GPS RFID reader unit, with the destination data stored in vehicle GPS unit. If product or personnel being scanned by the vehicle RFID reader as they exiting the vehicle, and if the personnel or product RFID tag scanned information does not match the given product, personnel address stored within the GPS unit database, that of to the actual physical location of vehicle by longitude/latitude, the vehicle GPS unit will send an alarm signal to driver, within predetermine time if the driver does not return the wrong tagged product or personnel back into truck/trailer or bus, then the GPS modem unit will transmit an security violation to a monitoring station.
[0051] It is another objective of the present invention that provides an electronic dead bolt lock to lock said truck/trailer or bus door(s), which will activate by receiving a signal from a driver key fob unit, only when vehicle mount GPS unit arrives a given address that matches the address information entered in the GPS data logger (longitude/latitude) In a preferred embodiment of the invention, the vehicle uses a tamper sensing RF transceiver CPU, GPS cellular modem or 2-way pager with tamper sensing antenna. The units are equipped with pressure sensing tamper switch on its case; the tamper switch mount case side is being installed against the vehicle body or window. The vehicle Transceiver CPU or GPS/modem and the antenna unit is communicating with digital data with said vehicle Fuel Pump or starter relay circuitry, to operation the vehicles Fuel Pump or Starter. When an unauthorized attempt is being made to remove or disconnect the vehicle RF transceiver, GPS/modem or antenna, the tamper switch triggers the CPU or GPS/modem. The RF transceiver or GPS/modem processor sees sending (or sending intermittent) digital data to the vehicle Fuel pump or starter relay, thus slowing down the vehicle speed and immobilizing the vehicle or immobilizing the vehicle starter circuitry, and transmit a RF or cellular or pager “tamper” signal to a monitoring station, containing information about a particular vehicle unit with a “tamper” detection signal along with location information. Same process takes place when the vehicle RF Transceiver CPU and GPS/modem or antenna cable is being cut or disconnected by an unauthorized person or when units gets abused or damaged, becomes inoperative.
[0052] In the present invention in order to monitor the product and person with an unlimited distance monitoring capability for long period of time, each one of said RFID-RF transceiver Tag unit additionally contains a GPS/cell modem, pager, or a satellite communication unit, which is installed on the product (pallet) or person. The GPS/cellular modem or pager or satellite unit is being in power off mode in order not to use energy. When any of said product or person carrying departs without computer clearance from said site or vehicle. The site being equipped with RFID gate read unit and RF transceiver unit, when the tag passes through the gate reader, the tag gets energies from reader generated magnetic field, which will power up the RF transceiver, and the RF transceiver upon receiving security violation code will power on the GPS/modem unit. And both the GPS and RF transceiver will transmit an emergency stolen good signal. In addition if transceiver Tag read unit or goes out of communication range of said site computer or vehicle RF transceiver. The site computer or vehicle transceiver will initiate a security violation signal to said RFID RF transceiver tag which upon receipt of said signal power up said tag GPS/cellular modem or pager, which upon power up will transmit GPS based product(s) or person(s) location information along with said RFID Tag information to a monitoring station.
[0053] Additionally all said RF communication between said vehicles and said base station can utilized use of a mobile phone, 2-way pager, UHF/VHF, or satellite communication means.
[0054] Finally if the location of a particular product(s) or person(s) on a site (warehouse, factory, school) is desired. In the present invention plurality of or transponder read unit are installed at an assigned spots at a predetermine location at a site, if and when any one of said products or person carrying said RFID Tag unit comes close into communicating range (within 2 meters) said transponder read unit communicates with said RFID tag unit and transmits said RFID tag information to said site PC and said PC logs the data information and displays location of said product or person on its monitor. In a preferred embodiment of the present invention plurality of short rang (1-5 meter) low power RF proximity transmitters unit powered by a battery are installed at a assigned spot(s) at a predetermined location at a site, transmitting periodically (every 12 Seconds.) with a unique identification code. A product (pallet) or person carrying RFID-RF Transceiver Tag, when said product or person carrying said RFID Transceiver unit receive a RF signal from said site computer transceiver unit, said RFID Transceiver unit being within communication range of said proximity transmitter unit (within predetermined time of 12 sec.) will read said proximity transmitter unit ID code data and transmits a RF signal containing information for both said proximity unit and said product or person RFID Transceiver unit, and when said site computer transceiver unit receives said signal will indicate said product or said persons presence along with its location at a site.
[0055] Additionally each one of said RFID-RF transceiver unit could have a built in push button, able reading a particular spot proximity transmitter ID data by user pressing said button and RFID Transceiver upon reading said proximity transmitter ID, transmits a signal containing both proximity transmitter and RFID-RF transceiver data information to a site transceiver PC. Which will indicate the presence of a product or person with its location at a site.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0056] [0056]FIG. 1A. Illustrates a site station wherehouse equipped with Gate RFID reader, an RF transceiver connected to a computer with GPS map software.
[0057] [0057]FIG. 1B. Illustrates view of warehouse floor plane, equipped with plurality of proximity RFID transponder readers, proximity RF transmitters, proximity RFID and RF transmitters and pallets equipped with RFID tags, pallets with RFID transponder and RF transceiver, Pallets with RFID transponder and RF transceiver with GPS/cellular modem or 2 way pager. And a computer interface unit.
[0058] [0058]FIG. 1C. Illustrates a vehicle (Truck), equipped with gate RFID tad reader, a vehicle gate lock solenoid, vehicle RF transceiver unit, vehicle GPS antenna with GPS/cellular modem, and a driver RFID reader.
[0059] [0059]FIG. 1D. Illustrates a RFID transponder.
[0060] [0060]FIG. 1E. Illustrates a pallet with an RFID transponder tag.
[0061] [0061]FIG. 2A. Illustrates a Vehicle (Bus) Equipped with vehicle RFID tag reader, vehicle RF transceiver, and a GPS modem and a personnel (student)
[0062] [0062]FIG. 2B. Illustrates a house site with RF transceiver and a digital and voice auto-dialer.
[0063] [0063]FIG. 2C. Illustrates a site (School) equipped with RFID gate and door readers, and a site RF transceiver interface connected to a computer containing GPS map
[0064] [0064]FIG. 3A. Illustrates a tamper sensing wrist tag with built in RFID transponder and RF transceiver with optical nylon conductive strap and strap connector latch.
[0065] [0065]FIG. 3B. Illustrates tamper sensing cargo or personnel use GPS/modem with optical nylon conductive belt.
[0066] [0066]FIG. 3C. Illustrates strap inner view
[0067] [0067]FIG. 3D. Illustrates tamper sensing RFID-RF transceiver tag with mounting adhesive tape, side view.
[0068] [0068]FIG. 3E. Illustrates tamper-sensing pallet RFID-RF transceiver tag rapped with conductive strap.
[0069] [0069]FIG. 3F. Illustrates a tamper sensing RFID-RF transceiver mounted on the bottom of a pallet.
[0070] [0070]FIG. 3G. Illustrates bottom view of tamper sensing RFID-RF transceiver tag with pressure sensing taper switch surrounded by tamper resistive metal “O” ring.
[0071] [0071]FIG. 3H. Illustrates a bottom view of a temper sensing vehicle RF transceiver, RFID read unit and GPS/modem unit with temper sensing GPS, cellular antenna and digital data read immobilizer CPU.
[0072] [0072]FIG. 4 Block Diagram
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
[0073] The electronic vehicle and cargo tacking information system of the present invention is illustrated in FIG 1 B. Where a Site station warehouse 20 is equipped with RFID gate read antenna 24 with a site station RFID read CPU, which is connected to say site station computer 26 . A RFID tag 19 with a unique code mounted on a pallet 21 , said unique code is programmed in to said site station computer 26 . When a site station computer 26 operator registers an invoice or bill of lading enters the pallet content an RFID 21 tag ID number into the site computer 26 system. Along with vehicle RF transceiver number FIG. 1A, 36, which will represent vehicle 30 ID number, and the pallet 21 destination address with site computer number (picture not shown). When the pallet departs through the gate 23 of the site station 20 , the gate RFID reader will energies the pallet RFID tag 21 by means of magnetic field, and the pallet mount tag 21 transmits it's ID code data, and the gate RFID antenna 24 transmits said data through said station RFID reader 22 into site station computer 26 . Which will indicate the departure of said particular pallet 21 from its inventory system.
[0074] A Vehicle 30 is equipped with RFID gate read antenna 40 with a RFID read CPU 32 , which is connected to a vehicle RF transceiver CPU 36 . having a driver RFID read antenna 37 is connected to said vehicle RFID read CPU 32 . A driver 27 wearing a RFID wrist mount transponder or a tag with a unique ID code, enters the vehicle 30 , upon turning the ignition key on, said vehicle RFID tag read CPU 32 will read said driver RFID tag 24 , and sends the driver ID information data to the vehicle RF transceiver CPU 36 , which stores the driver authentication information in the RF transceiver CPU data base. And the vehicle RF transceiver CPU FIG. 3H starts sending digital data through vehicle harness. Said data is being pick up by the vehicle immobilazer CPU 128 , which upon receipt of data will energies the vehicle starter or fuel pump relay 129 , driver now could operate the vehicle 30 . In a preferred embodiment in order to operate the vehicle fuel pump, it necessary the vehicle RF transceiver CPU 36 to provide constant data flow, through said vehicle wires to said immobilizer CPU 128 , other wise the vehicle 30 immobilizer CPU will shut down the vehicle fuel pump relay 129 .
[0075] When the vehicle 30 arrives near said site station 20 , upon driver pressing vehicle RF transceiver 36 transmit, or by turning the vehicle in park position (which will activate transmit switch), the vehicle RF transceiver 36 will transmit an RF signal containing information to said vehicle 30 . Said site station RF transceiver 28 receives said signal through the site station RF antenna 25 , and dawn-load said vehicle 30 ID and driver 27 ID information in its computer data base 26 , and indicates the presence of said particular vehicle 30 at that particular site 20 , and transmit a RF signal through site station RF transceiver 28 into said vehicle RF transceiver 36 , so driver 27 by use of a remote key-fob, transmits a signals into the vehicle RF transceiver CPU 36 , to unlock vehicle gate lock solenoid 26 . The site station computer operator based on driver and vehicle information can prepare the particular vehicle and particular cargo bill of lading (invoice).
[0076] When the vehicle gate 41 is opened, the vehicle gate switch 33 sends a signal to the vehicle RFID read CPU 32 , which energies vehicle gate read antenna 40 with a magnetic field. When a particular pallet with RFID tag 21 is loaded in the truck 30 , the vehicle RFID gate reader antenna 40 upon interrogating the pallet tag 21 and loader tag 24 , sends the pallet tag ID 21 data and the driver tag ID 24 data to the vehicle RFID read CPU 32 , which upon process sends the information to the vehicle RF transceiver CPU 36 to transmit said vehicle ID 36 , driver ID 24 and pallet ID 21 information into said site station computer 26 , indicating which vehicle 30 , driver (Loader) 27 and which pallet 21 is located within the particular vehicle 30 , which matches the given bill of lading instruction into the site computer 26 .
[0077] When the vehicle 30 arrives at a given cargo destination site (picture not shown), after logging the vehicle 30 presence at the site computer, it receives gate open signal from said site computer interfaced RF transceiver, when the driver 27 moves the pallets out of vehicle 30 , the vehicle RFID read CPU 32 , reads driver and pallet ID and sends the data via vehicle RF transceiver 36 into said site computer. Since the system runs on intranet or internet data base, the destination site computer will accept the delivered pallets, as logged in data base, as part of incoming inventory. If a pallet 21 was not destined to said particular site station, the site computer will generate an alarm signal, indicating wrong package arrival at the site, in which the site computer sends an RF signal to vehicle RF transceiver unit 36 , which upon receipt of said signal notifies driver 27 to reload the pallet 21 back into truck inventory.
[0078] In a preferred embodiment of the invention, the new art provides tamper sensing RFID tags with a unique code, having connected to a built-in RF low power transceiver with the same unique code, powered by a battery. The tag FIG. 3D. FIG. 3G. and FIG. 3F. Is equipped with reset switch 84 and pressure sensing tamper switch, protected by a Metal “O” ring 94 . The tags 80 , 90 , are mounted on pallets 100 or product 81 , by mounting tamper sensing switch side against the pallet 100 or product 81 , with the use of screws 92 , adhesive tape 83 , 93 , or magnet 93 .
[0079] In another teaching of the new art, the tag is mounted on a pallet FIG. 3E. By use of tamper sensing conductive strap 111 strapped around the pallet 110 .
[0080] And the new art provides for driver (Loader) Personnel 27 a tamper sensing wrist mount watch style RFID transponder 24 , 50 with a unique code with a built-in RF transceiver 53 using the same code, equipped with a reset push button switch 58 FIG. 3A. attached to an optical nylon conductive strap 56 to mount the tag 50 with mounting connector 57 . When a pallet 100 , 110 or a personnel 27 carrying a tag 101 , 112 , 24 goes through a site station 20 gate 23 , the gate RFID read antenna 24 , generated magnetic field, which charges the RFID tags 101 , 112 , 24 built-in capacitor, the capacitor discharges the RFID tag 101 , 112 , 24 transmits its uplink data, and simultaneously powers on the tags built-in RF transceiver circuitry for a predetermine time (30 sec.). When the site station 20 computer receives said pallet or personnel transponder RFID data 101 , 112 , 24 , it creates a time slot in its computer database 26 for said particular tag units 101 , 112 , 24 , and starts communicating with an RF signal with said tag units transceiver at time interval, through said site station RF transceiver 28 , indicating the real time presence of said pallets 101 , 112 and personnel 24 at the particular site station location. In some application site station 20 my not be equipped with RFID gate 24 , 22 readers, therefore RFID-RF transceiver 80 , 50 entering a building cannot be power on by gate RFID reader 24 , 22 . In order to power up the tags RF transceiver 80 , 50 , the art provides additional, tag-reset switch 84 , 58 which is designed to manual power up tag's RF transceiver, by user pressing the reset button 84 , 58 for 5 second.
[0081] IF a pallet 100 , carrying a RFID-RF transceiver tag 101 , or a personnel wrist transceiver 50 located inside site station 20 , if said tag 101 , 50 built-in battery goes low, said tag 101 , 50 transmits at given time interval with an additional low battery code, to said site RF transceiver unit 28 , which upon receipt of said code, sends the received data into said side station computer 26 , which will notify the computer operator with a tag maintenance requirement notification.
[0082] IF a pallet, 100 carrying an tamper sensing RFID-RF transceiver 90 is removed from said pallet 100 , the pressure sensing tamper switch 91 signals to the tag 90 RF transceiver, and the transceiver will initiate a tamper signal to said site RF transceiver 28 , which upon receipt of signal will sent the tamper code data to said site computer interface 26 to notify operator of particular pallet tag tamper occurrence. The art teaches the same, when unauthorized removal of tag 112 , 50 is performed by detaching 57 or cutting the tag strap 56 , 111 without prior tag removal authorization
[0083] If a pallet 100 with a RFID-RF transceiver tag 101 , or a personnel carrying RFID-RF transceiver tag 24 , is removed or walked away from said site 20 (not through the site gate) without removal authorization code entry into said site station computer 26 , when the pallet 21 goes out of site station RF transceiver 28 communication range, the site station computer will generate a security violation signal containing information to said particular pallet 21 .
[0084] In a preferred embodiment of the invention said RFID-RF transceiver tag 90 mounted on a pallet 101 is additionally is equipped with a HI power 27 Mhz RF transmitter connected to said tag RF transceiver 90 . When an unauthorized cargo departs from site 20 , either through the site station gate 23 or gets removed out of the site station RF transceiver 28 communicating range. The site station RF transceiver 28 will issue an unique RF signal to said pallet tag 101 , which upon receipt will activate the built-in HI Power transmitter to transmit at time interval signal containing information relating to said pallet tag ID 101 with stolen code. Which helps security personnel to locate within 2 miles radius the stolen cargo by use of hand held monitor (picture not Shown).
[0085] If and when a cargo carrying an RFID-RF tag 101 or personnel tag 24 set by site computer 26 operator, to depart from the site station. The cargo carrying tag 101 and personnel tag 24 upon exit said site station gate, the gate RFID reader 24 , 22 reads the RFID tag data and sends the data to site station computer 26 , and the computer 26 sends an RF signal to said departing tag RF transceiver 101 , 24 to shut down it's RF transceiver power. IF the site station 20 is not equipped with gate RFID reader, when a cargo gets removed or personnel 27 becomes out of said site station 20 . And the tag(s) 101 , 24 goes beyond RF communicating range; the tag(s) 101 , 24 will not communicate at time interval (more then 10 minutes) with the site station computer 26 , the tag (s) 101 , 24 RF transceiver will power down automatically.
[0086] Additionally the site warehouse 10 is equipped with partitions with doorways or partitions sections equipped with RFID tag readers 12 , 13 , 14 herein described as zone “A” “B” “C”. When a pallet 17 or personnel 24 enters the partitioned warehouse site, the Tag RFID reader 19 reads the pallet 17 or personnel tag ID 24 and sends the information into said site warehouse computer 11 , indicating a particular tag or personnel entrance in said warehouse 10 partitions 12 .
[0087] In a preferred embodiment the pallet 16 or personnel RFID tag 24 having RF transceiver upon entering the warehouse partition 13 , after tag being read by said warehouse computer 11 . The computer 11 identifies the tag zone, in this case zone “B” and communicates through said site RF transceiver 15 with said pallet 16 or personnel RF transceiver tag on a real time bases indicating the presence of the particular pallet 16 or personnel 24 in a partition at a site.
[0088] The art provides a unique GPS based tag equipped with modem/pager and an RF transceiver. The tag 60 is equipped with a phone or pager antenna 66 and a GPS antenna 67 within the tag using a tamper sensing strap 61 for mounting the tag by raping the strap around a pallet or a personnel, said strap material being of conductive rubber and or a having a optical nylon string 62 , which is connected to said tag by a use of mounting pin post 63 . said tag having a conductive and or optical emitter collector points 64 , 65 Which the emitter and the collector communicates with an infrared signal through said strap or use for as a conductivity point to complete the conductive circuit. Lose of conductivity signal and or IR signal. causes tag to transmits an tamper signal. In another embodiment the pallet 18 is equipped with a GPS/cellular
[0089] Modem or a 2 way pager tag, being present in a site warehouse partition 14 , when a pallet 18 is moved out of said warehouse site 10 without warehouse computer 11 authorized access entry, and the pallet tag 18 goes through the gate reader 24 , 19 , the RFID tag powers on the built-in RF transceiver, the reader 24 , 19 upon reading the tag ID, sends the information into said site warehouse computer 11 which initiates a signal to said pallet tag 18 RF transceiver to activate said pallet's HI power transmitter and GPS/cellular modem. To help locate the cargo with both GPS and RF signals, by use of a site computer 11 or by hand held RF monitor (picture not shown). Wherever GPS signal is not available, such as under building, parking structures etc. the security personnel relies on locating the stolen cargo by hand held RF monitor.
[0090] In another embodiment of invention, if the warehouse site 10 is not equipped by a gate RFID reader unit 24 , 19 . When a pallet within the warehouse is to be removed from set site 10 , a computer 11 generates an RF command to said particular departing tag 18 which upon receipt of signal, will power down the pallet tag's 18 RF transceiver circuitry, and the pallet can be moved safely out of the site.
[0091] If pallet 18 is moved out of the warehouse site 10 , without going through gate reader 24 , 19 . The pallet 18 carrying RFID-RF transceiver with built-in GPS modem becomes out of site warehouse RF transceiver 15 communication range. The pallet tag 18 RF transceiver will power up the built-in HI power RF transmitter and the GPS/modem. Which transmits a HI power RF signal and a GPS location signal to helps security personnel to locate the cargo 18 both with GPS and RF monitoring devises.
[0092] The art can be used to monitoring personnel 27 by use of RF 24 and GPS combined 29 . Such example. A personnel 27 carrying a tamper proof GPS/modem, 2 way pager or satellite unit 29 with a built-in RF receiver, in which only the pager receiver is operative at a very low power stand by mode, and a temper detection wrist RFID-RF transceiver 24 communicating with a site RF transceiver unit 28 at time interval, indicating real time the presence of a personnel 27 at a site. When the personnel 27 departs from said site, the side RF transceiver 28 no longer receives RF signal from the personnel's wrist transmitter 24 , the site computer 26 initiates an RF signal through said site RF transceiver 28 into said personnel GPS/pager receiver 29 to power up the GPS unit and it's onboard receiver unit, which upon power up, start receiving RF signals at time interval from said personnel wrist transmitter 24 , and logs said received data in it's memory.
[0093] Simultaneously the personnel GPS unit 29 receiver receives satellite location data. The built-in pager unit upon receiving interrogations or at preset time or real time transmits signals containing information to said particular personnel 27 location information. When the personnel 27 returns back to the site 20 , personnel wrist tag 24 establishes communication with the site computer 26 , which upon receipt of said signal will transmit a signal to power down said GPS/pager unit 29 along with built-in RF receiver.
[0094] The invention relates same to when pallet 100 , 110 , or personnel 24 enter the vehicle 30 , the vehicle gate 41 is open the vehicle RFID tag reader 32 , energizes the antenna 40 . When the pallets 100 or personal 27 go through said vehicle gate reader 32 , 40 , the pallet RFID transponder powers on the tags RF transceiver, and the vehicle RFID tag reader 32 , 40 reads tag ID and sends the read ID data to vehicles RF transceiver CPU 36 , which upon receipt will create a communication slot in its data base, and sends short range RF signals to establish communication with the tags 100 , 110 ,, by logging on a real time bases the presence of certain pallets or personnel within the vehicle.
[0095] If and when a product carrying an RFID-RF transceiver tag 21 , is being unloaded from a truck 30 at a site 20 . The vehicle gate reader 40 , 32 reads the tag ID, and sends the read tag data to vehicle RF transceiver unit 36 , which upon receipt will transmits an RF signal containing information to said tag 21 data, into said site station transceiver 28 , which upon receipt of said signal, will download the information into site computer 26 data base. Indicating a particular cargo 21 drop off near the site 20 , and sends a confirmation RF signal back to said vehicle RF transceiver CPU 36 , which upon receipt of signal, transmits a RF signal to said unloaded tag 21 to power down the tags RF transceiver. If the wrong pallet 21 being unloaded by driver 27 at a site 20 , the site computer 26 upon receipt of said tag ID information from said vehicle transceiver CPU 36 , the site station computer 26 initiates a signal, into said vehicle transceiver unit 36 to ring an alarm signal to the driver 27 , warning the driver removal of wrong cargo from vehicle 30 at the site. If the driver 27 does not comply, the vehicle RF transceiver 36 will not initiate a power down RF signal to the wrong cargo tag 21 , the tag being equipped with an HI power transmitter, at predetermined time, the tag 21 start automatically transmitting at time interval a stolen cargo alarm signal, which helps authorities or security personnel to locate the stolen cargo by use of hand held RF monitor unit.
[0096] In a preferred embodiment the pallet tag 18 additionally is equipped with GPS/cellular modem or 2 way pager, during an unauthorized removal of pallet from said vehicle 30 , said pallet tag unit 18 upon passing the vehicle gate reader 32 , 40 will power on the tags GPS/Cellular modem, pager. The built-in GPS/modem receiver logs the satellite positioning signals in it's data base and transmits said pallet tag 18 ID information along with GPS location information. This will expedite to locate the stolen pallet by a monitoring station computer 26 equipped with GPS map.
[0097] In a more preferable embodiment of the invention the vehicle is equipped with a tamper sensing GPS and cellular antenna, 31 , 130 a tamper sensing GPS/Cellular modem or 2 way pager unit 38 , 120 which is connected the a vehicle RF tamper sensing RF transceiver unit 36 , 120 and the vehicle Gate RFID reader 40 , 32 . Additionally the GPS and the RF transceiver unit 120 is communicating through vehicle harness 126 by use of encryption data with vehicle immobilizer CPU 128 . The vehicle RF transceiver 36 also connected to the vehicle gate electronic solenoid deadbolt 34 , to open and close said vehicle gate by use of driver key fob.
[0098] A pallet 21 located at a site station waiting to be loaded on a vehicle 30 , the site station warehouse computer 26 operator, upon entry of said pallet 21 content, tag, and destination information into said site computer 26 , which upon send commend, will transmit the particular pallet tag 21 , product content information and destination information into said vehicle GPS unit CPU 38 , through a cellular modem or 2 way pager. The vehicle GPS CPU 38 logs said information in its database. When the vehicle 30 arrives the logged address destination (longitude/latitude) the vehicle GPS unit 38 gives a signal, to the vehicle RF transceiver unit 36 , which upon receipt of said signal will allow driver 27 key fob generated RF signal to open the gate lock solenoid 34 of said vehicle, at the given address. And the driver 27 precede prompt delivery of pallet. The delivery information can be polled via the cellular modem from any given site station computer network, intranet or Internet system. Since the vehicle RF transceiver 36 at time interval communicating with vehicle pallet tags, said information could be polled by computer operator at a site 26 , to help site station 20 be able monitor a mobile vehicle 30 and it's content at any given location, and be able to know estimated time of arrival of cargo, and monitor real time content of a vehicle.
[0099] On a none designated address location, if driver 27 decides to open vehicle gate solenoid lock 34 by use of given key fob, example “to steel the cargo”, the vehicle RF transceiver 36 will not respond to given signal to activate vehicle door solenoid 34 . First the vehicle RF transceiver 36 must receive vehicle GPS unit 38 signal, which is produced only if the vehicle physical location is at the given address location.
[0100] The GPS antenna 31 , and GPS/phone antenna 130 is equipped with a pressure sensing tamper switch 133 with a protective “O” ring 134 on the mounting side, the mounted side is against the vehicle inner or outer body or glass. Additionally the GPS antenna and modem antenna 31 , 130 , 131 , 132 has built-in processor 135 , producing encryption data, said data is transmitted through said antenna wire 136 into said GPS unit 120 . The GPS unit is equipped with a data processor 124 to process the incoming encryption codes. The GPS unit 120 is connected to vehicle harness 126 which is used to sends the encryption data through vehicle harness to a vehicle immobilizer CPU 128 , which is equipped with a data read processor 137 , which upon receipt of data will enable the vehicle starter or fuel pump 129 or vehicle/trailer brakes.
[0101] If the vehicle GPS/Cell antenna 130 , or GPS/modem 120 is being removed, the pressure sensing switch 121 is tripped, and if an attempt is made to disconnect the harness or cut the harness wires 126 , 136 to the GPS/modem or GPS antenna. The GPS antenna 31 , 130 and the GPS/modem 38 , 120 unit will no longer transmit encryption data flow into the vehicle immobilizer CPU 128 , the vehicle 30 becomes inoperative, such example; The vehicle starter will be disabled 129 , the fuel pump will be gradually shut off 129 , and vehicle (truck/trailer brakes will be gradually engaged.
[0102] The art has other application, such that to provide safety personnel (student) FIG. 2A. Transportation and tracking, buy use of vehicle mount RF transceiver 142 unit with a built-in counter counting electronically entered or exit personnel, which is connected into vehicle door mount RFID tag read unit 143 , 144 . The vehicle RF transceiver unit 142 communicates with house RF transceiver/autodiler units 171 , 172 , and communicate with a school RF transceiver units 166 . In addition the vehicle GPS/modem 141 contains information to personnel 146 ID tag 145 along with pick up or drop of address information. The GPS unit is connected into the vehicle mount door RFID tag read unit 143 , 144 , which will read RFID tag 145 worn by student, driver 147 , and communicate with vehicle RF transceiver 142 and GPS unit 141 .
[0103] Each student 146 wearing a wristwatch style RFID tag 145 or a badge in a house. A vehicle (bus) 140 sending RF time interval coded signal related to particular house unit's code, representing a rout. When a house transceiver unit 171 , 172 receives a particular bus 140 RF signal, the house transceiver unit 171 , 172 will produce a musical chem. indicating particular bus arrival, with assigned rout information. The student (s) 146 exit the house and enter the bus 140 . Upon entry, the bus gate reader 143 , 144 reads the individual tag ID and sends the information to vehicle RF transceiver 142 and GPS/modem unit 141 , upon receipt of personnel ID signal, the vehicle RF transceiver 142 transmits a RF signal containing information to said vehicle ID 140 , Driver ID 147 and student ID 146 , into said home RF transceiver unit 171 , 172 , which upon receipt of signal, will send the information through phone line 150 into school computer 164 , and autodials preprogrammed phone numbers and plays back prerecorded voice massage, to parent (s) or guardian (s) 153 office 151 phone 152 or mobile phones, indicating a particular student have departed from the house 170 . The vehicle GPS unit 141 upon receipt of said student RFID read signal will review the location address (Longitude/latitude). If picked up student ID matches of GPS unit pre stored address and student data, the picket up student, bus, driver and location information is send via a cellular, UHF/ or pager network into a school computer 164 , or store said pick-up information in it's data base, and download the data upon a polling requested from a monitoring site 164 . If the entered personnel ID does not match given bus GPS CPU unit 141 data, the GPS unit 141 signals to the driver 147 indicating person entering the vehicle is not assigned for the particular vehicle route.
[0104] The vehicle 140 upon arrival to school 160 , the student (s) will depart from the vehicle 140 , the vehicle door read unit 143 , 144 reads the departing student tag (s) ID numbers with counter indication, and each departing student ID will be checked out of the vehicle RF transceiver unit 142 , and download the departing student ID information via an RF 142 signal into school computer interface 166 , 164 , which indicates the presence of student dropped off at the particular school site 160 .
[0105] The vehicle GPS unit 141 will log in it's memory the departing students ID, time and location, for future polling references.
[0106] Since each one of said school (s) 160 are equipped with school gate 167 or classroom door 165 RFID reader 161 , 162 . When a student 146 enters the school gate 167 or classroom 165 , the Gate or door reader 161 , 162 will read student ID and log into school computer 164 school attendance of the student.
[0107] In a preferred embodiment of the invention each student wrist RFID tag 145 has a built-in RF transceiver, which upon entry of school gate 167 or particular classroom door 165 the wrist RF transceiver 145 will communicate with the school computer 164 at time interval to ascertain real time presence of student at a particular school.
[0108] When student depart from school 160 , the school Gate or classroom door reader (s) 161 , 162 , 163 reads the student RFID tag 145 , and the read data is transmitted to the school computer 164 indicating student departure from school, at a given time and date. If and when student enters the bus 140 , the bus door reader 144 will read student ID and sends said information into bus RF transceiver unit 142 , which upon receipt transmits an RF signal containing information to said Bus ID, driver ID, and student ID to said school computer 164 , which upon receipt will register the event. And the vehicle GPS/modem unit 141 logs such event for future polling needs by monitoring site or transmits said data.
[0109] When the bus is near by a student dropping address (Home) 170 , the bus RF transceiver 142 is transmitting its identification signal, when the home transceiver unit 171 , 172 picks-up the signal, the home transceiver 172 will sound a chime sound indicating bus arrival. Upon bus arrival at given home site 170 , the student 146 carrying tag departs from vehicle 140 , the door reader 144 , 143 reads the student wrist tag ID 145 , and sends it to vehicle RF transceiver unit 142 , which upon receipt transmits an RF signal containing information to said student ID, driver ID, and the bus ID to said particular site home 170 receiver unit 171 , 172 . The home transceiver unit 171 , 172 upon receipt of said signal, sends the information through phone line 150 into school computer 164 , and autodials into a pre-programmed phone numbers and plays back pre-recorded voice message to the answering party 153 answering the phone 152 , notifying the person (parent) 153 the safe arrival of student at home. The vehicle GPS units 141 compares the student ID 145 with a given address 170 in it's data logger memory, if given address 170 matches student ID, it logs the event in its memory or reports it to school computer via vehicle wireless modem. If the departing student ID 145 does not match the location address 170 , the vehicle GPS unit 141 will warn the driver 147 with an audiovisual or vibrating signal. The school computer 164 could be connected to an intranet or operate on the Internet. Additionally with the use of Internet, bus arrival or departure could be monitored in office, home computers, laptops and PDA by parents, student, school administrative and dispatch centers.
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A system providing Vehicle, Pallet, and personnel Tracking within buildings, vehicles such as, Trucks/Trailer, Buses, Trains, aircraft at a site or in a global network system. Using RFID transponder Gate readers in Building doorways, in Vehicles such as Tracks/Trailers gates or bus doors, to read Pallets, Packages, and Personnel equipped with RFID transponder and tamper proof RFID RF transceiver Tags. In a preferred embodiment of invention the RFID-RF transceivers containing GPS/GSM modem for locating of pallets or personnel with RF or GPS location system. Site Buildings and vehicles are equipped with compute interface unit, to communicate at time intervals with RFID-RF Tag transceiver units installed on pallets or personnel wristwatch, to indicate the presence of pallets or personnel at a site or in a vehicle. And Tamperproof RF, GPS/GSM or satellite modems installed on Vehicles, used to communicate with site station or to a monitoring station computer network (Server) with the collected data from said vehicle gate reader, for tracking and finding the location of a particular Vehicle, and It's cargo content or personnel information related to particular vehicle, at a remote or open site.
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CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
This application is a continuation application of U.S. Ser. No. 12/203,269, filed Sep. 3, 2008 now abandoned.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to knife opener which may be used as part of no-till or minimum-till farming practices primarily for placement in the ground of seed and/or fertilizer and other materials.
Important advantages have been found in soil preparation, and seed and fertilizer delivery in employing no-tilling or minimum tilling methods which cause minimum disturbance to the soil. This is particularly important in drier soil conditions where the soil is subject to moisture and topsoil loss if conventional tilling methods are used. It is usually desirable when employing no-till farming practices to disturb the soil surface as little as possible. The surface will be covered with the residue from previous crops, and the surface layer will contain old root structure. This plant material can serve to retain moisture below the surface and to assist in securing the soil against runoff and erosion.
Fertilizer is commonly used to improve crop yields. Broadcasting the fertilizer on the surface is a method that does not disturb the surface, but it can be inefficient as much of the fertilizer can be lost due to runoff surface water. As such, a number of soil bed preparation tools have been developed that are designed to place fertilizer directly in the soil. An example of such a device is a double shoot air drill which enables seed and fertilizer to be deposited as a knife, coulter or other device is towed through the soil.
Zero till or minimum till devices have been developed to deposit high concentrations of fertilizer in the furrows formed by the knife or other furrowing tool. If the seed is placed in close proximity to a high concentration of fertilizer, burning of the newly germinated plant can result. Thus, with higher fertilizer concentrations, it is generally desired to space the fertilizer from the seed, either laterally and/or vertically.
As noted above, one type of furrow opening tool is a knife. To achieve adequate separation either vertically or horizontally with a knife has required the knife to occupy a relatively large amount of space either in the soil or above the soil. In the case of the former, the knife opens a relatively large furrow thereby resulting in greater soil disturbance. In the case of the latter, the flow of residue around the knife can be impeded.
If the flow of residue is impeded that residue tends to collect around the knife and is dragged with the knife as the implement is towed. Not only can this residue collection impair operation of the implement, it also removes the desired moisture retaining cover that may be provided by the residue.
Another type of furrowing device is a coulter or disk opener. While disk openers have the ability to cut through most residue, some crop residue, such as straw, may not cut easily, and as a result may be pushed into the furrow, a result commonly called hair-pinning. This can displace seeds, as well as drying out the seed bed. Additionally, effective no-till disc openers can be quite costly.
Thus, there remains a need for a knife opener that cuts a furrow with reduced soil disturbance yet provides the desired spacing for higher concentrations of fertilizer. There is also a need for such a knife opener which provides tilling and/or seeding, fertilizing, or weed clearing in a single pass without significant trash accumulation.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The invention provides a ground opening knife for use in no-till or minimum-till farming operations primarily in conjunction with seed and/or fertilizer placement adjacent a soil cut-line generally in the direction of travel. The knife opener has a pair of cutting members or blades flared in opposite directions from one another relative to a vertical axis of the knife. In addition to be angled away from the main body of the opener, one of the cutting members is angled forward of the main body. Conversely, the other cutting member is angled rearward of the main body. These forward and rearward cutting members are designed to cut respective furrows into which seed and/or fertilizer may be deposited. As such, in one embodiment, respective product dispensing tubes are mounted to the opener and are designed to deposit particulate matter, such as seed and fertilizer, in the furrow as the cutting members cut through the soil.
The invention also provides a no-till or minimum-till farm implement primarily for use in conjunction with cultivation or materials placement adjacent a plurality of soil cut-lines generally parallel and in the direction of travel comprising a support frame structure, a plurality of ground opening knives attached to the support structure spaced from each other in a direction transverse to the direction of travel of the implement and each adapted to cut the soil along adjacent cut-lines. Each knife has a pair of flared cutting members.
Other objects, features, and advantages of the invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art from the following detailed description and accompanying drawings. It should be understood, however, that the detailed description and specific examples, while indicating preferred embodiments of the present invention, are given by way of illustration and not of limitation. Many changes and modifications may be made within the scope of the present invention without departing from the spirit thereof, and the invention includes all such modifications.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE FIGURES
Preferred exemplary embodiments of the invention are illustrated in the accompanying drawings in which like reference numerals represent like parts throughout.
In the drawings:
FIG. 1 is a side elevation view of an agricultural implement incorporating knife openers according to one embodiment of the present invention;
FIG. 2 is an isometric view of a knife opener for use with the implement shown in FIG. 1 according to one embodiment of the present invention;
FIG. 3 is a front elevation view of the knife opener shown in FIG. 2 ; and
FIG. 4 is a side elevation view of the knife opener shown in FIG. 2 .
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
FIG. 1 shows an air hoe drill 10 designed to form multiple furrows in a surface, e.g., farm field, and deposit seed and/or fertilizer in the furrows. The air hoe drill 10 is representative of one type of agricultural implement with which the present invention may be used. Generally, the drill 10 includes a frame 12 coupled in a known manner to a tow bar 14 that facilitates attachment of the frame 14 to a tractor (not shown) or other towing vehicle. The frame 12 is supported above the planting surface S by a series of forward wheels 16 and rear packing wheels 18 . As known in the art, the packing wheels 18 not only support the frame 12 but also serve to pack the furrows after seed and/or fertilizer has been deposited. In this regard, the packing wheels 18 are aligned with a series of knife openers 20 that are mounted in a known manner to the frame 12 . The depth of the knife openers 20 can be set and adjusted by raising and lowering the frame 12 relative to the wheels 16 , 18 as known in the art. In one representative embodiment, the knife openers 20 are equally spaced from one another in a direction transverse to the path of travel of the drill 10 . The drill 10 further includes an air cart 22 that includes a tank 24 for carrying seed and/or fertilizer. The particulate is fed from the tank 24 to the furrows using seed tubes 26 that are associated with the knife openers. One skilled in the art will appreciate that the air hoe drill shown in FIG. 1 is merely representative of one type of agricultural implement that can incorporate the present invention. For example, the invention may also be applicable with a precision air hoe drill where the frame is supported by a set of forward wheels and a set of rearward wheels, and having a series of trailing arms and/or parallel links to which knife openers such as those described herein may be substantially attached together with packer wheels.
Referring now to FIG. 2 , a representative knife opener 20 according to the present invention is shown. While a single knife opener 20 will be described, it is appreciated that the other knife openers of the drill 10 shown in FIG. 1 are similarly constructed. The knife opener 20 includes a shank 26 which may be mounted to the frame 12 in a known fashion. The shank 26 preferably has a pair of holes 28 adapted to receive fasteners (not shown), e.g., mounting bolts, for attaching the knife opener 20 to the frame 12 .
Knife opener 20 includes a forward biased blade 30 formed to penetrate the soil along a soil-cut line oriented in the direction of travel. Knife opener 20 further includes a rearward biased blade 32 that is formed to penetrate the soil along a separate soil-cut line oriented in the direction of travel. Each of the blades 30 , 32 is flared away from the shank 26 and, as such, each blade penetrates the soil along respective, but generally parallel soil-cut lines. In this regard, the soil-cut lines are paired with one another but spaced to accommodate a desired spacing between fertilizer and seed.
Adjacent the respective backsides of blades 30 , 32 are seed tube receivers 34 , 36 , respectively. Receiver 34 has an inlet 38 adapted to receive a seed tube or hose (not shown) that is fluidly linked with the tank 24 of the air seeder 22 . The receiver 34 further has an outlet 40 or mouth that is disposed generally behind blade 30 . Particulate matter is fed, generally by forced air, from the tank through the seed tubes to the outlet 40 whereupon the matter is deposited in the furrow created by blade 30 . Similarly, receiver 36 has an inlet 42 adapted to receive a seed tube or hose (not shown) that is fluidly linked with the tank 24 of the air seeder 22 . The receiver 36 has an outlet 44 or mouth that is disposed generally behind blade 32 . Particulate matter is fed, generally by forced air, from the tank through the seed tube to the outlet 44 whereupon the matter is deposited in the furrow created by blade 32 . The receivers 32 and 36 are placed such that the respective outlets 40 and 44 are generally in plane with the lowermost surfaces of blades 30 and 32 , respectively. Placement of the receivers behind the blades also serves to protect the receivers, and the seed tubes received therein, from damage during the seeding or fertilizing process.
As described above, blades 30 and 32 are flared relative to shank 26 , as further illustrated in FIG. 3 . In one representative embodiment, the shank 26 has an upper portion 26 a and a lower portion 26 b that are joined together by an angled portion 26 c . The lower portion 26 b generally extends about a vertical axis 46 and the blades 30 , 32 extend downwardly from the lower portion 26 b and angled relative to the vertical axis 46 . As shown in FIG. 4 , the profile of the lower portion 26 b has an inwardly angled portion 26 b ′ and an outwardly angled portion 26 b ″; however, it is understood that the invention is not so limited. For example, in one alternate embodiment the lower portion 26 b is faceted such that the leading edge of lower portion 26 b is curved.
In one preferred embodiment, the inside edge 48 of blade 30 is angled relative to the vertical axis 46 at angle of approximately 25 degrees; but it is understood that the blade 30 could be formed to extend at other angles. However, it is generally preferred that the angle α be between approximately 15 degrees and approximately 60 degrees. Blade 32 is angled relative the vertical axis, as defined by its inner edge 50 , at a preferred angle α of 30 degrees but it is understood that the blade 32 could be formed to be angled at other angles. However, it is generally preferred that the angle β be between approximately 15 degrees and approximately 60 degrees
Referring now to FIG. 4 , in addition to its flared orientation, shanks 30 and 32 are also biased in a forward direction and a rearward direction, respectively. More particularly, the backside of the shank generally defines a vertical axis 50 and the angle γ defined between the vertical axis 50 and the leading edge 52 of the blade 30 is preferably approximately 35 degrees, but other angular orientations are possible. Preferably, the angle γ is between approximately 15 degrees and approximately 60 degrees. As illustrated in FIG. 4 , the leading edge 52 of blade 30 has a tip portion 54 and the angle γ is measured between the tip portion 54 and the vertical axis 50 .
As illustrated in FIG. 4 , preferably the cutting edge 52 of blade 30 is significantly in advance of the lower portion 26 b of the shank 26 . Deeper soil is cut and lifted in advance of cutting the surface soil allowing the surface to be cut more easily and without undue lateral disruption. In addition, vertical motion is limited. Moreover, the blade 30 cuts through the surface and trash layers without accumulating trash on the shank 26 .
The rearward extending blade 32 also has a leading edge 56 and the leading edge 56 extends along an imaginary axis 58 that is angled relative to the vertical axis 50 at an angle δ. In one preferred embodiment, the angle δ is approximately 60 degrees; however, other angles are possible. It is generally preferred however that the angle δ fall between approximately 15 degrees and approximately 75 degrees.
As further illustrated in FIGS. 3-4 , in a preferred embodiment, the bottom edge 60 of blade 30 sits lower than the bottom edge 62 of blade 32 . Thus, blade 30 cuts a furrow that is deeper than the furrow cut by blade 32 . This allows a stratification in the vertical plane of seed and fertilizer in the paired furrows. It is appreciated however that the blades 30 , 32 could be oriented so that the bottom edges 60 , 62 are in the same plane and thus cut furrows of substantially the same depth.
In one representative embodiment, the width of the furrow cut by blade 30 is the same as that cut by blade 32 , but it is contemplated that the blades 30 , 32 could be sized such that different sized furrows are cut.
Referring again to FIG. 4 , not only are the blades 30 and 32 flared with respect to vertical axis 46 and angled with respect to vertical axis 50 , the blades also have respective pitch angles or “rake angles”. In a preferred embodiment, blade 30 has a rake angle ε between approximately 0 degrees and approximately 15 degrees, and preferably 2 degrees. Similarly, blade 32 has a rake angle θ between approximately 0 degrees and approximately 15 degrees, and preferably 2 degrees.
The flared blades 30 , 32 are designed such that each blade temporarily lifts a flap of soil then the flaps are lowered gently back after the knife opener is passed. Seed and/or fertilizer is deposited and is preferably covered as the flap settles back. As a result, the layers of the soil are preserved, during seeding and fertilizing. Thus, it is possible to plant seed or lay fertilizer without disturbing the stratification of the soil. It may be noted that the press wheels 18 may press the flaps back down, and assist in the maintenance of the stratification.
It is further understood that the invention is not limited to the exact shapes, sizes and orientations shown and described herein. For example, the blades may be shaped to have a rounded or blunted leading tip rather than the pointed tip shown in the figures. Similarly, the leading edge of the shank may be rounded, planar, or other geometrical shape. In addition, it is contemplated that one or more known or to be developed manufacturing techniques may be used to construct the soil preparation tool shown and described herein. For example, the blades could be welded to the shank or the blades and shank could be cast as a single unitary structure. It is also recognized that the individual components of the knife openers described herein may be coupled in a known manner whereby the individual components can be removed and/or replaced as desired.
Maintenance of soil stratification is important in currently-favored minimum-till farming regimes because moisture in the layers a few centimeters down is not dissipated, weed seeds on the surface remain on the surface and do not germinate, and stalks and vegetation at the surface remain intact providing cover and moisture retention.
Various alternatives and embodiments are contemplated as being within the scope of the following claims particularly pointing out and distinctly claiming the subject matter regarded as the invention.
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A knife opener includes a pair of flared blades designed to cut spaced, but paired furrows. The knife opener is particularly well-suited for use in no-till or minimum-till agricultural operations primarily in conjunction with seed and/or fertilizer placement adjacent a soil cut-line generally in the direction of travel. In addition to being angled away from the main body of the knife, one of the blades is angled forward and the other blade is angled rearward. Seed and/or fertilizer dispensing receivers may be associated with each of the blades.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The invention is directed to a circuit arrangement for generating synchronization signals in a transmission of data from a transmission unit to a reception unit, whereby the data are transmitted by binarily coded data signals that are sampled by reception clocks for the recovery of the transmitted data and whereby the reception clocks are synchronized phase-wise by synchronization signals allocated to the data signals upon employment of a counter that is respectively counted from an initial value up to a final value by clock pulses whose repetition rate is significantly higher than the repetition rates of the data signals.
It is notoriously known to transmit data with binary data signals from a transmission unit to a reception unit without accompanying clock pulses. In such a transmission, a clock control is provided in the reception unit, this clock control generating reception clocks from the received data signals and supplying them to a sampling unit. The reception clocks therein sample the data signals and recover the transmitted data from the data signals. To this end, the data signals should be respectively sampled in their middle insofar as possible.
Such a reception unit of the prior art is shown in FIG. 1 in the form of a block circuit diagram and its functioning shall be explained in greater detail together with the time diagrams shown in FIG. 2, the time t being shown therein in abscissa direction and the momentary values of signals being shown therein in ordinate direction.
Given the reception unit shown as a block circuit diagram in FIG. 1, the binarily coded data signals D are supplied, first, to a pulse generator IG and, second, to the sampling unit AB that recovers the transmitted data from the data signals D upon employment of reception clock ET and makes them available for a further processing as received data ED. The reception clock ET is generated in a clock control TS. For synchronizing the reception clock ET with the data signals D, the pulse generator IG generates synchronization signals SY. These synchronization signals SY are adjacent at the clock control TS and the latter sets the phase relation of the reception clock ET such that the reception clock ET always samples the data signals D in its middles insofar as possible.
The data signals D shown in FIG. 2 are undistorted data signals, i.e. they change their binary values at whole multiples of prescribed time intervals. At points in time at the trailing edges of the data signals D that respectively correspond to one another, the pulse generator IG generates the synchronization signals SY with which the phase relation of the reception clock ET generated in the clock control TS is set such that the data signals D are sampled in its middles at times t1 through t5 by the leading edges of the reception clock ET in order to recover the received data ED.
The data signals can be subject to distortions in the transmission of the data, for example via a radio link affected with interference. When the reception clocks are derived from these data signals, the data signals cannot be reliably sampled since the reception clocks are only synchronized by the edges of the data signals.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is therefore the object of the invention to specify a circuit arrangement for generating synchronization signals, the data signals also being sampled with great reliability given the employment thereof even when they are subject to distortions.
In a circuit arrangement of the species initially cited, this object is inventively achieved by the circuit arrangement wherein: the counter can be respectively counted from a constant initial value up to a constant final value; a synchronization unit is provided at which the data signals are received generating a load signal given every change of the binary value of the data signals from a first binary value to a second binary value, the load signal setting the counter to its initial value and generating switch-over signals at every change of the binary values of the data signals; the counter is preceded by a switch unit at which the switch-over signals are received, said switch unit always through-connecting first clock pulses having a higher repetition rate to the counter when a data signal has the first binary value and always through-connecting second clock pulses having a lower repetition rate to the counter whenever a data signal has the second binary value; and an output unit is provided that always outputs a synchronization signal when the counter has reached its final value.
A particular feature of the invention is comprised therein that the distortions of the data signals are taken into consideration in the generation of the synchronization signals.
The invention makes it possible to also reliably sample data signals having distortions of up to 50% of their pulse duration; the circuit arrangement nonetheless requires only little outlay and can be manufactured as an integrated circuit.
Advantageous developments of the invention include the following. The switch unit inhibits the counter after the appearance of every synchronization signal. The repetition rate of the first clock pulses is twice as high as the repetition rate of the second clock pulses. The synchronization unit generates an enable signal and outputs it to the output unit and only enables the output of the synchronization signals there when the data signal has the first binary value. An enable unit is provided that outputs an enable signal to the synchronization unit when a prescribed counter reading of the counter that is lower than the final value is reached, the enable signal enabling the generation of a synchronization signal. The enable unit contains a flip-flop that is set by a counter signal allocated to the prescribed counter reading and is reset by the load signal and at whose inverting output the enable signal is output. An inhibit unit is provided that outputs an inhibit signal to the synchronization unit when the counter transgresses a prescribed counter reading, the plurality of the data signals being inverted at synchronization unit with the inhibit signal and an inhibit signal being generated with which the clock pulses are inhibited in the switch unit. The synchronization unit contains an exclusive-OR element having one input that receives the data signals and another input that receives an output signal of a flip-flop, this flip-flop being switched into a respectively opposite position by the inhibit signal. The synchronization unit contains a flip-flop with which the data signals can be synchronized with the clock pulses. The counter can be respectively counted down from the prescribed initial value to the prescribed final value. An output signal of the counter supplied to the output unit is allocated to an overflow signal of the counter.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The features of the present invention which are believed to be novel, are set forth with particularity in the appended claims. The invention, together with further objects and advantages, may best be understood by reference to the following description taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, in the several Figures in which like reference numerals identify like elements, and in which:
FIG. 1 is a block circuit diagram of a reception unit for transmitted data signals;
FIG. 2 depicts time diagrams of signals given the reception of undistorted data signals;
FIG. 3 is a block circuit diagram of a circuit arrangement of the invention;
FIG. 4 depicts time diagrams of signals given a reception of distorted data signals;
FIG. 5 is a circuit diagram of a circuit arrangement of the invention; and
FIG. 6 depicts time diagrams of signals at various points of the circuit arrangement.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
Given the circuit arrangement shown in FIG. 3 that can be employed as a pulse generator IG in accord with FIG. 1, a clock generator TG generates clock pulses T1 and T2. The clock pulses T2 have half the repetition rate of the clock pulses T1 and are generated from the latter by frequency division, for example with a flip-flop. The clock pulses T1 and T2 are supplied to the various components of the circuit arrangement, whereby only the delivery thereof to a switch unit SS is shown. The repetition rate of the clock pulses T1, for example, is equal to 128 times the nominal repetition rate of the data signals D.
Further details of the circuit arrangement shall be set forth in greater detail below in conjunction with the time diagrams shown in FIG. 4, wherein the time t is shown in abscissa direction and the momentary values of signals as well as counter readings ZS of a counter Z are analogously shown in ordinate direction.
The data signals D pend at a synchronization unit SYS wherein they are synchronized with the clock pulses T1. When a data signal D assumes the binary value 1, the synchronization unit SYS generates a load pulse L that sets the counter Z to an initial value AN, for example 64, with initial value signals ANS and resets an enable unit FR and also cancels an inhibit signal S1 for the switch unit SS via the synchronization unit SYS. The synchronization unit SYS also generates a switch-over signal D3 for the data pulses T1 and T2, a data signal that through-connects the clock pulses T2 via the switch unit SS to the counter Z as clock pulses T3. The clock pulses T3 drive the counter Z and deincrement it down to a final value EN, for example zero. As soon as it reaches a counter reading 32 that corresponds to half the initial value AN, it outputs a signal Z1 that sets the enable unit FR and initiates it to generate an enable signal FRI since the data signal D then comprises a pulse duration of at least 50% of the rated duration in the undistorted case. Otherwise, the inhibit signal S1 would immediately inhibit the output of the clock pulses T3 and the counting would thus be terminated.
When the data signals D are undistorted, the corresponding data signal D is sampled precisely in its middle at time t1 by the reception clock ET and the counter Z reaches the final value EN having the value zero exactly when the data signal D changes its binary value from 1 to 0. In this case, it outputs a final value signal ES to an output unit AS. With the change of the binary value, the synchronization unit SYS also outputs an enable signal FR2 to the output unit AS and the latter generates a synchronization signal SY that serves the purpose of setting the phase relation of the reception clock ET. Further, the synchronization signal SY also results in the generation of the inhibit signal S1 with which the switch unit SS is inhibited and with which the counting is terminated. At time t2, the data signal D is again sampled in its middle by a reception clock ET. After the next change in the binary value of the data signal D, a similar procedure then repeats and the data signal D is again sampled at time t3.
When the data signal D is distorted and already changes its binary value from 1 to 0 at time t4 before the counter Z has reached its final value EN, the synchronization unit SYS forwards the data signal D4 to the switch unit SS as switch-over signal and this switch unit SS now through-connects the clock pulses T1 to the counter Z with the higher repetition rate, so that this reaches its final value En faster and the synchronization signal SY is output correspondingly earlier at time t5. The phase relation of the reception clock ET is thus again set, so that the corresponding data signal D is sampled closer toward its middle at time t6. Events similar to those between times t2 and t5 then repeat between times t6 and t9 and the corresponding data signal D is again sampled closer to its middle at time t7 than would be the case without the switching of the clock pulses T1 and T2.
When a data signal D lasts longer than the rated duration in the undistorted case, the counter Z generates a counting signal. This counting signal Z2 is adjacent at an inhibit unit SP that then generates an inhibit signal ST with which the switch unit SS is likewise inhibited by the inhibit signal S1 via the synchronization unit SY. The synchronization unit SYS is also inhibited and the polarity of the data signals D is inverted since these are not allowed to have any rated duration that is greater than 103%. Events corresponding to those given the other changes then repeat given the next change of the binary value of the data signal D.
Instead of being counted down, the counter Z can also be counted up. In this case, for example, the initial value signal ANS always sets it to the initial value AN of zero and the clock pulses T3 then increment it to a final value EN of 64.
In the illustration of FIG. 4, the data signals D are shortened by up to 50% due to distortions. The corresponding, undistorted data signals D are shown in broken lines. As a consequence of the distorted data signals D, the synchronization signals SY are not always generated at the edges thereof but by the counter Z that is respectively counted from the prescribed initial value AN to the prescribed final value EN. The synchronization signal SY with which the reception clock ET is synchronized is generated every time the final value EN is reached. At the end of every data signal D having trailing edges, a switch is undertaken from the clock pulses T2 having low repetition rate to the clock pulses T1 having high repetition rate, so that the final value EN is reached faster and the reception clock ET can be synchronized leading. At time t4 and t8, a switch is respectively undertaken to the clock pulses T1 having the higher repetition rate and the leading synchronization signals SY are generated at times t5 and t9.
The circuit diagram shown in FIG. 5 for the circuit arrangement shall be set forth in greater detail below together with the time diagrams shown in FIG. 6, wherein the time t is shown in abscissa direction and the momentary values of signals as well as the counter readings ZS of the counter Z are analogously shown in ordinate direction.
A clock generator TG is provided for the circuit diagram shown in FIG. 5 of the circuit arrangement, this clock generator TG generating clock pulses T1, T1 and T2, whereby the clock pulses T1 have twice the repetition rate of the clock pulses T2 and the clock pulses T1 correspond to the inverted clock pulses T1. The repetition rate of the clock pulses T1, for example, is equal to 128 times the repetition rate of the undistorted data signals D.
At the beginning, the circuit arrangement is reset by a reset signal R that is adjacent at the components in the illustrated way and resets flip-flops F1 through F3, F8 and F9. The data signals D are adjacent at an input of an exclusive-OR element A given the employment whereof the polarity of the data signals D can be inverted as warranted. The exclusive-OR element A outputs the data signal D1 at its output, this data signal D1 being adjacent at the clock input of the flip-flop F1 at whose data input the binary value 1 is adjacent. When the binary value of the data signal D changes, for example, from 0 to 1 at time t1, the binary value of the data signal D1 at the output of the exclusive-OR element A likewise changes from 0 to 1 and the flip-flop F1 is set, given the condition that the flip-flop F9 is reset. The output of the flip-flop F1 is connected to the data input of the flip-flop F2 at whose clock input the clock pulses T1 are adjacent and that, together with the flip-flop F3, serves the purpose of synchronization of the data signals D or, respectively, D1 with the clock pulses T1 and T1. The flip-flop F2 is set with the next clock pulses T1.
The non-inverting output of the flip-flop F2 is connected to an input of an NOR element N2, to the data input of the flip-flop F3, to the reset input of a flip-flop F4 and to a first input of an NAND element N1 whose second input is connected to the inverting output of the flip-flop F3. Since the flip-flop F3 is reset, the NAND element N1 outputs the load pulse L having the binary value 0 that, due to the initial value signals ANS having the binary values 1000000, loads the value 64 into the counter Z and resets a flip-flop F5 via an inverter I. The enable signal FR1 at the inverting output of the flip-flop F5 enables an AND element U2.
The inverting output of the flip-flop F2 is connected to the data input of the flip-flop F4 at whose clock input the clock pulses T1 are adjacent. The flip-flop F4 has already been reset, so that no change in the status of the flip-flop F4 ensues with the next clock pulse T1.
The clock pulses T1 are adjacent at the clock input of the flip-flop F3 and this flip-flop F3 is also set with the next clock pulse T1. The load pulse L thus again assumes the binary value 1 and it sets a further flip-flop F6 that enables two NAND elements N3 and N4 with an inhibit signal S1. These NAND elements N3 and N4 are respectively connected to an output of the flip-flop F3 and the data signals D3 and D4, on the one hand, are adjacent thereat as switch-over signals and, second, the clock pulses T1 or, respectively, T2 are also adjacent thereat. Since the flip-flop F3 is set, inverted clock pulses T2 are output via the NAND element N3 and are supplied to the counter Z as clock pulses T3 via an AND element U1. The counter Z thus begins to count down from its initial value 64 to its final value.
As soon as the counter Z has reached its counter reading 32 at time t2, it outputs a corresponding counter signal Z1 that is adjacent at the data input of the flip-flop F5 and sets it. The enable signal FR1 at the inverting output of this flip-flop F5 now inhibits the AND element U2. The flip-flop F5 essentially forms the enable unit FR and it only enables the circuit arrangement when the data are respectively longer than 50% of their rated duration. Otherwise, the AND element U2 would generate a reset signal that inhibits the switch unit SS.
At time t3, the data signal D again assumes the binary value 0 and the data signal D1 thus also assumes the binary value 0. The flip-flop F1 is reset via an NOR element N5 at whose first input the data signal D1 is adjacent and whose second input is connected to the inverting output of the flip-flop F1 and is also reset via an OR element O1. The flip-flop F2 is also reset with the next clock pulse T1. In a corresponding way, the next clock pulse T1 resets the flip-flop F3. The next clock pulse T1 sets the flip-flop F4 and this in turn holds the flip-flop F5 in the set condition on the basis of a set signal SE.
The NAND element N3 is inhibited and the NAND element N4 is enabled with the resetting of the flip-flop F3. Due to the data signal D4, this now through-connects the clock pulses T1 having twice the frequency to the counter Z, so that this reaches its final value 0 faster.
As soon as the counter Z has reached its final value 0, it outputs an overflow signal having the binary value 0 as final value signal ES at its output at time t4, this overflow signal setting a flip-flop F7 via the NOR element N2. The flip-flop F7 outputs the synchronization SY at its output.
Via an OR element O2, the synchronization signal SY resets the flip-flop F6 that in turn inhibits the NAND elements N3 and N4 with the inhibit signal S1 and prevents a further counting of the counter Z. The flip-flop F7 is again reset with the next clock pulse T2 and the synchronization signal SY is thus ended in turn. The synchronization signal SY resets the phase of the reception clock ET and the data signal D is again sampled at time t5. An event similar to that following time t1 repeats after time t6. If the binary value of the data signal D changes too late and the counter Z has previously reached its final value and outputs the final value ES, the NOR element N2 does not output a setting signal to the flip-flop F7 since the flip-flop F2 is set and the NOR element N2 is consequently inhibited.
In case the counter Z has reached a counter reading that is allocated to a distortion of the data signal D by more than 100% before the change of the binary value of the data signal D from 1 to 0, it outputs a counter signal Z2 via an AND element U3 to a flip-flop F8 that sets the latter and outputs an inhibit signal S2 at its output. This inhibit signal S2 likewise resets the flip-flop F6 and prevents the output of further clock pulses T1 or T2 to the counter Z. It also resets the flip-flop F1 and sets a flip-flop F9 whose output is connected to the exclusive OR element A. The exclusive OR element A now inverts the data signal D and an event similar to that between times t1 and t2 repeats with the next change of the binary value of the data signal D at time t6.
The invention is not limited to the particular details of the apparatus depicted and other modifications and applications are contemplated. Certain other changes may be made in the above described apparatus without departing from the true spirit and scope of the invention herein involved. It is intended, therefore, that the subject matter in the above depiction shall be interpreted as illustrative and not in a limiting sense.
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In a transmission of data upon employment of binarily coded data signals (D), reception clocks (ET) with which the data signals (D) are sampled in their middles are generated for the recovery of the transmitted data. The reception clocks (ET) are thereby synchronized phase-wise by the synchronization signals (SY) generated from the data signals (D). In order to also be able to sample the data signals (D) in their middles insofar as possible given distortions of the data signals (D) up to 50%, the synchronization signals (SY) are inventively generated taking the respective distortion into consideration. To this end, a counter (Z) is provided that is respectively counted from an initial value up to a final value by high-frequency clock pulses (T3). Given changes of the binary value of the data signals (D), a synchronization unit (SYS) sets the counter (Z) to its initial value. The counter (Z) is preceded by a switch unit (SS) that always through-connects clock pulses (T1) having a higher repetition rate whenever the counter (Z) has not yet reached its final value at the end of a data signal (D). An output unit (AS) always outputs a synchronization signal (SY) when the counter (Z) reaches its final value. The invention can be particularly employed in a transmission of data wherein the reception clocks allocated to the data signals are generated at the receiver side.
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FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to client-server systems generally, and in particular to client process termination detection by the service provider in a client-server system.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
In client-server systems, client processes are typically separate from the service provider, and require inter-process communication with the service provider. Once initiated, client processes typically occupy other system resources in addition to communication resources. For example, in a client-server system wherein the service provider is a Database Management System (DBMS), each client process occupies resources (eg, processes, threads, memory, locks on database data, etc.) in the DBMS. The cumulative resources occupied by clients can be significant, especially in systems which support hundreds, or even thousands of client application processes. It is therefore important for the service provider to deallocate these resources promptly after a client process terminates. Accordingly, client processes are usually designed to notify the service provider upon termination.
In situations where a client process terminates abnormally (for example, termination of the client process by the operating system due to an addressing violation), the service provider is not normally notified that the client has terminated. The client process can no longer notify the service provider because the client process has been terminated. Furthermore, although the operating system is often aware of the termination, since usually the operating system is responsible for the termination, the operating system does not normally notify the service provider that the client process has terminated. The service provider, therefore, must be able to detect the abnormal termination of a client process in order to deallocate the system resources previously allocated to the terminated client. The mechanism for detecting abnormal client termination depends on the inter-process communication mechanism utilized by the system.
In some systems, this communication is facilitated by means of a communication protocol (eg., TCPIP, SNA, NETBIOS). Typically in systems using one of these communication protocols, a polling mechanism is used by the service provider to verify the continued existence of each client at regular intervals. There are two primary disadvantages associated with such polling mechanisms. First, performance of the system is affected because CPU time is required to conduct the polling. Furthermore, such CPU time is used even if no client process abnormally terminates. Second, resources allocated to a terminated client process are not deallocated promptly after termination, but remain allocated until that client is next polled.
Another mechanism for enabling communication between client and server processes involves the utilization of shared memory. In such a system, the client process and the server process communicate by reading and writing to shared memory segments accessible by both. When shared memory is used, operating system mechanisms called semaphores are typically used for controlling client and server access to the shared memory segments by notifying one process when the other process has written data to a shared memory segment. For example, as a client process writes to shared memory, the client process will post (increment) a semaphore, which will in turn notify a waiting process (in this example, the server process) that data is waiting for it in shared memory. The waiting process will then read the data, completing the data transfer.
Semaphores can be used for a variety of purposes, and are more than just simple boolean flags. In particular, a semaphore has associated with it a non-negative integer value, and several types of operations can be performed on a semaphore. For example, operating systems which are UNIX System V Release 4 compliant have the capability of automatically adjusting the value of the semaphore, by "undoing" an operation which was previously performed on the semaphore by a process using the SEM -- UNDO flag, when that process terminates. For example, if a semaphore was initialized with the SEM -- UNDO flag and a decrement operation, the operating system will increment the semaphore (ie, undo the decrement operation), when that process terminates.
These features are often used in situations where a series of processes are competing for a particular resource, and the resource can only support a limited number of processes. In these situations, semaphores can be used for controlling access to the resource, with the initial value of the semaphore set at the maximum number of process which the resource can support. Each process attempting to obtain access to the resource will execute an operation to decrease the value of the semaphore by one. If this operation is possible without reducing the value of the semaphore below zero, the process will gain access to the resource, otherwise the process will wait in a queue. The next process in the queue will obtain access to the resource when the semaphore's value is incremented. When the process currently using a resource terminates, the operating system will automatically increment the semaphore's value, thus allowing the next waiting process to have access to that resource.
In systems using shared memory and semaphores as the inter-process communication mechanism between client and server processes, polling mechanisms are typically used for detecting the abnormal termination of a client process. In such a system, a dedicated service provider process polls all client processes at regular intervals. In this manner, the service provider is able to verify the continued existence of its clients. This mechanism suffers from the same disadvantages as the polling mechanisms for the communication protocols discussed above.
A termination detection system which more promptly frees system resources once a client terminates, while using less system resources itself, would be beneficial.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention provides a means and a method for a service provider in a client-server system to detect the abnormal termination of a client process, without requiring a dedicated polling mechanism. The invention pertains to client-server systems in an operating system environment which uses shared memory and semaphores in order to carry out interprocess communication between client processes and associated server processes.
A broad aspect of the invention provides:
in a computer system having a service provider communicating with a plurality of client processes and an operating system which supports communication between each client process and the service provider by means of shared memory and semaphores, an improved method of detecting the termination of a client process by the service provider without requiring periodic polling of the client processes, said method comprising the steps of:
establishing a semaphore associated with said client process in such a manner that the operating system will increment said semaphore in the event said client process terminates;
setting a flag associated with a client process whenever said client process increments said semaphore;
testing said flag by said service provider whenever said semaphore is incremented in order to determine whether said flag was set by said client process.
Another aspect of the invention provides for a service provider for a client server system running under an operating system of the type capable of supporting a plurality of client processes and utilizing shared memory segments and semaphores for interprocess communication between processes, said service provider being capable of detecting the abnormal termination of a client process without polling, said service provider comprising:
means for establishing a flag associated with said client process;
means for establishing a semaphore associated with said client process in such a manner that the operating system will automatically post the semaphore when said client process terminates;
server detection means for testing the condition of said flag whenever said semaphore is posted; and
flag resetting means for resetting said flag, said flag resetting means responsive to said server detection means.
Yet another aspect of the invention provides for a computer program product for use on a computer system capable of supporting a plurality of processes and capable of using shared memory segments and semaphores as a mechanism for allowing interprocess communication between processes running said computer system, said computer program product comprising:
means for establishing a server process running on said computer system for providing a service to a client process running on said computer system;
means for establishing a semaphore associated with said client process;
server library means for managing the interprocess communication for said client process, said server library means including means for initializing said semaphore in such a manner that the operating system will automatically increment the semaphore when said client process terminates;
means for establishing a flag associated with said client process;
server detection means for testing the condition of said flag whenever said semaphore is posted; and
flag resetting means for resetting said flag, said flag resetting means responsive to said server detection means.
Still another aspect of the invention provides a computer program product for use with a computer system having an operating system capable of using shared memory segments for data transfer between processes running on said computer system and semaphores for coordinating access to said shared memory segments by said processes, wherein said operating system is capable of incrementing a semaphore associated with a process in the event said process terminates, said computer program product comprising:
a recording medium;
means recorded on said recording medium for establishing a service provider program on said computer system which is capable of detecting the abnormal termination of a client process running on said computer system without having to periodically poll said client process; said service provider being capable of:
a) establishing a flag associated with each client process;
b) establishing a semaphore associated with each client process;
c) instructing said client process to set said flag whenever said client process increments said semaphore; and
d) testing said flag wherever said semaphore is incremented in order to determine whether said flag was set by its associated client process.
These foregoing aspects of the invention, together with other aspects and advantages thereof will be more apparent from the following description of the preferred embodiments thereof, taken in conjunction with the following drawings.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is a schematic block diagram illustrating the components of a client-server system incorporating the preferred embodiment of the present invention.
FIG. 2 is a flow chart illustrating the steps taken by both a client process (FIG. 2a), and its corresponding server process (FIG. 2b), according to the preferred embodiment of the invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
The present invention is applicable to service providers in general. For ease of discussion, the general implementation of the present invention will be discussed with respect to a particular example of a service provider, namely a DataBase Management System (DBMS). In particular, the features of the preferred embodiment of the invention will be discussed with respect to its implementation for operating systems which are UNIX System V Release 4 compliant.
The preferred embodiment of the present invention will now be described with reference to FIG. 1. Box 100 represents a single machine computer system, for example a mainframe computer system, which includes a CPU, memory, disc storage, etc. This figure illustrates schematically in block diagram form the components of a client-server system incorporating the preferred embodiment of the present invention. The figure also illustrates the interaction of these components for allowing inter-process communication between client processes and server processes running on the computer system. The left hand portion of FIG. 1 shows a terminal 141, and a personal computer 151, each connected to the computer system and communicating with client process 140 and client process 150 respectively, with each client process running on the main computer system. For ease of illustration, FIG. 1 only illustrates two client processes, although many more would be running concurrently in a typical client-server system. The middle portion of the figure illustrates the operating system inter-process communication resources established by the service provider for enabling data transfer between client and server processes. These resources, which are all labelled with numbers between 200 and 299, include a shared memory segment, and a set of semaphores for each client process. The right hand portion generally illustrates the service provider components within box 300, with each component labelled with numbers between 300 and 399.
Server listener code 305 represents a portion of the service provider which establishes a server listener process 310, which in turn manages each initial client-server interface. As part of the start up of the service provider, the server listener process 310 establishes two known inter-process communication resources, namely a Listener Response Queue (a queue for receiving initial messages from client processes) and a Listener Response Queue (a queue for responding to the initial messages from client processes), in order to facilitate initial communication between each new client process and the service provider.
When a user operating a terminal 141 runs an application which is designed to interact with a service provider incorporating the present invention, the application program establishes the client process 140 running on the computer system 100. The application calls the server library code 330, which is supplied as part of the service provider system. Server Library code 330 includes routines for controlling the client process communication with the service provider. A service provider can be upgraded to incorporate the preferred embodiment of the present invention without requiring any changes to the client application program, simply by upgrading the server library code 330, which will still be called by the application program as long as the name of the server library code 330 remains the same.
Upon loading the server library code 330, the client process 140 will send a message 145 to the Server listener process 310 by means of the Listener Response Queue, in a known manner. This message notifies the server listener process 310 that a new client process has been established.
The server listener process 310 then allocates inter-process communication resources to the client process 140. These resources are shown generally within box 200. The server listener process establishes a shared memory segment 240 which will be associated with client process 140. Server listener process 310 also establishes flag 242 (which we will refer to as the "valid request flag"), preferably within shared memory segment 240. Server listener process 310 also establishes a set of semaphores for controlling and synchronizing access to the shared memory segment 240.
Send semaphore 246 is established, as for example by using the UNIX semaphore semget() function. In the preferred embodiment of the present invention, each semaphore is used for controlling communication in one direction between a client process and a server process associated with it. Thus semaphore 246 is labelled as a "Send" semaphore because it is normally used to identify when the client process 140 has written data to the shared memory segment 240. The server listener process 310 also establishes a receive semaphore 248, which notifies the client process 140 when the service provider has written the response data to the shared memory segment 240, and also the sync semaphore 249, which is used in order to initially synchronize a client process with its associated server process.
In the preferred embodiment shown, flag 242 is boolean in nature, and can take on a value of true (ie, a value of one), or false (ie, a value of zero). For convenience a value of true will be referred to as valid request, while a value of false will be referred to as an invalid request (because, as will be made more apparent later, a value of false will indicate that the send semaphore has been posted even though the client process has not written a valid request to the shared memory, implying the semaphore was posted by the operating system as a result of the client process terminating). Flag 242 is initially set with a value of false.
The server listener process 310 then establishes a server process 340, according to the server engine code 320, for providing service to client process 140. The Server Listener Process informs the server process 340 of the identification information for the semaphores and shared memory segment associated with client process 140. In the preferred embodiment shown, the service provider establishes a dedicated server process for each client process. This is not a requirement for the present invention, which could operate with a plurality of client processes each serviced by a single server process. In such a system, any server process which served more than one client process would still communicate with each client process via a shared memory segment and a semaphore set associated with that client process.
The server listener process 310 then sends the identification information for the semaphores and shared memory segment to the client process 140 (in a known manner by means of the listener response queue) as indicated by arrow 308.
A similar initialization process takes place for each new client process. For example, client process 150 can be started by an application program, which could be the same application program which established client process 140, or a different application. For example, one application can be a financial data application whereas the other application can be a human resources application, wherein each accesses data from the same DBMS service provider. Upon initialization client process 150 loads the server library code 330 and carries out the same steps as described above for client process 140, in order to establish send semaphore 256, receive semaphore 258, sync semaphore 259, and shared memory segment 250 (including valid request flag 252, which is initially set with a value of false), for communication with server process 350.
In the preferred embodiment shown, each semaphore is utilized for controlling one way communication between two processes. Therefore, each semaphore will take on one of two values: one (posted), or zero ("not posted"). The value of each semaphore is initially set to zero (ie, not posted). The preferred embodiment described utilizes the following properties of UNIX System V Release 4 semaphores: i) the value of a semaphore must be a non-negative integer; and ii) any semop () function which attempts to reduce the value of a semaphore below zero blocks (puts to sleep) the calling process until the semop () function can operate without reducing the value below zero. Therefore a wait function, of the form semop(semoparray="-1", nops=1), executed on a "not posted" semaphore, forces the calling process to wait until the semaphore's value is incremented (ie, until some other process issues a semop () function to increment the semaphore value) before the process can proceed.
The operation of the preferred embodiment of the invention, will now be discussed with continued reference to FIG. 1, and also with reference to FIGS. 2a and 2b. FIG. 2a illustrates the steps taken by client process 150, and FIG. 2b illustrates the steps taken by the server process 350, after the processes have been established.
Boxes 2, 4, 6, and 8, as shown in FIGS. 2a and 2b, illustrate how the send semaphore is initialized with the SEM -- UNDO flag, and how the client and server processes are synchronized. After the server process 350 has been established, it executes a post (ie, increment) operation on the send semaphore 256, as shown at box 2. After the client process 150 receives the identification information from the Server Listener Process 310, the client process 150 executes a Wait function (ie, a semop() function with "-1" as the operator) with the SEM -- UNDO flag set on the send Semaphore 256, as shown at box 6. This operation serves two purposes. First, regardless of which of these two steps (box 2 or box 6) is executed first, it ensures that the client process will not proceed to the step indicated by box 8 until after the server process has completed the step indicated at box 2, since the send semaphore is initially set with a value of zero. Second, the client process has now initialized the send semaphore with the SEM -- UNDO flag. Therefore, when the client process subsequently terminates (either normally or abnormally), the operating system will automatically "undo" the "-1" operation carried out as part of the step shown at box 6, by incrementing (ie, posting) the semaphore 256. The client process then posts the sync semaphore 259, as shown at box 8, ending its initializing procedure before proceeding to the step shown at box 10.
Meanwhile, as shown at box 4, the server process 350 waits for the client process 150 to post the sync semaphore 259 (step 8), by executing a wait function on the sync semaphore 259, before proceeding to step 9. Thus, the sync semaphore 259 is used to ensure that the send semaphore 256 is initialized with the SEM -- UNDO flag before the server process attempts to execute a wait function on it, regardless of which process first gains access to the CPU.
After initialization, the server process 350 waits for input from the client process 150. This input can be in the form of commands, data or a combination thereof. Thus, upon initialization, server process 350 executes a wait function, by using, for example, the semop(semoparray="-1", nops=1) function on send semaphore 256, as illustrated by step 9 in FIG. 2. This attempts to decrease the value of the semaphore below zero, which can not happen until semaphore 256 is posted by some other process, because the semaphore's state after the initialization process of steps 2-8 is "not posted". Therefore, the server process 350 waits until semaphore 256 is posted by either client process 150 (box 25), or by the operating system as a result of client process 150 terminating.
Meanwhile, referring to the step illustrated at box 10 of FIG. 2b, after initialization, the client process 150 waits until it receives a request from the client application. Client process 150 then writes the request data and/or instructions to the shared memory segment 250, as shown at 15. Client process 150 then sets the valid request flag 252 to true, as shown at 20. The client process 150 then executes a post function to increment the value of the send semaphore 256, by using, for example, the semop (semoparray="+1", nops=1) function, as shown at 25. This post function will switch the state of the send semaphore 256 from its current state of "not posted" to posted, by incrementing the value of the semaphore from zero to one. Client process 150 then waits for the server process to read the request data from the shared memory segment and write a response. In other words, as shown at 30, client process 150 executes a wait function on the receive semaphore 258 (which will attempt to decrease the value of the semaphore from its initial value of zero), making client process 150 wait until the receive semaphore 258 is posted by server process 350 (step 75).
Referring now to FIG. 2b, once send semaphore 256 is posted as a result of step 25, the wait function executed at step 9 will be able to carry out its semop () operation, switching the newly posted semaphore back to a state of not posted and ending the wait function. As shown at 50, Server process 350 then reads flag 252 in order to test whether the flag has been set as a valid request (ie. whether it has been set true) by client process 150 at step 20. Test 50 is executed in order to determine whether the send semaphore 256 was posted by client process 150, which will indicate that client process 150 has written data to shared memory segment 250, or whether send semaphore 256 was posted by the operating system, indicating the termination of client process 150.
In order for the result of test 50 to be positive, flag 252 must be set as an invalid request (ie. the flag value is false). This indicates that the send semaphore 256 has been posted by the operating system due to the termination of client process 150, and the Server Process 350 will therefore execute the terminate server routine, as shown at 80, in order to free up system resources.
For the result of test 50 to be negative, flag 252 must have been set as a valid request (ie, to a value of true) by the client process 150 at step 20. This implies that client process 150, and not the operating system, was responsible for posting the send semaphore 256. If the result of test 50 is negative, then server process 350 proceeds to step 55, resetting flag 252 to invalid request (ie. setting it to false). In this manner, flag 252 is reinitialized, so that the next time send semaphore 256 is posted, flag 252 may be tested in order to determine whether the subsequent posting was due to client process 150 writing additional data to shared memory segment 250, or whether client process 150 has been terminated.
After server process 350 has reset flag 252, server process 350 reads the request data from the shared memory segment 250, as indicated at 60. Server process 350 then processes the request, for example, by carrying out a requested query on the data base tables 360, as shown at 65, and then writes the response data to the shared memory segment 250 as indicated at step 70. Server process 350 then posts the receive semaphore 258 in order to notify client process 150 that there is data waiting for it in shared memory segment 250, as shown at 75. Server process 350 then re-executes the wait function 9 on send semaphore 256, as shown by arrow 77. Assuming Client process 150 has not terminated, this wait function will attempt to reduce the value of send semaphore below zero, thus putting server process 350 into a waiting state until the send semaphore 256 is again posted. If Client process 350 has terminated since the last wait function 9 ended, the operating system would have posted semaphore 256 (as a result of the semaphore being initialized with the SEM -- UNDO flag), thus incrementing the semaphore's value from a value of zero to a value of one. Thus the value of the semaphore will not be reduced below zero as a result of the re-execution of the wait function (the semop() function only puts the calling process to sleep if the function attempts to reduce the semaphore value below 0), so the server process will immediately proceed to test 50. This test will necessarily be positive, because the flag 252 was set as an invalid request during step 55. Consequently the server process will proceed to step 80, and terminate the resources allocated to client process 350.
Assuming client process 150 has not terminated, once receive semaphore 258 has been posted by server process 350, then client process 150 will read the response data from the shared memory segment 250 as indicated at 90. Having received the data from the data base engine, client process 150 will then return the data and control to the application as indicated at 95. The client process will then wait until it receives another request from the application.
If the client process is terminated, either because the application has completed its processing, or because the operating system terminated the client process for some reason, the operating system will post the send semaphore. In this case, the valid request flag will not have been set to true by the client process. After the posting of the send semaphore, the server process will test the flag as discussed and terminate all resources allocated to the client process 150.
In an alternative embodiment, flag 252 could be an integer flag rather than a boolean flag. Step 20 is changed so that the client process increments the value of flag 252 every time the client process writes to the shared memory segment. In this case, the test step 50 determines whether the flag has been incremented since the last test (if any) was executed. To facilitate this test, a counter, which is initially set to zero, is established for storing the value of flag 252 after each test step 50. In other words, step 55 in this alternative embodiment increments the counter (ie, sets the counter to the current value of the flag 252), every time a test step 50 is executed while the client process is still active. Test 50 then determines whether the flag 252 is equal to the current value of the counter. If the values are equal, this implies the semaphore was posted by the operating system (otherwise the client process would have incremented the value of the flag at step 20, so that the flag's value is no longer equal to its value during the last test), so the system would proceed to step 80. In other words, rather than resetting a boolean flag, step 55 effectively resets a test condition for any subsequent test.
As stated, the UNIX System V Release 4 operating system has the capability of automatically incrementing the value of a semaphore when a process, which previously decremented the semaphore with the SEM -- UNDO flag specified, terminates. The UNIX operating system also has the capability to block (put to sleep) any process which attempts to reduce the value of a semaphore, if such a reduction would make the semaphore's value negative, until the reduction can take place without reducing the value of semaphore below zero. The present invention can be implemented for other operating systems which provide (or are upgraded to provide) equivalent features.
It will be apparent that many other changes may be made to the illustrative embodiments, while falling within the scope of the invention and it is intended that all such changes be covered by the claims appended hereto.
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A service provider for use in a client-server system which is capable of detecting the abnormal termination of a client process is disclosed. The service provider does not require a dedicated process for polling client processes in order to verify their status. Rather, a semaphore, which is used in conjunction with a shared memory segment for communication between a client process and the service provider, is initialized in such a manner that the operating system will automatically increment the semaphore in the event the client process is terminated. Thus, the semaphore will be incremented either when the client process deliberately increments the semaphore in order to notify the service provider that the client process has written data to a shared memory segment, or the semaphore will be incremented by the operating system in the event the client process terminates. A test flag is established in shared memory in order to differentiate whether the semaphore was incremented by the client process, or by the operating system. The client process will set the flag only when the client process increments the semaphore. Therefore, whenever the semaphore is incremented, the service provider will test the condition of the flag, and terminate resources allocated to the client process if the flag is not set.
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The Government has rights in this invention pursuant to a contract awarded by the Department of the U.S. Army.
BACKGROUND
1. Technical Field
The present application relates to a wing and especially to an improved method and apparatus for landing a wing.
2. Background of Related Art
Hang gliders allow manned flight without the expense or restrictions of powered flight. These gliders are aerodynamically designed such that their lift-to-drag ratio (commonly known as glide ratio) is greater than about 10:1 such that the glider is capable of suspending a flyer for several hours under the proper atmospheric conditions. Hang glider designs range from the popular delta wing design commonly known as a Rogallo wing and intermediate gliders with glide ratios of about 10:1 with docile characteristics to competition gliders with glide ratios as high as 13:1, but with less stable characteristics. The original Rogallo wing (about 45° sweep) had a glide ratio of about 4:1, and modem Rogallo wings (about 30° sweep) have a glide ratio of about 10:1.
The Rogallo wing design largely resembles a traditional kite with a keel, cross members, and diverging leading edge members. Another hang glider design generally similar to the Rogallo wing is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,116,406 which issued to Hamilton on Sep. 26, 1978. This glider has a double surface fabric airfoil forming an envelope, disposed around a Rogallo frame. This airfoil is inflated during flight as air enters an opening in the nose and exhausts through nozzles in the underside along the trailing edge. Inflating the wing improves its lift at lower air speeds. This hang glider, however, is manually controlled via a weight shift control bar by a flyer harnessed to the glider and is only usefull for manned flights and not for operations such as air drops of food, supplies, etc., where manned flights are either too dangerous or impossible.
Another hang glider design similar to the Rogallo wing and having a collapsible airfoil is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,116,407 to Murray. This hang glider comprises a wing which includes leading edge members, a keel and cross members in a traditional delta wing design. The wing further includes upper and lower flexible membranes, a first connector for attaching the upper flexible membrane to the upper aft section of the leading edge member and a second connector for attaching the lower flexible membrane to the lower aft section of the leading edge member. The flexible membranes are also joined together rearwardly of the leading edge member. At least one of the first and second connectors includes a track for receiving a member carried by one of the flexible membranes. The member cooperates with the track to attach the flexible membrane to the leading edge member. The leading edge members are also capable of being pivoted inwardly toward the keel to collapse the wing.
Parachutes, on the other hand, can and have been utilized for air drops of food, supplies, etc., in remote locations where landing an airplane is either impossible or dangerous. Although these parachutes are useful in reducing the ground impact of the dropped load, it is difficult to ensure the parachute reaches the targeted area. Depending upon the precise parachute release time, the atmospheric conditions during release and flight, and release altitude, the parachute may either reach its target or drift up to about 15 miles or more off course.
Patent application Ser. No. 08/156,322. (Issued as U.S. Pat. No. 5,474,257) which is commonly assigned and is hereby incorporated by reference, discloses a deployable wing comprising a double membrane fabric sail having an upper section disposed above and joined to a lower section, the sail having a leading edge with a front point, a trailing edge, and wing tips. The deployable wing further includes an internal structure disposed between the upper section and the lower section, the internal structure having two leading edge spars with a first end and a second end, said first ends pivotally connected together at approximately the front point, a keel spar connected to and disposed between the leading edge spars at the front point and extending rearward toward the trailing edge, and at least two cross spars pivotally attached to both the leading edge spars and a sliding mechanism which traverses along the keel. The wing also includes a plurality of fabric ribs disposed between and connected to the upper section and the lower section, the fabric ribs defining the shape of the fabric sail when inflated and have at least one slot through which the cross spars extend from the keel spar to the leading edge spars and ribs; and a ram air intake located on said leading edge at the stagnation point of the wing which inflates the wing during operation. The deployable wing attains a glide ration up to or exceeding about 12:1, and greater than 8:1 with typical payloads of about 1,000 lbs. for a 30 ft. wing.
The wing disclosed in application U.S. Pat. No. 5,474,257 is remotely controllable, allowing for both unmanned flight and accuracy in reaching a targeted area thereby making the wing useful for article recovery and delivery. The deployable wing is, however, the first of its type and it has been found that an improved apparatus and method for landing of such a wing is desired.
The present application therefore provides an improved apparatus and method for landing of a wing, preferably by parachutes.
SUMMARY
The present application relates to a deployable wing including a fabric sail having an upper section joined to a lower section, an air intake opening and an internal structure disposed substantially between the upper section and the lower section. The internal structure includes at least two leading edge spars joined at a first end, a keel adjacent to and disposed substantially between the leading edge spars and at least two cross spars pivotally attached to the leading edge spars and the keel. The wing further includes a kingpost attached to and extending from the keel, a cargo pod mounted to the wing via the keel and a parachute deployment system. The parachute deployment system includes at least one parachute attached to the wing, where deployment of the parachute causes the wing to decelerate in a controlled fashion and descend in a primarily vertical direction to land.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
Various embodiments are described herein with reference to the drawings, wherein:
FIG. 1 is a perspective view, partially broken away, of one embodiment of the deployable wing of the present application illustrating the parachute deployment system and secondary release mechanism, prior to deployment of the landing parachutes.
FIG. 2 is an enlarged view of the secondary release mechanism of FIG. 1.
FIG. 3 is a side view, in partial cross-section, illustrating the secondary release mechanism of FIG. 2.
FIG. 4 is a partial side view of the cargo pod according to the present application, partially broken away to show the parachute deployment system.
FIG. 5 is a rear view of the embodiment of FIG. 4.
FIG. 6 is a perspective view, partially broken away, of one embodiment of the deployable wing of the present application illustrating the parachute deployment system and secondary release mechanism, immediately after deployment of the landing parachutes.
FIG. 7 is a perspective view, partially broken away, of one embodiment of the deployable wing of the present application illustrating the parachute deployment system and secondary release mechanism, after deployment of the landing parachutes is complete.
FIG. 8 illustrates the operation of the wing according to the present application.
The figures are meant to further illustrate the various embodiments and not to limit the scope of the claimed invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
Referring now in specific detail to the drawings, with like reference numerals identifying similar or identical elements, FIG. 1 illustrates a perspective view, partially broken away, of one embodiment of the deployable wing 10 of the present application. As illustrated in FIG. 1, wing 10 includes a fabric sail 12 defining a leading edge 14 and a trailing edge 16. Fabric sail 12 preferably includes an upper section 12a substantially joined along its perimeter to a lower section (not shown) and a plurality of fabric ribs (not shown) connected to the upper and lower sections of the fabric sail. Joining the upper and lower sections forms an envelope which can be filled with air through a ram air intake 20 preferably located at the foremost point of the wing. In the present embodiment fabric sail 12 further includes an integral cover 13 comprising a first section 13a and a second section 13b, each of which is disposed along the leading edge of wing 10 as shown in FIG. 1. First and second sections 13a, 13b each further include complimentary zipper members 15a, 15b which matingly engage in a conventional manner to contain fabric sail 12 within the integral cover as described hereinbelow. In the present embodiment cover 13 is preferably made of dacron fabric while zipper members 15a, b are of a sufficiently high strength and durability to operate under deployment conditions, although other materials may be utilized depending upon the design configurations of the wing.
With continued reference to FIG. 1, wing 10 further includes an internal structure comprising two leading edge spars (not shown), two cross-spars 22a, 22b, a keel 24, a kingpost 26 and a control device, such as elevon struts 28a, 28b. The leading edge spars are pivotally attached at one end between faceplates 17a and 17b to form foremost point 21. Pivotally connected to the leading edge spars at a second end thereof are elevon struts 28a, 28b. Keel 24 is mounted at a first end between faceplates 17a, 7b, is mounted at an opposite end between rear plate members 27a, b and is disposed between the leading edge spars. Cross spars 22a, 22b each include an outboard end which is pivotally attached to a corresponding leading edge spar and further include inboard ends, opposite the outboard ends, which are pivotally attached to keel 24, preferably via a common slider 80. Kingpost 26 is also preferably mounted to keel 24 via the common slider. When erected, kingpost 26 extends substantially perpendicular to keel 24, through an opening in fabric sail 12, to provide an upper attachment point for wires 31a, 31b which support the wing on landing and when the wing experiences negative loads or inverted flight. In the present embodiment kingpost 26 is pivotally attached to slider 80 such that linear movement of the slider in the direction of arrow "A" along keel 24 causes kingpost 26 to erect through the fabric sail, substantially perpendicular to the keel as shown in FIG. 1.
The leading edge spars and cross spars are preferably pivotally mounted such that in a closed or pre-deployed position the leading edge spars and cross spars 22a, 22b rest substantially parallel to keel 24. In the closed position the common slider is preferably disposed adjacent the foremost point 21 and kingpost 26 is preferably disposed adjacent and substantially parallel to keel 24, within fabric sail 12. In the closed position complimentary zipper members 15a, 15b are matingly engaged in a conventional manner to contain fabric sail 12 within the integral cover. Preferably, the leading edge spars, cross spars, keel, elevon struts, kingpost and wing tips 29a, b are all substantially disposed within fabric sail 12 in the closed position.
The length of each leading edge spar is dependent upon the desired size of wing 10, which is only limited by practical considerations: size once folded, desired cruise speed, weight of the payload, etc. Once opened, or deployed, the leading edge spars form an angle therebetween. The size of the angle depends upon aerodynamic considerations including aspect ratio, yaw stability, and deployment simplicity, among others. Typically, the angle ranges from about 90° to about 150° with about 105° to about 110° preferred due to simplicity of the deployment mechanism geometry. Angles greater than about 150° result in more complex, and therefore less desirable, mechanical/structural geometry and decreasing yaw stability, while angles less than about 90° result in decreasing glide ratio. Yaw stability is where wing sweep allows the wing to tend to maintain its flight directly into the wind, commonly known as maintaining the yaw heading. As the wing yaws, the windward wing tends to drag more than the leeward wing, thereby correcting for the yaw.
Cross spars 22a, 22b provide structural integrity to the wing 10 by providing strength to the leading edge spars to ensure that in the deployed position the leading spars remain in the open position with the appropriate angle therebetween. The distance between the attachment point of the outboard ends to their respective leading edge spars and the inboard ends to the keel determine the length of cross spars 22a, 22b.
With continued reference to FIG. 1, keel 24 similarly provides structural integrity to wing 10 by ensuring that the wing 10 opens to and maintains its full length from the leading edge 14 to the trailing edge 16, commonly known as the wing's chordwise length. The length of the keel 24 is substantially equivalent to the chordwise length of the wing at the root (very center line) which, as with the leading edge spars' length, is determined on a practical basis with aeronautical considerations effecting the ultimate size. Keel 24 also connects payload pod 50 to wing 10 via mounting member 36.
The present embodiment also includes elevon struts 28a, 28b which are each connected to a motor or fluid actuator 30a, 30b, the actuators being located externally of fabric sail 12 and mounted to the leading edge spars. The motor or actuator is conventional in design and operates to deflect or rotate each elevon struts 28a, 28b independently, out of the plane of the sail, thereby controlling the flight of the wing. By rotating the elevon struts, wing tips 29a, 29b are twisted up or down relative to the leading edge. This helical twisting of the sail results in an aerodynamic force sufficient to pitch or roll the wing. Rotating or deflecting the elevon struts in unison generates an aerodynamic force substantially behind the pressure center of the wing which is located at the point about 55% down the keel from the foremost point 16, thereby forming a moment force about the pressure center which is used for pitch control of the wing. By rotating or deflecting the elevon struts 28a, 28b singularly or in opposite directions, aerodynamic forces at the wing tips 29a and 29b can be controlled in magnitude and direction, up or down. For example, if the elevon strut 28a is rotated up while elevon strut 28b is rotated down, a downward force is generated on tip 29a and an upward force on tip 29b, resulting in a roll or turn in the direction of strut 28a.
These elevon struts 28a, 28b, or other control devices, can be operated with any conventional motor capable of generating sufficient torque to overcome the aerodynamic forces at a speed sufficient for control response. Factors important in determining the required torque include wing area, wing loading, aspect ratio, and elevon strut length, among others. A wing having a 30 foot wing span, for example, with a sail area of about 190 ft 2 and a 700 lb load requires about 40 to about 80 ft-lb torque while a 15 ft wing span wing with an area of 45 ft 2 and a 90 lb load needs about 15 to about 25 ft-lb torque for control.
In the present embodiment the length of kingpost 26 is approximately 4 ft. which, as with the keel's and leading edge spars' length, is determined on a practical basis with aeronautical considerations effecting the ultimate size. In addition to providing an upper attachment point for wires 31a, b as described above, kingpost 26 also provides support for strap 32 which is attached at one end between front plate members 33a, 33b, extends over the kingpost and is attached at an opposite end between rear plate members 27a, 27b. Strap 32 is of a sufficient length such that when the strap extends over the kingpost and is strapped between plate members 33a, b and 27a, b, there is enough slack present in the strap to allow the strap to be pulled free of the kingpost when parachutes 46 deploy.
Attached to strap 32 at approximately its midpoint, in the present embodiment, is parachute attachment line 34. The point at which line 34 attaches to strap 32 is the point at which the wing 10 with cargo pod, or payload 50 will hang substantially horizontal beneath the parachutes without excessive rotation or pitching. Likewise, the length of strap 32 is the length at which the payload will hang substantially horizontal beneath the parachutes. Attachment of line 34 to strap 32 is achieved in the present embodiment through loops which are sewn onto strap 32 and line 34 and which are connected by a clevis fitting, though any conventional method of attachment which will allow for parachute deployment may be utilized. Attachment line 34 is joined at an opposite end to parachute deployment system 40 and includes a second line 34a which branches from the attachment line 34 and attaches to a secondary release mechanism 39 disposed within mounting block 38 (FIG. 2). Mounting block 38 is connected to wing mounting member 36 which is mounted to both keel 24 and payload pod 50, the mounting member thereby attaching the payload to the wing. The secondary release mechanism 39 provides controlled release of parachute deployment system 40 which is described in greater detail below.
Referring now to FIGS. 4 and 5, parachute deployment system 40 is substantially disposed with in payload pad 50 and includes an extraction rocket 42 which is connected at one end to a pilot parachute 44, the pilot parachute being connected to a plurality of landing parachutes 46. In the present embodiment extraction rocket 42 is a compressed air rocket which does not require pyrotechnics and which is available from a number of companies including Second Chanz. Rocket 42 is connected to both the pilot parachute 44 and a rocket deployment system 48. In the present embodiment there are preferably three independent deployment systems by which the rocket may be deployed: by a first independent servo motor which is connected to an onboard electronic auto pilot program; by a second, independent servo motor which is signaled by a manual override through a separate radio signal initiated externally of the wing; or by a passive mechanical system which is set to initiate if certain conditions are present and/or if electronic failure has caused either of the servo motors to fail to activate the rocket. All three systems are conventional in design and other systems may be utilized as long as deployment of parachutes 44,46 is achieved.
If the rocket 42 is to be initiated by the first servo motor then the wing's autopilot system, which is a conventional design, will be programmed with a predetermined landing site and upon reaching the landing site the autopilot will send a command to the first servo motor to pull a pin attached to the rocket to activate the rocket. Upon receiving the command from the autopilot the servo motor will activate rocket 42. If prior to reaching the preprogrammed site the system is manually overridden by a radio signal from a manned controller, the second servo motor will pull the pin to activate the rocket. The third option is the passive mechanical system which is programmed in advance to activate if certain preset conditions are met. In the present embodiment this system is programmed at a minimum altitude limit of 1,000 ft above the ground. If the wing is descending at a rate that is greater than 65 ft/sec and the wing is at an altitude of 1,000 ft above the ground, or less, then the rocket will be activated by the mechanical system, which is spring loaded in a conventional manner, pulling the pin attached to the rocket to activate it. The mechanical system provides a backup for the servo systems if there is electronic failure either in the onboard electronics or the override system.
Referring now to FIG. 6, once the rocket is initiated it is released in the direction indicated by arrow "B" out of pod 50. Releasing rocket 42 causes extraction of pilot parachute 44, which in the present embodiment is approximately 8 ft. in diameter. The pilot parachute, in turn, is connected by line 33 to landing parachutes 46 which are released by the force of the deployed pilot parachute. In the present embodiment there are preferably four landing parachutes, each with a diameter of approximately 35 ft. The number and size of the parachutes used with the deployment system may, however, vary and can be determined by one skilled in the art by taking into consideration the operating conditions of the wing including, but not limited to, the size of the wing, speed at which the wing is traveling, altitude, etc. In the present embodiment the extraction of the landing parachutes 46 normally occurs at a relatively low altitude, approximately 500 feet or less above the ground at cruise velocity, which for the present embodiment is approximately 60 knots.
Upon deployment of the landing parachutes 46, line 34 which is attached to the parachutes extends rearwardly, behind the wing, in line with wing mounting member 36 thereby acting as a brake to decelerate the wing. In the present embodiment, for a wing system weighing approximately 900 lbs, deployment of landing parachutes 46 provides a descent rate of approximately 18 feet per second. As parachute attachment line 34 is being pulled by parachutes 46 it transmits a deployment force to line 34a which activates the secondary release mechanism 39.
Referring now to FIGS. 2 and 3, secondary release mechanism 39 preferably includes a hydraulic member 52, a latching member 54 and a flow control valve 56 which is attached to hydraulic member 52. Hydraulic member 52 is attached to block assembly 38 and includes a cylinder 58 filled with a fluid, such as oil, and a piston 60 disposed substantially within the cylinder. Flow control valve 56 includes a fluid line 66 operatively attached at one end to cylinder 58, and operatively attached at a second end to chamber 68. Fluid line 66 transports the liquid disposed in cylinder 58 from the cylinder to the chamber 68, as described below. Piston 60 includes a shaft 62 attached at one end, exterior the cylinder, to latching member 54. Latching member 54 is pivotally attached to shaft 62 such that in a closed position the latching member is pivotally latched against wall 38a of mounting block assembly 38.
Prior to deployment of parachutes 46, latching member 54 is pivoted closed around line 34a and is biased against wall 38a thereby holding the line as shown in FIG. 3. Upon deployment of parachutes 46 in the direction of arrow "B" as shown in FIG. 6, the parachutes exert a deployment force on line 34a in the direction of arrow "C" which likewise exerts a force on latching member 54, thereby exerting a force on shaft 62 of piston 60. This force causes latching member 54 to pull the shaft of piston 60 in the direction of arrow "C" against the fluid disposed in cylinder 58 thereby forcing the fluid into fluid line 66. The shaft 62 extends at a rate proportion to the force exerted by the parachute deployment. The fluid flows through line 66 and into chamber 68 at a predetermined rate thereby resulting in a controlled movement of shaft 62 and latching member 54 in the direction of arrow "C". When shaft 62 is fully extended, latching member 54 has moved past wall 38a, and there is no longer a force preventing the latch from pivoting about pin 69. The force from line 34a then causes latching member 54 to pivot about the pin, in the direction of arrow "D", thereby releasing line 34a and hence also line 34, from the secondary release mechanism.
Referring now to FIG. 7, once released from secondary release mechanism 39, line 34 pulls strap 32 free of kingpost 26 and the wing and attached payload pod rotate to a substantially horizontal position for landing. In the present embodiment the flow control valve 56 is set such that the parachute deployment force is initially transmitted through the center of gravity of the vehicle, then after approximately 4 seconds line 34a is released from the secondary release mechanism, as described above for final descent. The secondary release mechanism is utilized so as to avoid extreme rotation imparted on the wing by deployment of the parachutes and allows for a substantially vertical descent of the wing.
The operation of wing 10 will now be described with respect to FIGS. 1-8. Referring initially to FIG. 8, in the present embodiment wing 10 is preferably deployed from an aircraft, such as the Air Force C-130 airplane 70. Prior to deployment wing 10 is placed in the closed or pre-deployed position and is loaded into the cargo bay of the airplane. In order to secure the wing inside the airplane and to facilitate its extraction therefrom, the present embodiment includes a platform 94 mounted to the underside of cargo pod 50. When the aircraft has reached the site over which wing 10 is to be deployed, the wing is deployed from the aircraft, exiting therefrom, as shown in FIG. 8. Upon exiting the aircraft a static line deploys pilot parachute 72 which decelerates and stabilizes the wing, and releases a drogue parachute 74. Drogue parachute 74 then initiates deployment of wing 10 and then disengages from the wing. Deployment of wing 10 is described in greater detail in commonly assigned patent application S/N (Atty. docket ST-88) to Fisher et al., filed on Oct. 26, 1995, which is hereby incorporated by reference.
Once deployed, the wing inflates with ram air and begins flight, gliding through the air where it is preferably guided to its desired destination by the on-board autopilot. Once wing 10 reaches its desired location, extraction rocket 42 is initiated, preferably by a first servo motor, but alternatively may be initiated prior to reaching its desired destination by a manual override signaling a second servo motor, or if electronic failure has occurred, by a mechanical system as described hereinabove. Once initiated, rocket 42 is deployed from pod 50, thereby extracting pilot parachute 44, attached thereto. Pilot parachute 44 thereby releases a cluster of landing parachutes 46, which are attached thereto and which act as a brake to decelerate the wing as described hereinabove. Parachutes 46 are connected via line 34 to line 34a which is attached to the secondary release mechanism 39.
Upon deployment of landing parachutes 46, a force is exerted on line 34a which activates the secondary release mechanism 39, the operation of which is described above. The secondary release mechanism 39 provides controlled movement of the landing parachutes 46 from an initial position extending rearwardly behind the wing, substantially in line with wing mounting member 36, to a position above the wing, after release of line 34a from the secondary release mechanism, thereby pulling strap 32 free from kingpost 26 as described hereinabove and illustrated in FIG. 8. The parachute system along with the secondary release mechanism allows for a rapid, substantially vertical descent of the wing while avoiding extreme rotation imparted on the wing by the deployment of the landing parachutes.
The deployable wing of the present application is therefore capable of unmanned cargo delivery to a predetermined destination and includes a reliable, controlled landing system for improved cargo delivery.
It will be understood that various modifications may be made to the embodiments disclosed herein. For example, although the present application discloses deployment from a C-130 airplane, other deployment methods, including other airplanes and helicopters is also within the scope of the present application. In addition, the structure of the wing may be altered, and/or the number and size of the parachutes may be varied, depending upon the desired configuration of the wing and the landing requirements. Therefore, the above description should not be construed as limiting, but merely as exemplifications of the preferred embodiments. Those skilled in the art will envision other modifications within the scope and spirit of the claims appended hereto.
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The deployable wing of the present invention comprises an internal structure having diverging leading edge spars attached to a keel spar and cross spars to form a delta wing configuration. This internal structure is enclosed within a volume defined by a fabric sail having an upper section and a lower section. This fabric sail volume is internally pressurized through a ram air intake at the nose stagnation point. This deployable wing can be folded closed, extracted from an aircraft, deployed in the air and landed with the aid of parachutes.
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This application is a continuation, of application Ser. No. 07/799,767, filed Nov. 27, 1991, now abandoned which is a continuation of Ser. No. 07/680,610, filed Apr. 1, 1991, now abandoned which is a continuation of Ser. No. 07/382,858, filed Jul. 20, 1989 now abandoned.
This invention relates in general to the downstream purification of cellular products and more particularly to methods and apparatuses for the extraction of products from microbial cells using supercritical fluids and explosive decompression.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Genetically engineered proteins have been gaining increased importance as potential therapeutics for human and animal health care, as well as industrial applications. Currently, such proteins are produced by several similar series of processing steps which can be generically summarized as follows: (1) Protein production by cell culture; (2) Cell breakage, extraction and removal; (3) Primary purification or initial fractionation; (4) High resolution chromatographic purification; and (5) Formulation and encapsulation. Downstream purification (steps 2-5) typically accounts for a large percent of the total production costs.
As cells are relatively expensive raw materials, high product and activity yields are of prime importance. For large scale operations, the preferred methods of cell disruption are high-pressure homogenization and wet milling in high-speed agitator bead mills. These techniques employ high shear forces and generate heat, both factors which are potentially damaging to the protein being recovered.
Furthermore, conventional industrial-scale microbial cell disruption techniques are non-selective in that the cell wall is attacked at multiple locations leading to the formation of small cell wall fragments. This increases the downstream purification burden because such fragments are difficult to separate from the process stream and may lead to the fouling of adsorbents and the clogging of chromatographic columns (steps 3 and 4 above). While such cell disruption is not usually a requirement in the recovery of intracellular proteins, in most conventional processes, cell wall fragmentation is a consequence.
It is an object of the invention to provide a method and an apparatus for extracting material from cells, which method avoids the above-mentioned drawbacks.
Another object of the invention is to provide a method for microbial cell disruption that reduces cell wall fragmentation.
Still another object of the invention is to provide a method of cell disruption which only minimally exposes the cells to high shear forces and little or no heat generation.
Yet another object of the invention is to provide an improved method of microbial cell disruption that simplifies the purification scheme, reduces processing time and favorably impacts production costs.
These and other objects are achieved by the methods and apparatus of the invention.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The invention combines the beneficial aspects of explosive decompression and supercritical fluid extraction. First, a solvent that is a gas at ambient conditions and that has a critical temperature between 0° and 100° C. is selected. Preferably, the critical temperature is between 0° and 50° C. This solvent is brought to near-critical pressure or higher and to near-critical temperature. The solvent then is combined with a slurry of intact cells to saturate the cells with the solvent under the prescribed conditions. Next, the pressure is released, preferably suddenly, to cause a pressure drop which results in partial disruption of the cell membrane and release of solvent and other materials from the cell. Surprisingly, the cell walls are less fragmented than when using conventional microbial cell disruption techniques, and yet the yield of proteins and nucleic acids from the cells is greatly improved. Further, the cells are exposed to minimal shear forces and there is no heat generation which would adversely affect yield.
According to one aspect of the invention, conditions are applied to allow preferential collection of proteins or nucleic acids. First, the mixture of solvent and cells is maintained at just below the critical temperature of the solvent while subjecting the mixture to pressures at or above the critical pressure of the solvent. When the pressure is released, proteins are selectively expressed from the cell, with little or no nucleic acids expressed. After removing the solvent containing the expressed protein, new solvent optionally may be added and the mixture then may be repressurized and maintained at a temperature above the solvent's critical temperature. Explosive decompression under these conditions results in nucleic acids being released from the cells, along with additional proteins.
Preferably, the solvent when combined with the cells result in a mixture having a pH that is close to the pH at which the cells are normally cultured. For example, when working with prokaryotes cultured at neutral pH, the preferred solvent is neutral and only slightly polar such as nitrous oxide (N 2 O).
According to another aspect of the invention, microbial cell disruption and extraction of intracellular components are carried out continuously in a novel apparatus. A slurry of cells is continuously introduced into a high-pressure soaking vessel. Likewise, a solvent at near-critical temperature also is continuously introduced into the vessel. The solvent and cells are maintained at or near critical temperature and are continuously mixed. All the while, a portion of the solvent and cells is continuously removed from the vessel and is depressurized. The broth containing the expressed cellular material is then continuously collected.
Preferably the vessel has an upstream end and a downstream end, with the slurry of cells and the solvent being introduced under pressure into the upstream end. The solvent and cells are caused to move continuously from the upstream end toward the downstream end of the vessel while continuously mixing the solvent and cells in the vessel. The solvent and cells are then removed continuously from the downstream end of the vessel and depressurized.
The vessel may include means for maintaining at a preset temperature the solvent and cells in the vessel. The vessel also may include means for mixing the solvent and cells within the vessel. The mixing means may be a blade or other mechanically actuated mixer or may be a conduit constructed and arranged to withdraw and recirculate a portion of the contents of the vessel. The vessel also may include recirculation means independent of the mixing means for recirculating solvent, cells or both back to the upstream end of the vessel.
These and other features of the invention are described in greater detail below.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is a schematic illustration of one apparatus of the invention;
FIG. 2 is a schematic illustration of a modified version of the apparatus of FIG. 1;
FIG. 3 is a schematic illustration of a preferred apparatus of the invention capable of continuous microbial cell disruption;
FIG. 4 is a graph illustrating the recovery of nucleic acids from E. coli using N 2 O, CO 2 and N 2 ;
FIG. 5 is a graph illustrating the recovery of proteins from E. coli using N 2 O, CO 2 and N 2 ;
FIG. 6 is a table showing the recovery of nucleic acids and of protein from Bacillus subtilis using N 2 O, CO 2 and N 2 ;
FIG. 7 is a table showing the recovery of nucleic acids and of proteins from Saccharomyces cerevisiae using N 2 O, CO 2 and N 2 ;
FIG. 8 is a graph illustrating the effect of pressure on the microbial cell disruption of E. coli;
FIG. 9 is a graph illustrating the effect of pressure on microbial cell disruption of Saccharomyces cerevisiae;
FIG. 10 is a graph illustrating the effect of exposure or recirculation time on the microbial cell disruption of E. coli;
FIG. 11 is a graph illustrating the effect of exposure or recirculation time on the microbial cell disruption of Bacillus subtilis;
FIG. 12 is a graph illustrating the effect of exposure or recirculation time on the microbial cell disruption of Saccharomyces cerevisiae;
FIG. 13 is a graph illustrating the effect of cell concentration on the microbial cell disruption of E. coli;
FIG. 14 is a graph illustrating the effect of cell concentration on the microbial cell disruption of Saccharomyces cerevisiae;
FIG. 15 is a table showing the effect of temperature on the microbial cell disruption of E. coli;
FIG. 16 is a table showing the effect of temperature on the microbial cell disruption of Bacillus subtilis;
FIG. 17 is a graph illustrating the effect of temperature on the microbial cell disruption of Saccharomyces cerevisiae using N 2 O;
FIG. 18 is a table showing the effect of temperature on the microbial cell disruption of Saccharomyces cerevisiae using CO 2 ;
FIG. 19 is a table showing the effect of temperature on the microbial cell disruption of Saccharomyces cerevisiae using ethylene.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
An apparatus of the invention is depicted in FIG. 1. It includes a soaking chamber 10 in which a slurry of cells and solvent are mixed for a specified time under controlled conditions. The particular soaking chamber 10 employed was a high-pressure vessel having a capacity of 60 cc and an operating pressure rating of 5,000 psig at 25° C. (Model No. M1-TU4, Penberthy-Houdaille, Inc., Prophetstown, Ill.). The soaking chamber 10 is heat-traced with heating tape 12, which heating tape 12 in turn is connected to a thermocouple 14 inserted into the center of the soaking chamber 10. The heating tape 12 and the thermocouple 14 are connected to a proportional controller 16 (Model No. CN-3000 Omega, Inc., Stamford, Conn.) such that the temperature within the soaking chamber 10 may be preset and maintained automatically.
The soaking chamber 10 has a bottom port 18 and a top port 20. The bottom port 18 communicates via various conduits with a source of solvent 22. Between the source of solvent 22 and the bottom port 18 of the soaking chamber 10 is a high-pressure compressor 24 for introducing solvent 22 into the soaking chamber 10 as well as for compressing solvent 22 in soaking chamber 10 up to a prespecified operating pressure. The particular compressor employed was a single-ended diaphragm compressor which can compress gas or liquid up to 10,000 psi at a flow rate of 40 standard liters per minute (Model No. J-46-13411, Superpressure Gas Compressor, Newport Scientific, Jessup, Md.).
Between the compressor 24 and the bottom port 18 of the soaking chamber 10 is a heat exchanger 26 used to remove the heat of compression generated from the compression of solvent 22. The heat exchanger employed was a circulating, refrigerated water-bath capable of cooling the discharge line of the compressor to as low as 5° C. (Model No. HX-150, NESLAB, Inc., Concord, N.H., 15,300 Btu/hr capacity).
Conduits transfer the solvent 22 from a solvent container 28 to the soaking chamber 10. Solvent 22 exits from the solvent container 28 through valve V-1 and is delivered into the compressor 24 via solvent conduit 30 and valve V-2. Compressed solvent 22 exits the compressor 24 and is delivered via compressor discharge conduit 32 into the soaking chamber 10, passing on the way through heat exchanger 26, valve V-6 and bottom port 18.
The microbial slurry is introduced into the soaking chamber via the top port 20. The soaking chamber 10 is in fluid communication via top port 20 and slurry charge conduit 34 with a charge port 36 for introducing the slurry into the soaking chamber 10.
The soaking chamber 10 also is in fluid communication via the top port 20, slurry charge conduit 34 and blow-down conduit 38 with a blow-down chamber 40 into which the microbial slurry is sprayed upon release of the pressure in the soaking chamber 10. The blow-down chamber 40 employed also was a high-pressure vessel manufactured by Penberthy-Houdaille, supra (Model No. 1-TU7; 88 cc capacity). Upon release of the pressure, the cells may pass via slurry charge conduit 34 through valve V-7 and then via blow-down conduit 38 through valves V-9 and V-10 into blow-down chamber 40 via blow-down chamber top port 42.
Branching from blow-down conduit 38 between blow-down chamber top port 42 and valve V-10 is an overflow conduit 44. Overflow conduit 44 communicates via valve V-11 with low-pressure vessel 46 which vessel 46 acts to trap any spray carried over from the blow-down chamber 40.
Soaking chamber 10 also is provided with a recycle conduit 48. This recycle conduit 48 fluidly connects soaking chamber top port 20 and bottom port 18. Fluid may pass from the soaking chamber 10 via soaking chamber top port 20 into charge conduit 34. Charge conduit 34 in turn connects to recycle conduit 48 which is in fluid communication via valve V-3 with solvent conduit 30 between valve V-2 and compressor 24. Solvent conduit 30 communicates with compressor 24 which in turn communicates via compressor discharge conduit 32 with bottom port 18.
A cleaning fluid 50 also communicates with soaking chamber 10, making its connection between valve V-2 and compressor 24. Cleaning fluid pump 52 pumps cleaning fluid 50 through compressor 24 and conduit 32 via valve V-4 and into soaking chamber 10, blow-down chamber 40, low pressure trap 46 and connecting conduits.
The device shown in FIG. 1 and described above may be operated as follows: As an initial condition, all valves are in the fully closed position. A microbial slurry first is introduced through charge port 36 into the soaking chamber 10 when conduit valves V-7, V-10 and V-11 are fully opened, all other valves being closed. Valves V-1 and V-3 then are fully opened and valves V-2 and V-9 are slightly opened, allowing solvent to displace the air in solvent conduit 30, soaking chamber 10, recycle conduit 48 and blow-down conduit 38. Valve V-9 then is fully closed and the soaking chamber 10 is slowly pressurized to the pressure within the solvent container 28 by incrementally opening valve V-2. Pressurization is gradual to minimize thermal transients which result from the heat of compression. After stabilization of pressure and temperature, the valve V-2 is closed, valve V-6 is opened and compressor 24 is activated to circulate solvent 22 through the microbial slurry 54 in soaking chamber 10. The soaking chamber 10 then may be charged to near-critical or supercritical pressure as desired. With valve V-7 still open from the preceding steps, the system is dead-headed by closing valve V-3, and then charged to desired pressure by opening valve V-2 to feed more solvent 22 through the compressor 24. V-2 is then closed and V-3 opened for further circulation of the supercritical fluid. After The solvent 22 has circulated through the microbial slurry 54 to an extent sufficient to saturate the cells with solvent 22, the compressor 24 is turned off, valve V-6 is closed and valve V-9 is opened as rapidly as possible to allow the depressurization of soaking chamber 10 to atmospheric pressure. (Valves V-10 and V-11 are opened at this stage. Atmospheric pressure is reached because of an open vent in the low pressure vessel.) Disrupted cells and broth may then be collected from the soaking chamber 10 via valve V-12, from the blow-down chamber 40 via valve V-13 and from the low pressure vessel 46 via valve V-14. The lines are then purged with compressed air, preferably at about 200 psig, to remove any entrapped materials which are collected. Next, valve V-6 is opened and the system is fully decompressed, followed by again purging the system with air and draining of soaking, blow-down and low pressure chambers.
The apparatus of FIG. 1 may be cleaned by utilizing centrifugal cleaning pump 52 to circulate cleaning fluids such as 10% Clorox through the various conduits and vessels. The Clorox may be flushed out of the system using water pumped by the same cleaning pump 52.
The apparatus shown in FIG. 2 is a modification of that shown in FIG. 1, and includes certain features that are desirable for both research and industrial purposes. The soaking chamber 10 and the blow-down chamber 40 in this embodiment are high-pressure see-through vessels having an internal capacity of 100 cc and a maximum operating pressure of 10,000 psig at 25° C. (Model No. 28-T-51, Jerguson Gage & Valve Co., Burlington, Mass.). Alternatively, high pressure vessels such as Model No. OR0050SS11, Autoclave Engineers, Erie, Pa., can be utilized. These chambers 10, 40 are adapted to accommodate mechanical mixers, for example, magnetically coupled stirring devices.
Both soaking chamber 10 and blow-down chamber 40 are provided with pressure-equilibration conduits so that the chambers may be pressurized simultaneously from both ends. The pressure-equilibration conduit 56 for soaking chamber 10 fluidly connects recycle conduit 48 to compressor discharge conduit 32. Valve V-20 is located along the pressure-equlibration conduit 56 for controlling flow. The pressure-equilibration conduit 58 for blow-down chamber 40 fluidly connects blow-down conduit 38 to compressor discharge conduit 32, the connection located between soaking chamber 10 and blow-down chamber 40. Valve V-19 is located along the pressure-equilibration conduit 58 for controlling flow.
A second recycle conduit 60 provides for fluid communication between the slurry charge conduit 34 and the pressure-equilibration conduit 58, the connection to conduit 58 located between chambers 10 and 40. A flow valve V-8 is located on second recycle conduit 60. Another flow valve V-21 is located on the compressor discharge conduit 32 after valve V-12 and before the connection point of the second recycle conduit 60.
Unlike the apparatus of Fig. 1, the low-pressure vessel 46 of FIG. 2 does not vent directly to atmosphere. Rather, it fluidly connects via a back-pressure regulator valve V-15 and a flow rate metering valve V-16 to traps 62, 64. The back pressure regulator valve V-15 will be used to set the system pressure as well as to control depressurization. The flow metering valve V-16 will be used adjust the flow of material exiting the low-pressure vessel 46 into traps 62, 64. Valves V-15, V-16 are heated to avoid freeze-up due to solvent expansion upon depressurization.
The traps 62, 64 capture solutes which precipitate out of the solvent upon depressurization. Currently, glass wool in U-tubes are employed, although it will be recognized by one of ordinary skill in the art that many different types of traps may be used. The material exiting the traps 62, 64 is directed into a three-way valve V-17 which may be vented to atmosphere or may be directed to a flow meter 66 (e.g. a soap bubble flow meter or a standard gas meter).
The device shown in FIG. 2 may be operated in the same manner as described above in connection with FIG. 1. In this instance, the soaking chamber 10 would act as a mixing chamber, the blow-down chamber 40 would act to receive the depressurized contents of the soaking chamber 10 and the low-pressure vessel 46 would act as an overflow for blow-down chamber 40.
The device shown in of FIG. 2 also may be used to separate solvent from the microbial slurry to facilitate collection of materials from the solvent alone. In this instance, the soaking chamber 10 is brought up to the desired temperature and pressure and solvent is introduced through the compressor 24 substantially as described above in connection with the apparatus of FIG. 1. Then, with valves V-21, V-8, V-9 and V-19 closed, the compressor 24 is allowed to recirculate solvent through the soaking chamber 10. At the end of a specified recirculation-induced mixing Time, soaking chamber 10 is isolated and the solvent is routed to blow-down chamber 40 which now acts instead as an extraction chamber. In this instance, valves V-7, V-11, V-19 and V-20 are closed. Blow-down chamber 40 may be pre-charged with appropriate back extraction aqueous buffers of different pHs and ionic strengths with/without polar cosolvents such as methanol, acetone, ethylene glycol and such mixtures thereof for extracting material from the solvent 22. The solvent 22 then may be recirculated through this back extraction solvent in the blow-down chamber 40. In doing so, solvent exits the top port 68 of blow-down chamber 40, passes through blow-down conduit 38 and recycle conduit 48 and then is pumped back to the bottom port of blow-down chamber 40 by compressor 24. Recycle conduit 48 is preferably provided with a high pressure UV/VIS detector 67 which indicates the level of equilibration between the supercritical fluid solvent and the back extraction solvent in blow-down chamber 40.
The solute-depleted solvent may then be discharged from the system via low-pressure vessel 46 and traps 62, 64 by opening valve V-11, and regulating back-pressure valve V-15 and metering valve V-16. The back extraction buffer may then be recovered from blow-down chamber 40.
Traps 62, 64 may be rinsed with appropriate solvents and then cleaned, dried and returned to service. Thereafter, soaking chamber 10 will be depressurized by first opening valve V-11, and then rapidly opening V-7. The disrupted microbial slurry then will be collected from the various chambers as described above in connection with FIG. 1.
The solvent may be circulated through the soaking chamber 10 and the blow-down chamber 40 prior to isolating the slurry and solvent extraction. After such circulation, soaking chamber 10 may be isolated, and the above-described depressurization and sample recovery procedures repeated. This alternate method will allow investigation into whether or not the solvation of lipids and hydrophobic compounds in the solvent is capacity and/or time sensitive.
The apparatus in FIG. 2 also has the flexibility to handle solvents which are more dense than the microbial slurry. In this instance, the flow directions may be reversed so that the blow-down chamber 40 acts as the soaking chamber and the soaking chamber 10 acts as the blow-down chamber.
An embodiment of the apparatus of the invention intended for industrial use is shown in FIG. 3. The apparatus of FIG. 3 is designed for continuous operation. The apparatus includes a mixing chamber 70 in the form of an elongated cylinder having an inlet end 72 and outlet end 74. Disposed centrally throughout the mixing chamber 70 is a static mixer 76. The static mixer 76 mixes the microbial slurry 54 and the solvent 22 as the mixture is directed continuously from the inlet end 72 to the outlet end 74 of the mixing chamber 70. The mixing chamber 70 is jacketed and interfaced with a temperature control loop 78 which recovers the heat of compression of the solvent as well as any heat transferred from fermenters and centrifuges. The temperature control loop 78, of course, is capable of maintaining the contents of the mixing chamber 70 at a preset temperature.
A slurry conduit 80 for introducing a slurry of cells into the mixing chamber 70 communicates with the inlet end 72. A high-pressure slurry pump 82 is connected to the slurry conduit 80 for pumping the slurry of cells under pressure into the mixing chamber 70. A solvent conduit 84 is in fluid communication with the slurry conduit 80 downstream of the slurry pump 82. A compressor 86 is provided along the solvent conduit 84 for raising the pressure of the solvent 22 and of the mixture within the mixing chamber 70 to critical pressures and above. A discharge conduit 88 leads from the outlet end 74 of the mixing chamber 70 to a blow-down chamber 90. A back pressure regulator or valve 87 is placed along the discharge conduit 88 between the mixing chamber 70 and the blow-down chamber 90 for continuously releasing the pressure on the slurry of cells exiting from the mixing chamber 70.
The blow-down chamber 90 is constructed and arranged to allow effective gravity separation of the solvent and the disrupted microbial slurry. In the embodiment shown, the lower end of the blow-down chamber 90 is funnel-shaped for collecting the disrupted cells. At the bottom of The funnel is an exit port 91. A liquid level control valve 92 is attached at the bottom exit port of the blow-down chamber 90 for controlling the liquid level within the blow-down chamber. Material may be collected at this port 91 or recycled via slurry recycle conduit 94 to the slurry conduit 80 upstream of the slurry pump 82.
A solvent recycle conduit 96 fluidly connects the upper exit of the blow-down chamber 90 to the solvent conduit 84, upstream of the compressor 86. Another back-pressure regulator 93 is located on the solvent recycle conduit 96 for controlling the pressure within the blow-down chamber 90.
Heat exchangers 98 are located just downstream of the solvent compressor 86 and the slurry pump 82 to regulate the temperature of solvent leaving the compressor. The temperature control loop 78 also controls the heat exchangers 98.
In operation, a microbial cell slurry 54 may be fed directly from fermenters or centrifuges into the apparatus of FIG. 3. The slurry 54 is pumped with the high-pressure slurry pump 82 into the mixing chamber 70. Recycled solvent and any necessary make-up solvent are compressed and added to the microbial cell slurry downstream of the slurry pump 82 and upstream of the mixing chamber 70. The mixture of cells and solvent then is introduced continuously into the mixing chamber 70 and the mixture passes from the inlet end to the outlet end while being continuously mixed. The mixture continuously exits from the mixing chamber 70. As it exits, it is rapidly expanded through the heated, pressure-reduction valve 87 and is tangentially ejected into the blow-down chamber 90. Once in the blow-down chamber 90, the disrupted microbial slurry settles to the bottom and the solvent 22 stays on top. The separated solvent then may be recycled and used again. The disrupted slurry may be collected or may be recycled to increase the average residence time through the mixing chamber 70.
The pressure of the blow-down chamber may be maintained at pressures ranging from atmospheric to that of the mixing chamber. For a dominant coloration or permeability improvement mechanism, the pressure in the blow-down chamber 90 may be maintained at pressures relatively close to the operating pressures of the mixing chamber 70.
The continuous flow apparatus also may include a soaking chamber between the mixing chamber 70 and the blow-down chamber 90. Such a soaking chamber 100 will allow for a longer exposure time between the SCF solvent and the microbial cells; the soaking chamber may also accommodate mechanical mixers 102 to further facilitate the saturation of each microbial cell with SCF solvent. The soaking chamber can be bypassed by allowing the mixture of supercritical fluid and microbial slurry to flow directly from the mixing chamber 70 to blowdown chamber 90 via bypass loop 105.
Using the apparatus shown in FIG. 1 and described above, several organisms and several solvents were tested according to the invention. The organisms tested were: (1) E. coli, a Gram-negative bacterium; (2) Bacillus subtilis, a Gram-positive bacterium; and (3) Saccharomyces Cerevesiae (Baker's Yeast), a fungus.
E. coli. The E. coli was obtained from the E. coli genetic stock center, maintained by the Yale University School of Medicine (Culture No. 4401). Stock cultures of E. coli are maintained on agar slants at 420 C., and are transferred monthly.
The inoculum was prepared by streaking one loopful of cells from an agar slant onto an LB plate and grown up overnight. Individual colonies from this plate were used to inoculate 500 ml shake flasks containing 50 ml of medium. Shake flasks were grown up overnight at 37° C. on a rotary shaker operating at 200 rpm. After microscopic examination of the broth to ensure that no obvious contamination was present, the contents of the 500 ml shake flasks were transferred to 4,000 ml shake flasks containing 500 ml of medium. 4,000 ml shake flasks were similarly cultivated on the rotary shaker until cells reached mid-exponential phase (about 300 Klett units), whereupon the contents of one flask were used as inoculum for bench scale fermentation after again examining the culture microscopically.
Fermentations were started with 4.4% (v/v) inoculum in 11.5 liters of working volume. Fermentations were conducted at 16.7 psig, 37° C. and a pH of 7.0 in a 14 liter Chemap LF fermenter, and were run fed-batch with respect to glycerol. The pH of the material was controlled through the automatic addition of concentrated ammonium hydroxide when broth pH, as monitored by a sterilizable Ingold pH electrode, fell below pH 6.9. The aeration rate was maintained at 11 slpm (approximately 1 volume of gas per volume of liquid per minute). The agitation rate, initially 700 rpm, was gradually increased to 1,000 rpm during the course of fermentation so as to keep the partial pressure of oxygen in the bulk liquid phase 10% above air saturation values in order to avoid oxygen transfer limitations. The partial pressure of oxygen in the broth was monitored with the use of a galvanic oxygen electrode, and a Perkin-Elmer Mass Spectrometer was used for online analysis of inlet and exit gas compositions. Hourly samples were also taken for subsequent off-line analysis. Cell mass was determined using a Klett-Summerson Colorimeter calibrated to actual dry cell weight. Reversed phase HPLC employing a differential refractometer was used to determine broth composition.
Upon adequate biomass production, as inferred from cell mass measurements made on offline broth samples, the temperature set point of the fermenter was reduced to 20° C. Within 5 minutes of changing the temperature setpoint, the temperature of the broth fell to 21° C. and the metabolic activity of the culture (as seen by online gas data) was essentially suspended. The vessel contents where were harvested into a 20 liter Nalgene carboy. This carboy, fitted with an exhaust spigot at the base, was immediately placed at 4° C. After overnight gravity sedimentation of approximately 11 liters of biomass, the concentrated (sedimented) cell suspension--about 3 liters--at the bottom of the carboy was transferred through the exhaust spigot into large centrifuge tubes (each with a working volume of 250 ml) for centrifugation. Balanced samples were then centrifuged for 20 minutes at 5,000 rpm in a Sorvall 5B refrigerated centrifuge operating between 4° C. and 10° C. After decanting the supernatant, cell paste (occupying about 40 ml of the original 250 ml) was manually removed from the centrifuge tubes and stored at 4° C. The final concentration of the E. coli cell slurry was 275 grams dry cell weight per liter (g DCW/1).
Saccharomyces Cerevisiae Baker's yeast was aerobically grown in a fed-batch mode with glucose as the only limiting nutrient at a temperature of 30° C. and a pH of 5.0. Dissolved gas was kept above 15% through appropriate increase of air flow and agitation. Glucose was fed continuously; the glucose flow was determined by a computer control strategy which avoids ethanol production and keeps the specific growth rate around 0.22 l/hr. Ammonia was used as the nitrogen source and was fed as needed vis-a-vis a pH controller. The final cell density reached at the moment of harvesting was 51 grams dry cell weight per liter (g DCW/1).
The cells were harvested after cooling down the fermenter to 22° C., whereupon 3,200 ml of broth was collected for gravity sedimentation. After 48 hours, the supernatant was withdrawn and 1,200 ml of concentrated suspension was collected. The concentrated suspension contained approximately 136.0 g DCW/1 since gravity sedimentation concentrated the suspension by a factor of 2.67.
Bacillus Subtilis. Cultures of B. subtilis were obtained from the ATCC, Rockville, Md. (Bacillus subtilis, ATCC No. 21394). Stock cultures were maintained on Schaeffer sporulation agar (Schaeffer et al., 1965). To develop an inoculum, spores from a plate of Schaeffer sporulation agar were transferred to a plate of DIFCO nutrient agar in order for the spores to germinate into vegetative cells. A single colony was then transferred to a test tube containing 10 ml of the growth medium. After overnight growth, the 10 ml culture was used to inoculate a 900 ml culture growth medium. Growth was then continued until the 900 ml culture reached 200 Klett units, whereupon the culture was used to inoculate the main 12 liter fermenter. Microscopic observations were conducted at all stages of transfer to ensure that a pure culture was achieved.
Fermentation medium was designed to keep sporulation to a minimum. The fermentation was conducted at 34° C. and at a pH of 7.0. The pH of the material was controlled by the automatic addition of NaOH whenever the pH dropped below 6.85. The working volume, of approximately 11 liters, was supplied with air at a rate of one vvm (volume of air/volume of fermenter per minute) and continuously agitated at 500 rpm. After 13 hours of fermentation, the cell culture was harvested with a concentration of 4.8 g/l dry cell weight. At the time of harvest, the cells were estimated to have finished exponential growth and to be entering the stationary phase. No spores were detected by microscopic examination and cell lysis had not occurred to any significant extent.
After harvest, the culture was cooled to 4° C. and allowed to settle under gravity for three days. The concentrated cell suspension at the bottom of the carboy was then transferred to smaller containers. This post harvest concentration step yielded a dry cell weight concentration of 15 g DCW/1. The suspension was divided up into six aliquots (approximately 250 ml each) and centrifuged at 1,300 rpm for one hour at temperatures between 4° C. and 10° C. This centrifugation produced a light pellet which permitted most (95%) of the supernatant to be poured off easily before resuspending the pellet by vortexing. Upon combining all resuspended material, the final volume of the concentrated suspension was approximately 250 ml. To obtain more cell suspension, another 1,500 ml of dilute suspension was centrifuged at the same conditions for 30 minutes. Upon collection of the supernatant, the pelleted material from this centrifugation was resuspended and combined with the gravity sedimented and centrifuged cell slurry to give a final volume of concentrated cell suspension of approximately 300 ml. After mixing, duplicate 2.5 ml samples were taken for DCW analysis. The final concentration of the B. subtilis slurry was 93.3 g DCW/1.
Analytic Techniques. For E. coli and Baker's yeast, chilled samples of feed and product were centrifuged for 20 minutes at 3,000 rpm; the B. subtilis samples were centrifuged for 40 minutes at 3,000 rpm.
Total protein content of appropriately diluted samples of the supernatants was measured using a bicinchoninic acid (BCA) assay kit supplied by the Pierce Chemical Company, Rockford, Ill. In the BCA analysis, the protein molecule reduces cuprous ion in an alkaline medium to its cupric form which complexes the BCA into a purple reaction product which shows strong absorbance at 562 nm. Bovine serum albumin (BSA) was used as the protein standard using a 2 hour, room temperature incubation protocol. When measuring protein recovered from the disruption of E. coli cells, the BCA assay was relatively linear with concentration for a mixture of proteins.
UV absorbance of the suoernatant solutions were measured at 260 nm and 280 nm. Measured ratios of absorbance at 260 nm and 280 nm were approximately 2.0±10%. This ratio indicates that the absorptivity measurements primarily reflect the presence of nucleic acids since they have a peak absorbance at 260 nm which is approximately twice that at 280 nm. Proteins in the supernatant will also contribute to the absorptivity measurements since their peak absorbance is at 280 nm which is, at least for insulin, about 60% greater than their absorbance at 260 nm. Their contribution is, however, reduced because the specific absorbance of proteins is about 10 times less than the specific absorbance of nucleic acids, and may actually account for most of the ±10% in the ratio of absorbance at 260 and 280 nm. Absorbance at 260 nm and 280 nm thus were used as measures of the amount of nucleic acids present in the supernatants of the microbial cell slurries.
Enzymatic activities of alkaline phosphatase and glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase (G-6-PDH) were measured in selected supernatant samples. Alkaline phosphate was determined from the hydrolyric cleavage of p-nitrophenyl phosphate into p-nitrophenol which, in an alkaline medium, is converted to a yellow complex readily measured at 420 nm. Alkaline phosphatase assays were conducted with a kit purchased from the Sigma Chemical Co., St. Louis, Mo. G-6-PDH was measured by following the rate of formation of nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide hydrogen phosphate (NADPH) as an increase in UV absorbance at 340 nm. G-6-PDH reduces nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide phosphate (NADP) to NADPH in the presence of glucose-6-phosphate. G-6-PDH was measured using a Sigma Chemical kit.
Visible and ultraviolet absorbance measurements were made with a UV/VIS narrow bandwidth spectrophotometer (Model No. 100-10), manufactured by Hitachi, Tokyo, Japan.
All protein assays except one early assay involving E. coli (Example 4) were completed within hours (usually 2 to 4 but never more than 24) of test run completion since time studies suggested some aging effects after 48 hours for samples stored at 4° C. All nucleic acids and enzyme assays were conducted within 0.25 to 2 hours of test completion. All samples were stored at 4° C. before assays and before microscopic examination.
The solvents selected are gases at ambient conditions. For such solvents, when the critical pressure conditions are discontinued and ambient temperature and pressure suddenly resumed, a gaseous, high volume state is achieved. In addition, solvents were selected to have critical temperatures close to the optimal growth conditions of the cell cultures selected. This allowed the critical conditions to be achieved at a temperature nondestructive to the cells of their contents. Gaseous solvents such as N 2 with very low critical temperatures are not recommended because their supercritical or near critical densities at near ambient temperatures are not large enough to facilitate cell disruption and extraction by explosive disruption and permeability enhancement mechanisms.
The primary supercritical fluids tested were nitrous oxide (N 2 O), carbon dooxide (CO 2 ) and nitrogen (N 2 ). Nitrous oxide was tested because of its polarity (0.2) and its critical temperature of 36.4° C., which is just about equal to the optimal growth temperatures of E. coli (37.0° C.), Baker's yeast (30.0° C.), and B. subtilis (34.0° C.). CO 2 was tested also because of its desirable critical temperature (31.0° C.) and further because of its low cost, nontoxicity, and nonflammability. Two tests were conducted with ethylene, primarily because of its low critical temperature of 9.2° C. The effectiveness of N 2 O and CO 2 was measured against N 2 , the gas which is used in most conventional explosive decompression processes.
In the following examples, tests were conducted using the apparatus of FIG. 1 as described above. Unless otherwise stated, the concentration of E. coli was 69 g DCW/1; the concentration of B. subtilis was 93 g DCW/1; and the concentration of Baker's yeast was 68 g DCW/1.
EXAMPLE 1
The solvents N 2 O, CO 2 and N 2 were tested for their efficacy in the supercritical microbial disruption of E. coli. Each test was conducted at a fixed temperature of 40° C. and a recirculation or exposure time of 25 minutes. Each solvent was tested at various pressures ranging from about 1400 psig to about 4900 psig. The recoveries of nucleic acids and of protein are respectively shown in FIGS. 4 and 5. N 2 O was the most effective solvent for recovering nucleic acids, being about twice as effective as either CO 2 or N 2 . Using N 2 O, the maximum recovery as a percentage of the total amount of nucleic acids present (yield) was about 50%. Using N 2 , the yield was about 26%, and using CO 2 , the yield was about 21%. For protein recovery, both N 2 O and N 2 were at least four times as effective as CO 2 , with N 2 slightly better than N 2 O.
Thus, for E. coli N 2 O is the preferred solvent and CO 2 is relatively ineffective at the stated experimental conditions. N 2 O is a nonhomologous solvent for E. coli in that N 2 O is not involved in the biosynthetic pathway of E. coli.
EXAMPLE 2
The solvents N 2 O, CO 2 and N 2 were tested for their efficacy in the supercritical microbial disruption of B. subtilis. Each test was conducted at a fixed temperature of 40° C. and a fixed pressure of about 5100 psig. Recirculation or exposure time was about 2 hours. The recovery of nucleic acids and protein is set forth in FIG. 6. N 2 O again was the most effective solvent for both nucleic acids and protein recovery. For nucleic acids recovery, N 2 O was about 11 times effective as CO 2 and about 3.5 times as effective as N 2 . For protein recovery, N 2 O was about twice as effective as CO 2 and was infinitely more effective than N 2 .
EXAMPLE 3
The solvents N 2 O, CO 2 and N 2 were tested for their efficacy in the supercritical microbial disruption of S. cerevisiae. Each test was conducted at a fixed temperature of 40° C., a fixed pressure of about 4500 psig and a fixed recirculation time of about 25 minutes. The recovery of nucleic acids and protein is set forth in FIG. 7. N 2 O and CO 2 performed equivalently for nucleic acids and for protein recovery. Both of the solvents were more effective than N 2 (about 4 times as effective for recovery of both nucleic acids and protein).
EXAMPLE 4
Because N 2 O performed about as well or better than CO 2 and N 2 in the recovery of nucleic acids and protein from all organisms tested, N 2 O was used in tests regarding optimal pressure, temperature and recirculation times for the apparatus used (described herein as FIG. 1).
The effect of pressure on the supercritical microbial disruption of E. coli using N 2 O was tested. The temperature and recirculation time were fixed at 40° C. and 25 minutes, respectively. Pressure was varied from about 1100 psig to 4800 psig. As pressure increased, the recovery of nucleic acids and protein also increased (FIG. 8). However, the relationship is a decaying one with a maximum recovery leveling off around 5000 psig.
The effect of pressure on the supercritical microbial disruption of Baker's yeast using N 2 O was also tested. The temperature and recirculation time were fixed at 40° C. and 25 minutes respectively. Pressure was varied from about 1100 psig to 4800 psig. As pressure increased, the recovery of nucleic acids and protein also increased (FIG. 9). However, the relationship was more linear than that for E. coli, indicating that higher pressures may result in even higher recovery efficiencies.
EXAMPLE 5
The effect of recirculation or exposure time on the supercritical fluid microbial disruption of E. coli using N 2 O was tested. The temperature and pressure were fixed at 40° C. and 1200 psig respectively. Recirculation time was varied from 10 minutes to 118 minutes. The relationship between recirculation time and nucleic acids and protein recovery was positive and almost linear (FIG. 10). Nucleic acids recovery increased from 12.6% at 10 minutes recirculation to 55.6% at 118 minutes. Protein recovery increased from 3.5% at 10 minutes recirculation time to 21.1% at 118 minutes.
The recovery efficiencies at 1200 psig and 2 hours recirculation time are similar to those observed for E. coli using higher pressures (4800 psig) but lower recirculation times (25 minutes). This suggests that within certain constraints, longer recirculation times may be substituted for higher pressures and that yield is being controlled by mass diffusion of solvent into the cells.
EXAMPLE 6
The effect of recirculation or exposure time on the supercritical microbial disruption of B. subtilis using N 2 O was tested. Temperature and pressure were fixed at 40° C. and about 5000 psig respectively. Recirculation time was varied from 21 minutes to 122 minutes. The relationship between recirculation time and nucleic acids and protein recovery was positive, and almost linear (FIG. 11). Nucleic acids recovery increased from 21.4% at 21 minutes to 70.7% at 122 minutes. Protein recovery increased from 0% at 21 minutes to 41.3% at 122 minutes.
EXAMPLE 7
The effect of recirculation or exposure time on the supercritical microbial disruption of Baker's yeast using N 2 O was tested. Temperature and pressure were fixed at 40° C. and about 4700 psig respectively. Recirculation time was varied from about 15 minutes to 122 minutes. The relationship between recirculation time and nucleic acids and protein recovery was asymptotic, with a maximum recovery beginning to level off at about 50 minutes. The nucleic acids recovery increased from 82% at 15 minutes to about 90% at about 122 minutes. The protein recovery increased from 17% at 15 minutes to 28.9% at 122 minutes.
The need for longer recirculation time for E. coli and B. subtilis may result because mixing may be more efficient in contacting and saturating a single large cell (Baker's yeast) than in saturating an equivalent volume of smaller ones (E. coli and B. subtilis). The mass transfer limiting step may be diffusion of the solvent through the aqueous phase and into the outer membrane of the cell wall.
EXAMPLE 8
The effect of cell concentration on supercritical microbial disruption of E. coli using N 2 O was tested. Cell suspensions were prepared in continuous fermenters and were concentrated by some combination of sedimentation, centrifugation and dewatering. To achieve desired cell concentrations, the microbial cell slurries were resuspended and buffered with the same pH, ionic composition (major ions) and molarity as the original growth medium to prevent osmotic lysis due to swelling or osmotic dehydration. Experiments were run at a fixed temperature of 40° C., fixed recirculation time of 25 minutes and a fixed pressure of about 1300 psig.
Microbial cell disruption efficiency, as measured by percentage change in protein and nucleic acids concentration, decreased rapidly as cell concentration increased (FIG. 13). Recovery of nucleic acids decreased from a high of 76.3% at 22.9 grams DCW/1 to a low of 15.9% at 91.7 grams DCW/1. Likewise, recovered protein decreased from a high of 42.7% at 22.9 DCW/1 to a low of 6.5% at 91.7 DCW/1.
EXAMPLE 9
The effect of cell concentration on supercritical microbial disruption of Baker's yeast using N 2 O was tested. The preparation of the cell suspensions and the conditions for the experiments were as described above in connection with Example 8. The nucleic acids recovery decayed quickly from highs approaching 100% at cell concentrations of 1.1 gram DCW/1 to lows of about 10% at 150 grams DCW/1 (FIG. 14). Protein recovery also decreased rapidly from a high of 55.5% at cell concentrations of 1.1 gram DCW/1 to about 10% at 150 gram DCW/1.
The cell concentration experiments on E. coli and Baker's yeast were conducted under moderate conditions (relatively low pressures and short recirculation times) in order to accentuate any effect of cell concentration. It is anticipated that increased pressures and recirculation times and/or more efficient mixing would reduce the levels of decay characteristic of examples 8 and 9.
EXAMPLE 10
The effect of temperature on supercritical microbial disruption of E. coli at a concentration of 39 grams DCW/1 using N 2 O was tested. Pressure was fixed about about 4900 psig. One set of experiments was run at 25 minutes recirculation time and another set was run at 125 minutes recirculation time. In each set of experiments, temperature was either just below critical temperatare or just above the critical temperature of N 2 O which is 36.4° C.
The change in temperature from just below critical temperature to just above critical temperature resulted in an extraordinary and surprising increase in the yield of nucleic acids, while little or no effect on the yield of protein resulted (FIG. 15).
It should be noted that the yield for both nucleic acids and protein at 40° C., At 4900 psig and at a recirculation time of 25 minutes differed greatly from that reported in example 1 above. This may be due to the cell culture and harvest condition differences. In the examples above, cells were harvested during log-phase growth, gravity sedimented at 4° C. overnight, centrifuged and then used. Here, cells were obtained 14 hours into fermentation as the cells approached their stationary phase and then stored at 4° C. for a week before harvesting and centrifugation. It is believed that for a maximum yield, log-phase cells should be employed.
EXAMPLE 11
The effect of temperature on the supercritical microbial disruption of B. subtilis using N 2 O was tested. The B. subtilis were at 62 grams DCW per liter. The pressure was fixed at about 4700 psig. and the recirculation time was fixed at 60 minutes. As shown in FIG. 16, recovery of both nucleic acids and protein increased dramatically when changing the temperature from just below critical temperature to just above critical temperature.
EXAMPLE 12
The effect of temperature on supercritical microbial disruption of Baker's yeast using N 2 O was tested. Pressure was fixed at about 1100 psig and recirculation time was fixed at 25 minutes. Temperature was varied from 20° C. to 70° C.
Nucleic acids and protein recoveries at temperatures below critical temperazure were about equal and increased gradually from 8.7% at 20° C. to about 20% at 35° C. Thereafter, there was a dramatic increase in the nucleic acids recovered, while the percentage of protein recovered increased only slightly with further increases in temperature (FIG. 17). Nucleic acids recovery peaked at 94.4% at a temperature of about 50° C.
EXAMPLE 13
The effect of temperature on supercritical microbial disruption of Baker's yeast using CO 2 , with a critical temperature of 31.0° C., was also tested. Pressure, recirculation time, and temperature all were varied.
The recovery of nucleic acids increased more rapidly than the recovery of proteins as critical temperature was reached (FIG. 18). Below critical temperature, the amount of nucleic acids recovery and protein recovery was about equal. However, at just 1° above critical temperature, the amount of nucleic acids recovered about doubled while the amount of protein recovered decreased slightly. These results suggest that the efficacy with which the cytoplasmic membrane is disrupted increases rapidly with temperature after the attainment of supercritical temperature.
EXAMPLE 14
The effect of temperature on the supercritical microbial disruption of Baker's yeast using ethylene, with a critical temperature of 9.2° C., was tested. Pressure and temperature were fixed at 1650 psig and about 2 hours respectively. Temperature was set at either 6° C. or 22° C. As shown in FIG. 19, the recovery of both nucleic acids and of protein greatly increased once ethylene's critical temperature of 9.2° C. was surpassed.
It is intended that all matter contained in the above description or shown in the accompanying drawings shall be interpreted in an illustrative and not a limiting sense.
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The invention involves the supercritical or near-critical fluid disruption of microbial cells and extraction of intracellular components. First, a solvent that is a gas at ambient conditions and that has a critical temperature of between 0° and 100° C. is selected. This solvent is brought to near-critical pressure or higher and to near-critical temperature. The solvent then is combined with a slurry of cells to saturate the cells with the solvent under the prescribed conditions. Next, the pressure is released to cause a pressure drop which results in partial disruption of the cell membrane and release of solvent and other materials from the cell. Novel apparatus and associated methods are provided for carrying out the foregoing process continuously.
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RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] This application claims priority to provisional application Ser. No. 60/531,703 filed Dec. 22, 2003 and incorporated herein by reference.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0002] A. Field of Invention
[0003] This application pertains to a dividing system for partitioning a room or closing off one side of the room or doorway and separate the room from another room or from the outside. The system includes one or more panels formed of two frames and an intermediate transparent or opaque member sandwiched therebetween.
[0004] B. Description of the Prior Art
[0005] Typically, rooms are either subdivided by a system of screens or panels. Many screens and panels have similar structures; they consist of a generally rectangular frame that provides most of the structural strength of the panel and have some sort of indentation used to hold and support a central intermediate element. In the case of screens, the intermediate member is either a stiff material, such as a grill, or a flexible material such as a mesh. On the other hand, the central element of a panel is a relatively rigid material that is frequently transparent, or at least translucent, such as a sheet of glass or plastic.
[0006] One problem with existing panels or screens is that the frame of the panel has to be strong and heavy to support the central member. However, esthetically, panels made of lighter and thinner materials are more desirable.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0007] A system of panels is disclosed that can be used as a room divider, as a door, etc. The system includes at least one panel formed of two superimposed frames and an intermediate member sandwiched between the frames. The intermediate member is made from a transparent or translucent material. Alternatively, the intermediate member is made of an opaque member, provided, optionally with decorative cutouts. The frames and the glazing have substantially identical dimensions. Means are also provided to join the frames and the glazing into single integral unit. These locking means include holes and complementary dowels, and/or double sided tapes.
[0008] The frames can be made of wood, a wood-based composite material, a plastic material or metal tubing.
[0009] The intermediate member may be a glazing made of glass, acrylic, etc, and preferably made with design elements to enhance its esthetic aspects. In one embodiment, panels of a system have different designs which, when superimposed, create a completely new and attractive design.
[0010] Preferably, the system can also be provided with a set of hook plates and stop plates attached to the panels. These plates are constructed and arranged so that the panels can be opened and closed selectively in a telescopic action.
[0011] The system may also include wheels mounted on the panels, the wheels engaging stationary rails. The system may also be provided with channels, or other guides for controlling the lateral movement of the panels.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0012] FIG. 1A shows a front elevational view of a panel constructed in accordance with this invention;
[0013] FIG. 1B shows a first enlarged side-elevational cross sectional view of the panel of FIG. 1A taken along line 1 B- 1 B in FIG. 1A ;
[0014] FIG. 1C shows a front elevational view of the frame member;
[0015] FIG. 1D shows a second enlarged side-elevational cross sectional view of the panel of FIG. 1A taken along line 1 D- 1 D in FIG. 1A ;
[0016] FIG. 2 shows an isometric exploded view of the panel of FIGS. 1A-1D ;
[0017] FIG. 3A shows a front elevational view of a hook plate for the panel of FIGS. 1 A-D and 2 ;
[0018] FIG. 3B shows a side elevational view of the hook plate of FIG. 3A ;
[0019] FIG. 3C shows a rear elevational view of the hook plate of FIGS. 3A and 3B ;
[0020] FIG. 4A shows a plan view of a stop plate used for the panel;
[0021] FIG. 4B shows a side sectional view of the stop plate of FIG. 4A ;
[0022] FIG. 4C shows a bottom view of the stop plate of FIGS. 4A and 4B ;
[0023] FIG. 5 shows a side sectional view of a plurality of panels in accordance with this invention;
[0024] FIG. 6A shows a bottom view of a plurality of panels in the open position;
[0025] FIG. 6B shows a top view of the panels of FIG. 6A in a partially closed position; and
[0026] FIG. 6C shows a top view of the panels of FIG. 6A in a completely closed position;
[0027] FIG. 7 -A-D shows top views of typical panel systems with a single panel;
[0028] FIGS. 8A-8F show top views of typical panel systems with two panels;
[0029] FIGS. 9A-8F show top views of typical panel systems with three panels;
[0030] FIGS. 10A-10E show top views of typical panel systems with four panels;
[0031] FIG. 11 show top views of a special panel system with six panels;
[0032] FIGS. 12 A-C show three panels with three different designs, and FIG. 12D show the three designs superimposed.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
[0033] Referring now to the drawings, and more particularly FIGS. 1 A-D, a panel 10 constructed in accordance with this invention includes a front frame 12 , a back frame 14 and an intermediate glazing 16 . Preferably the two frames 12 , 14 , are made from the same material, but they could be made of different materials as well. Some typical materials that could be used for frames 12 , 14 include solid, furniture grade wood, composite wood (such as plywood that is painted or covered with a natural or artificial veneer or a laminate material) acrylic, plastic, metal (aluminum—solid or tubular—) and other similar materials. The glazing could be made of glass, but preferably it is made of a plastic material such as an acrylic. A typical frame may be about 3″ wide and the panel may be about 48″ wide, 96″ high and 2″ thick, however, it may be made to any other dimensions as well. Typically, the glazing is about ¼: thick. As shown in the drawings, these three components have substantially the same dimensions, except at the bottom where the glazing 16 may be about ⅞″ shorter to form a groove 18 . This groove may be used to mount the panel on a floor guide (not shown).
[0034] As shown in FIG. 1C , on its inner surface, each frame 12 , 14 and glazing 16 are formed with a plurality of holes 20 and complementary dowels 22 . These holes 20 and dowels 22 are used as a means for securing the three components together. Dowels 22 can be made of wood, plastic, or other materials and typically have a diameter of ⅜ in. The dowels have several purposes: they align the frames and the glazing during assembly, and they hold the elements of the panel together. The clear double sided tape may also be used on the inner surfaces of the frames, as at 24 . The tape insures that the glazing and panels do not shift with respect to each other during assembly. The tape further holds the elements of the panel together.
[0035] The panel 10 is assembled as follows. A template (not shown) is made of stiff material such as MDF and has the required dimensions and ⅜″ holes made about a foot apart and 1½″ from the edge. For the frames, strips are cut from standard stock. The strips are edge-banded, sanded and finished with stain and/or other coating material. Four strips are attached at right angles, or butt-joined, using for example a Hoffman joining machine, to form each frame 12 , 14 . The frame 14 and the glazing 16 are placed on a worktable with template disposed on top of the glazing 16 . The bottom two elements are aligned and clamped to the table. The template is then used to drill holes 20 through the glazing and into the frame 14 . Each hole is about ⅝″ deep. The template is then reversed and used in a similar operation to drill holes in frame 12 in a mirror pattern. Alternatively, the glazing can be predrilled with the holes 20 and then used as the template for making the holes in the frames 12 , 14 .
[0036] Next, a protective cover from one side of a double sided 2¾″ tape 24 is removed and the exposed tape is applied all around the frame. The portions of the tape covering holes 20 are burned out (using, for instance, a hot glue gun nozzle) and the tape is then pressed by hand causing its adhesive to wet the frame. Next, dowels 22 with some glue are inserted in all the holes 20 . The protective cover from the second side of the tape is removed.
[0037] Typically, the glazing 16 is covered with a protective sheet. This sheet is now removed on one side, at least around the glazing perimeter, thus exposing the actual glazing surface. The glazing 16 is then lowered over the dowels 22 so that the glazing surface comes into contact with the tape 24 and is secured in this manner to frame 14 . Next, some glue is applied to the dowels 22 and/or holes 20 in frame 12 , the protective sheet from the other side of the glazing 16 is removed and tape is applied to the second frame 12 . The frame 12 is then lowered over the glazing 16 thereby securing the glazing to the second frame 12 as well. In order to insure proper adhesion, the frames are pressed together by hand and by a 130 psi continuous air clamp (not shown). The air clamp squeezes all the layers together, one side at a time. It may be applied for five seconds on each side. The resulting panel 10 can be shipped, stored or hardware can be applied to it, as described below.
[0038] The panel may have other configurations as well, and may be assembled by using other techniques. For example, in one embodiment, the glazing is replaced by a core having approximately the same thickness, but being made of an opaque material, such as solid wood, composite wood, plastic or aluminum sheets, and so on. Moreover, the intermediate element is opaque, holes or cutouts may be provided therein, having different geometric shapes.
[0039] In a somewhat preferred embodiment, the panel is made by first making the required holes in the intermediate element, be it a transparent or an opaque element. The intermediate element is then used instead of a template to make the holes in the frames 12 , 14 .
[0040] The process for making the panel 10 could be altered in other ways as well. For example, the frames 12 , 14 can be made from strips that have been mitered and then joined in a normal manner. Moreover, depending on the materials used for the frames, the frames can be painted, or covered with a low pressure molded laminate skin (not shown).
[0041] Once the panel 10 is finished it can be used in various configurations as described in more detail below. If necessary, the panel can be hung on a standard sliding system. For example, as shown in FIG. 5 , a plurality of panels 10 A, 10 B, and 10 C can be secured to an overhead track system as follows. First, each panel 10 receives a plurality of rods 50 , each rod being provided with a pair of wheels 52 . Also provided are a plurality of rails 54 attached to the top wall 56 of the opening to be closed with the panels. The panels 10 A-C are dimensioned so that they fit between this top wall 56 and the flooring 58 . The panels can now be moved along the railings 52 . They can be left floating over the flooring, and a guide bar (not shown) can be secured to the flooring so that it can extend into the groove 18 .
[0042] Alternatively, if the panels are left floating, then they can be provided with some additional hardware that interlocks the panels and allows them to be moved in a telescopic manner. The hardware to accomplish this mode of operation includes a hook-plate 70 and a stop plate 80 . As shown in FIGS. 3A-3C , the hook plate 70 includes base 72 with a plurality of beveled holes 74 used to mount the hook plate 70 to the panel. Attached to the base 70 , there is an arm 76 formed of an extension 78 , collinear plate 72 and a member 79 . As can be seen in FIG. 6A , the hook plate is attached along the bottom surface of the panels with the member 79 extending into groove 18 .
[0043] Stop plates 80 have a generally rectangular shape and have two holes 82 . They are also attached to the bottom of the panels 10 .
[0044] The hook plate 70 and stop plate 80 is made of a ¾″ by 3″ cold rolled steel stock or other similar materials.
[0045] The telescoping operation is now described in conjunction with FIGS. 6A-6C . In FIG. 6A , the three panels 10 A, 10 B, 10 C are aligned so that they completely overlap. As seen in the Figure, panel 10 A has a hook plate 70 A, panel 10 B has a hook plate 70 B and a stop plate 80 B and panel 10 C has two stop plates 80 C 1 and 80 C 2 . This is the open or consolidated position of the panels. In this position, the hook plate 70 A is abutting hook plate 70 B, and hook plate 70 B is abutting stop plate 80 C 2 . Thus, base 72 on hook plate 70 B acts as a stop for the hook plate 70 A.
[0046] Next, system can be closed by pulling panel 10 C to the right. As the panel 10 C moves to the right, it is maintained stable by the member 79 riding in groove 18 . The other two panels 10 A, 10 B remain stationary until the stop 80 C 1 reaches the hook plate 70 B. Once stop 80 C 1 contacts hook plate 70 B, further motion of the panel 10 C to the right causes the panel 10 B to start moving to the right as well, as shown in FIG. 6B . The position in FIG. 6B is a partially closed position.
[0047] The panels 10 C, 10 B continue moving to the right until the stop 80 B contacts hook 70 A. Preferably, panel 70 A is anchored in place to keep it from moving. This is the closed position of the system. Each panel maintains each position and does not flop with respect to the other panels because of the engagement between member 79 of the hook plates 70 and the groove 18 of the adjacent panels.
[0048] Systems with panels constructed in this manner can be used in various configurations, and for various purposes. Moreover, systems can be made that include from one to six panels, or even more panels, depending on the size and weight of the desired design. FIGS. 7A-7D , 8 A- 8 F , 9 A- 9 C, 10 A- 10 E and 11 show just some of these systems. FIGS. 7A-7D show systems with a single panel 10 AA, 10 BB, 10 CC, 10 DD. The panel could form a sliding door ( FIG. 7A ), a door that fits into a pocket 90 ( FIG. 7B ), a fixed door ( FIG. 7C ), or a hinged door ( FIG. 7D ).
[0049] FIGS. 8A-8E show various similar configurations for two panel systems. FIG. 8F shows two panels 10 AB, 10 BA that are hinged to each other so that they can be folded.
[0050] FIGS. 9A-9C show three-panel systems can slide with respect to each other, or can be folded ( FIG. 9C ).
[0051] FIGS. 10A-10E show four-panel systems. The four panels can be connected end-to-end so that they can opened telescopically ( FIG. 10B ) all at once, or they are coupled two-by-two so that they can be opened from the center, either telescopically ( FIGS. 10A, 10C , 10 D) or by folding ( FIG. 10E ).
[0052] Finally, FIG. 11 shows a six-panel system that can be opened from the center.
[0053] The configurations shown in FIGS. 8-11 are provided merely as illustrative examples. Obviously, panels may be assembled in many other variations as well.
[0054] One of the advantages of the invention is that different esthetic designs can be achieved as the panels are opened and closed. For example, FIGS. 12A-12C show three different panels, each having a unique design as seen when the panels are disposed side by side. FIG. 12D show how, when the panels are in superimposed position, the three designs are also superimposed creating a new design.
[0055] As shown in FIG. 5 , for at least some of the systems, the panels are provided with wheels that can engage stationary railings. Thus, the panels can be hung from the railings and moved back and forth, as desired. In addition, in some systems, other means are provided, if necessary to limit the lateral movement of the panels. These means may include floor channels disposed on the sides of the panels. The means may also include either a single elongated rail that extends into the groove 18 . This embodiment, of course, is applicable only in configurations with panels that do not have stop or hook plates. In another embodiment, pins are provided in the panels that expand downwardly to engage a groove or other similar guide formed in the floor below the panels.
[0056] Obviously, numerous modifications may be made to this invention without departing from its scope as defined in the appended claims.
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A system of panels is described that is used as a room divider and or door. The system includes at least one panel formed of two frames sandwiching an intermediate member made of an opaque or a light transmissive glazing, the frames and intermediate member having substantially identical dimensions and being superimposed. Locking means are also provided that are used to open and close several panels in a telescopic manner.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a cable car system having two pairs of supporting cables that are anchored in a valley station and in a mountain station and along which cabins that are coupled to a self-contained traction cable can be moved. It is thereby possible to decouple the cabins from the traction cable, to be moved in the stations along guide rails.
Prior art cable car systems of this type have two pairs of supporting cables which are anchored in the valley station and in the mountain station and along which cabins can be moved. The cabins are provided with traveling mechanisms which are assigned to the two supporting cables of the pairs. Along the route, the movement of the cabins takes place by means of a self-contained conveying cable which is guided in the stations over a driving pulley, over reversing pulleys and over deflecting pulleys and to which the cabins are coupled when they leave one of the stations and from which the cabins are decoupled when they enter a station. The movement of the cabins in the stations takes place by means of deceleration wheels, conveying wheels and acceleration wheels which are arranged in the stations.
In the case of systems of this type, the tensile load of that strand of the traction cable to which the cabins traveling uphill are coupled increases from the valley station to the mountain station, the tensile load in the region of the mountain station being multiplied in comparison with the tensile load in the region of the valley station. The tensile load of that strand of the traction cable to which the cabins traveling downhill are coupled drops sharply in an analogous manner from the mountain station to the valley station.
According to the international CEN standards (CEN, European Committee for Standardization), the safety of the traction cable has to be at least 4.5, but it may not exceed 20. The reason for this maximum value is that the durability of the splice is not ensured by an excessive relaxing of the traction cable. This state of affairs means that limits are placed on the difference in the vertical positions of the cable car stations of a cable car system and on the number of cabins in the system. Those limits cannot be exceeded with conventional cable car technology.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is accordingly an object of the invention to provide a cable car system, which overcomes the above-mentioned disadvantages of the heretofore-known devices and methods of this general type and which makes it possible to increase the height difference between the valley station and the mountain station without the conveying capacity of the system being reduced as a result.
With the foregoing and other objects in view there is provided, in accordance with the invention, a cable car system, comprising:
two pairs of supporting cables respectively anchored in a valley station and in a mountain station; a self-contained traction cable formed with two loops substantially extending between the valley station and the mountain station, the traction cable having two strands commonly moving in a direction towards the valley station and two strands commonly moving in a direction towards the mountain station; a plurality of cabins with coupling devices for coupling the cabins to the traction cable for movement along the supporting cables, and for decoupling the cabins from the traction cable for movement along guide rails respectively disposed in the valley station and in the mountain station.
In other words, the objects of the invention are achieved by the fact that the self-contained traction cable is formed with two loops. That is, it has two strands in each case which are moved in the same direction and to which the cabins can be coupled.
The two supporting cables of the respective pairs of supporting cables are preferably situated at a distance from each other which is greater than the width of the cabins, it being possible for the cabins to be moved between the two supporting cables of one of the pairs in each case, and the two strands of the traction cable, which strands are moved in the same direction, are also situated at a distance from each other which is greater than the width of the cabins, the cabins being situated between the respective two strands of the traction cable. In particular, the strands of the traction cable are situated transversely with respect to the direction of movement of the cabins between the cabins and the two supporting cables of one pair of the supporting cables in each case. Furthermore, the two supporting cables of one of the pairs can be connected to each other by means of bars which are situated above the same and are arranged at a distance from one another, these bars connecting the two supporting cables of a pair being fastened to the supporting cables from the lower side thereof by means of clamps. Furthermore, supporting rollers for the traction cable are preferably mounted on the bars.
Furthermore, the coupling apparatuses which are arranged on the suspension bars for the cabins can preferably be pivoted about an axis lying in the direction of movement of the traction cable in order to couple them to the strands of the traction cable, and the coupling apparatuses which are arranged on the suspension bars for the cabins can be pivoted about axes lying transversely with respect to the direction of movement of the traction cable and approximately horizontally in order to couple the same to the two strands of the traction cable. According to one preferred embodiment, the two strands of the traction cable, which strands are moved in the same direction, are guided along the route next to each other at approximately the same height, and, in one of the two stations, firstly, two deflecting pulleys, over which the respectively outer strand of the traction cable is guided, are provided and, secondly, a driving pulley having two cable grooves for all of the strands of the traction cable is provided, and in the other station the respectively inner strands of the traction cable are guided over a reversing pulley and the outer strands of the traction cable are guided over two mutually assigned deflecting pulleys.
Furthermore, the coupling apparatuses which are arranged on the supporting bars for the cabins are preferably designed with upwardly protruding supporting rollers which are assigned supporting surfaces which are situated on supports for hold-down rollers and along which the supporting rollers can be moved, as a result of which the coupling clamps can be lifted off the hold-down rollers in the vicinity thereof.
Other features which are considered as characteristic for the invention are set forth in the appended claims.
Although the invention is illustrated and described herein as embodied in a cable car system, it is nevertheless not intended to be limited to the details shown, since various modifications and structural changes may be made therein without departing from the spirit of the invention and within the scope and range of equivalents of the claims.
The construction and method of operation of the invention, however, together with additional objects and advantages thereof will be best understood from the following description of specific embodiments when read in connection with the accompanying drawings.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is a schematic axonometric view of a cable car system according to the invention;
FIG. 2 is a vertical section taken through a valley station of the cable car system;
FIG. 2A is a plan view thereof;
FIG. 3 is a vertical section taken through a mountain station of the cable car system;
FIG. 3A is a plan view thereof;
FIG. 4 is a side view showing the profile of the supporting cables and the traction cable in the vicinity of the mounting station;
FIG. 4A is a side view showing the profile of the supporting cables and the traction cable in the vicinity of the valley station;
FIG. 5 is a front view of a cable car cabin that can be moved along two supporting cables by way of two strands of the traction cable;
FIG. 5A is a side view thereof;
FIG. 5B is a front view of a variant embodiment of the cable car cabin of FIG. 5 ;
FIG. 6 is a detail view of the clamping mechanism with the cabin clamped onto the traction cable in the region of supporting rollers; and
FIG. 6A is a similar view showing the clamped cabin in the region of holding-down rollers.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
Referring now to the figures of the drawing in detail and first, particularly, to FIG. 1 thereof, there is shown a cable car system according to the invention with two pairs of supporting cables 1 , 1 a and 2 , 2 a . The pairs are disposed at the same height (i.e., level) and are anchored in the valley station 10 and in the mountain station 20 . The two pairs of supporting cables 1 , 1 a and 2 , 2 a are assigned a single, self-contained traction cable 3 which has two upwardly moving strands 3 a , 3 b and two downwardly moving strands 3 c and 3 d . The upwardly moving strands 3 a , 3 b are assigned to the supporting cables 1 , 1 a and the downwardly moving strands 3 c , 3 d are assigned to the supporting cables 2 , 2 a.
In the mountain station 20 , the strand 3 a of the traction cable 3 is guided over a deflecting pulley 31 having a horizontal axis of rotation and over a deflecting pulley 32 having a vertical axis of rotation and over a driving pulley 33 having two cable grooves situated one above the other. The strand 3 a merges there into the strand 3 c which is guided over a deflecting pulley 31 a having a horizontal axis. In the valley station 10 , the strand 3 c is guided over a deflecting pulley 34 a having a horizontal axis and over a reversing pulley 36 having a vertical axis, the strand 3 c merging there into the strand 3 b which is guided over a deflecting pulley 34 having a horizontal axis. In the mountain station 20 , the strand 3 b is guided over a second deflecting pulley 31 to the second cable groove of the driving pulley 33 where it merges into the strand 3 d which is guided over a deflecting pulley 32 a having a vertical axis and a second deflecting pulley 31 a having a horizontal axis. In the valley station 10 , the strand 3 d is guided over a second deflecting pulley 34 a having a horizontal axis and over two deflecting pulleys 35 and 35 a having vertical axes, the strand 3 d then merging into the strand 3 a which is guided over a second deflecting pulley 34 .
This manner of guiding the traction cable 3 means that the latter is self-contained, the strands 3 a and 3 b being moved upward and the strands 3 c and 3 d being moved downward and all of the strands of the traction cable 3 having the same speed. The traction cable 3 is moved by the drive pulley 33 .
Referring now to FIG. 2 , the supporting cables 1 , 1 a and 2 , 2 a are securely anchored in the valley station 10 by means of a fixed drum 11 in each case. As is furthermore apparent from FIGS. 2 and 2A , the reversing pulleys 35 , 35 a and 36 can be moved in the direction of the cable 3 , as a result of which the latter can be tensioned. The traction cable 3 is used to move cabins 4 , which can be moved on the supporting cables 1 , 1 a and 2 , 2 a , along the route. In the valley station 10 and in the mountain station 20 , the cabins 4 are decoupled from the traction cable 3 and are moved through the stations along guide rails. For this purpose, guide rails 51 and deceleration, conveying and acceleration wheels 52 are provided in the valley station 10 .
As is apparent from FIG. 3 , the supporting cables 1 , 1 a and 2 , 2 a are respectively anchored in the mountain station 20 via fixed drums 12 and 13 . Guide rails 53 along which the cabins 4 , which are decoupled from the traction cable 3 , can be moved through the station 20 by means of deceleration, conveying and acceleration wheels 54 are provided in the mountain station 20 .
As is apparent from FIGS. 4 and 4A , a group of supporting rollers 37 is provided in front of the mountain station 20 . The rollers 37 are used to deflect the strands 3 a , 3 b of the traction cable into an approximately horizontal direction and to deflect the strands 3 c , 3 d from the horizontal direction. In an analogous manner, a group of hold-down rollers 38 is provided in front of the valley station 10 , which rollers are used to deflect the strands 3 c , 3 d of the traction cable 3 in an approximately horizontal direction and to deflect the strands 3 a , 3 b from the horizontal direction. It is necessary to take structural measures in the case of the hold-down rollers 38 in order to avoid the cabins 4 being subjected to impact shocks by the clamping jaws of the coupling apparatuses traveling over the hold-down rollers 38 .
With reference to FIGS. 5 and 5A , the cabins 4 are fastened to a supporting frame 41 having two supporting bars 42 , 42 a which are situated above the supporting frame, with damping devices being situated between the cabin 4 and the supporting frame 41 . Coupling apparatuses 43 are situated on the supporting bars 42 , 42 a and running mechanisms 44 are situated above the coupling apparatuses. The coupling apparatuses 43 can be used to couple the cabins 4 onto the strands 3 a , 3 b , 3 c , 3 d of the traction cable 3 and the running mechanisms 44 can be used to move the cabins 4 along the supporting cables 1 , 1 a and 2 , 2 a and along the guide rails 51 and 53 in the stations 10 , 20 . The coupling apparatuses 43 are known from the prior art.
As is illustrated in FIG. 5B , the two respectively assigned supporting cables 1 , 1 a and 2 , 2 a can be connected to each other over the course of the route by means of bars 6 . In this case, these bars 6 are fastened to the supporting cables 1 , 1 a and 2 , 2 a from below by means of clamps 61 . In addition, further supporting rollers 37 a for the traction cable 2 are mounted on each side of the bars 6 .
As is apparent from FIGS. 6 and 6A , the clamping jaws of the coupling apparatuses 43 come into action on the strands 3 a , 3 b , 3 c , 3 d of the traction cable 3 from above, as a result of which no impact shocks at all occur when the coupling apparatuses 43 move over the supporting rollers 37 . In contrast, as is apparent from FIG. 6A , in the region of hold-down rollers 38 , on which the strands 3 a , 3 b , 3 c , 3 d of the traction cable 3 are situated on the lower side of the holding-down rollers 38 , the clamping jaws of the coupling apparatuses 43 would run onto the hold-down rollers 38 , as a result of which the cabins 4 would be subjected to impact shocks.
In order to avoid impact shocks of this type, the coupling apparatuses 43 are provided with upwardly protruding supporting rollers 45 which are assigned supporting surfaces 39 on the hold-down rollers 38 . In addition, the coupling apparatuses 43 can be pivoted about a respective bolt 46 running in the direction of the cable 3 . As soon as a coupling apparatus 43 enters into the region of the hold-down rollers 38 , the supporting rollers 45 run onto the supporting surfaces 39 , as a result of which the clamping jaws of the coupling apparatus 43 are pivoted about the bolt 46 and are thereby lifted downward off the hold-down rollers 38 . This prevents impact shocks, which are produced by the movement of the clamping jaws over the hold-down rollers 38 , from affecting the cabins 4 . In addition, the coupling apparatuses 43 are mounted in a manner such that they can pivot with respect to the supporting bars 42 , 42 a about a respective axis 47 which is aligned transversely with respect to the traction cable 3 .
The instant application claims the foreign priority under 35 U.S.C. § 119 of Austrian patent application A 1118/2003 of Jul. 17, 2003, which is herewith incorporated by reference.
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A cable car system has two pairs of supporting cables that are respectively anchored in a valley station and in a mountain station. Cabins or similar people movers travel along the supporting cables while they are coupled to a self-contained traction cable. The cabins can be decoupled from the traction cable, to be moved in the stations along guide rails. The self-contained traction cable is formed with two loops, forming two strands in each case which are moved in the same direction and to which the cabins can be coupled.
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This invention relates to combustorless air turbine cycles; and, in particular, this invention relates to heat generating processes used in combination with air turbine cycles.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The use of hot gas generators which produce corrosive or abrasive products of combustion have precluded the use of gas turbines in a direct flow path of combustion products. In a prior art heat generating cycle, a heat recovery steam generator was used in combination with a steam turbine and electrical generator to recover valuable heat which would otherwise be wasted. An air turbine in combination with a gas to air heat recovery heat exchanger provides a means for utilizing what would be an otherwise wasted hot exhaust gas stream.
In U.S. patent application Ser. No. 747,552; filed June 21, 1985 for an Air Cycle Thermodynamic Conversion System, and assigned to the assignee of the present invention, the efficiency of a so-called air bottoming cycle (ABC) was demonstrated and fully explained. To summarize the disclosure of that patent application, an air turbine drives a string of compressors which have intercoolers so that each stage output is cooled to about ambient before being sent on to the next stage. The intercooling process between compressors lowers the work input into the compressor necessary for providing the pressure rise. Moreover, as the compressed air leaves the final compressor stage, it is at a lower temperature so that the heat recovery from the gas turbine exhaust stack flow, with which it is in a heat exchange process, is also greater.
In U.S. patent application Ser. No. 552,213, having the same inventors as the present application and a common assignee, and filed on the same date: a coal gasification plant is shown wherein a gas turbine exhaust provides heat to an air bottoming cycle air turbine. The air turbine, in turn, drives a string of compressors to provide air to the air turbine and air for an oxygen plant which provides oxygen to a coal gasification plant. The coal gasification plant thereafter provides fuel to the gas turbine.
In some processes, such as are used in the manufacture of sulfuric acid, the hot gas products of a sulfur furnace must be cooled but cannot be expanded directly in a gas turbine because of the corrosive nature of the product gas. However, the process of producing sulfur dioxide gas requires a compressed air supply and therefore it would be desirable to provide a gas turbine/compressor package which could somehow use the heat produced in the sulfur burning furnace. In the prior art, the process included the provision of a heat recovery steam generator to absorb heat from the sulfur furnace hot gas stream and to produce steam for a steam turbine. The steam turbine would drive an electric generator to produce electricity some of which would be used to drive an electric motor and the remainder available to sell as power. The electric motor would, in turn, drive a compressor to supply compressed air to the sulfur burning furnace.
OBJECTS OF THE INVENTION
In accordance with the foregoing, it would be desirable to provide an air turbine cycle which is usable with and which will render more efficient certain processes.
It is an object of this invention to provide a high efficiency cycle for certain processes without the use of steam or water.
It is another object of this invention to provide a process cycle wherein the products of combustion never enter the turbomachinery but the heat of these products is used to drive turbomachinery.
It is another object of this invention to remove an optimum amount of heat from combustion gas as is feasible to ensure high efficiency.
Finally, it is another object of this invention to improve cycle efficiency by providing a heated air supply to the combustion process for producing a hot exhaust gas stream.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
An air cycle turbine is provided with hot air through a heat exchange relationship with process heat. The process may be for the generation of a useful product or simply be available for the sole purpose of providing a hot exhaust gas stream. The air turbine may drive a string of compressors with intercoolers for the purpose of producing compressed air for the air turbine. In addition, there may be a need for a specific quantity or condition of compressor discharge air for combustion purposes, such that a boost or auxillary compressor may be added to a compressor string for providing the appropriate discharge air for the combustion process. In some applications, it may be appropriate to include air preheating for the combustion air input in order to reduce the fuel requirements in a combustor. Finally, a recuperative heat exchange may be included to preheat turbine air in a heat transfer relation with turbine exhaust gas prior to the heat exchange with process or combustion air.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is a schematic of a combined cycle including a hot gas producing cycle and a steam cycle in accordance with the prior art.
FIG. 2 is a schematic of another prior art process which utilizes a gas to gas heat exchange process for heating air input into an air turbine.
FIG. 3 is a schematic view of an air turbine cycle in accordance with the present invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
FIG. 1 is a schematic representation of a sulfuric acid producing process 10. Sulfur 12 is input into a furnace 14 where it is burned to produce a sulfur product gas SO2. The combustion process of the furnace requires an air input from a compressor 16 which is driven by an electric motor 18 through a connecting shaft 20. The air input into the compressor is indicated by the arrow 22 whereas an air dryer 24 may be interposed between the compressor discharge line 26 and the inlet line 28 to the sulfur burning furnace.
The output line 30 from the gas furnace carries a hot gas stream of SO2 which then, according to process requirements must be reduced in temperature in order to be converted catalytically to SO3 which will eventually be processed to a condensate sulfuric acid H2SO4. The heat reducing process can be made more efficient by the inclusion of a Rankine cycle including a heat recovery steam generator 32, a steam turbine and condenser 34 and an electric generator 36. Some of the electrical output of the electric generator may be used to power the electric motor 18 which drives the air compressor 16. The excess electric power is sold or displaces purchased power elsewhere. Condensate from the steam turbine is input into the heat recovery steam generator 32 on line 38 whereas steam is discharged from the heat recovery steam generator on line 40 and input into the steam turbine 34 or may be used elsewhere in the process. The heat exchange process in the heat recovery steam generator thus reduces the temperature of the hot gas stream according to process requirements whereas a steam output is made available from the heat recovery steam generator. In addition to the foregoing, additional heat exchange units 42 and 44 may be provided in a condensate loop 45 for added cooling of the product gas and to produce process steam. The cooled product gas SO2 is output from the heat exchanger 32 and subsequently processed through catalytic converters 52 and 54 in a manner known to the prior art, the details, of which, are not particularly important to the present invention except to the extent that the reaction is exothermic.
It has been suggested that the steam equipment could be eliminated by using a gas turbine connected directly to the output of a sulfur burning furnace so that the combustion products of the sulfur furnace could be expanded directly through the gas turbine. However, this approach has been avoided because of the corrosive nature of the product gas.
In searching for an approach which could utilize a gas turbine, while avoiding the introduction of corrosive gas into a turbine the embodiment of FIG. 2 was discovered in the prior art. FIG. 2 shows an air turbine cycle which includes an air compressor 60 which is driven by an air turbine 64 through an interconnecting shaft 66. The air turbine 64 may also drive an electrical generator or other load 68 through a connecting shaft 70. A furnace 72 is provided with fuel 74 such that combustion occurs within the furnace to produce a hot exhaust gas stream or product gas on line 76. The hot exhaust gas stream is input into a heat exchanger 80 where it passes in a heat exchange relation with compressor discharge air on line 82 whereupon hot air is provided on line 84 to the air turbine inlet. The hot air is expanded through the air turbine to drive a bladed rotor (not shown) which, in turn, drives the compressor and the electrical generator. The turbine exhaust is output on line 86 whereupon it is input into the furnace 72 for providing heated air to the combustion furnace. The prior art therefore includes an air turbine 64 having an inlet 84 and an exhaust 86; at least one main compressor 60 for supplying air to the air turbine, the air turbine drivingly connected to the main compressor through shaft 66. The means for generating a hot exhaust gas stream includes a furnace 72. A heat exchanger 80 passes the compressor air supply or discharge 82 in heat exchange relationship with the furnace hot exhaust gas stream 76 for heating the air supply to the air turbine inlet 84 and the means for providing a preheated air supply to the hot gas generating means includes the turbine exhaust duct or line 86 connected to the furnace 72. The product gas output of the heat exchanger on line 90 may then be sent on to further process for producing sulfuric acid.
The advantages of this cycle are readily apparent. The turbomachinery only uses clean air and can be made of conventional materials. The means for generating a hot gas stream can be conventional. The heat exchanger isolates the combustion products from the turbomachinery and can use materials consistent with current practice for static equipment handling such combustion products. This process is presented in U.S. Pat. No. 4,492,085 issued Jan. 8, 1985 and assigned to the assignee of the present invention. On the other hand, this process may be disadvantaged because of the potential high temperature of the output stream. In addition, the pressure and quantity of turbine exhaust air may not be suited to the stoichiometry of the furnace 72.
Referring now to FIG. 3, an air turbine cycle 100 is shown which includes an air turbine 101 connected to drive a first main compressor 102 through shaft 104. The air turbine is further connected to drive an electrical generator or load 106 through an output shaft 108. Means for generating a hot exhaust gas stream includes a furnace 110 which has a fuel input 112. In the context of a process plant, the fuel supplied to the furnace may be sulfur for producing a hot exhaust gas stream of SO2. In a power plant, which uses coal as the fuel input 112, the furnace 110 may be an atmospheric fluidized bed (AFB) type of coal burner.
The furnace 110 provides a hot exhaust gas stream 114 to a first heat exchanger 116. A second counter flow stream input to the first heat exchanger is compressor discharge air 118 from the main compressor 102. The hot exhaust gas heats the main compressor discharge air prior to it being input into an air turbine inlet 120. A second main compressor 124 is connected to the first main compressor 102 by shaft 126 and ultimately driven by the air turbine through shaft 104 which drives the first main compressor. A first intercooler 128 connects the discharge end of the second main compressor 124 with the inlet end of the first main compressor 102 whereas a third main compressor 130 may be connected to the second main compressor through intercooler 132 and be driven by shaft 134 which is ultimately driven by the air turbine 101. Two or more compressors comprise a plurality of compressors. The advantage of the plurality of compressors with intercoolers is to lower the work put into providing the pressurized air while also lowering the temperature of the first main compressor discharge air so that the stack temperature of air turbine exhaust may be lowered for maximum heat recovery.
Heat recovery of air turbine exhaust gas is accommodated by a second heat exchanger 140 for preheating the compressor discharge air 118. The air turbine exhaust in duct 142 is input into the second heat exchanger 140 for prewarming the main compressor discharge air prior to its input into the first heat exchanger 116 upstream of the air turbine inlet. The advantage of prewarming the compressor discharge air is that it increases the output of the cycle and enables heat recovery of otherwise wasted air turbine exhaust gas. The output 148 from the second heat exchanger 140 may be sent to the stack to be discharged as waste gas. However, it is pointed out that this "stack gas" is basically air and needs no further treatment with respect to the surrounding environment. It could also be available for process needs in a cogeneration application.
Air input into the furnace 110 or means for producing a hot exhaust gas stream is derived from a boost compressor 160 which is connected to the plurality of main compressors through shaft 162 and which is, in turn, driven by the air turbine 101. The boost compressor 160 is used to more efficiently match the stoichiometry and pressure requirements of the furnace 110. The boost compressor discharge air is sent to the means of generating a hot exhaust gas stream through a third heat exchanger 170. The hot side input to the heat exchanger is the discharge hot exhaust gas stream 172 from the first heat exchanger 116 whereas the cold side input into the third heat exchanger is the boost compressor discharge air 166. If the process to which the air turbine cycle is applied is similar to the process for producing sulfur where the process stream is required to be at a higher temperature, then the third heat exchanger 170 may not be used and the stream goes "to process" as indicated by dashed line. If the process stream is needed at a low temperature, then the third heat exchange process may be for reducing the temperature of the product gas; whereas, if the process is for producing a power output from a coal or other such fuel, then the third heat exchange may be for recovery of exhaust heat from the furnace by prewarming the boost compressor air which may lower the heat rate of the means for producing a hot exhaust gas stream.
In accordance with the present invention therefore, there has been shown the air turbine 101 having an air inlet 120 and an air turbine exhaust 142. The plurality of main compressors 102, 124 and 130 are connected in tandem and driven by the air turbine 101. Each pair of main compressors has an intercooler 128, 132 interposed therebetween. The means for generating a hot exhaust gas stream is a furnace 110 which may be used for burning a chemical for process reasons or coal for the sole purpose of producing heat. The first heat exchanger 116 is used to pass the compressor discharge air 118 in heat exchange relation with the hot exhaust gas stream 114 for the purpose of heating the compressor discharge air. The second heat exchanger 140 is used for preheating the compressor discharge air prior to its input into the first heat exchanger with the benefit of preheating the air into the air turbine for increased cycle output by recovering heat from the air turbine exhaust gas. The boost compressor 160 provides an air input into the means for generating a hot exhaust gas stream 110 whereas the third heat exchanger 170 provides a heat exchange between the boost compressor discharge air and the exhaust gas stream after it has passed through the first heat exchanger 116.
The advantages of the foregoing described air turbine cycle includes the achievement of high cycle efficiency without the use of water or steam. The products of combustion never enter the air turbine and thus the air turbine materials selection is not compromised by corrosion concerns. The critical material concerns are therefore left only to the means for producing a hot exhaust gas stream and to the first and third heat exchangers in the flow path of the hot exhaust gas stream. The combustion is performed with specified stoichiometry; in the case of a coal fired furnace with minimum excess air so that any subsequent stack gas cleanup of the hot exhaust gas stream is performed on a minimum volume of gas, and in the case of a chemical furnace to achieve desired product composition. Because of the use of the second heat exchanger for recuperation of the turbine exhaust gas output and the use of the third heat exchanger with respect to the incoming boost compressor discharge air and the outgoing hot exhaust gas stream the stack discharge temperatures are at a minimum ensuring maximum heat recovery throughout the cycle. The combination of heat addition at moderately high temperature and all heat rejection at low temperature affords good efficiency. For cogeneration applications there are three streams of clean, hot air including the turbine exhaust, and the two intercoolers.
While there has been shown what is considered to be the preferred embodiment of the present invention, other modifications may occur to those having ordinary skill in the art. It is intended to claim in the appended claims all such modification which fall within the true spirit and scope of the appended claims.
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The use of hot gas generators which produce corrosive or abrasive products of combustion have precluded the use of gas turbines in a direct flow path of the combustion products. It is preferable to utilize non-contact gas to gas heat exchangers in order to transfer heat from a hot gas stream to a working fluid. A first heat exchanger connected to a gas furnace is used to raise the temperature of an air turbine inlet gas. A second heat exchanger is used to raise the temperature (prewarm) of compressor discharge air to the air turbine air inlet, the second heat exchanger connected to the air turbine exhaust. A third heat exchanger preheats the air input into a furnace.
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BACKGROUND AND SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
This invention relates to a recuperator for heat exchange between flow media of dissimilar temperatures, and in a broad aspect it provides a recuperator that is easy to maintain and is configured such that it can still be used when the hotter of the two flow media is at a temperature of at least 1000° C.
It is a particular object of the present invention to provide a recuperator wherein a housing containing the flow of the first of two flow media also has a plurality of essentially parallel tubes containing the flow of the second flow medium arranged therein. According to a preferred embodiment these tubes are made of a highly heat-resistant ceramic material and extend at right angles to the direction of flow of the first flow medium around the tubes for causing a meandering of the second flow medium through the tubes. In a further feature of the invention, at least two tubes at a time are interconnected at adjacent ends by means of a component of a highly heat-resistant material. This component deflects the flow from the one tube into the other tube, and pressure is applied to that surface of the respective component which points away from the tube ends so as to urge the component against the tube ends.
The recuperator of the present invention provides an advantage in that for the tubes, use can be made of high-strength ceramic materials of any coefficient of thermal expansion, in that maintenance is very simple, the various tubes being readily replaced, and in that the use of highly heat-resistant ceramic materials for the tubes enables heat exchange to be achieved between two flow media of temperatures in the 1000° to 1400° C. range.
In a further aspect of the present invention, an expansion mechanism to generate the above-noted pressure, which acts on those surfaces of the components which point away from the tube ends, is provided between a first wall of the housing and the components arranged at the one ends of the tubes, said expansion mechanism operating on the force of a spring or pressure medium that operationally abutts on the one wall of the housing, and acting on the components arranged at the one end of the tubes to urge the components against the one tube ends thereby c using the tubes to press against the components arranged at the other tubes ends, said components in turn abutting on a second, opposite wall of the housing.
As expansion mechanisms, use can be made either of spring-loaded bolts or compressed-air cylinders equally made of highly heat-resistant ceramic materials.
In a further aspect of the present invention a pressure chamber is optionally arranged, in lieu of an expansion mechanism, between the components at the one tube ends and the adjacent wall of the housing, which pressure chamber develops pressure when in operation to act on that surface of the components which points away from the one tube ends to urge the components against the tube ends.
According to a further preferred embodiment, the pressure chamber is defined by a pressurizeable elastic foil of a highly heat resistant material disposed between the components and the wall of the housing.
In a further aspect of the present invention each of the noted deflecting components has a number of annular slots corresponding to the number of tubes to be interconnected by this component, in which annular slots are inserted the adjacent ends of the tubes to be interconnected by this component.
In a preferred aspect of the present invention a seal is provided in each annular slot between the tube ends inserted into said annular slot and the bottom of the annular slot, where the seal can be either a highly heat-resistant, ceramic or metal felt material.
Another arrangement for connecting the tube ends to the components according to the invention is to make each component snugly fit the contour of the tube ends connected to this component, where each component and the tube ends connected to this component preferably have spherical mating surfaces. This arrangement provides an advantage in that the need for an additional seal between the mating surfaces of the components and tubes is eliminated, in that the recuperator can be assembled at a faster rate, and in that even in the presence of minor rotary movements of the tubes about their ends the sealing effect between the components and the tubes will continue unchanged.
In a still further aspect of the present invention, the tubes are arranged and stacked in layers and the components are a snug fit one with the other, the tubes being spaced apart to permit the flow of the first flow medium between them. In a preferred aspect, the ends of at least two tubes of respective uppermost and lowermost layers of tubes are interconnected by means of an adaptor designed for the ingress and egress of the second flow medium, the components of the respective layer of tubes above and below being snug fit with the adaptors and two adjacent adaptors at a time being urged against the one ends of the tubes connected by said two adaptors by means of one of the expansion mechanisms.
In yet another feature of the present invention, components interconnecting three tubes at a time can be used instead of the noted two tube connecting components, the flow being deflected from one tube into the two others, or from two tubes into the remaining tube. This provides an advantage in that the position of the components is defined statically.
The recuperator of the present invention is suitable especially for use in a vehicular gas turbine engine fitted with a regenerative heat exchanger made of a ceramic material. The recuperator of the present invention is then arranged in the turbine operating cycle such that the hot steam of exhaust gas, when issuing from the turbine, will first flow through the recuperator of the present invention and then through the regenerative heat exchanger.
These and further objects, features and advantages of the present invention will become more obvious from the following description when taken in connection with the accompanying drawings which show, for purposes of illustration only, plural embodiments in accordance with the present invention.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is a schematic sectional view illustrating the recuperator of the present invention;
FIG. 2 is a rear view illustrating the stacked tubes of the recuperator of FIG. 1 in schematic representation, with the uppermost and lowermost row of tubes omitted;
FIG. 3 is a sectional view illustrating an adaptor for two tubes of the uppermost and lowermost row of tubes and an expansion mechanism for urging this adaptor against the tubes;
FIG. 4 is a rear view illustrating stacked tubes with modified components interconnecting three tubes at a time, in schematic representation;
FIG. 5 is a sectional view illustrating an alternative version of the component and expansion mechanism illustrated in FIG. 1;
FIG. 5a is a further alternate version of the component and expansion mechanism;
FIG. 6 is a sectional view illustrating a further alternative version of the component illustrated in FIG. 1, with suitably formed tube ends; and
FIG. 7 is a sectional view illustrating a recuperator of the present invention with an alternative arrangement of modified adaptors for the entry and exit of the flow.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
With reference now to FIGS. 1, 2 and 3, the recuperator of the present invention comprises a housing 1 which, when the recuperator is operating, permits the flow of a first flow medium in the direction of arrowheads 2, and a stack of parallel ceramic tubes 3 slideably arranged in the housing 1 at right angles to the direction of flow of the first flow medium and which, when the recuperator is operating, permits the flow of a second flow medium in the direction of arrowheads 4 for heat exchange with the first flow medium. The tubes 3 are spaced apart to permit the flow of the first flow medium between the tubes. The first flow medium 2, flowing through the housing 1, is preferably the hotter of the two flow media.
When the recuperator arranged in accordance with the present invention is used on a vehicular gas turbine, the stream of hot gas issuing from the turbine is carried through the housing before it is allowed to enter the regenerative heat exchanger, while the compressor air ducted and heated in its passage through the regenerative heat exchanger flows through the tubes 3.
The wall of the housing comprises several layers, consisting of, proceeding from the inner to the outer end, a ceramic plate 5, an insulating felt 6 and a metal sheet wall 7. The stack of tubes rests on a ceramic rectangular member 8 arranged within the housing 1, through which flows the first flow medium when the recuperator is operating.
Two adjacent tubes 3 at a time of the uppermost row of tubes 9 and the lowermost row of tubes 10 are connected at their right-hand (on the drawing) ends to an adaptor 11 more closely illustrated in FIG. 3. Each adaptor 11 has two adjacent annular slots 12a for insertion of the ends of the two tubes 3 connected to the adaptor 11. To prevent leakage between the tubes 3 and the respective adaptor 11, a felt ring 12b of a highly heat-resistant ceramic or metallic material is inserted into the annular slot 12a before the tube ends are installed.
In the interior of each adaptor 11 is a U-shaped duct 13 the legs of which issue into the tubes 3 connected to said adaptor 11. Provided in the wall of the adaptor 11 opposite the tube ends is a passage 14 establishing communication between the U-shaped duct 13 and a pipe 15 fitted to that side of the wall of the respective adaptor 11 which points away from the tube ends. Seated over the free end of each pipe 15 is the end of a metal bellows 16, the other end of which is seated over a pipe elbow 17. The pipe elbows 17 communicating with the tubes 3 of the uppermost row of tubes 9 and the lowermost row of tubes 10 are each connected to one of two rigid pipes 18 arranged one over the other, of which FIG. 1 only shows the lower pipe. In operation of the recuperator, the first flow medium is admitted to the stack of tubes through the upper rigid pipe and is again carried away through the lower rigid pipe. Compensation for thermal expansion of the tubes 3 is achieved by the metal bellows 16, such that thermal stresses arising between the tubes 3 and the rigid pipes 18 are prevented to a great extent.
Each ceramic tube 3 arranged between the upper row 9 and the lower row 10 is connected at its respective one end to the adjacent end of the next higher tube 3, and at its other end to the adjacent end of the next lower tube 3, by means of a flow deflection component 19, which is designed to deflect the flow from one tube 3 into the other tube 3, so that when the recuperator is operating, the flow through the stack of tubes takes a meandering course at right angles to the direction of flow of the first flow medium 2 passing through the housing 1. The deflection components 19 are made of a highly heat-resistant material, such as a ceramic material. Each component 19 exhibits two annular slots 20 arranged one above the other to accommodate the adjacent ends of the tubes 3 interconnected thereby. As with the adaptors 11, felt rings 12b are inserted into the annular slots before the tube ends are installed in the annular slots 20, and the components 19, likewise, have an internal U-shaped duct the legs of which issue into the interconnected tubes 3. The components 19 have corrugated side walls of conforming contours, so that their rear walls--as it will be seen from FIG. 2--interfit to form a closed surface area.
A space 21 is provided, between the adaptors 11, the components 19 (arranged between the adaptors 11 on the right-hand side of the stack of tubes) and the right-hand housing plate 5, in which a number of expansion mechanisms 22 for urging the adaptors 11 and the components 19 arranged on this side against the tube ends are heated. Each expansion mechanism 22 has a ceramic pin 23, a portion of which is slideably carried in a hole in the right-hand plate 5 of the housing, and of which another portion projects into the space 21. On the portion projecting into space 21, each ceramic pin 23 has a collar 24 which has a bearing surface on its side facing the right-hand plate 5 against which one end of a coil sring 25 (which is seated over the ceramic pin 23 and the other end of which bears on the right-hand plate of the housing) bears to urge the ceramic pin towards the stack of tubes. One component 19 or two adaptors 11 are urged towards the tube ends by means of one ceramic pin 23. The one ends of those ceramic pins 23 that serve for urging the components 19 into contact are each located radially in a pipe end 26 formed on the rear side of the components 19, are radiused, and are in direct contact with the surface of the components 19 (FIG. 1). The one end of each ceramic pin 23 used for urging two each adaptors 11 into contact is radiused and fits into a recess in a ceramic plate 27, the surface of which pointing away from the ceramic pin 23 is concave and abuts on the rear surface of the two adjacent adaptors 11 (FIG. 3). On two opposite sides, each ceramic plate 27 is recessed for positive connection with the pipes 15 of the two adaptors 11 to prevent it from rotating about the axis of the pin 23.
The pressure exerted by the expansion mechanisms 22 on the adaptors 11 and the right-hand components 19 urges the adaptors 11 and the right-hand components 19 against the tube ends, so that the tubes 3 are forced against the left-hand components 19 which abut on the left-hand plate 5 of the housing.
FIG. 4 illustrates an alternative version of the component 19. The alternative version is an essentially triangular component 28 connected to which are the adjacent ends of three tubes at a time. As did the components 19, the components 28 are a contour fit one with the other, and their rear walls form a closed surface. The components 28 provide an advantage over the components 19 in that their position is statically determined; yet, the combination of three adjacent tube ends at a time has the disadvantage of the flow velocities and quantities varying from one row of tubes to the next.
FIG. 5 illustrates an alternative design of the expansion mechanisms 22. The alternative design of the expansion mechanisms, indicated generally at 22', are compressed-air cylinders 29 each attached at its one end to the right-hand plate 5 of the housing. Provided in each cylinder 29 is a piston 30, one end of which projects beyond the open end of the cylinder pointing away from the plate 5 of the housing. The flow deflector component illustrated in FIG. 5 has, in lieu of the pipe end 26, a cam 31, formed on component 19', on which is the piston end projecting from the cylinder. The interior of the cylinder 29 communicates with a source of compressed air through a pipe 32 routed through the plate 5. When the piston 30 is pressurized with air, the piston 30 is urged against the cam 31 of the flow deflector component, the latter being pressed against the tube ends. The cylinder 29 and the pistons 30 alike can be made of a highly heat-resistant ceramic material. When the recuperator of the present invention is used together with the alternative design of expansion mechanism as illustrated in FIG. 5, the piston 30 and the cylinder 29 can also be pressurized with leakage air.
In a further modified embodiment, the place of the compressed-air cylinders 29 and the spring-loaded pins 23 can also be taken by a pressure chamber arranged in space 21, said pressure chamber being confined by the plate 5 of the housing and the rear surfaces of the components 19 and the adaptors 11 arranged at the right-hand tube ends and a surrounding chamber wall. The pressure built in the pressure chamber will then act directly on the rear surfaces of the components 19 and adaptors 11 arranged at the right-hand tube ends to urge them against the tube ends. Since the ends of the components and adaptors will be functioning in a manner somewhat analogous to pistons 30, to minimize air leaks, seals are imbedded between the components 19 and adaptors 11 arranged at the right-hand tube ends.
Additionally, in a still further modified embodiment shown in FIG. 5a, the pressure chamber is defined by elastic foil. The foil is formed into a bag-like enclosure 22" which is disposed between the ends of the connector components and adaptors, and the wall 5 in abutting relation thereto. The elastic enclosure 22' confines a compressible medium such as air and thus is able to deform so as to facilitate the positional changes of the components 19" and adaptors. Foil of a highly heat-resistant material suitable for this purpose and of about 0.1 mm thick is commercially available. The foil need not be a totally enclosed bag, but also can be provided as a skin over the rear surfaces of the components, the edge of the foil being fastened to wall 5 in an air-tight manner. Likewise, a pressure chamber could be defined by a cylinder which has a flexible foil draped over its end facing the tube ends.
The pressure to be built in the pressure chamber can, whether a foil is used or not, be developed using compressor air, should the recuperator of the present invention be used on a vehicular gas turbine engine.
Axial clamping of the tubes 3 by means of the expansion mechanisms or the pressure chamber will compensate internal tensile stresses and, partially, thermal stresses in the tubes.
FIG. 6 illustrates a further alternative design of the deflection components 19. The component 33 shown in FIG. 6 has, instead of annular slots, spherically formed bearing surfaces which engage the tube ends which are appropriately crowned and are urged against these surfaces. The need for additional sealing will be obviated with this design. This version provides an advantage in that it facilitates the assembly of the recuperator and in that minor rotational movements of the tubes about the tube ends will not entail leakage between the tubes and the components. The adaptors 11 and their associated tube ends can also be formed in accordance with the design illustrated in FIG. 6.
FIG. 7 illustrates an alternative arrangement of modified adaptors, where the adaptors 34 for the uppermost row of tubes are arranged on the left-hand side of the stack of tubes. Each adaptor 34 arranged on the left-hand side has on this left-hand side, the one pointing away from the tubes, a pipe 35 leading through the wall of the housing. Outside the housing the pipe 35 is connected to the metal bellows 16 which communicates with a further pipe 36 leading to the upper of the two rigid pipes 18.
Each adaptor 37 connected to the tubes 3 of the lowermost row of tubes has on its underside a pipe 38 pointed downward and connected to the metal bellows 16. Connected to the metal bellows 16 is a short end of pipe 39 leading to the lower rigid pipe 18. On its rear side each adaptor has a pipe 40 for engagement with the ceramic pin 23. In this version the adaptors 37 arranged below on the right-hand side are urged against the tube ends by the expansion mechanism 22 exactly as are the right-hand components.
While I have shown and described several embodiments in accordance with the present invention, it is understood that the same is not limited thereto but is susceptible of numerous changes and modifications as known to those skilled in the art and I therefore do not wish to be limited to the details shown and described herein but intend to cover all such changes and modifications as are encompassed by the scope of the appended claims.
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A recuperator for heat exchange between two flow media of dissimilar temperatures is formed by a housing containing the flow of a first of the two flow media and a plurality of essentially parallel slidably supported tubes containing the flow of the second flow medium. The tubes are made of a highly heat resistant material, such as ceramic material, and are biased at one end by an expansion pressure device that acts upon flow deflection connectors at the one end of the tubes. In one preferred embodiment, the expansion pressure means utilizes spring force, while in other preferred embodiments, the expansion pressure device uses a compressible medium for applying the biasing force.
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CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] This application claims the benefit of provisional application No. 61/983,789 filed on Apr. 24, 2014. The entire provisional application is incorporated herein by reference.
STATEMENT REGARDING FEDERALLY SPONSORED RESEARCH OR DEVELOPMENT
[0002] Not applicable.
REFERENCE TO SEQUENCE LISTING, A TABLE, OR COMPUTER PROGRAM LISTING
[0003] Not applicable.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0004] (1) Field of the Invention
[0005] This invention is directed toward magnet therapies that are believed to improve a patient's health. It is designed around ‘whole body’ patient care which target particular ailments by use of magnetic fields that are generated by electrical wave forms at varying intensities and frequencies.
[0006] (2) Description of Related Art
[0007] Magnetic therapy is an alternative form of medical treatment that is believed to affect various parts and tissues of the human body, in particular, the blood vessels, and also for the reduction of inflammation of various parts of human anatomy. While it is considered an alternate treatment, many individuals will claim that this kind of therapy provides relief for various ailments such as arthritis, pains, inflammation, and provides for improved blood circulation. It is also believed that certain pathogens and body tissues will react to magnetic fields, and are advantageously affected by a close magnetic field which varies in frequency.
[0008] Others have worked in the field of magnetic therapy. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 6,280,376 describes an electromagnetic treatment. While a treatment is described, it does not cover the entire body at once. U.S. Pat. No. 5,014,699 also has similar limitations.
[0009] U.S. Pat. No. 6,234,953 describes pulsed magnetic treatments, but only at a low frequency of less than 300 Hz.
[0010] U.S. Pat. No. 7,175,587 is typical of small magnetic treatment devices, and only describes a small hand held device, which is not effective in treating the entire body all at once.
[0011] Commercial sales by ASA Laser (www.asalaser.com—PMT Qs) intend to provide for whole body treatment, but the treatment coil is too small to be effective for simultaneous, whole body treatment. When the coil is moved from position to position, the patient's blood continues to flow and some portion does not receive effective treatment. Additionally, to provide treatment at a specified length of time requires the patient to wait for the treatment at each coil position to be completed. This makes for a very long patient session.
[0012] An effective pulsed magnetic field is needed which applies the field to the whole body simultaneously, rather than particular parts, or portions at a time. An important benefit of whole body magnetic care is speed due to the ability to combine multiple sessions utilizing different frequencies, waveforms, and intensities into a single session. The time for electromagnetic care is reduced which is an important enhancement to convenience.
[0013] Pulsed electromagnetic therapy is considered to be controversial for some uses. Benefits of electromagnetic therapy for bones and bone cell repair are known and continue to be studied. Pulse electromagnetic field (PEMF) stimulators are the most commonly used type of noninvasive bone growth and spinal fusion stimulators.
[0014] Benefits of pulsed electromagnetic therapy in other tissues is controversial, and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has a history of issuing fines and penalizing companies that promise cures for cancer and other diseases due to a lack of scientifically approved and recognized studies, completed according to the scientific standards of the FDA. It is important that any pulsed magnetic field care fits into the FDA guidelines by not promising benefits to patients that would imply FDA approval, or obtain therapy benefits from scientific studies that are free from controversy.
[0015] A portion of the population believes there are diseases and health conditions that will respond to pulsed electromagnetic therapy. An individual may have come to the belief that their health is improved by pulsed electromagnetic therapy based on personal study or experience. Table 1 below is information that pulsed electromagnetic therapy is believed will address, according to some sources.
[0000] TABLE 1 Hz Benefits 0-4 Promotes Growth Hormone for healing and regeneration. 40 Helpful for cognition. 4-12 Helpful for learning and memory. 7-12 Helpful for deeper states of consciousness. 45-67 Mosquito Repelling Frequencies 51 Makes the sphere of energy larger 73 Helpful in acupuncture and increasing circulation in areas being treated 147 For areas scar tissue tendons, ligaments. 294 For tissue of ectodermal origin, such as body openings, skin and nerve. 587 For circulatory and lymphatic stimulation and treatment 1,174 For tissue of mesodermal origin, such as bone, joints, ligament, viscera and tendon. 1,552 Frequency for worms/parasites 2,114 Morgellons Frequency 2,349 For chronic conditions 4,698 For pain control. 20,000 General use and especially anti-aging purposes. 378,000 Borrelia - Gulf War Syndrome 378,500 Borrelia - Gulf War Syndrome alternate frequency 382,000 Borrelia - Gulf War Syndrome alternate frequency
The ability to provide equipment that is capable of the frequencies above during any patient session, or provide any patient requested frequency, is important to respond to patient wishes. Patient sessions that apply a pulsed magnetic field will provide reassurance, contentment, and comfort to individuals that are concerned about these various ailments, and have come to believe that pulsed electro-magnetic therapy will address their health issues.
[0016] What is needed is a pulsed electromagnet system in combination with a patient session that will respond to individual concerns that the magnetic field is applied to the entire body at once.
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0017] The primary goal is to direct uniform inline magnetic fields into the human body that that are variable in intensity and frequency. The electromagnet disclosed in the present invention is conceived to be a large, body length ring (i.e. hollow cylinder), fully encompassing a patient, with an associated electrical control system that provides the desired magnetic field intensity at the desired frequency. The system is designed to be capable of providing multiple, simultaneous, wave forms and frequencies.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWING(S)
[0018] FIG. 1 is a side view of the patient who is inside the therapeutic electromagnetic coil.
[0019] FIG. 2 is an abbreviated version of one possible electrical control system for regulating the amount of current in the electromagnetic coil.
[0020] FIGS. 3A & 3B are plan and elevation of a patient room.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
[0021] FIG. 1 is a side view of the patient who is inside the therapeutic electromagnetic coil. A preferred embodiment is to provide pulsed electromagnetic fields to the whole body as illustrated in the figure.
[0022] FIG. 2 is an electrical control system that is capable of providing the desired therapeutic magnetic field. The incoming power 201 is optionally rectified to a DC current by a rectifier 202 . After that, a function generator 203 provides a sine wave output at a variable frequency and amplitude based on operator setpoints of amplitude 205 and frequency 204 . This wave form is amplified 206 and the electricity then flows into the electromagnetic ring 207 . To convert the incoming power to a controllable frequency and amplitude, either solid state electrical equipment or rotational equipment may be used, such as a motor-generator set. It is a preferred embodiment to use solid state equipment. The control of the function generator 203 is preferably provided for and monitored by, a computer, however this is not a strict requirement. Dial and push button settings into a hardwired control system may equally be used. Noise suppressors are optionally used on the function generator output if there is an electrical noise problem that significantly affects the magnetic field being generated.
[0023] The pulsed current waveform may be a sine wave, a square wave, a triangle wave, or a saw-tooth wave. All pulsed electromagnetic fields use these waveforms. The function generator is designed to provide any frequency for the current waveforms between 1 Hz to 11,780,000 Hz.
[0024] Alternatively, the function generator is completely self-contained as a direct ‘plug into the wall’ style, and utilizes commonly available power such as 110 VAC or 220 VAC. Such devices are known in the art, and the circuitry methods used to create the wave form are not a part of the present invention. In an alternate embodiment, an arbitrary wave form generator (AWG) is used to control the electric current into the electromagnet coil.
[0025] The function generator capability is designed based on the desired maximum magnetic field strength, which determines a maximum needed power. An optimum electromagnetic coil is also used to establish the power capability of the function generator, and winding and power losses are included in the calculation.
[0026] FIGS. 3A & 3B are a plan view and an elevation view of an embodied room that provides pulsed electromagnetic fields to the whole body of a patient.
[0027] The incoming power supply to the building is a typical 220 VAC and inside the building, the power supply 500 to the electrical control system is 110 vac.
[0028] The electrical supply to the electromagnet coil comes from an electrical control system, which includes a function generator. Incoming power is directed to a Tesla AC or DC rectifier/Converter/Power 501 . This, in turn, feeds a frequency generator 502 . An optional noise suppression is used, such as a ferrite suppressor, to remove unwanted frequencies in the output of the frequency generator. The output is then adjusted using an a second adjustable frequency converter 503 (if needed). Finally, the output from the second frequency converter is fed into an amplifier 504 which amplifies either the voltage or current.
[0029] A cable 505 from the amplifier then goes through the wall to the electromagnet coil which incorporates a scanning section 506 at the left end as viewed, and an electromagnetic care section 507 on the right as viewed. A sliding patient table 508 allows the patient to be conveniently inserted into the electro-magnetic care area 507 . A patient table 509 supports the patient 510 just before going into the electro-magnetic care area. A technologist 511 operates a computer with display 512 , 513 which feeds a communication cable 514 that controls the electrical supply to the electromagnet coil. The electromagnet coil utilizes insulated copper windings 516 and stops at terminal 515 . The overall resistance of the cooper windings 516 (end to end) is approximately 8 ohms. Additionally, the circumferential copper wiring is designed to provide a uniform magnetic field inside the volume of the electrical magnetic coil when an electric current passes through it.
[0030] The overall length of the electromagnet coil is approximately eight feet.
[0031] If enough power is used in the electromagnet coil, an optional cooling system (not shown) is used such as a fan or water cooled tubes. It is designed to cool the circumferential wiring of the electromagnet to a designated temperature amount.
[0032] The patient 509 is moved in and out of the electromagnet coil 507 area using a table 508 which slides conveniently into (and out of) the center of the electromagnet coil. The patient is preferably centered in the electromagnet coil.
[0033] The operator station is used to control the electro-magnetic field using adjustable volts, amps, time, and output power (watts) along with adjustable timing of the application of the electro-magnetic field. A graph of the frequency used to treat the patient is also provided by a computer display/picture. After electro-magnetic care is completed, a printout is made which records the patient name, and a log of how the patient was treated (such as frequency, time, power level, etc.).
[0034] The control system is designed to be capable of adjusting the frequencies to the electromagnet coil, and is especially capable of providing a 2,114 Hz frequency, and additionally, a frequency range of 2,114 up to 382,000 Hz to get a that is believed to address nano robots, various diseases, various infections by a portion of the population. It also provides a particular frequency of 2,114 Hz, which is believed to treat Morgellons disease. It is also capable of adjusting to 382,000 Hz to address Borrelia (Gulf War Syndrome).
[0035] Important features of the disclosed invention include:
1) A electro-magnetic coil which covers the entire body, that is, from head to toe while the patient lies horizontally inside the coil. 2) A patient table that slides in and out of the electro magnet coil, and the table is capable of supporting up to a 300 lb person. 3) A sine wave is the preferred magnetic field. However, other wave forms such as a square wave, a triangle wave, or a saw-tooth wave are also used. Optionally, the wave forms are used in combination, such as the use of multiple sine waves overlapped with each wave form at a different frequency and magnitude. 4) Two stop switches (not shown in figures) are used to provide safety for the operator and patient. An operator stop (kill) switch is used to shut the magnetic field down for any reason. The patient also is given a stop switch to stop the power into the magnetic coil if the patent is uncomfortable or panics. The patient has operational control over the stop switch and it is in the patient's possession during a patient session. 5) The amplitude of the magnetic field (the field strength) is variable based on the current input into the magnetic coil. The operator control may be simplified to three different levels of electro-magnetic care: mild, medium, and strong based on the comfort of the patient and the desired level of electro-magnetic care. 6) In one embodiment, the frequency of the magnetic field is designed to provide a therapeutic frequency of 2,114 Hz, but also is variable and capable of providing higher and lower frequency electro-magnetic fields. The electro-magnetic care would optionally include an overlay of 15 Hz by overlaying a separate waveform on top of the 2,114 Hz waveform. 7) During electro-magnetic care, the patient is put into the middle of the electromagnetic coil, so that the patient is completely surrounded by the coil. 8) A convenient and comfortable moving table is used to place the patient inside the coil, to avoid the need for the patient to self move, who may not be very capable of motion. 9) A disclaimer statement that is signed by the patient which contains language that disclaims success for application of a magnetic field against any known disease or health condition, 10) The patient is required to self-determine a session criterion for the amount and type of electromagnetic field. The criterion for a patient session includes the wave form(s), the desired waveform frequency, the time length for the application of the magnetic field, and the magnetic field strength. The patient may optionally request a field strength of as strong, moderate, and mild which are taken to mean the upper ⅓, middle ⅓, and lower ⅓ of the capability of the function generator's maximum power. 11) The patient session information is re-interpreted by the operator to the type of electrical current waveform. The calculation is based on the electro-magnetic device characteristics which includes wiring resistance and magnetic field characteristics of the electromagnetic coil. 12) determining criterion for a patient session including:
a. current frequency and amplitude for the multiple waveforms based on the circumferential wiring around the electromagnetic ring, b. sequence and timing of the single or multiple waveforms.
13) applying the magnetic field and completing the patient session according to items 10 -12.
[0051] While various embodiments of the present invention have been described, the invention may be modified and adapted to various operational methods to those skilled in the art. Therefore, this invention is not limited to the description and figure shown herein, and includes all such embodiments, changes, and modifications that are encompassed by the scope of the claims.
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A device for electro-magnetic care to address certain ailments of the human body by use of a varying magnetic field in proximity to the whole human body. The variable magnetic field is shaped by a current waveform which is applied to a large electromagnetic coil surrounding a human body. The device comprises an electromagnetic coil and suitable power supply to create the desired wave form and frequency suitable for an alternative medical care. The electromagnetic field is noninvasive and is applied to the entire body simultaneously.
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FIELD OF THE INVENTION
[0001] This invention relates to the use of buproprion metabolites for the treatment of inflammatory disorders.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0002] Immune-driven inflammatory events are a significant cause of many chronic inflammatory diseases where prolonged inflammation causes tissue destruction and results in extensive damage and eventual failure of the effected organ. The cause of these diseases is unknown, so they are often called autoimmune, as they appear to originate from an individual's immune system turning on itself. Conditions include those involving multiple organs, such as systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and scleroderma. Other types of autoimmune disease can involve specific tissues or organs such as the musculoskeletal tissue (rheumatoid arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis), gastro-intestinal tract (Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis), the central nervous system (Alzheimer's, multiple sclerosis, motor neurone disease, Parkinson's disease and chronic fatigue syndrome), pancreatic beta cells (insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus), the adrenal gland (Addison's disease), the kidney (Goodpasture's syndrome, IgA nephropathy, interstitial nephritis), exocrine glands (Sjogren's syndrome and autoimmune pancreatitis) and skin (psoriasis and atopic dermatitis).
[0003] In addition, there are chronic inflammatory diseases whose aetiology is more or less known but whose inflammation is also chronic and unremitting. These also exhibit massive tissue/organ destruction and include conditions such as osteoarthritis, periodontal disease, diabetic nephropathy, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, artherosclerosis, graft versus host disease, chronic pelvic inflammatory disease, endometriosis, chronic hepatitis and tuberculosis. In these diseases, the tissue destruction often damages organ function, resulting in progressive reductions in quality of life and organ failure. These conditions are a major cause of illness in the developing world and are poorly treated by current therapies.
[0004] Inflammation of skin structures (dermatitis) is a common set of conditions which include actinic keratosis, acne rosacea, acne vulgaris, allergic contact dermatitis, angioedema, atopic dermatitis, bullous pemiphigoid, cutaneous drug reactions, erythema multiforme, lupus erythrametosus, photodermatitis, psoriasis, psoriatic arthritis, scleroderma and urticaria. These diseases are treated using a wide array of therapies, many of which have very severe side-effects.
[0005] Current disease-modifying treatments (if any) for immune-driven conditions include neutralising antibodies, cytotoxics, corticosteroids, immunosuppressants, antihistamines and antimuscarinics. These treatments are often associated with inconvenient routes of administration and severe side-effects, leading to compliance issues. Moreover, certain drug classes are only effective for certain types of inflammatory diseases, e.g. antihistamines for rhinitis.
[0006] Bupropion is a marketed anti-depressant with serotonin and noradrenaline reuptake inhibition as its central mechanism of action. Metabolites of bupropion are described in the literature as having therapeutic utility in various diseases of the central nervous system.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0007] Surprisingly, it has been found that selected bupropion metabolites are modulators of cytokines and possess anti-inflammatory properties. According to the present invention an inflammatory condition, e.g. described above, is treated by the use of a compound of general formula (I)
[0000]
[0000] or a salt thereof.
DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
[0008] While bupropion itself has very weak cytokine modulatory activity in the LPS-induced model of cytokine release, compounds of formula (I) are surprisingly potent cytokine modulators. Bupropion is metabolised non-stereoselectively to all four enantiomers of formula (I), but these compounds represent a relatively small proportion of the total metabolism of the parent drug.
[0009] Compounds for use in the invention are chiral, and it will be understood that this invention includes any diastereomers and enantiomers of (I). A preferred diastereomer or enantiomer of (I) has little or no monoamine reuptake activity but displays potent cytokine modulatory activity. These activities may be determined by use of the appropriate in vitro and in vivo assays. Particularly preferred compounds include the erythro-pair of diastereoisomers and the individual erythro enantiomers. These particularly preferred compounds are (1S,2R)-erythro-2-(1,1-dimethylethyl)amino-1-(3-chlorophenyl)propan-1-ol and (1R,2S)-erythro-2-(1,1-dimethylethyl)amino-1-(3-chlorophenyl)propan-1-ol. It is understood that compounds for use in the invention include pharmaceutically active salts, e.g. the hydrochloride.
[0010] The compounds of formula (I) according to the invention are used to treat inflammatory diseases including, but not exclusive to, autoimmune diseases involving multiple organs, such as systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE) and scleroderma, specific tissues or organs such as the musculoskeletal tissue (rheumatoid arthritis, ankylosing spondylitis), gastro-intestinal tract (Crohn's disease and ulcerative colitis), the central nervous system (Alzheimer's, multiple sclerosis, motor neurone disease, Parkinson's disease and chronic fatigue syndrome), pancreatic beta cells (insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus), the adrenal gland (Addison's disease), the kidney (Goodpasture's syndrome, IgA nephropathy, interstitial nephritis) exocrine glands (Sjogren's syndrome and autoimmune pancreatitis) and skin (psoriasis and atopic dermatitis), chronic inflammatory diseases such as osteoarthritis, periodontal disease, diabetic nephropathy, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, artherosclerosis, graft versus host disease, chronic pelvic inflammatory disease, endometriosis, chronic hepatitis and tuberculosis, IgE mediated (Type I) hypersensitivities such as rhinitis, asthma, anaphylaxis and dermatitis. Dermatitis conditions include actinic keratosis, acne rosacea, acne vulgaris, allergic contact dermatitis, angioedema, atopic dermatitis, bullous pemiphigoid, cutaneous drug reactions, erythema multiforme, lupus erythrametosus, photodermatitis, psoriasis, psoriatic arthritis, scleroderma and urticaria. Conditions of the eye, such as diabetic retinopathy, macular degeneration, choroidal neovascular membrane, cystoid macular edema, epi-retinal membrane, macular hole, dry eye, uveitis and conjunctivitis, may also be treated.
[0011] These compounds may be used according to the invention when the patient is also administered or in combination with another therapeutic agent selected from corticosteroids (examples including cortisol, cortisone, hydrocortisone, dihydrocortisone, fludrocortisone, prednisone, prednisolone, deflazacort, flunisolide, beconase, methylprednisolone, triamcinolone, betamethasone, and dexamethasone), disease modifying anti-rheumatic drugs (DMARDs) (examples including azulfidine, aurothiomalate, bucillamine, chlorambucil, cyclophosphamide, leflunomide, methotrexate, mizoribine, penicillamine and sulphasalazine), immunosuppressants (examples including azathioprine, cyclosporin, mycophenolate), COX inhibitors (examples including aceclofenac, acemetacin, alcofenac, alminoprofen, aloxipirin, amfenac, aminophenazone, antraphenine, aspirin, azapropazone, benorilate, benoxaprofen, benzydamine, butibufen, celecoxib, chlorthenoxacine, choline salicylate, chlometacin, dexketoprofen, diclofenac, diflunisal, emorfazone, epirizole, etodolac, feclobuzone, felbinac, fenbufen, fenclofenac, flurbiprofen, glafenine, hydroxylethyl salicylate, ibuprofen, indometacin, indoprofen, ketoprofen, ketorolac, lactyl phenetidin, loxoprofen, mefenamic acid, metamizole, mofebutazone, mofezolac, nabumetone, naproxen, nifenazone, oxametacin, phenacetin, pipebuzone, pranoprofen, propyphenazone, proquazone, rofecoxib, salicylamide, salsalate, sulindac, suprofen, tiaramide, tinoridine, tolfenamic acid, zomepirac) neutralising antibodies (examples including etanercept and infliximab), antibiotics (examples including doxycycline and minocycline).
[0012] Any suitable route of administration can be used. For example, any of oral, topical, parenteral, ocular, rectal, vaginal, inhalation, buccal, sublingual and intranasal delivery routes may be suitable. The dose of the active agent will depend on the nature and degree of the condition, the age and condition of the patient and other factors known to those skilled in the art. A typical dose is from 0.1, e.g. 10 to 100, mg given one to three times per day.
[0013] The following Scheme and synthesis illustrate the preparation of compounds of formula I.
[0000]
2-Bromo-1-(3-chlorophenyl)propan-1-one (2)
[0014] A 3-necked 2 L round bottomed flask equipped with a dropping funnel was charged with 3-chloropropiophenone (1) (110 g, 0.65 mol) and 770 ml of CH 3 CN. The resulting reaction mixture was cooled to 0° C. under nitrogen. Bromine (33.4 ml, 0.65 mol) was added drop wise to the solution initially at 0° C. but during the addition (approximately ¼ of bromine was added) ice bath was removed [note: the reaction was scrubbed through 30% aqueous solution of sodium metabisulfite]. The reaction mixture was allowed to warm to 30° C. until initiation of the reaction occurred (gas evolution and decolourisation). The overall addition took 1.5 hours. After the addition was complete, the reaction mixture was then cooled to 0° C. and a saturated solution of sodium bicarbonate (˜550 ml) was added carefully. The layers were separated and the aqueous layer was extracted with dichloromethane (3×440 ml). The combined organic layers were dried over anhydrous sodium sulphate, filtered and concentrated under vacuum to give a pale yellow solid (152 g, quantitative yield), which did not require any further purification and was used directly in the next step.
[0015] 1 H-NMR (500 MHz, CDCl 3 ) δ H 7.99 (s, 1H), 7.88 (d, 1H), 7.55 (d, 1H), 7.41 (m, 1H), 5.20 (m, 1H), 1.89 (d, 3H).
2-tert-Butylamino-1-(3-chlorophenyl)propan-1-one (3)
[0016] Crude 2-bromo-1-(3-chlorophenyl)propan-1-one (2) (152 g, 0.65 mol) was dissolved in 600 ml of acetonitrile (HPLC grade) in a 3-necked 2 L round bottomed flask fitted with a condenser and a dropping funnel. Tert-butylamine (172.5 ml, 1.63 mol) was added drop wise to the resulting mixture, at room temperature and under nitrogen. The reaction mixture was then heated to reflux for approximately 5 hours. During this time the reaction progress was monitored by TLC analysis (silica, hexane: ethyl acetate, 90:10). On consumption of the starting material, the reaction mixture was cooled to room temperature, filtered through celite and the celite washed with approximately 250 ml of ethyl acetate. The filtrate was washed with a 2M solution of KOH (350 ml). The layers were separated and the organic phase was dried over sodium sulphate anhydrous, filtered and concentrated to dryness to give a pale orange oil (147 g, quantitative yield), which did not need any further purification.
[0017] 1 H-NMR (500 MHz, CDCl 3 ) δ H 7.98 (s, 1H), 7.87 (d, 1H), 7.56 (d, 1H), 7.43 (m, 1H), 4.29 (m, 1H), 2.04 (broad singlet, 1H), 1.35 (d, 3H), 1.05 (s, 9H).
2-tert-Butylamino-1-(3-chlorophenyl)propan-1-ol (4)
[0018] 147 g (0.65 mol) of the crude 2-bromo-1-(3-chlorophenyl)propan-1-one (3) was dissolved in 1500 ml of ethanol, in a 2 L round bottomed flask. The resulting solution was cooled to 0° C. under nitrogen and NaBH 4 (27.1 g, 0.72 mol) was added portion-wise while stirring. During the addition the temperature was kept below 5° C. After the final addition was complete, the reaction mixture was allowed to reach room temperature and was monitored by TLC analysis (silica, hexane: ethyl acetate, 50:50). On complete consumption of the starting material (approximately 1 hour), 147 ml of HCl (37%) were added until pH 1 was observed. Solid KOH (˜25 g) in a minimal amount of water was then added until pH was adjusted at 7-8. The mixture was concentrated under reduced pressure. The resulting residue was basified further with solid KOH (˜25 g) in a minimal amount of water, adjusting the pH to 10-11. The mixture was extracted into TBME (2×500 mL). The organic layers were combined, washed with brine, dried over anhydrous MgSO 4 and concentrated to yield a crude brown oil.
[0019] Purification: The crude material (127 g) was purified by gradient elution chromatography on silica gel (hexane: ethyl acetate, 90/10→hexane: ethyl acetate, 5:95). Single spot fractions were combined and reduced under reduced pressure to constant weight. This resulted in a low melting point solid as a mixture of distereoisomers (90.6 g, 58% yield).
[0020] 1 H-NMR (500 MHz, CDCl 3 ) δ 7.16-7.37 (m, 10H, both diastereoisomers), 4.55 (d, 1H, major isomer), 3.84 (d, 1H, minor isomer), 3.08 (m, 1H, major isomer), 2.61 (m, 1H, minor isomer), 1.15 (s, 9H, major isomer), 1.14 (s, 9H, minor isomer), 1.01 (d, 3H, minor isomer), 077 (d, 3H, major isomer).
[0021] 13 C-NMR (125 MHz, CDCl 3 ) δ H 145.16, 144.19, 134.12, 134.00, 129.63, 129.42, 129.22, 127.65, 127.25, 126.97, 126.30, 125.57, 125.14, 124.35, 74.24, 71.95, 54.54, 51.84, 51.32, 51.29, 30.34, 30.18, 30.04, 20.39, 18.83, 17.81.
[0022] Mass Spec: 242 in +ve ESI
[0023] HPLC analysis: Erythro isomer 72.85%, Threo isomer 25.51%
[0024] The separate erythro isomers, and the threo diastereomeric pair of 2-tert-butylamino-1-(3-chlorophenyl)propan-1-ol were obtained by preparative Chiral HPLC, using a 330×50 CHIRALPAK® AD 20 μm column, a mobile phase of 90/10 CO2/ethanol+1% Diethylamine, a flow rate of 60 ml/min and a UV detection wavelength at 230 nm at a temperature of 25° C. 99 g of crude 2-tert-butylamino-1-(3-chlorophenyl)propan-1-ol were separated using this method to give:
(−)-(erythro)-2-tert-Butylamino-1-(3-chlorophenyl)propan-1-ol (5)
[0025] 30.3 g of a light brown oil
[0026] Retention time 10.1 min
[0027] HPLC analysis (area % at 230 nm) >98
[0028] Isomeric purity >99
(+)-(erythro)-2-tert-Butylamino-1-(3-chlorophenyl)propan-1-ol (6)
[0029] 29.6 g of a of a dark brown oil
[0030] Retention time 11.7 min
[0031] HPLC analysis (area % at 230 nm) >97
[0032] Isomeric purity >99
(±)-(threo)-2-tert-Butylamino-1-(3-chlorophenyl)propan-1-ol (7)
[0033] 18.5 g of a pale brown oil
[0034] Retention time 12.4 and 14.6 min
[0035] HPLC analysis (area % at 230 nm) >98.5
[0036] Diastereomeric purity >99
(±)-(erythro)-2-tert-Butylamino-1-(3-chlorophenyl)propan-1-ol (8)
[0037] The following Assays provide evidence of the invention.
LPS Mouse Assay
[0038] 7 week old Balb C ByJ mice (24-28 g) were administered, either by i.p. (5 ml/kg) or oral (10 ml/kg) administration, with vehicle or test article. 30 minutes later these animals were challenged with an intraperitoneal injection of 1 mg/kg LPS. 2 hours after LPS challenge blood samples were collected under light isoflurane anaesthesia into normal tubes by retro-orbital puncture. Samples were allowed to clot at room temperature and then spun at 6000 g for 3 min at 4° C. Serum was stored at −20° C. until use. Serum TNFα and IL-10 levels were analysed in duplicate by ELISA technique.
[0039] Bupropion (3) had a small effect on TNF alpha secretion induced by LPS at the top doses administered while its effect on IL-10 secretion was not present. The reduced forms of bupropion (7) (threo racemate) and (8) (erythro racemate) both had cytokine modulatory effects. (7) was the most potent agent, inhibiting TNF alpha at all doses administrated and potentiating IL-10 secretion at the higher doses. (7) was a considerably less potent cytokine modulator, having a small inhibitory effect on TNF alpha at the highest dose, and no real effect on IL-10 at any dose.
[0040] The erythro enantiomers (5) and (6) both had good cytokine modulatory profiles. (5) inhibited TNFα production after LPS stimulation, but had no effect on IL-10 levels. (6) however inhibited both TNFα and potentiated II-10 secretion. Both molecules have a cytokine modulatory profile that highlights their potential as their anti-inflammatory and immunomodulatory treatments.
Carrageenan Paw Assay
[0041] Fasted (18 hour) male Wistar rats (105-130 g) were weighed and a basal mercury plethysmometer reading was taken of the right hind paw by submerging the paw in the mercury up to the tibiotarsal joint. Subsequently, vehicles, reference items and test articles were administered by oral gavage (10 ml/kg). Half an hour after treatment, 0.1 ml of 2% carrageenan in 0.9% saline was injected into the subplanatar area of the right hind paw. The right paw was measured again with the plethysmometer at 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 hours after carrageenan administration. Paw volume effects was expressed as the area under the curve for paw volume over time. Activity (inhibition of paw volume) was expressed as the % antiinflammatory activity versus the vehicle control.
[0042] Compounds (5) and (6) each showed a dose-dependant anti-inflammatory effect against intraplantar carrageenan induced paw oedema.
Rat Adjuvant Assay
[0043] Male Wistar rats (180 to 200 g) were inoculated by subplantar injection of Freund's adjuvant (suspension of Mycobacterium butyricum in mineral oil) into the right paw at day 0. Sham inoculations were injected in the same way with 0.9% saline in matched Male Wistar rats. On day 2, animals were weighed. On days 3, 4, 7, 9 and 11, animals were weighed and both their right and left hind paws were measured by plethsymometry by submerging the paw up to the tibiotarsal joint. On day 11, rats with left hind paw volumes increased by 20% were selected for continuance in the study. On the same day, continuance rats were administered test article orally (10 ml/kg in distilled water) and from then on once a day until the completion of the study. Left and right hind paw volumes were measured on days 11, 14, 15, 16, 18 and 21.
[0044] Both compounds (5) and (6) had protective effects against adjuvant arthritis. (5) reduced paw oedema at the top two doses, while (6) inhibited paw inflammation at all doses (3, 10 and 30 mg/kg).
DSS Induced Colitis
[0045] 8-10 week old BDF1 male mice (˜30 g) were housed in normal conditions. At the start of the study normal water was exchanged for a 3% dextran sulphate solution to induce colonic inflammation. Concurrently actarit and the positive control budesonide were administered rectally twice a day for 7 days. On day 8 the animal were sacrificed and the large intestine was removed. The lower two thirds were assessed for histological severity (scoring system; 1 mild to 4 severe). Mice were assessed for cumulative rectal bleeding scores, diarrheal scores and cumulative hemoccult measurements.
[0046] Compounds (5) and (6) at the top dose both had a marked effect on histological scores induced by oral dextran sulphate. (6) was marginally more effective; a large ameliorating effect was seen at the lower dose. This suggests that both could have utility in treating inflammatory bowel disease.
Experimental Autoimmune Encephalitis
[0047] Acclimatised SJL mice were sensitised by a subcutaneous injection proteolipid protein (PLP) in Freund's complete adjuvant (CFA) acting as an encephalitogenic inoculum. Innoculum was administered subcutaneously at a concentration of 125 μg PLP/300 μg CFA in a volume of 200 μl. 48 hours later, an intraperitoneal injection of pertussis toxin (PTX) was administered at a dose of 20 μg/kg, to increase blood-brain barrier permeability.
[0048] Compound (6) was administered from the first day of the experiment and once a day until the end, orally at a dose of 10 mg/kg. Copaxone was administered intraperitoneally at a dose of 25 mg/kg. Throughout the experiment, careful clinical examinations and body weights were taken to observe the well being of the animal.
[0049] It was found that compound (6) completely ameliorated the second relapse of the SJL mouse EAE model.
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Compounds that may be used for the treatment or prevention of a condition associated with T-cell proliferation or that is mediated by pro-inflammatory cytokines are of formula (1)
or a salt thereof.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a television broadcast receiving/recording device which receives a television broadcast signal and outputs a video/audio signal of a selected channel, and which records digital data generated based on the television broadcast signal.
2. Description of Related Art
For example, a television broadcast receiving/recording device such as a hard disk recorder includes a circuit which receives a digital or analogue television broadcast signal, converts the received television broadcast signal, and outputs an analogue video/audio signal. In a case where the television broadcast signal is to be recorded, the received television broadcast signal is replayed using predetermined video/audio data, and is converted into predetermined type of digital data and recorded in a recording medium such as a hard disk drive (HDD) and a DVD (Digital Versatile Disk).
Especially, in a digital broadcast signal, program information including a title of a program, contents, broadcast time and the like is superposed. In the television broadcast receiving/recording device, an EPG (electronic program guide) is generated based on the program information, and it is displayed on a display device. If a viewer selects a desired program in this EPG screen and sets reservation to record a program, it is possible to easily set reservation to record the program.
When a viewer is watching a program, if he or she needs to record this program, it is possible to start recording the program by pushing a recording button provided on a remote control or the like, and if he or she carries out a stop recording operation (pushes a stop button for example) when it is desired to stop recording, it is possible to stop recording.
In addition to the above-described recording method, the following techniques are proposed as a method concerning recording of a program of a television broadcast signal.
Japanese Utility Model Registration No. 3094992 (hereinafter referred to as patent document 1) for example discloses a digital broadcast/analogue broadcast receiving/recording device in which in a case where a recording command is input (e.g., recording button) during replay of a program such as a digital broadcast, program information is analyzed, a broadcast time of the broadcast signal that is being replayed is extracted so that a currently replayed program or a program to be broadcast at the broadcast time at a predetermined day cycle can be recorded.
Japanese Patent Application Publication Laid-open No. 2002-171455 (hereinafter referred to as patent document 2) discloses a digital broadcast receiving device capable of reliably recording a next broadcast by taking out and recording next broadcast date and time information which is in association with currently broadcasting program from a digital broadcast wave.
Japanese Patent Application Publication Laid-open No. 2004-120408 (hereinafter referred to as patent document 3) discloses a recording device in which a preview CM data is selected from broadcast data in currently broadcasting broadcast data that is received or from broadcast data which is already recorded by recording means and which is currently replayed, program information is extracted from this preview CM data, and sets reservation to record a program in accordance with this extracted program information.
Japanese Patent Application Publication Laid-open No. 2005-117402 (hereinafter referred to as patent document 4) discloses a TV program recording reservation system in which reservation is set to record a desired program, a recording-start picture and a recording-finish picture are set, and pictures in a range from the recording-start picture and the recording-finish picture are recorded. Thus it is possible to easily and reliably set reservation to record a program.
Japanese Patent Application Publication Laid-open No. 2004-343520 (hereinafter referred to as patent document 5) discloses a content record/replay managing device in which it is possible to manage a series of contents to facilitate a user's operation when serialized programs (series of contents) which are serialized and broadcast on a constant period basis such as every day and every week.
To enhance the convenience when a viewer watches by means of a broadcast receiving device, Japanese Patent Application Publication Laid-open No. 2001-230979 (Patent No. 3703357, hereinafter referred to as patent document 6) discloses a receiving device in which a program desired by a user is displayed when a power supply of a remote control is ON.
According to the techniques described in the patent documents 1 to 5, however, there is a merit that the convenience when a user sets reservation to record a program by a recording device is remarkably enhanced but the setting operation of the reservation setting to record a program is not always simple. That is, although the techniques of the earlier applications provide conveniences, there is a question as to whether a viewer can actually use the technique, and there is an adverse possibility that the techniques of the earlier applications are useless functions for a viewer who can not utilize the conventionally provided EPG as a convenient function.
The technique described in the patent document 6 can enhance the convenience when a viewer watches a program by a simple input operation. However, this technique can not enhance convenience when the viewer sets reservation to record a program.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Hence, it is an object of the present invention to provide a television broadcast receiving/recording device in which a viewer can set reservation to record a desired program with a simple input operation.
According to a first aspect of the present invention, there is provided a television broadcast receiving/recording device that receives a digital broadcast signal or an analogue broadcast signal, and outputs and records a video/audio signal of a selected channel, comprising: a recording section to record predetermined type digital data including video data and audio data generated based on a received broadcast signal; a program information obtaining section to obtain program information through a predetermined path (through broadcast signal or network); a program information analyzing section to analyze the program information obtained by the program information obtaining section; a program recording control section which makes the program information analyzing section analyze the program information (program information of a program which is being watched and a program before (after) that program) including a program which is being watched, thereby setting reservation to record a program when a recording command is input while watching the program; and an input section to input the recording command to the program recording control section by a single input operation to execute the reservation setting of recording. For example, the remote control is provided with a special-purpose button (simple recording reservation button) for easily setting reservation to record.
With this, a viewer can set reservation to record a broadcast after the currently watching program by an extremely simple input operation, i.e., operation of the simple recording reservation button of the remote control while watching a program. It is also possible to record a currently watching program while making a reservation of recording at the same time.
Preferably, the television broadcast receiving/recording device further comprises a timekeeper section to keep current time, wherein the record control section determines date and time when the recording command is input by the input section in accordance with information from the timekeeper section, the record control section makes the program information analyzing section extract a broadcast day of the week of the program, a program broadcast starting time and a program broadcast ending time based on the date and time, and the record control section sets reservation to record based on the extraction result.
That is, in the reservation setting operation to record, only a day of the week, a program broadcast starting time and a broadcast ending time are simply set and thus, it is possible to realize with a relatively simple program.
Preferably, the record control section is capable of setting the recording reservation of a program before or after a program which is being watched, in a case where time when the recording command is input by the input section is within a predetermined time from the start of or the end of the program which is being watched, i.e., when it can be determined that the recording command is input at a switching timing of the program. With this, it is possible to set reservation to record a program with a simple input operation, and to set reservation to record a desired program even in a case where time when a viewer inputs a recording command is slightly deviated.
Preferably, the record control section is capable of changing a recording cycle in the setting of reservation to record. Basically, the television broadcast receiving/recording device sets reservation to record a program in accordance with the day of the week information extracted from the program information. Therefore, the reservation of the recording is made on a weekly basis. However, in a case where that program is broadcast every day, it is preferable to set reservation to record on a daily basis. To achieve such a desire, the recording cycle in the setting of recording reservation can be changed. In this case, when the inputting operation of the input means (simple recording reservation button) is carried out, the recording reservation may be set on the weekly basis, and only when special inputting operation is carried out (long time pressing of the simple recording reservation button for example), the recording reservation can be changed to the daily basis.
According to the present invention, the television broadcast receiving/recording device is provided with the input means (e.g., the simple recording reservation button of the remote control) which inputs a recording command to the program recording control means by a single inputting operation to set the recording reservation. Therefore, a viewer can set the recording reservation of a broadcast after the program which is being watched by an extremely simple inputting operation, i.e., operating the simple recording reservation button during watching the program. Further, since it is unnecessary to carry out the troublesome inputting operation, even in a case where a viewer is not good at operating a recent television receiving/recording device having complicated functions, the viewer can easily utilize the television broadcast receiving/recording device.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The above and further objects, features and advantages of the present invention will become more apparent from the following detailed description taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, wherein:
FIG. 1 is a block diagram of function of a HDD recorder 100 of an embodiment;
FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of a remote control 20 ;
FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing a recording reservation setting processing according to a first embodiment;
FIG. 4 is an example of display of a confirmation screen to determine a recording cycle;
FIG. 5 is an example of display of an EPG screen (excerpt);
FIG. 6 is a flowchart showing recording reservation setting processing of a second embodiment; and
FIG. 7 is an example of display of a confirmation screen to determine a program to be recorded.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
Preferred embodiments of the present invention will be explained with reference to the drawings.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram showing essential portions of a hard disk recorder (HDD recorder) 100 as a television broadcast receiving/recording device of the invention. The HDD recorder 100 mainly comprises a tuner 1 , an NTSC decoder 2 , an NTSC encoder 3 , an ATSC front-end 4 , an MPEG decoder 5 , a digital data storing section 6 , a controller 7 , an operating unit 8 , a memory 9 , a device clock 10 , and a remote control 20 .
The tuner 1 includes a digital broadcast signal receiver and an analogue broadcast signal receiver, and can simultaneously receive a digital broadcast signal and an analogue broadcast signal. The MPEG decoder 5 includes an OSD synthetic circuit. The operating unit 9 comprises a plurality of operation keys provided on a front surface of the device. The operating unit 9 includes a receiving circuit which receives an operation signal from the remote control 20 . The device clock 10 is timekeeper means for keeping the current time. For example, the device clock 10 can determine date and time which are recorded and input from information from the device clock 10 .
FIG. 2 is a schematic diagram of the remote control 20 . The remote control 20 includes a power supply button 21 , numeric buttons 22 , an EPG button 24 for displaying an EPG screen, an ENT button 23 for determining by means of an item selected on the EPG screen, channel buttons 25 and 26 used for selecting channels, navigation buttons 27 for vertically and laterally moving a cursor CSR on the EPG screen, recording/replaying buttons 28 for replaying video/audio data recorded in the storing section 6 and for recording a television broadcast signal, and buttons for executing other predetermined functions. Especially, the remote control 20 of this embodiment is provided with a simple recording reservation button 29 for executing the setting of recording reservation by a single inputting operation as one of the recording/replaying buttons 28 . A viewer can set the recording reservation (day of the week, starting time and ending time) of next and subsequent broadcast of the program only by the inputting operation of the simple recording reservation button 29 while watching a program.
In the HDD recorder 100 having the above-described structure, if a viewer selects a channel at which a desired program is broadcast using the operating unit 8 or the remote control 20 , this selection signal is transmitted to the controller 7 , and the controller 7 controls the tuner 1 such that this channel is extracted.
When the selected program is digital broadcast, the tuner 1 extracts a digital broadcast signal of the channel which broadcasts the selected program from ATSC scheme digital broadcast received by an antenna 40 , amplifies the digital broadcast signal and outputs the same to the ATSC front-end 4 .
The ATSC front-end 4 separates program information which is superposed on the digital broadcast signal which is input from the tuner 1 , converts the same into MPEG scheme digital data including video data and audio data, and outputs the same to the MPEG decoder 5 .
The MPEG decoder 5 separates the input digital data into the video data and audio data, converts the same into analogue video signal and analogue audio signal, and outputs the same to a display 30 such as an analogue scheme television image receiving device. If there is an OSD image signal, it is superposed on the video signal and output to the display 30 .
The program information separated by the ATSC front-end 4 is stored in the memory 9 (program information obtaining means). If the controller 7 receives operation (inputting operation of the EPG button 24 of the remote control 20 ) for outputting the EPG screen from the viewer, the controller 7 reads program information stored in the memory 9 , generates an EPG screen of predetermined format, and outputs the same to the MPEG decoder 5 as an image signal
When a program selected by the viewer is analogue broadcast, an analogue broadcast signal of the channel which broadcasts the selected program from the NTSC scheme analogue broadcast wave received by the antenna 40 is extracted, and it is amplified and output to the NTSC decoder 2 . The NTSC decoder 2 separates the program information from the input analogue broadcast signal, converts the same into an analogue video signal and analogue audio signal and outputs the same to the NTSC encoder 3 . The NTSC encoder 3 encodes the input analogue video signal and audio signal and converts the same to MPEG digital data, and outputs the same to the MPEG decoder 5 . Since the processing after it is input to the MPEG decoder 5 is the same as that of the digital broadcast signal, explanation thereof will be omitted.
A recording operation of a program which is being watched is carried out in the following manner. That is, if a record-starting command is input (for example, a REC button which is one of the recording/replaying buttons 28 ), control is performed such that MPEG scheme digital data generated by the NTSC encoder 3 or the ATSC front-end 4 is stored in a predetermined storing medium (e.g., HDD) by the digital data storing section 6 . If a record-ending command is input (a stop button which is one of the recording/replaying buttons 28 ), the recording to the storing medium is stopped.
The MPEG scheme digital data recorded in the storing section 6 is input to the MPEG decoder 5 based on the operation of a replay button of the remote control 20 for example. The MPEG decoder 5 separates the input digital data into video data and audio data and then, the MPEG decoder 5 converts the same into analogue scheme video signal and audio signal, and outputs the same to the display 30 such as a television image receiving device of the analogue scheme.
A viewer can record a program which is currently watched by carrying out the above operation while watching the program. This recording processing is the same as that of a recording function of a conventional general HDD recorder.
Next, the original recording function (simple recording reservation function) of the HDD recorder 100 of the embodiment will be explained. This simple recording reservation function is executed when a viewer operates the simple recording reservation button 29 of the remote control 20 during watching a program.
First Embodiment
FIG. 3 is a flowchart showing recording reservation setting processing of the first embodiment. The flowchart shown in FIG. 3 is executed by the controller 7 as the record control means.
First, in step S 101 , it is determined whether a viewer is watching a program. When the viewer does not watch a program, since the simple recording reservation button 29 is invalid, the processing is ended as it is.
When it is determined in step S 101 that the viewer is watching a program, it is determined whether the viewer carries out the inputting operation of the simple recording reservation button 29 of the remote control 20 and the recording command is input (step S 102 ). When it is determined in step S 102 that the recording command is not input, the processing is ended as it is.
When it is determined in step S 102 that the recording command is input, program information of the program which is being watched is analyzed (program information analyzing means), and necessary information is extracted (step S 103 ). More specifically, date and time when the recording command is input is determined from information from the device clock 10 , and broadcast day of the week, program broadcast starting time and broadcast ending time are extracted from the program information based on the date and time.
Next, setting to program the recording is carried out based on the information extracted in step S 103 (step S 104 ). In this manner, the setting of the simple recording reservation of the embodiment is completed. In the HDD recorder 100 of the embodiment, since the remote control 20 is provided with the simple recording reservation button 29 , a viewer can set reservation of the recording of broadcast after the currently watching program by the extremely simple inputting operation, i.e., by operating the simple recording reservation button 29 during watching the program.
For example, if a viewer carries out the inputting operation of the simple recording reservation button 29 during watching a program of broadcast on Monday at 21:00 to 22:00 (e.g., 21:30), broadcast day of the week: Monday, broadcast starting time 21:00, and broadcast ending time 22:00 are extracted from the program information of the program, and the setting of the recording reservation is carried out based on this. In this embodiment, the ending time of the recording reservation is not especially limited, and when the setting of the recording reservation is carried out, the recording is carried out from 21:00 to 22:00 on every Monday until the viewer cancels the recording reservation.
In this embodiment, when the inputting operation of the simple recording reservation button 29 is carried out, since the recording reservation setting processing is executed in accordance with the flowchart shown in FIG. 3 in principle, reservation is set to record programs on a weekly basis. However, in some cases, a program to be recorded is broadcast every day and it is preferable to set reservation to record the program on a daily basis. Therefore, the recording cycle may be changed when setting of the recording reservation.
For example, when the simple recording reservation button 29 is pushed for a short time, it is assumed that the recording reservation is made on a weekly basis in accordance with the flowchart shown in FIG. 3 , and when the simple recording reservation button 29 is pushed for a long time, the recording cycle can be changed. More specifically, when the simple recording reservation button 29 is pushed for a long time, a recording cycle selecting screen D 1 as shown in FIG. 4 is indicated. In this screen, a viewer operates the navigation buttons 27 of the remote control 20 to vertically move the cursor CSR, and can determine the recording cycle by operating the ENT button 23 in accordance with a desired recording cycle.
When the inputting operation of the simple recording reservation button 29 is carried out, the recording cycle selecting screen as shown in FIG. 4 may be always indicated so that a viewer can select a desired recording cycle.
Second Embodiment
A recording reservation setting processing of the second embodiment is different from that of the first embodiment in that when the inputting operation of the simple recording reservation button 29 is carried out within a predetermined time from the start or the end of the program which is being watched, the recording reservation can be set for a program before or after the program which is being watched.
In the program guide shown in FIG. 5 , when a viewer desires to set reservation to record a program B (drama for 60 minutes) which is broadcast from 21:00 to 22:00, the timing at which the viewer carries out the inputting operation of the simple recording reservation button 29 is as follows. That is, (1) during watching that program (e.g., 21:10), (2) during CM of preview which is broadcast before the program starts (e.g., 21:59), and (3) immediately after the program is ended (e.g., 22:01).
In the case of (1), there is no problem because the program information of the program which is being watched is analyzed, and a broadcast day of the week and a time frame of the broadcast are set. However, in the cases (2) and (3), a program which is being watched (program A in the case (2) and program C in the case (3)) and a program which is to be recorded (program B) are different. Therefore, in such cases, it is possible to set reservation to record a program before (or after) the program which is being watched. In some cases, it is required to set reservation to record a program which is actually being watched. Therefore, it is preferable that a viewer can select which program should be recorded.
FIG. 5 is a flowchart showing the recording reservation setting processing of the second embodiment. The flowchart shown in FIG. 5 is executed by the controller 7 as the record control means.
First, in step S 201 , it is determined whether a program is watched. When a program is not watched, since the simple recording reservation button 29 is invalid, the processing is ended as it is.
When it is determined in step S 201 that the program is watched, it is determined whether a viewer carries out the inputting operation of the simple recording reservation button 29 of the remote control 20 and the recording command is input (step S 202 ). When it is determined in step S 202 that the recording command is not input, the processing is ended as it is.
When it is determined in step S 202 that the recording command is input, program information of the program which is being watched is analyzed (program information analyzing means), and necessary information is extracted (step S 203 ). More specifically, date and time when the recording command is input is determined from information from the device clock 10 , and broadcast day of the week, program broadcast starting time and broadcast ending time are extracted from the program information based on the date and time.
Then, the current time (time when the recording command is input), and the broadcast starting time and broadcast ending time extracted in step S 203 are compared with each other (step S 204 ), and it is determined whether the current time is within a predetermined time (e.g., two minutes) from the broadcast starting time of or the broadcast ending time of the program which is being watched (step S 205 ). That is, it is determined whether the recording command is input at the timing at which the program is switched. In the cases (2) and (3), the current time is within the predetermined time (e.g., two minutes) from the broadcast starting time or broadcast ending time of the program which is being watched.
When it is determined in step S 205 that the current time is not within the predetermined time from the broadcast starting time or broadcast ending time of the program which is being watched (e.g., the case (1)), the setting of the recording reservation is carried out based on the information extracted in step S 203 (step S 208 ).
When it is determined in step S 205 that the current time is within the predetermined time from the broadcast starting time or broadcast ending time of the program which is being watched (e.g., the case (2) or (3)), a confirmation screen is indicated (step S 206 ). In this confirmation screen, a viewer operates the remote control 20 to select and determine a program to be recorded (step S 207 ).
For example, in the case (2), a confirmation screen as shown in FIG. 7 is indicated. That is, if a recording command is input at time (20:59 in the case (2)) near a boundary at which the program is changed, a confirmation screen DA having program information concerning the program B which is currently watched is indicated, and a viewer selects whether the program A is to be recorded. If the viewer operates the ENT button 23 in this confirmation screen DA, setting for recording reservation of the program A is made. If the lateral key of the navigation buttons 27 is operated in the confirmation screen DA, a confirmation screen DB having program information concerning the program A is indicated as a next screen, and the viewer selects whether the program A should be recorded. If the viewer operates the ENT button 23 in this confirmation screen DB, the device is set with reservation to record a program B. In this manner, the viewer can select which program should be recorded, and recording reservation of a desired program can be made.
Next, the setting of the recording reservation is carried out based on the program information of the selected program (step S 208 ). In this manner, the setting of the simple recording reservation of the embodiment is completed. In this embodiment, if the time when the recording command is input by the simple recording reservation button 29 is within the predetermined time from the start or the end of the currently watched program, the setting of recording reservation of a program before or after the currently watched program can be made. Therefore, setting of recording reservation can be made by a simple inputting operation, and even when the time when the viewer inputs the recording command is slightly deviated, it is possible to set reservation to record the desired program.
Although the confirmation screen DA and the confirmation screen DB are indicated in a switching manner in this embodiment, the invention is not limited to this. For example, an EPG screen including a currently watched program may be indicated, and a viewer may select a program to be recorded from the EPG screen. The confirmation screens DA and DB may be superposed on the currently watched program by OSD.
According to the television broadcast receiving/recording device of the present invention, the remote control 20 is provided with the simple recording reservation button 29 capable of inputting the recording command (setting of recording reservation) by a single inputting operation. Therefore, a viewer can made the setting of recording reservation of a broadcast after the currently watched program by the extremely simple inputting operation, i.e., operation of the simple recording reservation button 29 while watching a program. Since it is unnecessary to carry out a complicated inputting operation, even a viewer is not good at operating a television broadcast receiving/recording device having complicated functions, he or she can easily utilize the television broadcast receiving/recording device.
Although the television broadcast receiving/recording device is applied to the HDD recorder as one example in the explanation, the television broadcast receiving/recording device can also be applied to a DVD recorder, a video cassette recorder and the like of course.
Although the reservation setting to record a program is carried out automatically by carrying out the inputting operation of the simple recording reservation button 29 in the embodiment, the recording of the currently watched program may be carried out simultaneously with the recording reservation. In the television broadcast receiving/recording device of the embodiment, the program information is obtained from a digital broadcast signal, but the program information may be obtained by other methods. For example, program information which is made available on the Internet can be obtained through a network.
When program information can not be obtained in the television broadcast receiving/recording device, it is conceived that if a broadcast program is divided every 30 minutes and if time when a recording command is input is referred to, it is possible to carry out the setting of recording reservation using a time frame including that time. For example, if a recording command is input at 21:10, a time frame including that time is in a range of 21:00 to 21:30, it is possible to carry out the setting of recording reservation using this. In this case, automatically set recording time does not correspond to broadcast time of the program in some cases, it is preferable that the recording time can be changed in increments of 30 minutes for example.
The entire disclosure of Japanese Patent Application No. 2006-019127 filed on Jan. 27, 2006 including specification, claims, drawings and abstract are incorporated herein by reference in its entirety.
Although various exemplary embodiments have been shown and described, the invention is not limited to the embodiments shown. Therefore, the scope of the invention is intended to be limited solely by the scope of the claims that follow.
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Disclosed is a television broadcast receiving/recording device that receives a digital broadcast signal or an analogue broadcast signal, and outputs and records a video/audio signal of a selected channel, including a recording section to record predetermined type digital data including video data and audio data generated based on a received broadcast signal; a program information obtaining section to obtain program information through a predetermined path; a program information analyzing section to analyze the program information obtained by the program information obtaining section; a program recording control section which makes the program information analyzing section analyze the program information including a program which is being watched, thereby setting reservation to record a program when a recording command is input while watching the program; and an input section to input the recording command to the program recording control section by a single input operation to execute the reservation setting of recording.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the art of incineration systems used to burn waste materials. More specifically, the present invention relates to an improved system for incinerating waste material and disposing of the ash and waste gases efficiently.
2. Description of Related Area of Art
Assignee of the present application is aware of a related company in Europe which has been selling pin-hole hearths for approximately two years.
OBJECTS AND SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is a primary object of the present invention to provide an improved incineration system which utilizes pyrolytic gasification of waste materials to subsequently be burned in a thermal reactor yielding a minimum of waste gas and ash material.
It is another object of the present invention to provide an incineration system with an improved pyrolysis chamber which is both structurally stronger than those in the past and easier to produce.
It is a different object of the present invention to provide an improved incineration system utilizing a simpler and more effective combustion air pre-heating system which also maintains a cool skin temperature thereby eliminating excessive room temperatures in indoor installations and reduces paint problems.
It is still a different object of the present invention to provide an improved incineration system having a platform/air plenum on top of the main chamber which can be used as a platform for service and inspection and which remains cool during operation.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide an improved incineration system which utilizes a bolted front head on the main pyrolytic chamber so that proper sealing may be achieved with minimal, if any, leaking and yet is detachable in case of major repairs.
It is still a different object of the present invention to provide an improved incineration system having a manual access door incorporating an intergral hydraulic ash door which eliminates large swing door and sagging problems, swivel hydraulic connections which generally leak, substitutes a steel labyrinth seal and cam locking for older rope seals, reduces overall unit length by eliminating the need for a large swing door clearance, eliminates the need for a separate ash removal door and eliminates the extended transition housing for a standard ash removal.
It is but another object of the present invention to provide an improved incineration system utilizing a flat cast iron hearth which eliminates the need for air tubes, provides uniform distribution of underfire air over the entire hearth area, has a non-slagging surface, has individual plates which can be replaced, provides a large flat grate surface for combustion material allowing uniform pyrolysis and complete burndown of carbon to sterile ash, minimizes corrosion of the tank structure due to condensing steam underneath the plates of the hearth, provides a flat working surface for ash removal, permits use of metal tools for cleaning which would ordinarily harm a refractory surface.
Yet another object of the present invention is to provide an improved incineration system having an ash ram which allows an increased ram head area to remove more material, matches the flat upper structure of the hearth, is wider so that less material can escape on the sides of the bed and simplifies the structure of the ash ram to reduce possible maintenance problems.
Still another object of the present invention is to provide an improved incineration system utilizing a cable and cylinder ash ram moving system which permits movement of the ash ram through the main pyrolysis chamber without exposing the cylinder or piston or any parts thereof to any significant heat while utilizing a system that does not cause high torquing or overleading of the ash ram.
One more object of the present invention is to provide an incineration system having a thermal reactor design using forced air combustion so that all exposed flame is eliminated, dependency on room air supply is greatly reduced, combustion efficiency is improved due to higher control over mixing, turbulence and the air/fuel ratio and federal, state and local regulations may be complied with with little or no guessing as to temperature and time requirements.
How these and further objects of the invention are accomplished will be described by reference to the following description of the preferred embodiment of the present invention taken in conjunction with the FIGURES. Generally, however, the objects are accomplished in an incineration system utilizing a circular cross-section pyrolysis chamber in which waste materials are gasified. A flat cast iron hearth therein serves as the floor of the pyrolysis chamber. The cast iron hearth has a number of small holes which reduce slagging and are raised above the general hearth level by a number of nipples for quick and easy location. The front head of the pyrolysis chamber is bolted on to eliminate leaking encountered with earlier rope seals. A front door assembly is built onto the front head, the door assembly being vertically movable by means of hydraulic cylinders mounted to the head. When the door assembly is in its lower position, it is held in place and sealed by a number of cam locks. The door assembly may be opened by unscrewing a pair of locking mechanisms which seal the door to a vertically movable frame. Ash removal may be accomplished by simply raising the entire structure, rather than opening the door. The ash ram of the present invention is a rectangular ram covers a substantial area of the pyrolysis chamber floor (i.e., the flat cast iron hearth) and utilizes a unique cable and cylinder ram moving system. A series of pulleys are used in connection with the cable so that extension of a hydraulic piston moves the ash ram inwardly and through the pyrolysis chamber without exposing any of the cylinder or piston elements to high levels of heat. Likewise, using the pulleys, twice the travel length of the piston extension may be accomplished, thereby reducing the required length of the piston and any torque effects on the piston caused in earlier devices by using tandem cylinders. The air plenum above the pyrolysis chamber also acts as a platform, thereby allowing inspection and maintenance to take place on top of the pyrolysis chamber and maintaining a relatively cool temperature for that platform. The pyrolysis chamber itself is circular in cross-section, which increases the strength of the chamber as well as the ease of manufacture. In addition, it is easier to add brick or to pour refractory material in the chamber. Finally, the gasified waste material leaves the pyrolysis chamber and is actually ignited and burned in a thermal reactor. The thermal reactor utilizes reverse rotation and forced air combustion to effectively mix and burn the waste material after gasification. This is accomplished by using combustion air jets which reverse the rotation of the combustion mixture several times during combustion and stoichiometrically control the burning. Because the combustion air and fuel ratios are very closely controlled and the dependency on room air supply is reduced, the efficiency of the burning is greatly improved and makes it easier for an operator comply with emmissions regulations.
Other variations and modifications of the invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art after reading the specification and are deemed to fall within the scope of the present invention if they fall within the scope of the claims which follow the description of the preferred ebodiment.
DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is a side elevation view of an incineration system incorporating the present invention;
FIG. 2 is a top plan view of an incineration system incorporating the present invention taken along the line 2--2 of FIG. 1;
FIG. 3 is a side cross-sectional view of the pyrolysis chamber and front door assembly taken along the line 3--3 of FIG. 2;
FIG. 4 is a front cross-sectional view of the pyrolysis chamber taken along the line 4--4 of FIG. 1;
FIG. 5 is a top plan view of a hearth plate taken along the line 5--5 of FIG. 4;
FIG. 5A is a cross-sectional view of a part of the hearth plate taken along the line 5A--5A of FIG. 5;
FIG. 5B is a partial cross-sectional view of a hearth plate taken along the line 5B--5B of FIG. 5;
FIG. 6A is a front plan view of the front door assembly taken along the line 6--6 of FIG. 1;
FIG. 6B is a front view of the front door assembly of FIG. 6A with the front door assembly in its raised position;
FIG. 7A is a partial and cross-sectional view of the front door assembly taken along the line 7A--7A of FIG. 6A.
FIG. 7B is a partial cross-sectional view of the front door assembly taken along the line 7B--7B of FIG. 6A;
FIG. 7C is a partial cross-sectional view of the front door assembly taken along the line 7C--7C of FIG. 6A;
FIG. 7D is a partial cross-sectional view of the front door assembly taken along the line 7D--7D of FIG. 6A;
FIG. 8 is a side elevation plan view of the ash removal system;
FIG. 9 is a cross-sectional view of the thermal reactor taken along the line 9--9 of FIG. 1;
FIG. 9A is cross-sectional view of the premixing section of the thermal reactor taken along the line 9A--9A of FIG. 9;
FIG. 9B is a cross-sectional view of the ignitor section of the thermal reactor taken along the line 9B--9B of FIG. 9;
FIG. 9C is a cross-sectional view of the expansion section of the thermal reactor taken along the line 9C--9C of FIG. 9.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
The preferred embodiment of the present invention is illustrated in FIGS. 1 and 2. An incinerator 20 includes a pyrolysis chamber 22 with several appendages attached thereto. A waste feed apparatus 24 and ash removal apparatus 26 are adjacently mounted to the rear head of the main chamber 22. The thermal reactor unit 28 is mounted on top of the main chamber 22. An air preheating system also serves to air-cool the main chamber 22. Finally, a new front door and front head assembly 30 are incorporated into the front of main chamber 22.
Main Chamber
The main chamber 22 of incinerator 20 is shown in more detail in FIGS. 3 and 4. Chamber 22 is generally defined by cylindrical wall 32. A rear head 44 has a waste feed opening 23 and ram entry 48. A number of mounting brackets 34 are found along the inner sides of wall 32. These brackets 34 hold curved walls 36 which are sealed at their front and rear edges (not shown) and at their top and bottom edges with angled brackets 34a. Lower spacers 38 define a flat floor along the length of the chamber 22.
The inside of the chamber 22 is lined with refractory material 40. An upper hole 42 is provided for the thermal reactor assembly 28. The front head of chamber 22 will be discussed in more detail below. The rear head 44 is also lined with refractory material 40 and has a passageway 46 through which waste may be fed by the feeder apparatus 24, a rectangular entry port 48 for the ash removal apparatus 26, and a smaller pair of holes 50 designed to provide access for inspection, and injection of steam into the underfire air system.
A horizontal air channel header and a pair of vertical air channels 78 are employed to distribute a portion of the preheated air as underfire combustion air in the pyrolysis chamber 22 through the hearth described in more detail below. These air channels 78 are located on the rear wall 44 and serve to cool the corners of the feeder 46 for waste material and the rear wall which can achieve high temperatures if not cooled.
The bottom of chamber 22 is generally flat refractory material 40 that has a longitudinal support 52. Support 52 provides a central support for a number of plates 54 that define the hearth of incinerator 20. A hearth plate 54 is shown in detail in FIG. 5.
The design of chamber 22 is such that liquid and solid waste materials fed into the chamber by feed system 24 are gasified as opposed to being burned in an open flame. This means that the gasified materials may be burned at a later time. Thermal reactor 28 is provided in the preferred embodiment to accomplish this. A burner 33 may also be incorporated into pyrolysis chamber 22 to eliminate additional waste.
Cast Iron Hearth Plates
An individual hearth plate 54 is a generally flat piece of cast iron in the preferred embodiment. A number of air holes 56 are distributed throughout plate 54 to provide an even flow of combustion air to chamber 22, avoiding "hot spots", or concentrated burn areas, across the hearth. As seen in FIGS. 5A and 5B, each of the holes 56 is surrounded on the upper side of plate 54 by a nipple 58. Nipples 58 help in finding the holes 56 for cleaning as well as preventing molten material from getting into the holes 56.
The hearth configuration using plates 54 allows one to replace individual plates when necessary. Plates 54 have interlocking edges 60 extending laterally. The longitudinal edges 62 rest on either support 52 or a groove 64 formed in the refractory material 40. The underside of plates 54 have ribs 64 which help support the plates.
As seen in FIGS. 5A and 5B, the sides of nipples 58 are tapered upwardly from the surface of the hearth plate 54 toward the upper edge of each aperture 56. This allows rakes and other cleaning equipment to be used without damage to the plates 54, the nipples 56 or the cleaning equipment itself.
These plates 54, having the holes 56 incorporated therein, eliminate the need for separate air tubes to provide combustion air for gasification of the waste materials. In addition, the distribution of underfire air is across the entire hearth area and is more even than in earlier devices. In addition, damage to the incinerator is minimized because metal tools can be used for cleaning without harm to the hearth and corrosion due to steam condensation is minimized.
Combustion Air Supply
The combustion air supply of the present invention utilizes atmospheric air both to cool the main combustion chamber 22 and to provide incinerator 20 with air for burning. A blower fan 66 and thermal reactor combustion air (TRCA) fan 67 on top of chamber 22 help draw air through inlets 68 in lower skirt 70. The air is then drawn up through holes 72 in the lower part of walls 32 and through the spaces formed by walls 32 and walls 36. Unlike earlier devices which used individual channels, this configuration requires fewer weld seams, is easier to brick or insulate, and permits holes to be cut or punched out (such as holes 72 and 74). In addition, the circular cross-section is stronger. Finally, the single wall 36 ensures more even and complete cooling of the chamber 22 as compared to a number of channels in the wall.
The heated air is drawn by fans 66 and 67 and convected into plenum 76 through upper holes 74 in wall 32. Blower fan 66 then transfers a portion of the air to interior passages 78 which allow for further heating and direct the air through holes 51 into the space between the hearth plates 54 and the lower refractory material 40. The heated air is then forced up through the holes 56 in plates 54. A majority of the preheated air is used in the thermal reactor plenums 174 and 190 described later and the remainder is used for burner air supply.
The air passing between walls 32 and 36 assists in cooling the refractory material lining the pyrolysis chamber 22. The cooling effect is very even due to the even distribution of air through the walls. This assists in keeping the temperature in the room in which the incineration system is kept to a minimum and reduces problems with paint blistering or peeling due to the excessive air temperatures on the outer skin of the incinerator. In addition, plenum 76 provides a stable and relatively cool platform on which one or more persons may work. Service and inspection may be performed on the platform while the incineration system is in operation.
Front Door Assembly
The front door assembly 30 is shown in FIGS. 6A and 6B. Front head 80 is bolted to main chamber 22 with bolts 82. In the past, a rope seal had been used which periodically led to leaking. The bolted configuration avoids this problem. Bolts 82 do allow removal of head 80 for major work to be performed internally. Two hydraulic cylinders 84 are mounted to front head 80 on either side of a dual-action door 86. The upper ends of cylinder rods 88 have horizontal brackets 90 attached thereto. Door 86 eliminates the need for a separate ash removal door and room clearance for a large access door. Sagging of the door is also greatly reduced.
Brackets 90 also hold the top edge of a vertically slidable, rectangular frame 92 onto which door 86 is mounted. Side rails 92a of frame 92 are L-shaped in cross-section, as seen in FIG. 7A. Also seen in FIGS. 6A and 7A are guide plates 94 secured to front head 80 by a number of bolts 96. Side rails 92a run within guide plates 94 to limit the maximum distance between door 86 and head 80.
Hinges of standard configuration are provided on door 86. Lugs 98 are welded to the frame 92a. Two other members 101 are welded to door 86 and are on the upper and lower sides of each lug 98. A lug pin 103 extends through members 101 and lug 98. Opposite the hinges are locking mechanisms 100. As seen in FIG. 7B, locks 100 have a bracket 102 secured to door 86 with an extension 104 that extends beyond the left edge of door 86. Extension 104 engages a pivoting member 106. Member 106 has a hinged bracket 108 which pivots on a mounted bracket 110. Brackets 110, like lugs 98, are mounted to side rails 92a, and therefore move vertically with cylinder rods 88. Brackets 110 secure extension 104 with a screw 112 operated by handles 114.
To open the hinged door 86, one unscrews the locking mechanism 100 using handle 114. The bracket 106 then swings to the side, freeing extension 104 to move outwardly. A handle 116 is provided to assist in pivoting the door 86 open.
To ensure that a tight seal is maintained when door 86 is in its lowered position, a number of side cam locks 118 and bottom cam locks 120 are employed. Side locks 118 use moving members 122 welded to side rail 92a which engage stationary members 124 welded to front head 80. As door 86 is lowered, members 122 and 124 engage, the weight of door 86 pulling itself in toward head 80.
Similarly, bottom cam locks 120 have a moving member 126 mounted to lower rail 92b. This moving member 126 engages stationary lower members 128 when the door 86 is lowered. As with members 122, members 128 are welded to front head 80.
Finally, a unique labyrinth seal is used to prevent heat from escaping from the combustion chamber 22. The front plate 130 of door 86 has a perpendicular lip 132 about its periphery. Rails 92a and 92b have portions 134 extending perpendicular to front head 80. These portions 134 extend outward to plate 130 between the side plates 136 of door 86 and lip 132. Welded to each portion 134 are strips 138 which engage the tip of lip 132.
The labyrinth arrangement requires air attempting to escape chamber 22 to change directions a number of times, thereby inhibiting its flow outward. Once again, reliance on the leaky rope seals found in earlier devices is not necessary.
Ash Removal System
The ash removal system 26 is shown in more detail in FIG. 8. An ash ram 140 is mounted to enter main chamber 22 through an ash ram port 48. The ash ram 140 is generally rectangular in cross-section and is designed to slide along the hearth plates 54 of the incinerator to push ash and debris toward the front head 80. A unique cable and cylinder system is utilized to operate the ash ram 140.
Ram 140 is connected to cables 142a and 142b by a sleeve 144 attached at the rear of ram 140. A hydraulic cylinder 146 utilizes a specially adapted piston mounting 148 onto which are mounted pulleys 150 and 152. A third pulley 154 is rotatably mounted to a bracket 156 adjacent the front end of ram 140. Similarly, a fourth pulley 158 is mounted on a rear bracket 160 and allowed to rotate. Cable 142a, secured to bracket 162 by clasp 164, extends around pulley 150 to pulley 154, then back along the length of ram 140. Cable 142b runs to rear pulley 158, around pulley 158 to pulley 152 and finally back to bracket 160 where the cable 142b is secured to a clasp 166.
When cleaning of the chamber 22 is desired, cylinder 146 is energized, thereby extending mounting bracket 148 rearward. The configuration of the pulleys, while only providing one-half (1/2) the force generated by cylinder 146, allows the ram 140 to travel twice as far as bracket 148. Therefore, a relatively minor amount of piston travel permits full length travel of the ram 140. As the cylinder bracket 148 retracts, the ash ram 140 is pulled back to its storage position outside the pyrolysis chamber.
Another advantage of this configuration is that no part of the cylinder or piston ever enters any hot areas directly above the hearth or within the combustion chamber 22. Likewise, the cylinder does not need to be extended the entire length of the chamber either by itself, or in tandem with another cylinder or cylinders. Therefore, there is no extreme torquing as in earlier configurations or overleading of the cylinder (caused by double welding cylinders). Likewise, no undercarriage is required because the rails 168 on which the ram runs, along with the support given by cable 142 in mounting sleeve 144, keep the cylinder in line and horizontal and therefore obviate the need for the undercarriage. An appropriate wiper mechanism 170 may be installed at port 48 to seal the ram 140 from any combustion activity in chamber 22. The front door assembly 30 is part of the ash removal cycle in that it is raised to allow ash to be pushed out.
Thermal Reactor
The thermal reactor of the present incineration system is shown in FIG. 9 in more detail. The thermal reactor 28 is a staged combustion process system which uses forced air combustion instead of a diffusion flame. Gasified combustion material from the pyrolysis chamber 22 enters the thermal reactor in its premixer section 172. At this stage, a plenum 174 connected to TRCA fan 67 forces combustion air through a number of holes 176 as seen in FIG. 9A which are oriented to move the gasified material further down the thermal reactor in an axial manner. The air/fuel mixture next reaches the ignitor section 178, which has a pair of ignitors 180 and a pair of view ports 181 for observing ignition. The ignitors 180 impart a clockwise rotation to the air/fuel mixture as it is ignited. After ignition, the air/fuel mixture encounters a second series of combustion air orificies 184 seen in FIG. 9B.
The reactor walls then form an air expansion section 186 in which are located a third set of air holes 188 shown in detail in FIG. 9C. While ignitors 180 have imparted a clockwise spin to the combustion mixture, air holes 184 reverse that orientation by inducing a counter-clockwise combustion air spin with air coming in through those holes. Similarly, holes 188 again reverse the orientation of the spin of the combustion mixture within the thermal reactor 28, causing the clockwise spin to be induced to the combustion mixture when it goes through air expansion section 186. This multiple reversal of spin directions improves mixing of the combustion air with the fuel. Air added to the combustion mixture through holes 176, 184, 188 is added in a stoichiometric fashion so that burning of the combustion mixture takes place in a step-wise fashion. In addition, the expanding diameter of the thermal reactor forces the combustion mixture, as it burns, to seek out a larger volume and therefore proceed through the reactor without causing pockets of gas to circulate within the reactor.
Air for holes 184 and 188 is provided through another collar 190 which, like collar 174, is supplied with combustion air from TRCA fan 67. The combustion mixture enters the secondary combustion section 192 which includes a burner apparatus 194 having a view port 195 across therefrom. In the preferred embodiment, an gas burner is placed here to assist in burning the combustion mixture. Additionally, a combustion extension section 196 is added to prolong the residence time of the combustion mixture in the thermal reactor 28. As can be seen in FIG. 9, the reactor then terminates with a reducer section 198 which feeds the gases of combustion to an appropriate stack apparatus 29 after passing through a retention chamber 31.
The above-described thermal reactor design permits complete control of all combustion and, therefore, the air/fuel ratio control at each stage of combustion. Likewise, there is no exposed flame and a greatly reduced dependency on room combustion air supply.
With more demanding federal, state and local regulations with respect to emmissions, the reactor design disclosed herein provides the operator with the ability to maintain temperature and time requirements for the retention of the gases without having to guess as to air flow and burning characteristics. In addition, the high degree of air/fuel ratio control improves the combustion efficiency, as does the reverse rotation turbulence mixing of the combustion mixture. Any desired temperature characteristics may be maintained by altering or maintaining air/fuel ratios as well.
The pyrolysis incineration system described herein is designed to accomplish several specific functions. The pyrolysis function is efficiently performed in the pyrolysis chamber 22. The gases generated therein are completely burned in the thermal reactor 28 which maintains minimum combustion temperatures. Finally, the retention chamber 31 holds the products of combustion exiting the thermal reactor 28 at a minimum temperature for a specified time. Each part of the system is designed to accomplish these tasks without compromising performance. Other devices that have done so by attempting to combine functions, such as combustion and retention, fail to provide an effective system.
Variations, modifications and other applications will become apparent to those skilled in the art. Therefore, the above description of the preferred embodiment is to be interpreted as illustrative rather than limiting. The scope of the present invention is limited only by the scope of the claims that follow.
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An incineration system utilizes a circular cross-section pyrolysis chamber in which waste materials are gasified. A flat cast iron hearth serves as the floor of the pyrolysis chamber and has a number of small holes which are raised above the general hearth level by a number of nipples. The bolted front head of the chamber has a vertically movable front door. When raised, the hinged door assembly may be opened by unscrewing a pair of locking mechanisms which seal the door to a vertically movable frame. Ash removal may be accomplished by partially raising the entire structure, rather than opening the door. The ash ram is rectangular, covers a substantial area of the chamber floor when extended, and utilizes a unique cable and cylinder ram moving system. An air plenum above the chamber also acts as a platform, allowing inspection and maintenance to take place on top of the chamber. Gasified waste material leaving the pyrolysis chamber is ignited and burned in a thermal reactor utilizing reverse rotation and forced air combustion to effectively mix and burn the waste material after gasification.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a structure comprising high-frequency components, for example a protection structure.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
Generally, electronic components are formed either in a solid substrate semiconductor wafer, or in a semiconductor-on-insulator (SOI) layer.
FIG. 1 shows the upper portion of a doped solid substrate 1 of a first conductivity type, for example, P, in which are formed several doped wells 3 of a second conductivity type, for example N. High-frequency electronic components can then be formed in wells 3 . The isolation between wells 3 results from an appropriate biasing of the PN junctions between wells 3 and substrate 1 . The capacitances between a well 3 and substrate 1 and between two neighboring wells 3 are often non-negligible as compared with the specific capacitances of the components formed in wells 3 and this is a problem, especially in the field of high-frequency components.
FIG. 2 shows an example of an SOI type structure. This structure comprises, on a semiconductor support 5 , a thin layer of a semiconductor substrate with an interposed silicon oxide layer 7 . Semiconductor wells 9 , in which are formed electronic components, are formed side by side in the substrate. The free space between the wells is occupied by an insulator, for example, silicon oxide 11 . The silicon oxide of layer 7 , as for itself, enables insulating the electronic components in the vertical direction. This structure has the advantage over the structure of FIG. 1 of decreasing the values of the stray capacitances between neighboring components. However, these capacitances are not negligible in certain cases, especially at high frequency.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention aims at providing a structure comprising several electronic components operating at high frequency, insulated with respect to one another, in which the stray capacitances between components are decreased.
To achieve all or part of these objects as well as others, one embodiment of the present invention provides a structure comprising at least two neighboring components, capable of operating at high frequencies, formed in a thin silicon substrate extending on a silicon support of a first conductivity type and separated therefrom by an insulating layer, the components being laterally separated by insulating regions, wherein the silicon support has, at least in the vicinity of its portion in contact with the insulating layer, heavily-doped islands of a second conductivity type, the distance between islands being smaller than twice the extent of the space charge area created by the junction with the silicon support.
According to an embodiment of the present invention, the components are two diodes for protecting a line, the first diode having its anode connected to ground and its cathode connected to the line to be protected and the second diode having its cathode connected to a supply voltage and its anode connected to the line to be protected.
According to an embodiment of the present invention, each diode comprises a silicon well of a first conductivity type having its bottom and its lateral walls bordered by an area of the first conductivity type with a strong doping level and in the surface of which is formed a region of the second conductivity type.
The foregoing and other objects, features, and advantages of the present invention will be discussed in detail in the following non-limiting description of specific embodiments in connection with the accompanying drawings.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIGS. 1 and 2 , previously described, are cross-section views illustrating two known electronic component forming modes;
FIG. 3 is a cross-section view of a structure comprising two diodes according to an embodiment of the present invention;
FIG. 4 is an equivalent electric diagram of the structure of FIG. 3 ;
FIG. 5 illustrates the stray capacitances present in the structure of FIG. 3 ;
FIG. 6 is an equivalent electric diagram of the structure of FIG. 5 ; and
FIG. 7 illustrates a structure according to an alternative embodiment of the present invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
For clarity, the same elements have been designated with the same reference numerals in the different drawings and, further, as usual in the representation of semiconductor components, the various representations of semiconductor components are not drawn to scale.
FIG. 3 shows two adjacent diodes D 1 and D 2 of protection against overvoltages. These diodes are placed side by side and are formed on an SOI-type structure comprising a thin semiconductor substrate formed on an insulating layer 7 , itself formed on a semiconductor support 5 . Diodes D 1 and D 2 , which are identical, are laterally insulated by insulating regions 11 , for example made of silicon oxide. Each diode comprises an N-type doped well 13 in which is formed a P-type doped region 15 . The well is surrounded (bottom, lateral walls and part of its upper surface) with a heavily-doped N-type region 17 . Anode and cathode contacts 21 and 22 are formed on region 15 and on region 17 in contact with well 13 . Anode 21 of diode D 1 is grounded. Cathode 22 of diode D 2 is connected to a voltage source Vcc. Cathode 22 of diode D 1 and anode 21 of diode D 2 are connected to a line I/O to be protected.
FIG. 4 shows the equivalent electric diagram of the structure shown in FIG. 3 . This circuit comprises diode D 1 having its anode connected to ground and its cathode connected to a line I/O to be protected, and diode D 2 having its cathode connected to voltage source Vcc and its anode connected to line I/O.
As described previously, components D 1 and D 2 are insulated from each other by insulating layer 7 and by insulating regions 11 . Now, this insulation is not perfect and stray capacitances still exist between the various components, which capacitances must be minimized for a high-frequency operation.
FIG. 5 shows a modeling of the different capacitances of the structure of FIG. 3 . The stray capacitance horizontally created between the two wells 13 is called C 1 . The stray capacitances vertically formed between wells 13 and support 5 are called C 2 and C 2 ′. The impedance of support 5 between the areas underlying components D 1 and D 2 is formed of a resistor Rs in parallel with a capacitor Cs.
FIG. 6 illustrates the way in which the various high-frequency capacitances are associated, in which case it can be considered that terminals Vcc and the ground are connected. This drawing relates to the case where the diodes are off. The diode capacitances are designated as C D1 and C D2 , respectively. Capacitances C D1 , C 1 , and C D2 are in parallel, the assembly being in parallel with the series assembly of capacitances C 2 and C 2 ′ and of impedance (Cs/Rs) of support 5 .
The applicant has analyzed the circuit operation at 1 MHz. This analysis is summed up by table 1 hereafter. This table indicates the values of the various capacitances for various resistivity values of the material of support 5 . The capacitance values are given in arbitrary units, stating that, for a relatively conductive substrate of a resistivity lower than 1 ohm.cm, the assembly of the capacitances of both diodes D 1 and D 2 and of the associated parasitic elements brings the capacitance on terminal I/O (see FIG. 6 ) to a value of 1.
TABLE 1
1 ohm ·
5,000
cm
10 ohms · cm
1,000 ohms · cm
ohms · cm
D1//D2
0.64
0.64
0.64
0.64
C1
0.08
0.08
0.08
0.08
D1//D2//C1
0.72
0.72
0.72
0.72
C2 + C2′
0.28
0.28
0.28
0.28
Cs
High
High
0.8
0.37
C2 + C2′ + Cs
0.28
0.28
0.21
0.16
Total Cap.
1
1
0.93
0.88
It is considered that diodes D 1 and D 2 each have a 0.32 capacitance and that capacitance C 1 of the oxide walls is 0.08, which brings the parallel value of the capacitances of diodes D 1 , D 2 , and C 1 to 0.72. Capacitances C 2 and C 2 ′ corresponding to oxide 7 of the SOI structure have in series a value equal to 0.28. All the above-mentioned capacitances have constant values, independently from the resistance of support 5 . However, the equivalent capacitance Cs of the impedance of support 5 depends on the resistivity of this support. Thus, it can be seen that for a frequency of approximately 1 MHz, the contribution of the impedance of support 5 decreases from 0.28 to 0.16 when the resistivity of support 5 increases from 1 to 5,000 ohms.cm. This difference is not very significant and this may be the reason why prior art studies for improving the influence of stray capacitances have come to nothing.
The applicant has carried out the same study in the context of the same circuit operating at a 1 GHz frequency. The results of this study are provided in table 2 hereafter.
TABLE 2
1 ohm ·
5,000
cm
10 ohms · cm
1,000 ohms · cm
ohms · cm
D1//D2
0.64
0.64
0.64
0.64
C1
0.08
0.08
0.08
0.08
D1//D2//C1
0.72
0.72
0.72
0.72
C2 + C2′
0.28
0.28
0.28
0.28
Cs
High
1.6
0.01
0.01
C2 + C2′ + Cs
0.28
0.24
0.01
0.01
Total Cap.
1
0.96
0.73
0.73
It can be seen that for most of its lines, table 2 corresponds to table 1. Especially, the capacitances of diodes D 1 and D 2 , capacitance C 1 and capacitances C 2 and C 2 ′ practically do not vary along with the frequency. However, equivalent capacitance Cs of the substrate depends a lot on the frequency. While it was relatively high at a 1-MHz frequency, when operating at frequencies close to 1 GHz, its value considerably decreases when the substrate resistivity increases. Thus, as shown by the table, as soon as the substrate resistivity exceeds 1000 ohms.cm, the contribution of capacitances C 2 , Cs, and C 2 ′ altogether becomes negligible: the total capacitance varies from 0.72 in the case where the substrate would have been perfectly insulating to 0.73 as soon as the substrate reaches a resistivity greater than 1,000 ohms.cm, that is, the influence of the substrate becomes negligible. It should however be noted that this could not be observed at frequencies on the order of one megahertz.
Thus, the present invention provides using a substrate of a resistivity equal to or greater than 1000 ohms.cm to reduce the inter-component capacitance of a high-frequency circuit intended to operate a values on the order of one gigahertz or more.
A way to obtain this performance increase without requiring an additional increase in the substrate resistivity is illustrated in FIG. 7 . Heavily-doped islands 23 of the conductivity type opposite to that of the substrate, for example, N + islands in a P substrate, are formed in the upper substrate portion. This results in the creation of a depleted area 25 free of any carrier, which can be considered as equivalent to an insulator. In the case of a substrate of a doping level on the order of 5.10 12 atoms/cm 3 , the extent of the depleted area is on the order of from 10 to 15 μm. A structure having a heavily-insulating upper portion is thus obtained, which enables improving the performances displayed in table 1, achieving the advantages previously discussed in relation with table 2.
With the above-indicated method, it should be noted that the frequency for which a decrease in the stray capacitance is obtained is decreased. Thus, low stray capacitance values may be provided, such as indicated in the right-hand column of table 2, at frequencies much lower than 1 GHz. The present invention can then usefully be applied to devices operating, for example, at frequencies on the order of one megahertz.
The present invention has been described in the context of the association of two protection diodes for high-frequency circuits. It should be understood that the present invention may find other applications and generally applies in the high-frequency field when the stray capacitances between two components are desired to be as negligible as possible.
Of course, the present invention is likely to have various alterations, modifications, and improvements which will readily occur to those skilled in the art. Such alterations, modifications, and improvements are intended to be part of this disclosure, and are intended to be within the spirit and the scope of the present invention. Accordingly, the foregoing description is by way of example only and is not intended to be limiting. The present invention is limited only as defined in the following claims and the equivalents thereto.
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A structure including at least two neighboring components, capable of operating at high frequencies, formed in a thin silicon substrate extending on a silicon support and separated therefrom by an insulating layer, the components being laterally separated by insulating regions. The silicon support has, at least in the vicinity of its portion in contact with the insulating layer, a resistivity greater than or equal to 1,000 ohms.cm.
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CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION
[0001] This application is a divisional of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 12/624,141, filed Nov. 23, 2009, the disclosure of which is incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.
BACKGROUND
[0002] The present invention relates generally to integrated circuit memory devices and, more particularly, to a high density, low power nanowire phase change material (PCM) memory device.
[0003] There are numerous contemporary applications where a compact, non-volatile memory with no moving parts would be an enabling technology. Such examples include portable computing and communication devices, computers that use low power, etc. Current techniques for achieving non-volatile memory include magnetic random access memory (MRAM), FLASH, and ferroelectric random access memory (FeRAM). At the present time, the capacities and speeds of these memories in practical devices are comparable with the capacities of dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chips, which is a volatile type of memory that requires continuous power in order to retain the data therein. In addition, DRAM is also relatively slow. Regardless, none of these types of memory described above can compete with the high volumes in disk storage.
[0004] A new technology, Phase Change Material (PCM), is now becoming available and seems well-suited for non-volatile memory technology. The phase change material is typically a ternary alloy of germanium (Ge), antimony (Sb) and tellurium (Te) (GST), with a typical composition being Ge 2 Sb 2 Te 5 , also referred to as GST 225. The GST material is interconvertible between two discrete states, amorphous (high electrical resistance) and crystalline (low electrical resistance), thereby enabling data storage therein. The interconversion or write process is done by thermal cycling of the PCM.
[0005] The challenge in any storage class memory, including those formed from PCM elements, is the achievement of ultra-high storage densities. Accordingly, it would be desirable to be able to provide a PCM memory device with an ultra-high storage density characterized by an aggressively low footprint memory cell.
SUMMARY
[0006] In an exemplary embodiment, a memory cell device includes a semiconductor nanowire extending, at a first end thereof, from a substrate; the nanowire having a doping profile so as to define a field effect transistor (FET) adjacent the first end, the FET further including a gate electrode at least partially surrounding the nanowire, the doping profile further defining a p-n junction in series with the FET, the p-n junction adjacent a second end of the nanowire; and a phase change material at least partially surrounding the nanowire, at a location corresponding to the p-n junction.
[0007] In another embodiment, a memory array includes a plurality of semiconductor nanowires extending, at a first end thereof, from a substrate; each nanowire having a doping profile so as to define a field effect transistor (FET) adjacent the first end, each FET further including a gate electrode at least partially surrounding the nanowire, the doping profile further defining a p-n junction in series with the FET, the p-n junction adjacent a second end of the nanowire; a phase change material (PCM) at least partially surrounding the nanowire, at a location corresponding to the p-n junction; a plurality of data lines connected to the second end of the nanowires; and a plurality of control lines connected to the gate electrode of the FETs.
[0008] In another embodiment, a method of operating a memory array is provided, the memory array including a plurality of semiconductor nanowires extending, at a first end thereof, from a substrate, with each nanowire having a doping profile so as to define a field effect transistor (FET) adjacent the first end, each FET further including a gate electrode at least partially surrounding the nanowire, the doping profile further defining a p-n junction in series with the FET, the p-n junction adjacent a second end of the nanowire, a phase change material (PCM) at least partially surrounding the nanowire, at a location corresponding to the p-n junction, a plurality of data lines connected to the second end of the nanowires, and a plurality of control lines connected to the gate electrode of the FETs. The method includes performing a write operation by coupling unselected control lines and the substrate to a ground voltage, while coupling a selected control line to a negative voltage; and coupling one or more selected data lines to a positive voltage so as cause a programming current to flow through each p-n junction corresponding to a selected control line and a selected data line, the programming current causing the PCM to assume one of a high resistance amorphous state and a low resistance crystalline state, depending on a duration and a magnitude of the programming current.
[0009] In still another embodiment, a method of forming a memory array includes growing a plurality of semiconductor nanowires extending, at a first end thereof, from a substrate; doping each nanowire so as to define a field effect transistor (FET) doping region adjacent the first end, and a p-n junction in series with the FET doping region, the p-n junction adjacent a second end of the nanowire; forming a gate dielectric layer over the nanowires and the substrate; forming a gate electrode layer over the gate dielectric layer; forming a first patterning layer over the gate electrode layer; removing portions of the gate electrode layer not protected by the first patterning layer so as to define a gate electrode at least partially surrounding a transistor portion of each nanowire; forming a second patterning layer over the first patterning layer; removing portions of the gate dielectric layer not protected by the second patterning layer so as expose the second end of each nanowire including the p-n junction; and forming a phase change material (PCM) over the second end of each nanowire, including the p-n junction.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS
[0010] Referring to the exemplary drawings wherein like elements are numbered alike in the several Figures:
[0011] FIG. 1 is a graph illustrating the resistivity of various phases of Ge 2 Sb 2 Te 5 as a function of nitrogen doping;
[0012] FIG. 2 is a graph illustrating the exemplary thermal cycling operations of a phase change material;
[0013] FIG. 3( a ) is a cross-sectional view of a nanowire PCM memory element, in accordance with an embodiment of the invention;
[0014] FIG. 3( b ) is a schematic diagram of an equivalent circuit for the nanowire PCM memory element shown in FIG. 3( a );
[0015] FIG. 4 is a top view of a nanowire PCM memory array, using individual PCM memory elements, in accordance with a further embodiment of the invention;
[0016] FIG. 5 is a schematic diagram illustrating the operation of a nanowire PCM memory array, in accordance with a further embodiment of the invention; and
[0017] FIGS. 6( a ) through 6 ( j ) are a series of cross-sectional views illustrating an exemplary process of forming a nanowire PCM memory element, in accordance with a further embodiment of the invention.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
[0018] PCM memories for computers are being intensively investigated because of attractive features such as non-volatility and speed. Both two-terminal (directly heated) and multiterminal (indirectly heated) PCM memory elements may be configured in crossbar memory arrays with a local diode or transistor switch to control read and write access. It would be highly desirable to increase memory density and lower the relatively high PCM write power as these are among the competitive features in memory which control access to the market.
[0019] Disclosed herein a technological solution yielding very high memory density and extremely low write power that is based on implementing an indirectly heated PCM memory cell in the developing technology of nanowires. In this memory concept, a small droplet of PCM is wrapped around a silicon nanowire at a p-n junction in the nanowire. Forward conduction in the p-n junction diode thermally switches the PCM between its high conducting and low conducting states. The memory is read by applying a voltage across the nanowire in the reverse-biased direction with respect to the p-n junction diode. If the PCM is nonconductive, then both the reversed-biased diode and the PCM in parallel with the diode will block substantially any current from flowing through the device. On the other hand, if the PCM is conductive, then the reversed-biased applied voltage will cause current to pass around the diode, flowing through the PCM. A result, a high-density memory device (e.g., 10 GB/cm −2 ) with low write power (e.g., about 10 μW) may be fabricated with minor modifications to existing nanowire FET processes.
[0020] In an exemplary embodiment, the PCM used herein may be a ternary alloy of germanium (Ge), antimony (Sb) and tellurium (Te) (GST), with an exemplary composition being Ge 2 Sb 2 Te 5 , however other compositions such as GeSb 4 , (including substitution/addition of other elements) are contemplated within the scope of the present disclosure.
[0021] At room temperature, and up to moderately elevated temperatures, a PCM is stable in two phases: a crystalline phase, which is a moderately good conductor of electricity, and an amorphous phase, which is insulating. For example, FIG. 1 is a graph illustrating the resistivity of various phases of Ge 2 Sb 2 Te 5 as a function of nitrogen doping. The phases of a PCM such as Ge 2 Sb 2 Te 5 are interconverted by thermal cycling, as illustrated by the graph shown FIG. 2 . The thermal cycling consists of (a) the so called “RESET” pulse which describes the conversion from crystalline to amorphous form (here, the temperature is raised above melting, followed by a rapid quench in a time t 1 as a result of which the disordered arrangement of atoms in the melt is retained); and (b) the so-called “SET” pulse, in which an anneal at a lower temperature (for a somewhat longer time t 2 ), enables the amorphous form to crystallize.
[0022] Most PCM memories are 2-terminal, having either an FET or a diode switch at each element of the crossbar. However, it is also possible for the heat to originate in a thermally coupled heater element in a separate electrical current path from the PCM. In either instance, switching powers on the order of about several tenths of a mW are required for PCM volumes typical of the technology today.
[0023] Silicon nanowires represent a new form of semiconductor structure capable of patterning and functionalization. The nanowire state exhibits certain unique properties, such as low thermal conductivity for example. A new technological capability of growing silicon nanowires vertically from an array of catalyst particles positioned onto a silicon substrate enables the fabrication of very high density circuits in which the current flow is axial within the nanowires, and hence orthogonal to the silicon substrate. The nanowires may be doped with either p-type or n-type dopant (or both), and the doping may have different concentrations at different locations along the nanowire. Given this doping capability of nanowires, the technology for building coaxially configured, “surround gate” field effect transistors (FETs) along the nanowires thus exists. Given this capability, the present embodiments provide a compelling memory application for such nanowire technology that may be implemented with relatively small additional overhead with respect to nanowire transistor arrays.
[0024] Referring now to FIG. 3( a ), there is shown a cross-sectional view of a nanowire PCM memory element 300 , in accordance with an embodiment of the invention. As is shown, a vertically oriented silicon nanowire 302 is grown from a substrate 304 . The vertical nanowire 302 is shown with doping patterns of n, p, n and p, beginning from the bottom (although the reverse arrangement is also possible). The lower n-p-n region forms an axial FET 306 having a gate oxide 308 and a gate electrode 310 wrapped around part or all of the circumference of the nanowire 302 , wherein the gate electrode 310 is also connected to one of a plurality of conductive y-lines 312 used to form a crossbar type memory array. The FET 306 is to control access to the memory element. As further shown in FIG. 3( a ), a conductive x-line 314 (orthogonal to the y-line 312 ) is coupled to the opposite end of the nanowire 302 with respect to the substrate 304 .
[0025] A memory element 316 is defined by PCM 318 formed as a coating around, or in the vicinity of, the upper p-n junction in the nanowire 302 . An equivalent circuit of this device is depicted in the schematic diagram of FIG. 3( b ). When current passes in the forward direction through the upper p-n junction (i.e., from top to bottom in the figures) there is a voltage drop of about 0.7 V across the junction, leading to heat generation in the neighborhood of the junction. This heat may be used to change the conductive state of the PCM 318 (i.e., perform a write operation), which makes this design one type of an externally heated PCM device. If the current is high enough, the temperature reached in the PCM may be sufficient to melt the material in the vicinity of the nanowire 302 . A sudden drop in such current will in turn cause the temperature to drop suddenly, thus resulting in the phase of the PCM 318 changing from crystalline to amorphous (i.e., the previously described RESET pulse). In contrast, a lower temperature (smaller current) turned off relatively slowly will cause the phase of the PCM 318 to change to crystalline (i.e., the SET pulse). In the amorphous phase, the PCM 318 is a semiconductor material while, in the crystalline phase, PCM 318 is a semi-metallic conductor. As such, electrically distinguishable states of the PCM 318 may be written by an appropriate time sequence and magnitude of applied current through the nanowire 302 .
[0026] The PCM memory element 316 is read by applying a reverse bias voltage across the diode defined by the upper p-n junction. If the PCM 318 is in its amorphous insulating state, then very little current will flow because the diode blocks the current through the nanowire itself and the PCM 318 prevents any significant current from flowing around the diode junction. However, if the PCM 318 is in its crystalline conducting state, then a current will flow through the PCM 318 , shunted around the diode junction, and this current may be sensed in the x-line 314 .
[0027] Referring now to FIG. 4 , there is shown a top view of a nanowire PCM memory array 400 , using individual PCM memory elements 316 such as shown in FIG. 3( a ). The top view of the crossbar array 400 specifically illustrates nanowires 302 , viewed axially and represented by circles. The x-lines (i.e., data lines) 314 contact the top ends of the nanowires 302 , while the y-lines (i.e., control lines, shown in dash) 312 , disposed orthogonal with respect to the x-lines, contact the FET gates 310 from FIG. 3( a ).
[0028] FIG. 5 is a schematic diagram illustrating the operation of the nanowire PCM memory array 400 , in accordance with a further embodiment of the invention. The substrate (e.g., substrate 304 , FIG. 3( a ), from which the nanowires are grown) is assumed to be at zero or ground potential in the exemplary embodiment. With respect to a write operation, all cells enabled by a selected y-line (e.g., y 1 , y 2 , etc.) may be written simultaneously. All unselected y-lines are held at ground potential, while the selected y-line is set to some positive voltage in the neighborhood of about 0.5 V (depending on whether the write is a SET or RESET). Passive x-lines, whose bit value is to be unchanged in the column write operation, are kept at zero potential, thus preventing current through the associated cells, while active x-lines are set at approximately 1.2 V, in one non-limiting example. As a result, for the write-active cells, current flows through the forward biased p-n junction, in turn heating the PCM element to which it is thermally coupled (noting that there is also some small current through the PCM contributing to the heat budget for writing). Again, the applied heat pulse is a standard slow, low power annealing pulse to turn the PCM ON, and a fast, high current pulse to turn the PCM OFF.
[0029] With respect to a read operation for the memory array 400 , all cells enabled by a selected y-line may be read simultaneously or sequentially. Here, unselected y-lines are at a negative voltage with respect to ground, in the neighborhood of about −0.5 V. The selected y-line is held at zero potential, while all selected x-lines are at −0.5 V. If the PCM element is in the ON state, then current flows around the reverse biased p-n junction into the x-line, where it is sensed. On the other hand, no current flows around the reversed biased p-n junction if the PCM element is in the OFF state.
[0030] It should be possible also to program intermediate levels of PCM resistance by varying the length of time and the current pulse during the write phase. Deep melting of the PCM can lead to a large volume of amorphous material after the quench, and therefore a large resistance, while shallow melting can lead to a low volume of the amorphous phase and a low resistance. The result of such variation is that there could be several (e.g., four) possible PCM memory states, allowing several (e.g., two) bits to be written per memory cell.
[0031] In the following estimates, an exemplary nanowire diameter of 15 nanometers (nm) is assumed, with a nanowire length on the order of about 0.5 microns (μm). An estimate of cell area is about 40×60 nm 2 , thus allowing for a memory density of 10 GB/cm 2 with 2 bits per memory cell. The axial thermal conductivity of a silicon nanowire has been shown to be remarkably low, on the order of about 0.01 W/cm·K. Thus, for a nanowire of about 0.5 μm in length, the axial heat flux when the PCM is heated to its melting point of approximately 600° C. is approximately 1 μW.
[0032] By way of further estimation, the PCM can be approximated as a sphere with a 30 nm radius with a heat sink at 60 nm radius, the space being filled with SiO 2 (whose thermal conductivity is 0.014 W/cm·K.) If all the PCM is at 600° C., then the approximate heat flux is 30 μW. However, it is assumed that in actual device operation with much of the outer part of the PCM still cool, when its lower thermal conductivity is about 0.006 W/cm·K, the PCM will act as a thermal blanket and reduce the heat flow. Moreover, a lower thermal conductivity material, such as SiCOH may replace the SiO 2 . This, the actual heat flow, and heater power requirement, may be only 10 μW or less.
[0033] A 1024×1024 individual memory array matrix will be approximately 50 μm 2 . For a wire length of 50 μm, a 20×20 nm metal wire will have a resistance on the order of about 1 KΩ. If doped to a concentration of about 10 20 atoms/cm 3 , a nanowire of 0.5 μm in length and 15 nm in diameter will have a resistance of about 12.5 KΩ. The total metal and nanowire resistance in series is therefore about 13.5 KΩ.
[0034] Typical PCM resistivities are shown in FIG. 1 . At 0% doping, the ON resistance of a shell 50 nm in length and 10 nm in thickness around the nanowire is estimated to be on the order of about 50 KΩ. This resistance can be sensed against the total wiring resistance on the order of about 13.5 KΩ. The OFF resistance is three orders of magnitude higher and can easily be distinguished therefrom. Therefore, estimates show that the ON/OFF ratio may be easily distinguished with this array/memory cell design, while the power requirement for RESET is on the order of about 10 μW.
[0035] Finally, FIGS. 6( a ) through 6 ( j ) are a series of cross-sectional views illustrating an exemplary process of forming a nanowire PCM memory element, in accordance with a further embodiment of the invention. As shown in FIG. 6( a ), a substrate 602 (e.g., silicon) is patterned to accommodate an ordered array, such as a simple square lattice, of catalyst nanoparticles 604 (e.g., gold), which promotes the growth of silicon nanowires 606 or other types nanowires grown from an alternative semiconductor material, such as a group III-IV material for example. In an exemplary embodiment, the nanowires are formed by chemical vapor deposition (CVD) process in a temperature range of about 400° C. to about 800° C. The modulation doping of silicon or other type of nanowire to form a series of p-type and n-type doped regions along the longitudinal axis of the nanowire is accomplished by exposure to appropriate gaseous ambients during the growth process. In example depicted, the doping sequence n-p-n-p, beginning from the substrate 602 , and moving upward is utilized to form an NFET device and series diode. However, as also indicated above, the opposite doping sequence p-n-p-n beginning from the substrate 602 moving upward would be utilized to form a PFET device and series diode. In either instance, the p-n junctions are depicted at 607 in FIG. 6( a ).
[0036] After initial formation and doping of the nanowires 606 , FIG. 6( b ) illustrates the formation of a surround-gate dielectric layer 608 , such as SiO 2 , for example, over the substrate 602 , nanowires 606 and catalyst tips 604 . A suitable gate electrode layer 610 (e.g., aluminum) is then formed over the gate oxide layer. Then, as shown in FIG. 6( c ), a gate patterning layer 612 , such as a polyimide (PI) is formed over the resulting structure, deposited and etched to a height so as to protect portions of the gate electrode layer where the surround-gate electrode for the transistor portion of the nanowire 606 is to be defined. The removal of exposed portions of the gate electrode layer 610 , such as by wet etching for example, is depicted in FIG. 6( d ).
[0037] At this point, a more conventional “transistor only” nanowire process (where additional insulating material and top electrode would then be formed) is instead modified for the formation of the PCM portion of the memory cell. Proceeding to FIG. 6( e ), another patterning layer 614 (e.g., a second PI layer) is deposited and etched down (e.g., by reactive ion etching (RIE)) to a higher level with respect to the top of the gate metal 610 . This assures a separation between the gate metal 610 and the PCM, which is subsequently deposited. Then, as shown in FIG. 6( f ), both the thin gate oxide layer 608 and the catalyst nanoparticle on the top portion of the nanowire 606 are removed. It will be noted that there is still a portion of the gate oxide layer 608 that extends upward beyond the top edge of the gate electrode layer 610 .
[0038] Optionally, a very thin layer (e.g., about 1 nm) of Ti or TiN (not shown) may be sputtered on the exposed ends of the nanowires 606 to act as an adhesion layer for the subsequently formed PCM. In any case, the polyimide layers 612 , 614 are then dissolved away, leaving the completed FET structure as depicted in FIG. 6( g ). In FIG. 6( h ), PCM 616 is sputter-deposited over the ends of the nanowires 606 using an oblique angle while rotating the sample. Because of the high vertical height to horizontal spacing aspect ratio of the wire (e.g., 20:1) the sputtered PCM 616 will form a cap on the nanowires 606 , with very little penetration lower down the wire toward the FET structure, thereby surrounding the upper portion of the nanowire 606 as shown in FIG. 6( h ).
[0039] Referring next to FIG. 6( i ), additional insulating material 618 (e.g., SiO 2 ) is formed over the device. Finally, a chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) operation is then performed in order to planarize the top surface of the device and to expose the end of the nanowires 606 for contact to an electrode (x-line). As shown in FIG. 6( j ), the top electrode 620 is formed, such as by using a mask involving purely repeated linear features (stripes). As is the case for the gate electrode metal, the x-line metal may be appropriately chosen (e.g., Al, W, etc.).
[0040] While the invention has been described with reference to a preferred embodiment or embodiments, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes may be made and equivalents may be substituted for elements thereof without departing from the scope of the invention. In addition, many modifications may be made to adapt a particular situation or material to the teachings of the invention without departing from the essential scope thereof. Therefore, it is intended that the invention not be limited to the particular embodiment disclosed as the best mode contemplated for carrying out this invention, but that the invention will include all embodiments falling within the scope of the appended claims.
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A memory cell device includes a semiconductor nanowire extending, at a first end thereof, from a substrate; the nanowire having a doping profile so as to define a field effect transistor (FET) adjacent the first end, the FET further including a gate electrode at least partially surrounding the nanowire, the doping profile further defining a p-n junction in series with the FET, the p-n junction adjacent a second end of the nanowire; and a phase change material at least partially surrounding the nanowire, at a location corresponding to the p-n junction.
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FIELD OF THE INVENTION
[0001] The present invention relates generally to wireless transmissions and in particular to a retransmission mechanism.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0002] This section is intended to introduce the reader to various aspects of art, which may be related to various aspects of the present invention that are described and/or claimed below. This discussion is believed to be helpful in providing the reader with background information to facilitate a better understanding of the various aspects of the present invention. Accordingly, it should be understood that these statements are to be read in this light, and not as admissions of prior art.
[0003] A residential gateway is adapted to connect a residential network to the Internet. It permits to receive and distribute in the residential network some video content transported over the Internet protocol (IP). Inside the residential network the video may be transported over a wired or wireless network. If wired networks have showed to be suitable for transporting video services, it requires home devices to be plugged to the wired network. This is not adapted to devices mobility. Wireless technologies, such as IEEE802.11 are more convenient to reach mobile device in a local network, but they don't provide enough quality of service required for video applications. In particular, wireless interferences degrade the wireless transmissions, and as a result the video quality. The IEEE802.11 standard on Wireless LAN Medium Access Control (MAC) and Physical Layer (PHY) Specifications dated Jun. 12, 2007, noted 802.11 herein below, defines a retransmission mechanism in chapter 9.2.5.3 on recovery procedures and retransmit limits. Retransmission mechanism is part of the distributed coordination function (DCF) mechanism defined in chapter 9.2. In particular, in a frame exchange, the transmitter performs the error recovery mechanism by retrying transmissions for a frame exchange sequence. It performs retransmission until the retransmission is successful or a retry limit is reached. The retry limit is usually set to seven. This mechanism is not sufficient to enable an acceptable video frames transfer over the wireless medium.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0004] The present invention attempts to remedy at least some of the concerns connected with packet transmission in the prior art, by providing a transmission mechanism adapted for video services.
[0005] The invention concerns a retransmission mechanism that enhances the quality of service on wireless networks for video services.
[0006] To this end, the invention relates to a method at a wireless device for transmitting a packet, the method comprising the steps of setting a lifetime value to a packet to transmit;, transmitting the packet. According to the invention, if the transmission fails, and while the packet retransmission fails and the packet lifetime has not expired, the method comprises the steps of retransmitting the packet up to a retry limit, and waiting a pause time before retransmitting the packet up to a retry limit.
[0007] Surprisingly, and in contrast to what is usually done in wireless transmission systems, the retransmission is performed in several steps, comprising multiple retransmissions. It is not based on multiple continuous packet reemissions. It suspends and resumes retransmission to bypass the interference period. It has been shown that the retransmission mechanism provides a better quality of service for video services. Instead of retransmitting a packet several times in a short interval, the mechanism delays the retransmissions. This enables at least to successively pass some interference problems.
[0008] This retransmission mechanism has proved to be useful when used with video transmission. It significantly reduces packet error rate. This retransmission mechanism also advantageously saves the wireless medium, in contrast with what a standard implementation would do.
[0009] According to an embodiment of the invention, the pause time corresponds to the time needed to transmit a packet a number of a retry limit times.
[0010] According to another embodiment of the invention, the pause time corresponds to the time needed to transmit a packet a number of a retry limit times at the lowest transmission rate.
[0011] According to an embodiment of the invention, the method is performed for audio and video packets only.
[0012] Another object of the invention is a wireless device comprising a wireless interface for communicating in a wireless network, and retransmission means for setting a lifetime value to a packet to transmit and while the packet lifetime has not expired and the packet transmission fails, transmitting the packet up to a retry limit, and suspending transmitting the packet during a pause time before transmitting the packet up to a retry limit.
[0013] According to an embodiment, the wireless device comprises Interference detecting means for detecting interferences in the wireless network.
[0014] Another object of the invention is a computer program product comprising program code instructions for executing the steps of the method according to the invention, when that program is executed on a computer. By “computer program product”, it is meant a computer program support, which may consist not only in a storing space containing the program, such as a computer memory, but also in a signal, such as an electrical or optical signal.
[0015] Certain aspects commensurate in scope with the disclosed embodiments are set forth below. It should be understood that these aspects are presented merely to provide the reader with a brief summary of certain forms the invention might take and that these aspects are not intended to limit the scope of the invention. Indeed, the invention may encompass a variety of aspects that may not be set forth below.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0016] The invention will be better understood and illustrated by means of the following embodiment and execution examples, in no way limitative, with reference to the appended figures on which:
[0017] FIG. 1 is a block diagram of an access point compliant with the embodiment;
[0018] FIG. 2 illustrates a retransmission mechanism according to the embodiment; and
[0019] FIG. 3 is a flow diagram of a retransmission mechanism according to the embodiment.
[0020] In FIG. 1 , the represented blocks are purely functional entities, which do not necessarily correspond to physically separate entities. Namely, they could be developed in the form of hardware or software, or be implemented in one or several integrated circuits.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
[0021] It is to be understood that the figures and descriptions of the present invention have been simplified to illustrate elements that are relevant for a clear understanding of the present invention, while eliminating, for purposes of clarity, many other elements found in typical digital multimedia content delivery methods and systems. However, because such elements are well known in the art, a detailed discussion of such elements is not provided herein. The disclosure herein is directed to all such variations and modifications known to those skilled in the art.
[0022] The exemplary embodiment comes within the framework of IEEE802.11, but the invention is not limited to this particular environment and may be applied within other frameworks where retransmission occurs in a manner similar to the one defined in the IEEE802.11 standard.
[0023] The access point, AP, device 1 according to the embodiment is illustrated in FIG. 1 . It comprises a wireless interface 11 compliant to the IEEE 802.11 standard. The AP 1 comprises an interference detecting module 13 that is adapted to detect interferences in the wireless medium. Interference detection mechanism is out of the scope of the invention. The AP comprises a retransmission module 14 that is adapted to perform retransmission as described hereinafter. The Interference detection module is also adapted to inform the retransmission module when an interference has been detected. The AP 1 also comprises a memory 12 for storing packets that are transmitted on the wireless medium.
[0024] Even if the embodiment applies to an AP, the mechanism of the embodiment applies to a wireless station as well.
[0025] The retransmission mechanism according to the embodiment is now described. The retransmission module controls two parameters. The first parameter is the packet lifetime. The packet lifetime corresponds to the time the packet is stored in memory. When the packet lifetime expires, and if the packet has not been transmitted, the packet is removed from the memory. When the packet is transmitted it is dropped from the memory.
[0026] The packet lifetime may be chosen according to the following constraints. It is longer than the interference duration that can usually be expected. It is smaller than the maximum AP buffer capacity; which depends on the video bandwidth and the available memory. And, it is smaller than the amount of video buffered on the receiving station. In particular, some values may be as follows: a buffer capacity on the AP of around 5 seconds, a buffer capacity on the video player around 10 seconds, and a packet lifetime of 2.5 seconds.
[0027] The second parameter is a retransmission_suspend value. It defines the time the AP suspends transmissions between two series of retransmission.
[0028] The mechanism is summarized as follows, as illustrated in FIG. 3 . The AP has a packet to transmit to a station, step S 1 . It sets a packet lifetime value to the packet, step S 2 . The packet has not been correctly received by the station; this is detected by the AP because the AP has not received an acknowledgment packet. The AP retransmits the packet according to the mechanism defined in the IEEE802.11 specification, step S 3 . If necessary it retransmits the packet up to the retry limit. If the retransmission succeeds, the AP may send the next packet, step S 4 . If the retransmission still fails, the Interference detecting module informs the retransmission module that interference is occurring. The retransmission mechanism according to the embodiment is setup. If the packet lifetime expires, step S 5 , the AP drops the packets and transmits the next one. While the packet lifetime doesn't expire, the AP suspends the retransmissions, step S 6 , and starts another set of retransmissions, step S 3 . The retry limit of the embodiment concerns the ShortRetryLimit parameter defined in chapter 9.2.4 of the IEEE 802.11 standard. Of course this mechanism could apply to the Long RetryLimit parameter as well.
[0029] The AP device sends several series of retransmission packets, spaced out by pause periods. This is illustrated in FIG. 2 , where each vertical line corresponds to a transmission attempt and the line height indicates the transmit rate. The rate can be modified inside a series of retransmissions or between two series. As indicated in FIG. 2 , the AP manages to send a retransmission packet after twenty four failed retransmissions. The retransmissions have been grouped into series of seven retransmissions. If the seventh retransmission fails, the AP suspends retransmitting until it starts another set of retransmissions. Between the series of retransmissions it lets the medium free. During this pause, the same AP can transmit data to other associated stations or other devices in the same channel may transmit data. The AP doesn't pollute the wireless medium with useless retransmission, and enables other devices to use the medium.
[0030] This corresponds to using the standard retransmission mechanism several times, with a retry limit value set to seven. In the standard mechanism, after the retry limit has been reached, the packet is removed. Here the AP uses several times the standard retransmission mechanism, with pauses in between, until the packet lifetime has been reached.
[0031] The mechanism is configurable per quality of service (QoS) class. The IEEE802.11 standard, and in particular the IEEE802.11e on Medium Access Control on Quality of Services Enhancements, defines four classes: background, best effort, voice and video. According to the embodiment, the video and voice traffic class use this mechanism, the background and best effort traffic class don't use it. A proper implementation that supports transmitting video to multiple stations simultaneously must have four QoS queues per station, so that transmit problems to one station do not impact video quality on another one.
[0032] The pause between two series of retransmissions may be as long as the time needed for one series of retransmissions. For example, the retransmission_suspend value may be set to 25 milliseconds.
[0033] In particular the pause time corresponds to the time needed to transmit a series of retransmission packet at the lowest transmission rate of the BSSBasicRateSet that is defined in 7.3.2.2 of the IEEE802.11 specification. This corresponds to the time needed for a series of retransmissions in the worst case.
[0034] In other words, the AP according to the embodiment is a standard AP with in addition a retransmission module and an interference detecting module. A standard AP comprises a recovery module that performs retransmission as defined in the IEEE802.11 standard; using among others a retry limit parameter. A standard AP performs retransmission up to a retry limit.
[0035] The retransmission module performs retransmission, using the features of the recovery module. In particular it first asks the recovery module to perform retransmission up to the retry limit. If the retransmission doesn't succeed, it again asks the recovery module to perform retransmission. More generally, the retransmission module is adapted to drive the recovery module, according to parameters such as the retransmission_suspend value, the retry limit number and the packet lifetime. The retransmission_suspend value may be configurable through the AP user interface.
[0036] The retransmission module may also check, before using the retransmission mechanism according to the embodiment, that the receiver supports that retransmission mechanism. It checks the buffering capacity of the receiver to evaluate the maximum packet lifetime that can be set. If the packet lifetime would be too short, the retransmission mechanism is not used, and the standard recovery procedure is used only. This may be performed in any proprietary manner that is out of the scope of the invention.
[0037] References disclosed in the description, the claims and the drawings may be provided independently or in any appropriate combination. Features may, where appropriate, be implemented in hardware, software, or a combination of the two.
[0038] Reference herein to “one embodiment” or “an embodiment” means that a particular feature, structure, or characteristic described in connection with the embodiment can be included in at least one implementation of the invention. The appearances of the phrase “in one embodiment” in various places in the specification are not necessarily all referring to the same embodiment, nor are separate or alternative embodiments necessarily mutually exclusive of other embodiments.
[0039] Reference numerals appearing in the claims are by way of illustration only and shall have no limiting effect on the scope of the claims.
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The present invention concerns a wireless device ( 1 ) and a method at a wireless device for transmitting a packet, said method comprising the steps of setting (S 2 ) a lifetime value to a packet to transmit and, while the packet lifetime has not expired (S 5 ) and the packet transmission fails: retransmitting (S 3 ) the packet up to a retry limit, and suspending (S 6 ) transmitting said packet during a pause time before transmitting the packet up to a retry limit.
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CROSS REFERENCES TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] The present application claims the benefit of U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 60/692,597, filed Jun. 21, 2005 (Jun. 21, 2005).
STATEMENT REGARDING FEDERALLY SPONSORED RESEARCH OR DEVELOPMENT
[0002] Not applicable.
THE NAMES OR PARTIES TO A JOINT RESEARCH AGREEMENT
[0003] Not applicable.
INCORPORATION-BY-REFERENCE OF MATERIAL SUBMITTED ON A COMPACT DISC
[0004] Not applicable.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0005] 1. Field of the Invention
[0006] The present invention relates generally to golf clubs and, more particularly, to a putter having visual alignment indicator grid on the upper surface of the putter head for improving a player's ability to visualize the optimal line of the putt and, thus, to improve putting performance.
[0007] 2. Discussion of Related Art Including Information Disclosed Under 37 CFR §§1.97, 1.98
[0008] Putting is notoriously difficult. This is due not only to the fact that putting greens are rarely truly flat and level, to the fact that the effect of one or more slopes on ball roll is challenging to predict, and to the fact that the stroke itself, however simple it may appear, is subtle and excruciatingly demanding of precision.
[0009] In terms of stroke production, putting is unlike any other stroke in the game: It is performed with a relatively motionless trunk and lower torso; there are generally no discernible leg movements; and in current theory even independent arm movements are minimized so as to eliminate all extraneous motion that might undermine accurate alignment of the putter as it strikes the ball. It is now recommended that the force applied in a putting stroke come only from upper torso rotation about the thoracic region of the spine. All other parts of the body remain essentially still. In effect, putting mechanics are reduced to only whatever is necessary and sufficient for delivering the putter head into and through the resting ball along the intended line of the putt with a squarely aligned putter face and with sufficient force to deliver the ball the distance to the hole. Presumably, this ensures the greatest likelihood of keeping the putter square and “on-line.”
[0010] To the ball-striking purist, however, the rigid and seemingly non-athletic quality of the putting stroke makes it an awkward companion to the powerful and graceful quality of well-executed full swings. The incongruity is so great that putting has been aptly likened to sitting down to play chess in the middle of a tennis match. Consequently, many golfers have wished that putting be wholly jettisoned from the game of golf, including Ben Hogan, who only grudgingly conceded that it ought to be a part of the game. Regardless of the carping and complaining, however, putting is here to stay, and it will continue to be the ruin of many an otherwise fine professional player.
[0011] It should be remarked that it is only in putting that the phenomenon of the yips is evident. Byron Nelson retired early in no small part because of a bad case of the “yips.” Considerable investigation has gone into determining the cause of this vexing problem, and until recently it was largely a mystery. Now, due to brain imaging studies by Nancy Byl, Ph.D., and Michael Merzenich of the University of California San Francisco School of Medicine, the “yips” may have been identified as an instance of learning-induced de-differentiation of the representation of the hand in the primary somatosensory cortex. See, for example, Byl, N N, Merzenich, M M, Jenkin, W M, A primate genesis model of focal dystonia and repetitive strain injury: Ann Neurrology 1996; 47: 509-520; and Byl, N N, Merzenich, M., The neural consequences of repetition: Clinical implications of a learning hypothesis. J. of hand Therapy, 1997; April-June: 160-174. The studies suggest that in some cases, repetitive practice of stereotypical movements involving co-contractions of the muscles of the hand and arm may induce a learning catastrophe resulting in potentially permanent neurological changes giving rise to uncontrollable muscular contractions, including spasms. It is possible that a contributory factor to this malady is the inability of the golfer to easily and clearly see the line of the putt, introducing a level of anxiety in the performance, and thus placing too much emphasis on the feel and the control of the putter. When practiced repetitively in this emotionally heightened environment, the somatosensory map of the action/feel expands too broadly within the brain, and too many neurons are recruited to sense and control the simple action. This undermines appropriate muscular inhibition de-differentiates the appropriate muscular involvement. In effect, too many muscles fire off simultaneously, the hands turn into virtual claws, and the putter is jerked, yanked, “yipped” in a convulsive or spasmodic manner. Obviously, this is not the optimal internal performance climate. And one route to avoiding such extreme conditions is to provide strong visual cues to assist in performing the precise actions more easily.
[0012] Countless innovative golfers have contributed to the art and science of putting with inventive contributions to golf club technology. Some have endeavored to enhance a player's ability to develop “feel” for putting by improving the materials and shapes of the putter head, the shaft, and the grip. Some have endeavored to improve a player's ability to “read” a green, or visualize the ideal line of a putt for an intended force applied to the ball. Some have endeavored to improve putting stroke mechanics by altering the weight distribution of mass in the putter head, or changing the very way the putter is employed. And some have endeavored to improve the player's ability to ascertain at address whether the putter face is properly aligned with the intended line of the putt or whether during the stroke the putter head is traveling on a proper path. It is to this latter class of improvements that the instant invention belongs.
[0013] There is little disagreement about the need to“read” a putt well and then to “see” clearly that the putter is properly oriented relative to the intended line of the putt, both at address and as the putter head moves through the ball. There is much disagreement, however, about how this is best accomplished. Historically, the efforts have concentrated in improved reference lines and their placement on the putter head, lighted guides of various kinds; training mats and club guides; and combinations thereof. Recent technology intended to solve the problem of properly aligning a putter is reflected in the following exemplary references:
[0014] U.S. Pat. No. 6,837,799, issued Jan. 4, 2005 to Cameron et al, discloses a method of aligning a putter, which includes the steps of providing a putter having a head and an offset hosel, and a flat striking face that includes a removable reflecting surface for receiving and reflecting incident light. Laser light directed down the shaft of the putter is partly reflected from the reflecting surface and is directed to and detected by a reference device the compares the alignment with predetermined reference lines.
[0015] U.S. Pat. No. 6,743,112, issued Jun. 1, 2004 to Nelson, shows a golf putter visual alignment aid comprising a rear edge parallel to the front surface of the putter head, and a back body having a flange portion that extends rearwardly and has an upper surface displaced below the top ledge of the putter head. The flange includes a reference line perpendicular to the front surface and rear edge. The face member and back body have contrasting colors.
[0016] U.S. Pat. No. 6,409,619, issued Jun. 25, 2002, teaches a putter precision machined to have a concave horizontal face from the heel to toe of the hitting face. The curvature of the concave horizontal face may range from an arc of a five-foot radius circle to an arc of a one-foot radius circle with the center point at the center of the hole. Accordingly, the curvature of the striking face ranges from the reciprocal of five feet to the reciprocal of one foot. Markings on the top surface assist with both aiming and centering the ball in the curvature. The marking is an arc of a concentric circle of the golf ball in front of the putter face and has a radius of curvature which is a function of the radius from the center point of a golf ball abutting the striking face.
[0017] U.S. Pat. No. 5,916,035, issued Jun. 29, 1999 to Caiozzo, discloses a putter head having an elongate flat front hitting surface, an arcuate cavity extending from the back surface toward the hitting surface, and a substantially semicircular rear section attached to and extending back from the front section. The rear section has a semicircular lip arranged around the edge, and a keyhole-shaped cutout extending from a rearmost point of the rear section toward a center point of the front section. The putter head has a beveled bottom surface encompassing the front and rear sections. Parallel grooves are arranged on the top surface of the front section. The grooves run in a direction perpendicular to the plane of the hitting surface and are arranged above the arcuate cavity. The grooves define an optimum area for hitting a golf ball.
[0018] U.S. Pat. No. 5,913,731, issued Jun. 22, 1999 to Westerman, shows a mallet-style putter head with a blade front surface attached such that its bottom surface is suspended above the bottom surface of the mallet portion for reducing unwanted scuffing of the putting surface during the striking of the golf ball. The mallet portion has its mass uniformly distributed between heel and toe portions of the mallet portion. A shaft extends upwardly from a heel of the mallet portion and includes a double bend spaced from the mallet portion for positioning a shaft handle above the blade portion and providing face balancing to the putter. The mass of the mallet portion is sufficient for reducing torque on the shaft during the striking of the golf ball and provides a desirable feel for the golfer during the putting stroke. Alignment aids include a smoothly contoured channel carried within a top surface of the mallet portion which forms opposing parallel side wall edges transversely spaced by the diameter of the golf ball for aligning the golf ball within imaginary lines extending forward from the opposing side wall edges through the front face.
[0019] U.S. Pat. No. 5,830,078, issued Nov. 3, 1998, to McMahan, teaches a putter head having a planar front surface and a rear portion of the club head includes a cantilever portion including a semi-circular arc bisected by a centerline extending substantially perpendicular to the front surface. The semi-circular arc includes a expansion which moves the center of mass of the rear portion a distance rearward of the respective centers of mass of the heel and toe portions and rearward of the combined center of mass of the heel and toe portions. Front and rear sighting lines may also be included along the central axis of the club head at or near the top edge of the head or on the expansion of the cantilever portion.
[0020] U.S. Pat. No. 5,470,070, issued Nov. 28, 1995, to Bendo, discloses a putter having a T-shaped head with an elongated stem extending rearwardly from the front face and laterally extending arms which terminate in integral enlargements that form weights. The stem and arms of the T-shape have a forward, normally vertically arranged surface which provide a ball striking surface on the head. Markings may be formed on the upper surface of the arms and stem for providing sight lines for aiming the stem along a desired direction.
[0021] The foregoing patents and prior art devices reflect the current state of the art of which the present inventor is aware. Reference to, and discussion of, these patents is intended to aid in discharging Applicant's acknowledged duty of candor in disclosing information that may be relevant to the examination of prospective claims to the present invention. However, it is respectfully submitted that none of the above-indicated patents disclose, teach, suggest, show, or otherwise render obvious, either singly or when considered in combination, the invention described herein. Moreover, many of the disclosed putters have a “busy” appearance, making alignment at address a needlessly cerebral affair. Still further problems reside in the sometimes exotic, and even displeasing appearance that the putters must assume to embody the disclosed technology.
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0022] The present invention is an improved putter head having a grid pattern with unique alignment characteristics and features.
[0023] It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a new and improved putter head having an alignment enhancing grid pattern formed of line elements arranged generally according to the golden mean, golden ratio, golden proportion, divine proportion, extreme ratio, golden section, golden cut, or sectio divina, as it is variously known.
[0024] It is another object of the present invention to provide a new and improved putter head that gives the user increased confidence resulting from the geometric balance inherent in its alignment aiding grid pattern.
[0025] A further object or feature of the present invention is a new and improved putter head comprising a block of material that itself is dimensioned according to the golden ratio.
[0026] An even further object of the present invention is to provide a novel putter head having a grid pattern on its top surface which includes parallel ball bracketing lines that assist in placing the center of mass of the putter head behind the ball at address and directing it at the center of mass of the ball through impact.
[0027] Other novel features which are characteristic of the invention, as to organization and method of operation, together with further objects and advantages thereof will be better understood from the following description considered in connection with the accompanying drawings, in which preferred embodiments of the invention are illustrated by way of example. It is to be expressly understood, however, that the drawings are for illustration and description only and are not intended as a definition of the limits of the invention. The various features of novelty that characterize the invention are pointed out with particularity in the claims annexed to and forming part of this disclosure. The invention does not reside in any one of these features taken alone, but rather in the particular combination of all of its structures for the functions specified.
[0028] There has thus been broadly outlined the more important features of the invention in order that the detailed description thereof that follows may be better understood, and in order that the present contribution to the art may be better appreciated. There are, of course, additional features of the invention that will be described hereinafter and which will form additional subject matter of the claims appended hereto. Those skilled in the art will appreciate that the conception upon which this disclosure is based readily may be utilized as a basis for the designing of other structures, methods and systems for carrying out the several purposes of the present invention. It is important, therefore, that the claims be regarded as including such equivalent constructions insofar as they do not depart from the spirit and scope of the present invention.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS
[0029] The invention will be better understood and objects other than those set forth above will become apparent when consideration is given to the following detailed description thereof. Such description makes reference to the annexed drawings wherein:
[0030] FIG. 1 is a perspective view of a first preferred embodiment of the putter head of the present invention showing the putter positioned in relation to a ball, as it would be at address in preparation for a putt;
[0031] FIG. 2 is a top plan view of the putter head showing the top surface and visual alignment grid;
[0032] FIG. 3 is a rear side view in elevation taken along the lines shown in FIG. 2 ;
[0033] FIG. 4 is an elevational view looking toward either the heel or toe portion of the first preferred embodiment, each view being identical in visual features;
[0034] FIG. 5 is a top plan view of a second preferred embodiment of the putter head;
[0035] FIG. 6 is a side view in elevation taken along the lines shown in FIG. 5 ;
[0036] FIG. 7 is an elevational view looking toward either the heel or toe portion of a second preferred embodiment, each view being identical in visual features;
[0037] FIG. 8 is a top plan view of a third preferred embodiment of the inventive putter head;
[0038] FIG. 9 is a side view in elevation taken along the lines shown in FIG. 8 ;
[0039] FIG. 10 is an elevational view looking toward either the heel or toe portion of a third preferred embodiment, each view being identical in visual features;
[0040] FIG. 11 is a top plan view of a fourth preferred embodiment; and
[0041] FIG. 12 is a top plan view of a fifth preferred embodiment.
DRAWING REFERENCE NUMERALS
[0000]
100 putter head
110 block
120 top surface
130 bottom surface
140 toe portion
150 heel portion
160 a ball-striking surface
160 b ball-striking surface
170 grid
180 horizontal line
185 toe portion intermediate horizontal line
190 horizontal line
195 heel portion horizontal line
200 vertical line
210 vertical line
220 horizontal centerline
230 toe portion of vertical centerline
230 ′ heel portion of vertical centerline
240 apex
240 apex
B golf ball
260 intersection point of centerlines
270 shaft hole
230 ′ heel portion of vertical centerline
300 second preferred embodiment
310 block
320 top surface
330 a bottom surface
340 a toe portion
350 a heel portion
350 a front ball-striking surface
360 b rear ball-striking surface
370 visual indicator grid
380 a upper horizontal line
380 b upper ball bracketing line
390 a lower horizontal line
390 b lower ball bracketing line
400 front vertical line
410 rear vertical line
420 horizontal centerline
430 vertical centerline
440 apex
450 apex
δ distance between ball bracketing lines
460 intersection point of horizontal and vertical centerlines
470 shaft hole
S club shaft
ABCD upper rectangle
DCEF lower rectangle
500 third preferred embodiment
510 heel portion
520 toe portion
530 a front surface
530 b rear surface
600 fourth preferred embodiment
610 rectangle
620 rectangle
630 rectangle
640 rectangle
650 toe
660 heel
670 front side
680 back side
690 grid forming rectangle
700 grid forming rectangle
710 grid forming rectangle
720 grid forming rectangle
800 fifth preferred embodiment
810 rectangle
820 rectangle
830 rectangle
840 rectangle
850 toe
860 heel
870 front side
880 back side
890 grid forming rectangle
900 grid forming rectangle
910 grid forming rectangle
920 grid forming rectangle
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
[0122] Referring to FIGS. 1 through 12 , wherein like reference numerals refer to like components in the various views, there is illustrated therein a new and improved golf putter head, the illustrative five preferred embodiments of which are herein generally denominated 100 , 300 , and 500 , 600 , and 800 , respectively.
[0123] FIGS. 1-4 illustrate a first preferred embodiment of the inventive putter head 100 , showing that the novel apparatus comprises a mallet-style block 110 with its mass substantially evenly distributed, and having a substantially planar top surface 120 , a bottom surface 130 (preferably substantially planar), a toe portion 140 , a heel portion 150 , and at least one planar ball-striking surface 160 a , 160 b , one of which will comprise a back surface, depending on the side from which the user putts.
[0124] The planar top surface of the putter head includes visual alignment indicator lines comprising a grid 170 of a tone or color that sharply contrasts with the color or tone of the block. Preferably the block is black and the grid is white, though any of a number of suitable contrasting colors and tones can be employed. The grid includes, at a minimum, parallel upper and lower horizontally disposed lines, 180 , 190 , respectively; parallel front and rear vertically disposed lines, 200 , 210 , respectively; a horizontal centerline 220 parallel to the upper and lower horizontally disposed lines; and a vertical centerline having a toe portion 230 and a heel portion 230 ′, each being parallel to the front and rear vertically disposed lines. Preferably, the grid also includes a toe portion intermediate horizontal line 185 disposed between the upper horizontal line and the horizontal centerline, and a heel portion intermediate horizontal line 195 disposed between the lower horizontal line and the horizontal centerline.
[0125] Collectively, the horizontal and vertical lines form a grid of eight rectangles: four equally-sized small exterior rectangles and four equally-sized large interior rectangles. The short sides of the smaller (uppermost and lowermost) rectangles have a length x that is substantially in the golden ratio relative to the length of the short sides y of the larger rectangles. That is:
( y+x ) ÷y=y÷x
[0126] As is well known, this ratio is an irrational number with a value of 1.618033989. However, as a practical matter, manufacturing limitations do not permit such careful control of the grid dimensions, and the sides therefore have a ratio with a value of approximately 1.618.
[0127] Next, the vertical centerline is immediately above the longitudinal axis of the center of mass of the block. Further, it will be appreciated that in the first preferred embodiment, the heel and toe portions are each convex, curving gently outwardly from the center of the block, each having an apex 240 , 250 , intersected by a hypothetical projection or extension of the vertical centerline.
[0128] The horizontal centerline is immediately above the lateral axis of the center of mass of the block. Accordingly, the horizontal centerline may be employed as an aid to aligning the putter head with the center of mass of a golf ball B for solid contact. Additionally, the horizontal centerline and the vertical centerline intersect at a point 260 immediately above the geometric center and the center of mass of the block, which point is also the uppermost tangent to the shaft hole 270 into which the club shaft S is installed at an angle suited to the user's needs. If extended hole 270 into which the club shaft S is installed at an angle suited to the user's needs. If extended beyond the upper and lower horizontally disposed lines, the vertical centerline would intersect the apices of each of the convex arcs at the heel and toe portions. Preferably, the center of mass of that portion of the shaft embedded in the block is coincident with the center of mass of the block. In each of the preferred embodiments, the center of mass of the putter head block lies substantially on the horizontal centerline, whether or not it is located on the vertical centerline. Overall, then, the putter head of the present invention is geometrically and structurally balanced with no element that would compromise or undermine the subtle cues that inform proper alignment and mechanics in the putting stroke.
[0129] As the element name implies, the visual indicator lines are employed as an aid to alignment. In the instant invention, the vertically disposed lines are used to help see, track, and select the intended line and the intermediate alignment point. The heel portion 230 ′ of the vertical centerline 230 , as viewed from above while addressing the ball, should be not visible either in the setup or stroke. If the user's head is too far forward or too far back at setup, he or she will see the line on either side of the shaft. Also if the user fans the face open or closed, he or she will see the line which will indicate that he is swinging the putter on the proper swing plane. If the hands are pressed too far forward or too far back at address, he will see the heel middle line. All of these things are intended to help develop a solid and connected setup of your hands, arms and body to the putter. Using this visual indicator as described, the correct setup forces the user to position his eyes behind the ball and over the intended line of the putt, which also facilitates seeing the line better.
[0130] Ideally the ratio of the length of the block (as measured from the tip of the toe to the base of the heel) to the width of the block (as measured from the front to rear planar striking surfaces), preferably conform to the golden ratio (1.618033989), or a substantial approximation thereof. It is known that rectangles having these dimensional ratios are most pleasing to the eye, and it is submitted that this phenomenon contributes to the overall effectiveness of the alignment system of the inventive apparatus. More specifically, the putter head of the present invention includes alignment indicating geometry that closely approximates the golden proportion not merely because such the proportion is pleasing to the eye, but because it facilitates a more accurate perception of the optimum putting line and initial direction of the line of the putt.
[0131] Accordingly, preferred dimensions of the inventive putter head include a length of 4.0 inches, a width of 2.5 inches, and a height (measured from the top to the bottom surface) of 0.979 inches. As will be readily appreciated by those with skill in the art, different lengths and widths could be used while preserving the desired ratio, and there is nothing in the inventive design that necessitates the specific preferred dimensions described herein.
[0132] Referring now to FIGS. 5-7 , in a second preferred embodiment 300 , the inventive putter head is generally identical to the first preferred embodiment, thus comprising a block 310 with an evenly distributed mass, a planar top surface 320 , a bottom surface 330 , a toe portion 340 , a heel portion 350 , and front and rear planar surfaces 360 a , 360 b , each of may be employed for striking putts.
[0133] The visual indicator grid 370 includes an upper horizontal line 380 a , an upper ball bracketing line 380 b , respectively, each disposed above the shaft hole; as well as a lower horizontal line, 390 a , and a lower ball bracketing line 390 b , respectively, each disposed below the shaft hole, and all of which are parallel to one another. The grid further includes front and rear vertically disposed lines, 400 , 410 , respectively. A horizontal centerline 420 is parallel to all other horizontally disposed lines, and a vertical centerline 430 is parallel to the front and rear vertically disposed lines. In this second preferred embodiment, the heel and toe portions are each concave, curving gently inward toward the center of the block from substantially the front planar surface 360 a to the rear planar surface 360 b , and each having an apex 440 , 450 , intersected by a hypothetical extension of the vertical centerline 430 .
[0134] As suggested in FIG. 5 , the distance δ between the ball bracketing lines is that of the diameter of a golf ball, preferably the smallest diameter of a ball allowed under the USGA Rules of Golf, Appendix III, i.e., 1.680 inches (42.67 mm). Thus, using the ball bracketing lines the player may literally bracket the golf ball at address and during the stroke. These lines alone will assist the user in finding the geometric center of mass of the inventive putter head, as that point is located precisely between the ball bracketing lines and behind the front surface 360 a . The horizontal centerline 420 complements the ball-bracketing lines in aiding the user to place the center of mass of the putter head directly behind the center of mass of the golf ball, both preparatory to and during the stroke.
[0135] As in the first preferred embodiment, the vertical centerline of the second preferred embodiment is immediately above the longitudinal axis of the center of mass of the block and the horizontal centerline is immediately above the lateral axis of the center of mass of the block. Again, the horizontal centerline may be employed as an aid to aligning the putter head with the center of mass of a golf ball B for solid contact. And, again, the horizontal centerline and the vertical centerline intersect at a point 460 immediately above the center of mass of the block, which point is also the uppermost tangent to the shaft hole 470 into which the club shaft S is inserted.
[0136] If the block of the putter head is not made in substantial conformity with dimensions conforming to the golden ratio, it is preferable that the length-to-width ratio of the sides of the upper and lower rectangles, ABCD and DCEF, respectively, be substantially those of the golden ratio. In fact, it is more important that the rectangles immediately above and below the shaft be the golden ratio than it is that the block itself be dimensioned to embody the golden ratio. Accordingly, in view of the fact that the ball bracketing lines are separated 1.680 inches (±0.10 inches) in diameter, the ideal distance from ball bracketing lines 380 b and 390 b to horizontal centerline 420 is 0.82 inches (±0.10 inches), and the length of the lines AB and FE is 1.359 (±0.10 inches); i.e., 0.82 inches multiplied by 1.6180. With these geometric principles incorporated into the visual indicator grid atop the upper surface of the block, the block may take any of a number of functional shapes having a balanced distribution of mass about the center of mass of the putter head. This is seen most clearly in the slightly more complex (but nonetheless balanced) designs shown in FIGS. 11 and 12 .
[0137] Referring now to FIGS. 8-10 , in a third preferred embodiment 500 , the putter head of the present invention is substantially identical to the second preferred embodiment in all of its elements, features, and characteristics, with the exception that the concave heel and toe portions, 510 , 520 , do not extend from substantially the front and rear planar surfaces 530 a , 530 b . Rather, the concavity comprises an interior region of the heel and toe portions, thereby leaving the block with a substantially rectangular appearance.
[0138] Once again, it is more important that the rectangles ABCD and DCEF embody the golden ratio than it is that the putter head block do so. Indeed, as FIGS. 11 and 12 show, fourth and fifth preferred embodiments, 600 and 800 , respectively, include variations on the placement of the geometric elements of the present invention. In these embodiments, representing a dome-shaped putter head 600 , and bell-shaped putter head 800 , the rectangles comprising the golden mean are rotated relative to those presented on the top surface of the earlier embodiments. Accordingly, in FIGS. 11 and 12 , respectively, rectangles 610 , 620 , 630 , and 640 , and 810 , 820 , 830 , and 840 are arranged so that the shortest sides of the side-by-side rectangles are adjacent as viewed from putter head toe 650 to heel 660 , and 850 , 860 . Thus, the longest sides are adjacent as viewed from putter head front 670 to back 680 , and 870 , 880 . In each embodiment, additional rectangles 690 , 700 , 710 , 720 , and 890 , 900 , 910 , 920 , are included to provide the advantageous grid pattern that aids in alignment.
[0139] The above disclosure is sufficient to enable one of ordinary skill in the art to practice the invention, and provides the best mode of practicing the invention presently contemplated by the inventor. While there is provided herein a full and complete disclosure of the preferred embodiments of this invention, it is not desired to limit the invention to the exact construction, dimensional relationships, and operation shown and described. Various modifications, alternative constructions, changes and equivalents will readily occur to those skilled in the art and may be employed, as suitable, without departing from the true spirit and scope of the invention. Such changes might involve alternative materials, components, structural arrangements, sizes, shapes, forms, functions, operational features or the like. For instance, the bottom surface of the block can be manufactured to have a beveled surface, wherein with the block inverted, so that the bottom surface is uppermost, all sides of the block can slope inwardly to form a truncated tetrahedron with all of the bevels having a trapezoidal shape. This will also help in elevating the center of mass of the putter well above the ground and above the horizontal line running through the center of mass of the ball, thus ensuring that the ball, when struck, tends to roll over, rather than pop up into the air, as happens with putters having a center of mass below the line through the center of mass of the ball.
[0140] Therefore, the above description and illustrations should not be construed as limiting the scope of the invention, which is defined by the appended claims.
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An improved putter head having an alignment enhancing grid pattern formed of line elements arranged generally according to the golden mean. The grid pattern includes ball-bracketing lines and a horizonatal centerline positioned therebetween that center a golf ball at address and facilitate solid contact with the ball during the stroke.
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[0001] The present application claims the benefit of the patent application No. 200510018799.8 filed with the State Intellectual Property Office of the People's Republic of China on May 30, 2005 by Wuhan University, which is incorporated herein by reference.
FIELD OF INVENTION
[0002] The present invention relates to a non-toxic process and system for pilot-scale production of cellulose products, and particularly to a process and system for pilot-scale production of cellulose products by using aqueous sodium hydroxide (NaOH)/urea solution. The said process and system can be used to produce fibers, films, chromatographic packings, or nonwovens of regenerated cellulose, as well as to produce a variety of high added-value products by adding other materials such as functional materials, nano-materials, etc. The present invention pertains to the field of natural macromolecules, and to the fields of material, textile, chemistry and chemical engineering, agriculture, and environmental engineering.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0003] Celluloses are the most abundant renewable resource on the earth are environmentally friendly materials, so sufficient utilization of celluloses can not only protect environment but also save the limited unrenewable petroleum resources. However, celluloses are far from being sufficiently utilized in chemical industry, mainly because the current processes for dissolving cellulose are complex, costly and tend to cause pollution.
[0004] In the past more than one hundred years, conventional viscose process has been used for producing regenerated cellulose products such as rayon, glassine paper and the like. The conventional viscose process comprises reacting cellulose with CS 2 (33 wt %) in the presence of strong base (the concentration of sodium hydroxide being 18 wt %) to produce cellulose xanthate that is dissolved in the alkaline solution to form a viscose solution, and then spinning or casting the viscose solution of cellulose, followed by regenerating in diluent acid solution to obtain viscose fiber (rayon) or glassine paper. A great quantity of toxic gases such as CS 2 and H 2 S which severely pollute environment are released during the process and are harmful to human health (J. Macromol. Sci.-Rev. Macromol. Chem., 1980, C18 (1), 1).
[0005] In the prior art, the cuprammonium process for producing cuprammonium rayon also has drawbacks of environmental pollution, high cost and difficulty to recover solution. The processes, in which other organic or inorganic solvents such as dimethylsulfoxide-nitrogen oxide (U.S. Pat. No. 3,236,669, 1966), aqueous ZnCl 2 solution (U.S. Pat. No. 5,290,349, 1994), LiCl/DMAc (U.S. Pat. No. 4,302,252, 1981) and the like are used, respectively, are difficult in industrialization due to the cost and their complicated dissolving procedures.
[0006] N-methylmorpholine oxide (NMMO) (U.S. Pat. No. 2,179,181, 1939; U.K. Patent No. GB1144048, 1967; U.S. Pat. No. 4,246,221, 1981) is considered as the most promising solvent for cellulose so far. In 1989, Bureau International pour la Standardisation des Fibres Artificielles (BISFA) in Brussels named such cellulose fibers made by NMMO process as “Lyocell”. Although a small amount of products of cellulose fibers made thereby had been marketed, the industrial production of them developed slowly due to high cost and high spinning temperature.
[0007] In addition, a process has been proposed that comprises reacting cellulose with urea at high temperature to obtain cellulose carbamate, and then dissolving directly in a diluent alkaline solution to obtain spinning solution (Finland Patent No. F161003; Finland Patent No. F162318; U.S. Pat. No. 4,404,369). However, this process requires a great amount of urea, leads to side product(s), and is difficult for industrialization either.
[0008] Japan Patent No. JP1777283 disclosed that cellulose was dissolved in 2.5 mol/L aqueous NaOH solution, but only wood pulp cellulose having a polymerization degree of below 250 and being treated by vapor explosion could be used, which could be dissolved in such aqueous NaOH solution at about 4° C. The cellulose filaments made by using this process have a poor strength and are not suitable for spinning or forming film in industry.
[0009] The present applicant proposed in Chinese Patent No. 00114486.3 that a mixed aqueous solution of 4 wt %-8 wt % sodium hydroxide and 2 wt %-8 wt % urea was used as solvent for dissolving cellulose, and in Chinese Patent No. 00114485.5, a regenerated cellulose film with good strength was prepared successfully. However, the practices indicated that the solvent system must be kept under freezing condition (−20° C.) for 3-8 hours to form an ice-like stuff and then thawed before it was used to dissolve cellulose for preparing transparent cellulose solution. Thus, it is applicable to laboratory scale only at present, and is not suitable for industrialization.
[0010] In addition, the present applicant proposed in Chinese Patent No. 03128386.1 that a mixed aqueous solution of 5 wt %-12 wt % sodium hydroxide and 8.5 wt %-20 wt % urea was cooled and then was used for directly dissolving the natural cellulose having a molecular weight of less than 10.1×10 4 and the regenerated cellulose having a molecular weight of less than 12×10 4 at room temperature to obtain a transparent, concentrated cellulose solution; subsequently, in Chinese Patent No. 200310111566.3, regenerated cellulose fibers and films were prepared therefrom by using simple, compact laboratory device; and in Chinese Patent No. 200410013389.X, regenerated cellulose filaments were prepared by wet spinning process using spinning machine. However, since one-bath process is used in formation, the surface of filaments solidified quickly, which influenced the further stretch orientation, thereby resulting in relatively low filament strength.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0011] One object of the present invention is to provide a process for pilot-scale production of cellulose products, the process comprising:
[0012] (a) Pre-cooling a mixed aqueous solution of sodium hydroxide and urea to a first temperature;
[0013] (b) Placing the pre-cooled mixed aqueous solution at a second temperature, then immediately adding a cellulose raw material which is thereby dissolved rapidly under agitation to obtain a cellulose solution;
[0014] (c) Filtering and deaerating the cellulose solution;
[0015] (d) Using a molding device for pilot-scale production to allow the filtered and deaerated cellulose solution to form a cellulose product.
[0016] According to the process of the present invention, in the mixed aqueous solution, the concentration of sodium hydroxide is 5.0 wt %˜12.0 wt %, preferably 6.0 wt %˜8.0 wt %, most preferably 7.0 wt %˜7.5 wt %; the concentration of urea is 8.0 wt %˜20.0 wt %, preferably 10.0 wt %˜20.0 wt %, most preferably 11.0 wt %˜12.0 wt %.
[0017] According to the process of the present invention, the said first temperature is in the range of −15° C. to −8° C., preferably in the range of −13° C. to −10° C., most preferably −12° C.
[0018] According to the process of the present invention, the said second temperature is ambient temperature, specifically in the range of 0° C.˜20° C.
[0019] According to the process of the present invention, the said cellulose raw material can be of various cellulose pulps including cotton linter pulp, bagasse pulp, wood pulp, straw pulp, etc., particularly various cellulose pulps having a polymerization degree of below 700 and a relatively narrow distribution of molecular weight, preferably a cellulose pulp having a polymerization degree of 250˜650, most preferably a cellulose pulp having a polymerization degree of 300˜440. Preferably, the said cellulose pulp has a viscosity-average molecular weight of below 1.1×10 5 .
[0020] According to the process of the present invention, after the cellulose raw material being added at the second temperature, the agitation is performed sufficiently for 10 minutes, preferably 15 minutes, and most preferably 20 minutes or more.
[0021] According to the process of the present invention, the deaerating time is preferably in the range of 4˜30 hours, more preferably 4˜10 hours, or alternatively, more preferably 10˜30 hours.
[0022] According to the process of the present invention, the concentration of the resulting cellulose solution is in the range of 3.0 wt %˜8.0 wt %, preferably 3.0 wt %˜7.0 wt %, more preferably 4.5 wt %˜5.5 wt %. It is preferred that with the increase of polymerization degree of the cellulose pulp from 250 to 650, the concentration of the cellulose solution is changed from 8.0 wt % to 4.0 wt %, and within such a range, the strength of the cellulose filaments can be enhanced by appropriately reducing molecular weight, maintaining relatively narrow distribution of molecular weight while increasing concentration.
[0023] According to the process of the present invention, the said molding device for pilot-scale production is selected from a variety of molding devices including spinning devices, film-forming devices, granulating devices, with a wet spinning device, more preferably a two-step coagulation bath spinning device, being preferred.
[0024] According to the process of the present invention, the process further comprises steps of producing a variety of high value-added cellulose products by adding other substances such as functional materials and/or nano-materials, wherein the said other substances can be added during the preparation of cellulose solution, or added by blending and molding with a functional master batch produced therefrom, or added by any other method known by those skilled in the art.
[0025] A further object of the present invention is to provide a system for pilot-scale production of cellulose products by using aqueous NaOH/urea solution, the system comprising a liquid storage tank, an agitating tank, a filtering device, a deaerating device and a molding device.
[0026] According to the system of the present invention, the temperature of each unit of the system is set according to the requirements of the corresponding steps.
[0027] According to the system of the present invention, the said molding device for pilot-scale production is selected from a variety of molding devices including spinning devices, film-forming devices, granulating devices, with a wet spinning device, more preferably a two-step coagulation bath spinning device, being preferred.
[0028] According to the system of the present invention, the said two-step coagulation bath spinning device comprises a first coagulation bath and a second coagulation bath. The said first coagulation bath is a mixed aqueous solution of H 2 SO 4 and Na 2 SO 4 , wherein the concentration of H 2 SO 4 is 5 wt %˜20 wt %, preferably 6 wt %˜15 wt %, and most preferably 7 wt %˜9 wt %, the concentration of Na 2 SO 4 is 5 wt %˜25 wt %, preferably 10 wt %˜25 wt %, and most preferably 10 wt %˜15 wt %, and the bath temperature is 0˜40° C., preferably 5˜20° C., most preferably 10˜15° C.; the said second coagulation bath is an aqueous H 2 SO 4 solution with the concentration of H 2 SO 4 being 3 wt %˜20 wt %, preferably 3 wt %˜10 wt %, and most preferably 4 wt %˜5 wt %, and the bath temperature being 0˜60° C., preferably 10˜30° C., and most preferably 10˜20° C.
[0029] According to the system of the present invention, the said cellulose solution, after being jetted out, enters into the first coagulation bath for solidification, partial stretch orientation and draft, and then enters into the second coagulation bath for further regeneration and stretch orientation.
[0030] According to the system of the present invention, the system further comprises a metering pump, a spinneret, a water-washing device, a plasticizing device, a drying device and/or a winding device, and can further comprise a circulation device for recycling coagulation baths and/or a recovery device for recovering urea. Among others, the spinneret can be vertical spinneret or horizontal spinneret, which can be adjusted or changed according to practical requirements.
[0031] A still further object of the present invention is to provide a cellulose product produced by using aqueous NaOH/urea solution, comprising filaments, chopped fibers, films, chromatographic packings and/or nonwovens. The said product can be used for production of a variety of high value-added cellulose products by adding other substances such as functional materials and/or nano-materials.
[0032] In an embodiment, the cellulose solution of the present invention is used for production of regenerated cellulose filaments by solidification and regeneration in a spinning device of two-step coagulation bath method, and is subsequently used for production of continuous fibers, chopped fibers, nonwovens, etc.
[0033] In a further embodiment, the cellulose solution of the present invention is used for production of regenerated cellulose films by using a film-forming device.
[0034] In a still further embodiment, the cellulose solution of the present invention is granulated by using a granulating device, and the resulted particles are used as chromatographic packings.
[0035] In an embodiment of the present invention, other substances such as functional materials, nano-materials, etc. can be added and/or dispersed in the cellulose solution of the present invention, thereby producing high added-value cellulose products.
[0036] As compared to the prior art, the advantage of the present invention lies in that: firstly, the chemical raw materials used are less costly and non-toxic, which are made available as a new solvent for cellulose by cooling at reduced temperature; secondly, a variety of high added-value cellulose products can be produced by employing the process of the present invention; thirdly, since CS 2 is not used in the production process, such regenerated cellulose products contain no sulfur (viscose fibers have a sulfur content of 10 g/kg) and are regenerated cellulose materials with very high safety; fourthly, during the production according to the process of the present invention, the dissolution of cellulose is the most fast for polymers, so the production cycle is short (30-40 hours), which is equivalent to ⅓ that of viscose process; and fifthly, the process of the present invention is particularly suitable for industrial production and practical applications.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0037] FIG. 1 shows a schematic diagram of a two-step coagulation bath spinning device for pilot-scale production according to the present invention.
[0038] FIG. 2 shows a schematic diagram of a preferred embodiment of the process according to the present invention.
[0039] FIG. 3 shows a cross-section view of the cellulose filaments obtained according to the process of the present invention.
[0040] FIG. 4 shows a surface view of the cellulose filaments obtained according to the process of the present invention.
[0041] FIG. 5 shows packages of cellulose filaments obtained by the process according to the present invention.
DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
[0042] The present invention is further illustrated in detail in combination with the drawings and specific examples, but the present invention is not intended to be limited thereto.
[0043] In a preferred embodiment of the present invention, a device for pilot-scale production ( FIG. 1 ) is used for wet spinning by the two-step coagulation bath method, wherein a cellulose solution is firstly deaerated by a deaerating tank a, and then, after being jetted out through a spinneret b, enters into a first coagulation bath tank c and subsequently, a second coagulation bath tank d in tow, followed by passing through a water-washing device e, and, as desired, being plasticized in a plasticizer tank f, and finally is drawn and wound by a winding device g to form a package. Preferably, the spinneret is reformed to spin downwardly so that cellulose molecules are stretched and oriented by gravity even when they are still in solution, and meanwhile the solidification time of cellulose is further prolonged and the stretch ratio is increased by arrangement of devices and process. Preferably, multi-stage stretch is employed to further enhance the strength of cellulose filaments, so that regenerated cellulose filaments with better mechanical properties are prepared.
[0044] Referring to FIG. 2 , the basic processing procedure of a preferred embodiment according to the present invention comprises: pre-cooling a mixed aqueous solution of 5 wt %˜12 wt % sodium hydroxide and 8 wt %˜20 wt % urea in a liquid storage tank 1 to a temperature in the range of −15° C. to −8° C., and then adding the pre-cooled solution into an agitating tank while adding a cellulose pulp from a pulp tank and stirring. Cellulose is dissolved rapidly during agitation to produce a transparent cellulose solution. The resulting cellulose solution is discharged into a liquid storage tank 2 , passing a filter to remove impurities. Then the filtered cellulose solution is discharged into a degassing tank, deaerating continuously under vacuum for 4˜24 hours. Herein, the deaerated cellulose solution is filtered by a filter, and then is pressed by a metering pump to be filtered again and jetted from a spinneret into a coagulation bath 1 . The cellulose solution is coagulated and regenerated in the coagulation bath 1 , and then pass through a roll I, a coagulation bath 2 , a roll II, a plasticizer tank, a roll III (drying roll), to finally produce a regenerated cellulose filament on a bobbin. The coagulation baths are recycled by a circulation device, and also urea can be recycled by a recovery device.
Example 1
[0045] 3 kg of a mixed aqueous solution of 7.0 wt % NaOH/12 wt % urea (analytically pure) was pre-cooled to −12° C., then 151 g of dry cotton linter cellulose pulp (having a polymerization degree of 620) was added immediately, while stirring under 1000 rpm at room temperature for 20 minutes to dissolve the cellulose completely. A transparent cellulose solution was obtained by deaerating in a self-made deaeration tank under vacuum at 5° C. for 12 hours. The concentrated cellulose solution was pressed to pass through a 0.12 mm×30 holes spinneret of a spinning machine and entered into a first coagulation bath for solidification and regeneration, wherein the bath was a mixed aqueous solution of 8 wt % H 2 SO 4 /12 wt % Na 2 SO 4 , and the bath temperature was 10° C. Subsequently, the cellulose filaments entered into a second coagulation bath for regeneration, wherein the bath was an aqueous solution of 4 wt % H 2 SO 4 , and the bath temperature was 15° C. The stretched and regenerated cellulose filaments were washed with water and entered into a plasticizer tank for oiling, dried by a drying roll and then wound on a bobbin to form a spindle numbered as 1. The filaments had a round cross-section ( FIG. 3 ) similar to Lyocell, smooth surface ( FIG. 3 ), and soft and glossy appearance ( FIG. 4 ), were free of sulfur and possessed excellent mechanical properties (Table 1).
Example 2
[0046] 3 kg of a mixed aqueous solution of 7.0 wt % NaOH/12 wt % urea (industrially pure) was pre-cooled to −12° C., and then 145 g of dry cotton linter cellulose pulp (having a polymerization degree of 620) was added immediately, while stirring under 1000 rpm at room temperature for 20 minutes to dissolve the cellulose completely. A transparent cellulose solution was obtained by deaerating in a self-made deaeration tank under vacuum at 5° C. for 12 hours. The concentrated cellulose solution was pressed to pass through a 0.12 mm×30 holes spinneret of a spinning machine and entered into a first coagulation bath for solidification and regeneration, wherein the bath was a mixed aqueous solution of 7.6 wt % H 2 SO 4 /12.5 wt % Na 2 SO 4 , and the bath temperature was 15° C. Subsequently, the cellulose filaments entered into a second coagulation bath for regeneration, wherein the bath was an aqueous solution of 4 wt % H 2 SO 4 , and the bath temperature was 15° C. The stretched and regenerated cellulose filaments were washed with water and entered into a plasticizer tank for oiling, dried by a drying roll and then wound on a bobbin to form a spindle numbered as 2. The filaments contained no sulfur as determined, and thus were fibers with high safety. The filaments had a round cross-section as well as soft and glossy appearance, and possessed relatively high strength.
Example 3
[0047] 3 kg of a mixed aqueous solution of 7.5 wt % NaOH/11 wt % urea (industrially pure) was pre-cooled to −12° C., and then 130 g of dry cotton linter cellulose pulp (having a polymerization degree of 440) was added immediately, while stirring under 700˜1000 rpm at room temperature for 15 minutes to dissolve cellulose completely. A transparent cellulose solution was obtained by deaerating in a self-made deaeration tank under vacuum at 5° C. for 5 hours. The concentrated cellulose solution was pressed to pass through a 0.12 mm×30 holes spinneret of a spinning machine and entered into a first coagulation bath for solidification and regeneration, wherein the bath was a mixed aqueous solution of 8.6 wt % H 2 SO 4 /10.5 wt % Na 2 SO 4 , and the bath temperature was 10° C. Subsequently, the cellulose filaments entered into a second coagulation bath for regeneration, wherein the bath was an aqueous solution of 5 wt % H 2 SO 4 , and the bath temperature was 10° C. The stretched and regenerated cellulose filaments were washed with water and entered into a plasticizer tank for oiling, dried by a drying roll and then wound on a bobbin to form a spindle numbered as 3. The filaments had a round cross-section, were free of sulfur, had soft and glossy appearance, and possessed relatively high strength.
Example 4
[0048] 3 kg of a mixed aqueous solution of 7 wt % NaOH/12 wt % urea (industrially pure) was pre-cooled to −12° C., and then 130 g of dry cotton linter cellulose pulp (having a polymerization degree of 440) was added immediately, while stirring under 700˜1000 rpm at room temperature for 15 minutes to dissolve cellulose completely. A transparent cellulose solution was obtained by deaerating in a self-made deaeration tank under vacuum at 10° C. for 5 hours. The concentrated cellulose solution was pressed to pass through a 0.12 mm×30 holes spinneret of a spinning machine and entered into a first coagulation bath for solidification and regeneration, wherein the bath was a mixed aqueous solution of 8.7 wt % H 2 SO 4 /10.9 wt % Na 2 SO 4 , and the bath temperature was 15° C. Subsequently, the cellulose filaments entered into a second coagulation bath for regeneration, wherein the bath was an aqueous solution of 5 wt % H 2 SO 4 , and the bath temperature was 15° C. The stretched and regenerated cellulose filaments were washed with water and entered into a plasticizer tank for oiling, dried by a drying roll and then wound on a bobbin to form a spindle numbered as 4. The filaments contained no sulfur as determined and were novel filaments with high safety. The filaments had a round cross-section, soft and glossy appearance, and relatively high strength.
Example 5
[0049] 3 kg of a mixed aqueous solution of 7 wt % NaOH/12 wt % urea (industrially pure) was pre-cooled to −12° C., and then 141 g of dry cotton linter cellulose pulp (having a polymerization degree of 440) was added immediately, while stirring under 700-1000 rpm at room temperature for 15 minutes to dissolve cellulose completely. A transparent cellulose solution was obtained by deaerating in a self-made deaeration tank under vacuum at 5° C. for 4.5 hours. The concentrated cellulose solution was pressed to pass through a 0.12 mm×75 holes spinneret of a spinning machine and entered into a first coagulation bath for solidification and regeneration, wherein the bath was a mixed aqueous solution of 10.5 wt % H 2 SO 4 /10.2 wt % Na 2 SO 4 , and the bath temperature was 13° C. Subsequently, the cellulose filaments entered into a second coagulation bath for regeneration, wherein the bath was an aqueous solution of 5 wt % H 2 SO 4 , and the bath temperature was 13° C. The stretched and regenerated cellulose filaments were washed with water and entered into a plasticizer tank for oiling, dried by a drying roll and then wound on a bobbin to form a spindle numbered as 5. The filaments had a round cross-section, were free of sulfur, had soft and glossy appearance, and possessed relatively high strength.
[0050] The mechanical properties of cellulose filaments obtained in the above examples were measured by XQ-1 constant-speed elongation type fiber strength tester. Their breaking strength and elongation at break in dry state were summarized in Table 1.
[0000]
TABLE 1
Test results of mechanical properties such as breaking
strength and elongation at break of cellulose filaments
Concen-
tration
Polymerization
Grade of
Tensile
Elongation
of cellulose
degree of
chemical
strength
at break
No.
(wt %)
cellulose
reagents
(cN/dtex)
(%)
1
4.5
620
Analytical
1.8
13
grade
2
4.4
620
Industrial
1.7
9
grade
3
4.3
440
Industrial
1.9
2
grade
4
4.2
440
Industrial
1.7
2
grade
5
4.5
440
Industrial
2.0
2
grade
[0051] It should be understood that all value ranges in the description and claims are intended to include their end values and all subranges within these ranges.
[0052] Although the present invention is illustrated and described with reference to the illustrative examples, those skilled in the art would understand that the present invention could be varied in manners and details without departing from the spirit and scope of the present invention. The protection scope of the present invention is defined as claimed in the appended claims.
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The present invention relates to a non-toxic process and system for pilot-scale production of cellulose products, and particularly to a process and system for pilot-scale production of cellulose products by using aqueous sodium hydroxide/urea solution pre-colled to lower than −8° C., in which cellulose could dissolved rapidly. The said process and system can be used to produce fibers, films, chromatographic packings, or nonwovens of regenerated cellulose, as well as to produce a variety of high added-value products by adding other materials such as functional materials, nano-materials, etc.
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RELATED APPLICATION
[0001] This application claims priority to U.S. Provisional Application Ser. No. 61/451,513 (entitled INTEGRATED NETWORKED ASSET MANAGEMENT, filed Mar. 10, 2012) which is incorporated herein by reference.
BACKGROUND
[0002] Managing ice merchandisers to keep them stocked with bags of ice has been performed by drivers of ice trucks, who visit sites and check the ice merchandisers visually to determine whether more bags of ice should be added. This process leads to wasted effort when the ice merchandisers do not need more ice. It also may lead to delay in refilling ice merchandisers and result in lost sales if not refilled quickly enough.
[0003] One proposal to begin to address such problems has been to add weight sensors under the ice merchandiser to weigh the entire ice merchandiser. This retrofit solution is not able to offer level information on more than one product inside the merchandiser and its components, all external, may be negatively impacted by adverse weather conditions or subject to tampering or vandalism.
SUMMARY
[0004] A system for an ice merchandiser having a compressor in a compressor enclosure to cool the ice merchandiser includes a sensor disposed within the ice merchandiser, and a communications component disposed within the compressor enclosure and coupled to the sensor to receive signals from the sensor representative of the amount of ice in the ice merchandiser, wherein the communications component is configured to convert the received signals to a digital format and publish the signals via a network connection.
[0005] In one embodiment, the sensor includes a camera and a heating element proximate a lens of the camera.
[0006] In another embodiment, an ice merchandiser is fitted with at least one weight scale that sits in the bottom of the ice merchandiser to measure the weight of ice bags placed upon it. The scale in one embodiment covers substantially the entire floor of the chest. The scale provides an output to a system outside a cooled volume of the ice merchandiser. The system takes the output and provides a signal on a network representative of the weight, and correspondingly, the ice supported by the scale.
[0007] In some embodiments, multiple scales may be used in the chest side by side to measure the weight of different sized bags of ice placed upon the scales.
[0008] In further embodiments, temperature sensors and contact switches may be coupled to the system to provide signals representative of temperature inside and outside of the chest, as well as whether a chest door is open or not.
[0009] The system may provide signal processing to provide signals representative of the sensed parameters to the network. In one embodiment, the system includes a device having an IP address to facilitate exposing the sensed information via a website like interface. A wireless modem may be included.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0010] FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a system to detect stocking of ice in an ice merchandiser according to an example embodiment.
[0011] FIG. 2 is a top view of components in a compressor container for the ice merchandiser of FIG. 1 .
[0012] FIG. 3 is a side block diagram illustrating further details of a sensor system within the ice merchandiser of FIG. 1
[0013] FIG. 4 is a block schematic diagram of an example heater.
[0014] FIG. 5 is a block flow diagram illustrating functions performed in accordance with an example embodiment.
[0015] FIG. 6 is an example interface to interact with the system of FIG. 1 .
[0016] FIG. 7 is a block diagram a system for performing functions and communications according to an example embodiment.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
[0017] In the following description, reference is made to the accompanying drawings that form a part hereof, and in which is shown by way of illustration specific embodiments which may be practiced. These embodiments are described in sufficient detail to enable those skilled in the art to practice the invention, and it is to be understood that other embodiments may be utilized and that structural, logical and electrical changes may be made without departing from the scope of the present invention. The following description of example embodiments is, therefore, not to be taken in a limited sense, and the scope of the present invention is defined by the appended claims.
[0018] The functions or algorithms described herein may be implemented in software or a combination of software and human implemented procedures in one embodiment. The software may consist of computer executable instructions stored on computer readable media such as memory or other type of storage devices. Further, such functions correspond to modules, which are software stored on a storage device, hardware, firmware or any combination thereof. Multiple functions may be performed in one or more modules as desired, and the embodiments described are merely examples. The software may be executed on a digital signal processor, ASIC, microprocessor, or other type of processor operating on a computer system, such as a personal computer, server or other computer system.
[0019] FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a system 100 to detect stocking of ice in an ice merchandiser 110 according to an example embodiment. One or more different types of sensors may be placed inside the ice merchandiser 110 in various embodiments. In one embodiment, a sensor includes a camera 115 placed to obtain images, such as still images or video images of items, such as bags of ice placed on one or more platforms 120 , 122 inside of the ice merchandiser 110 . In one embodiment, platform 120 is used to hold bags 124 of one size, and platform 122 is used to hold bags 126 of a different size.
[0020] In one embodiment, the camera has a lens that provides field of view 128 that is wide enough, such as at least 70 degrees in one embodiment that is sufficient to enable someone to determine whether the items need restocking. One or more further sensors may be included, such as a temperature sensor 130 disposed within the ice merchandiser 110 to measure the temperature within the ice merchandiser. Sensor 130 may also include multiple sensors to sense further parameters, such as humidity in further embodiments.
[0021] In one embodiment, the platforms 120 and 122 may comprise load cells, forming weight scales that sit in the bottom of the ice merchandiser to measure the weight of ice bags placed upon them. The scales may be used with or without the camera, and the camera may also be used without the scales in various embodiments. In one embodiment, one scale is used that covers substantially the entire floor of the chest and measures the pressure on each of four feet supporting the scale off the floor of the chest. In further embodiments, the scale provides a linear analog output representative of weight. The output may be provided to circuitry either inside, or outside the ice merchandiser 110 , such as within a compressor enclosure 140 housing a compressor 142 and fan 144 in various embodiments, where the output may be converted to standardized signal such as a linear zero to five volt signal representative of the weight of ice bags on the scale.
[0022] The scale has a low profile such that it does not adversely impact the cooling volume of the ice merchandiser for holding ice bags. The scales are sized to fit within the ice merchandiser, and to ensure that they cover enough of the floor to accurately measure the amount of ice stacked on them. In some embodiments, some space is left between walls of the ice merchandiser and sides of the scale to ensure that the scales are not adversely affected by interference from the wall. The space is also small enough to ensure that bags of ice are properly accounted for by the scale without falling between the scale and walls. Such a sized scale is said to substantially cover a desired portion of the ice merchandiser floor. As can be seen, there is some tolerance permitted.
[0023] In some embodiments, multiple scales may be used in the chest side by side to measure the weight of different sized bags of ice placed upon the scales. In an ice merchandiser with two doors, one door may be used for bags of one weight having a first scale, and the other door may be used for bags of a different weight having a second scale. Thus, two weights are provided to the system for publishing via the network connection. In some embodiments, the system may provide alerts regarding a need for restocking one side or the other of the ice merchandiser when the weight falls below a desired level. In various embodiments, the alerts may be provided via text messages, email, voicemail or other mechanisms including various social media. Information regarding the ice merchandiser may be accessible from at least mobile devices, computer systems, and other devices capable of providing information.
[0024] In further embodiments, temperature sensors and contact switches may be coupled to the system to provide signals representative of temperature inside and outside of the chest, as well as whether a chest door is open or not. FIG. 2 is a top view block diagram of components in the compressor enclosure 140 . A compressor electrical enclosure 210 contains circuitry for controlling the compressor and fan, as in standard compressor designs. In some embodiments, sensors are provided to sense temperature within the compressor enclosures 140 , external temperature, and compressor power draw. Still further sensors may be included in further embodiments.
[0025] A communications enclosure 215 is included, and contains circuitry for controlling the sensors that have been added to the ice merchandiser 110 in various embodiments. The circuitry has an IP address and modem, and provides data to a network such as the Internet, representative of the sensed parameters, such as images, weight, temperature, humidity or other parameters that may be sensed, and correspondingly, the ice supported by the scale. In one embodiment, a web enabled sensor appliance, such as a Maverick IP Sensor Appliance by Mamac Systems, incorporates a web server, analog/digital inputs and relay outputs. The appliance operates with any 24 VAC transformer, and may be plugged into a hub/router. Any web browser can be used to enter the default IP address to receive the data.
[0026] FIG. 3 is a side block diagram illustrating further details of the sensor 115 within the ice merchandiser 110 of FIG. 1 . A circuit board 310 has a camera 315 mounted on it, along with a light emitting diode 320 (LED) near the camera and corresponding lens of the camera. In one embodiment the camera 315 and LED 320 are enclosed in a transparent camera enclosure 325 . The camera enclosure 325 may be made of polycarbonate materials in one embodiment, and the volume enclosed may be heated sufficiently by the LED 320 to remove or prevent moister from condensing or freezing on the lens of the camera 315 , allowing a clear field of view of the items stocked in the ice merchandiser 110 . In further embodiments, the LED 320 may be positioned very close to the lens to obviate the need for the enclosure 325 . The proximity of the LED 320 to the camera may thus vary in different embodiments, but should be within a distance to allow it to perform the function of providing a clear field of view. In addition, the LED 320 may serve to illuminate the items for viewing. In still further embodiments, the camera may include circuitry to allow for imaging without the use of visible light.
[0027] The circuit board 310 may further include control circuitry 330 which can be used to control the camera and LED, and communicate with the circuitry in the electrical enclosure 210 in various embodiments. The processing of data may be split between such circuitry in various embodiments, or only one set of circuitry may perform all the functions. In still further embodiments, one or more sensors, such as temperatures sensor 335 may be included on the circuitry board 310 .
[0028] FIG. 4 is a block schematic diagram of an example heater 400 that may be used to provide a clear field of view for the lens of the camera. The heater may include a substrate having fine resistive heating wires to provide heat when powered via circuitry. The substrate may be adhesive, with the wires on or embedded, similar to add on rear windshield heaters for automobiles. The heater 400 be positioned proximate the lens of the camera or in the field of view of the lens on or embedded within the transparent camera enclosure 325 . The heater may be positioned outside the field of view on the camera enclosure 325 if it provides sufficient heat to create a clear field of view when images are obtained.
[0029] FIG. 5 is a block flow diagram 500 illustrating sensed parameters and components involved in data flow in various embodiments. Internal conditions 510 represent conditions inside of the ice merchandiser 110 in one embodiment. Internal conditions may include measurements from two scales at 512 and 514 , the camera 516 , and internal temperature 518 . External conditions 520 may include compressor enclosure or hood temperature 522 , compressor power draw 524 , a maintenance log 526 , and power loss indications 528 .
[0030] The information collected corresponding to these conditions is then communicated via the communications module 215 at 530 . The module 215 may be a 3 G, 4 G, WIFI, or other type of wireless communications module in various embodiments that is coupled to the internet represented at 532 . The information is then provided to server 534 , and back via a network 536 , such as the internet, to a provider of the items at 538 . The provider 538 may be an ice company in one embodiment responsible for restocking the ice merchandiser. One or more user interfaces may be provided on a personal computer, smart phone, tablet, or other device enabling a person responsible for restocking to determine whether or not an ice merchandiser needs restocking, and with what types of items. The information may distinguish between different sized bags of ice, such as 10 lbs or 20 lbs.
[0031] FIG. 6 is an example interface 600 to interact with the system of FIG. 1 . In one embodiment, the server 534 processes the information and creates a user interface allowing viewing of the information in various forms. Multiple different parameters may be published and viewable via interface 600 . A web type interface, or any number of other media, such as social media, including email and other forms of electronic communication may be used. Still further, the system may provide visible and audio alerts proximate the ice merchandiser.
[0032] In example interface 600 , images are shown at 610 , 612 , 614 . The images may be thumbnail images that are linked to higher quality images in further embodiments. The newest image is indicated at 614 , with prior images available to the left side of the display. In one embodiment, clicking on the latest image may initiate communications back to the system 100 to provide a real time image.
[0033] A graph 620 illustrates desired parameters over time. In some embodiments the time frame may be selected by the user in a common manner. Illustrated on graph 620 are internal ice merchandiser temperature 622 and ambient temperature 624 , which varies significantly over the few days that are shown. As desired, the internal temperature 622 is fairly constant. Note that a winter environment is like occurring in this representation as the ambient temperature dips below the internal temperature. While temperature is shown on the graph, other parameters may be shown in further embodiments. In addition, a link to multiple settings 630 may be provided to enable the user to change timing of when data is periodically provided, or change any other control points used to control the system 100 , including the compressor and fan in some embodiments.
[0034] Some example control points and corresponding notes are shown in the following TABLE 1:
[0000]
TABLE 1
Product
Product Level Measured
Level
Within ±5%
Product Level Differentiation
by Merchandiser Side
Compressor Status
Defrost Monitoring and
Control
Electric Current Draw
Monitoring
Power Outage Monitoring
Compressor Hood
Temperature Change
Monitoring
Maintenance Tracking and
Alerts
Interior Case Temperature
Temperature Change
Monitoring
Merchandiser Door Status
Open Door Alarm Set Points
[0035] FIG. 7 is a block diagram a system for performing functions and communications according to an example embodiment. FIG. 7 is a block diagram of a computer system or circuitry which may be used to process and publish sensed data and information according to an example embodiment. In the embodiment shown in FIG. 7 , a hardware and operating environment is provided that is applicable to any of the circuitry, servers and/or remote clients shown in the other Figures. It should be noted that many devices to provide the functions described herein may be formed with far fewer components than described below. Components may be included or excluded as desired and appropriate for the functions to be provided.
[0036] As shown in FIG. 7 , one embodiment of the hardware and operating environment includes a general purpose computing device in the form of a computer 700 (e.g., a personal computer, workstation, or server), including one or more processing units 721 , a system memory 722 , and a system bus 723 that operatively couples various system components including the system memory 722 to the processing unit 721 . There may be only one or there may be more than one processing unit 721 , such that the processor of computer 700 comprises a single central-processing unit (CPU), or a plurality of processing units, commonly referred to as a multiprocessor or parallel-processor environment. In various embodiments, computer 700 is a conventional computer, a distributed computer, or any other type of computer.
[0037] The system bus 723 can be any of several types of bus structures including a memory bus or memory controller, a peripheral bus, and a local bus using any of a variety of bus architectures. The system memory can also be referred to as simply the memory, and, in some embodiments, includes read-only memory (ROM) 724 and random-access memory (RAM) 725 . A basic input/output system (BIOS) program 726 , containing the basic routines that help to transfer information between elements within the computer 700 , such as during start-up, may be stored in ROM 724 . The computer 700 further includes a hard disk drive 727 for reading from and writing to a hard disk, not shown, a magnetic disk drive 728 for reading from or writing to a removable magnetic disk 729 , and an optical disk drive 730 for reading from or writing to a removable optical disk 731 such as a CD ROM or other optical media.
[0038] The hard disk drive 727 , magnetic disk drive 728 , and optical disk drive 730 couple with a hard disk drive interface 732 , a magnetic disk drive interface 733 , and an optical disk drive interface 734 , respectively. The drives and their associated computer-readable media provide non volatile storage of computer-readable instructions, data structures, program modules and other data for the computer 700 . It should be appreciated by those skilled in the art that any type of computer-readable media which can store data that is accessible by a computer, such as magnetic cassettes, flash memory cards, digital video disks, Bernoulli cartridges, random access memories (RAMs), read only memories (ROMs), redundant arrays of independent disks (e.g., RAID storage devices) and the like, can be used in the exemplary operating environment.
[0039] A plurality of program modules can be stored on the hard disk, magnetic disk 729 , optical disk 731 , ROM 724 , or RAM 725 , including an operating system 735 , one or more application programs 736 , other program modules 737 , and program data 738 . Programming for implementing one or more processes or method described herein may be resident on any one or number of these computer-readable media.
[0040] A user may enter commands and information into computer 700 through input devices such as a keyboard 740 and pointing device 742 . Other input devices (not shown) can include a microphone, joystick, game pad, touch screen, mobile phone, mobile pad, satellite dish, scanner, or the like. These other input devices are often connected to the processing unit 721 through a serial port interface 746 that is coupled to the system bus 723 , but can be connected by other interfaces, such as a parallel port, game port, wireless, or a universal serial bus (USB). A monitor 747 or other type of display device, including a touch screen, can also be connected to the system bus 723 via an interface, such as a video adapter 748 . The monitor 747 can display a graphical user interface for the user. In addition to the monitor 747 , computers typically include other peripheral output devices (not shown), such as speakers and printers.
[0041] The computer 700 may operate in a networked environment using logical connections to one or more remote computers or servers, such as remote computer 749 . These logical connections are achieved by a communication device coupled to or a part of the computer 700 ; the invention is not limited to a particular type of communications device. The remote computer 749 can be another computer, a server, a router, a network PC, a client, a peer device or other common network node, and typically includes many or all of the elements described above I/O relative to the computer 700 , although only a memory storage device 750 has been illustrated. The logical connections depicted in FIG. 7 include a local area network (LAN) 751 and/or a wide area network (WAN) 752 . Such networking environments are commonplace in office networks, enterprise-wide computer networks, intranets and the internet, which are all types of networks.
[0042] When used in a LAN-networking environment, the computer 700 is connected to the LAN 751 through a network interface or adapter 753 , which is one type of communications device. In some embodiments, when used in a WAN-networking environment, the computer 700 typically includes a modem 754 (another type of communications device) or any other type of communications device, e.g., a wireless transceiver, for establishing communications over the wide-area network 752 , such as the internet. The modem 754 , which may be internal or external, is connected to the system bus 723 via the serial port interface 746 . In a networked environment, program modules depicted relative to the computer 700 can be stored in the remote memory storage device 750 of remote computer, or server 749 . It is appreciated that the network connections shown are exemplary and other means of, and communications devices for, establishing a communications link between the computers may be used including hybrid fiber-coax connections, T1-T3 lines, DSL's, OC-3 and/or OC-12, TCP/IP, microwave, wireless application protocol, and any other electronic media through any suitable switches, routers, outlets and power lines, as the same are known and understood by one of ordinary skill in the art.
[0043] On the upper left part of the above picture is a signal conditioner that takes voltage signals entering the system on the lower part of the picture and converts them to a zero to five volt range compatible with the web enabled sensor appliance just below it. A model on the upper right couples the server to a wireless network. Wires from the sensors may follow the path of the condenser tubing placed on top of the ice merchandiser, and the entire device may fit inside the container for the condenser and include an antenna on top of the container as shown.
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A system for an ice merchandiser having a compressor in a compressor enclosure to cool the ice merchandiser includes a sensor disposed within the ice merchandiser, and a communications component disposed within the compressor enclosure and coupled to the sensor to receive signals from the sensor representative of the amount of ice in the ice merchandiser, wherein the communications component is configured to convert the received signals to a digital format and publish the signals via a network connection.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates in general to the treatment of wood chips for manufacturing pulp in a pulp mill, and more particularly, to the manufacture of pulp by subjecting the wood chips to a chemical treatment, such as chemi-mechanical, semi-chemical or chemical pulp.
The manufacture of pulp from wood chips by chemi-mechanical and semi-chemical treatment requires a final mechanical defibration of the wood chips in special equipment. Pulp produced by chemical treatment alone normally does not require any special mechanical defibration subsequent to its efficient digestion. Today, pulp mills generally receive included with the supply of wood chips, great amounts of gravel and sand. This often creates great difficulty in processing the wood chips especially in defibration equipment of the refiner type or the like and in many other places in the pulp mill. In the manufacture of mechanical pulp using defibration equipment of the refiner type, the wood chips are usually washed in water to remove the gravel and sand in a wood chip washer of which several designs exist. Characteristic of the operation of these chip washers is that the wood chips take up relatively great amounts of liquid by absorption. This liquid absorption has not been found to be a direct disadvantage in the manufacture of purely mechanical pulps. However, such liquid absorption does present a significant disadvantage in terms of the heat and other technical requirements when used in connection with a subsequent chemical impregnation and heat treatment/digestion of the wood chips. For this reason, washing of the wood chips in water is normally avoided as soon as a more complicated chemical treatment of the wood chips is required, as is the case of chemi-mechanical, semi-chemical, and chemical pulps. Wood chip washing with a cooking liquor is used in some cases, but this implies limitations from an apparatus view because special attention must be paid to the chemicals used in the cooking liquor.
Accordingly, there is an unsolved need for a wood chip treatment process to solve the aforementioned problems associated with the manufacture of pulp.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
It is broadly an object of the present invention to provide a chip treatment which overcomes or avoids one or more of the foregoing disadvantages associated with the prior art process used in the manufacture of pulp. Specifically, it is within the comtemplation of the present invention to provide a chip treatment process which prevents the chips from absorbing water during a washing cycle used to removed included material.
In accordance with one illustrative embodiment of the present invention, there is provided a method of treating wood chips in the manufacture of pulp. The wood chips are impregnated with an impregnation liquid, for instance NaOH, NaHSO 3 or Na 2 SO 3 , which causes the cavities within the wood chips to become filled with the impregnation liquid. The wood chips are drained to remove the excess impregnation liquid from the chip cavities. The impregnated chips are then washed with a wash solution whereby the wood chips are prevented from absorbing the wash solution by the presence of impregnation liquid remaining within the wood chips.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The above description as well as further objects, features and advantages of the present invention will be more fully understood by reference to the following detailed description of a presently preferred, but nonetheless illustrative, chip treatment method when taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, wherein:
FIG. 1 shows the dry content of spruce chips as a function of the steaming time, impregnation time and impregnation temperature;
FIG. 2 shows the change in dry content of spruce chips after impregnation as a function of the preceding steaming time;
FIG. 3 shows the dry content of steamed spruce chips as a function of very short impregnation times; and
FIG. 4 shows the diffusion time from out of the spruce chips of the impregnated liquid as a function of the quantity of water washing and its temperature.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
The present invention solves the aforementioned problems by impregnation of the wood chips with an impregnation liquid at atmospheric or elevated pressure. The impregnation liquid fills all easily accessible cavities in the chips. By a subsequent complete free drainage of the chips, it is possible to carry out a normal chip washing cycle in water without appreciable amounts of water being absorbed by the chips nor any substantial diffusion of impregnation liquid out of the chips and into the washing liquid. The chip washing time is generally short and the washing is preferably carried out at atmospheric pressure. After washing, the chips if desired can be impregnated further in a more rigorous impregnation operation whereafter they are ready for the next processing step. The cavities found in sapwood are easily filled with the impregnation liquid and is generally desirable before chip washing. As certain heartwoods have cavities having difficult access thereto, these chips therefore do not need filling with the impregnation liquid before chip washing. However, filling may be required before a more exacting digesting process.
In accordance with the present invention, the liquid absorption for spruce chips was studied in a first experiment at three different temperatures after a short, i.e., two minute, and a relatively long, i.e., thirty minute, impregnation time. The liquid absorption of unsteamed and steamed chips was measured. The steaming was carried out for a very short and a relatively long period of time. The change in dry content of the chips after these impregnations is shown in FIG. 1.
As shown in FIG. 1, the impregnation time is the least significant variable of the three variables examined in the experiment interval studied. Sufficient steaming combined with low temperature of the impregnation liquid yields the greatest liquid absorption.
During the steaming operation, air is driven out from the lumen of the fibres of the chips with water vapor replacing the air. When the steamed chips are cooled by an impregnation liquid having a temperature lower than that of the chips, the gas volume within the chips decreases. Impregnation liquid is sucked into the chips by the vacuum thus created. The greater the temperature difference between the steamed chips and the impregnation liquid, the greater the liquid absorption by the chips.
FIG. 1 also shows that short steaming and impregnation times likewise yield good liquid absorption. A second experiment was conducted to study this effect more closely and to generate measuring points in a shorter time interval than that of the first experiment. In this second experiment, four different steaming times shorter than ten minutes at a constant impregnation time of two minutes were tested. Also, four short impregnation times, i.e., ≦two minutes, after two minutes of steaming were tested.
The results of the second experiment are shown in FIGS. 2 and 3. FIG. 2 shows that the dry content of the chips drops approximately linear with the steaming time within the time interval studied. The differences in absorbed liquid increase with the different steaming times, however, these differences are relatively small and depend to a large extent on the decrease in the dry content of the chips during the steaming operation. This distinctive difference is found between the test points with unsteamed and steamed chips. From the second experiment, it can be concluded that the steaming time plays a small, possibly insignificant, role in the liquid absorption process when the chips have assumed the desired steaming temperature.
FIG. 3 shows that the liquid absorption rate of steamed chips is very rapid. The difference in dry content of the chips after impregnation for fifteen seconds and thirty minutes is relatively small. This result can be duplicated with the use of impregnation vessels of all types, provided that the chips are sufficiently steamed and the temperature of the impregnation liquid is not too high.
The results described herein show that liquid absorption initially proceeds very rapidly. After about one minute of impregnation time, all easily accessible cavities in the chips are filled with impregnation liquid, and subsequent liquid absorption proceeds very slowly. When the retention time in the chip washer is short, i.e., a maximum of two minutes and suitably shorter than one minute and preferably shorter than thirty seconds, the liquid absorption by the chips during the pulp manufacturing process is insignificant, provided that the chip washing is preceded by an impregnation step with an impregnation time exceeding about one minute.
FIG. 4 shows the result obtained from an experiment where spruce chips were impregnated with 61 kg Na 2 SO 3 per ton of chips. The results show the quantity of Na 2 SO 3 that diffuses out of the chips when the impregnated chips are immersed in clean water at 20° C. and 60° C. over a time interval of 0.5 to 5 minutes.
When the chip treatment of the present invention is incorporated in a process with a short preheating or digesting time, for example in a process for manufacturing chemically modified thermo-mechanical pulp, so-called CTMP, only part of the impregnated liquid actively affects the fiber wall of the chips. This is believed to occur because the chemical solution in the chip cavities has insufficient time to diffuse into the fiber walls of the chips.
A process for the manufacture of CTMP, based for example on pretreatment with a chemical solution of Na 2 SO 3 , can advantageously be carried out in accordance with the present invention as follows. This process is initiated by steaming incoming chips, at atmospheric pressure up to between 90° and 100° C. followed by subsequent liquid impregnation at a temperature below 60° C. for about one minute and then washing for less than 30 seconds. Thereafter the process of preheating and refining are performed.
Of the impregnated liquid, only the part diffusing into the fiber wall of the chips is active. By placing the impregnation step early in the pulp manufacturing process, a long time is provided for diffusion of the impregnation liquid into the fiber wall. The chemical solution, having insufficient time for affecting the fiber wall of the chips during their transport to the refiner, usually is regarded as a process loss. At a subsequent bleaching operation, for example, it may be considered advantageous that the excess impregnation chemicals be removed because they normally consume bleaching chemicals. It may also be considered advantageous that the chemicals, which during the impregnation step have not diffused into the fiber walls of the chips, be removed by washing the chips.
When the chip washer is arranged for use after the impregnation, part of the impregnation chemicals is transferred from the chips to the washing liquid. The staying time in the chip washer being short, most of the chemicals transferred come from surface water on the chips or from lumen liquid at the ends of the chips. According to laboratory investigations, about 15 percent of the sulphite is transferred while washing in clean water at the temperature and time occurring in a chip washer (see FIG. 4). The greatest part can be considered excess chemicals. When the impregnation washing system approaches equilibrium, the chemical content in the washing liquid contributes to a decrease of the content washed out.
Although the invention herein has been described with reference to particular embodiments, it is to be understood that these embodiments are merely illustrative of the principles and application of the present invention. Thus, it is to be understood that numerous modifications may be made in the illustrative embodiments and other arrangements may be devised without departing from the spirit and scope of the present invention as defined by the appended claims.
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A treatment for wood chips in the manufacture of pulp is described. Prior to chip washing, the chips are placed in contact with an impregnation liquid such that all readily fillable cavities in the chips become filled with the liquid. The chips can be steamed prior to the impregnation process to increase the liquid absorption. After the impregnated chips are drained of the excess liquid, no appreciable amount of washing liquid is absorbed by them during a subsequent washing cycle used to remove included gravel and sand.
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CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS
[0001] This application claims benefit of co-pending U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 60/592,708, filed on Jul. 30, 2004, which application is herein incorporated by reference in its entirety.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0002] 1. Field of the Invention
[0003] The present invention relates to methods and apparatus for drilling with top drive systems. Particularly, the invention relates to methods and apparatus for retrieving a downhole tool through a top drive system. More particularly still, the invention relates to running a wireline through the top drive system to retrieve the downhole tool and running a wireline access below the top drive system. The invention also relates to performing a cementing operation with the top drive system.
[0004] 2. Description of the Related Art
[0005] One conventional method to complete a well includes drilling to a first designated depth with a drill bit on a drill string. Then, the drill string is removed, and a first string of casing is run into the wellbore and set in the drilled out portion of the wellbore. Cement is circulated into the annulus behind the casing string and allowed to cure. Next, the well is drilled to a second designated depth, and a second string of casing, or liner, is run into the drilled out portion of the wellbore. The second string is set at a depth such that the upper portion of the second string of casing overlaps the lower portion of the first string of casing. The second string is then fixed, or “hung” off of the existing casing by the use of slips which utilize slip members and cones to wedgingly fix the second string of casing in the wellbore. The second casing string is then cemented. This process is typically repeated with additional casing strings until the well has been drilled to a desired depth. Therefore, two run-ins into the wellbore are required per casing string to set the casing into the wellbore.
[0006] As more casing strings are set in the wellbore, the casing strings become progressively smaller in diameter in order to fit within the previous casing string. In a drilling operation, the drill bit for drilling to the next predetermined depth must thus become progressively smaller as the diameter of each casing string decreases in order to fit within the previous casing string. Therefore, multiple drill bits of different sizes are ordinarily necessary for drilling in well completion operations.
[0007] Another method of performing well completion operations involves drilling with casing, as opposed to the first method of drilling and then setting the casing. In this method, the casing string is run into the wellbore along with a drill bit for drilling the subsequent, smaller diameter hole located in the interior of the existing casing string. The drill bit is operated by rotation of the drill string from the surface of the wellbore, and/or rotation of a downhole motor. Once the borehole is formed, the attached casing string may be cemented in the borehole. The drill bit is either removed or destroyed by the drilling of a subsequent borehole. The subsequent borehole may be drilled by a second working string comprising a second drill bit disposed at the end of a second casing that is of sufficient size to line the wall of the borehole formed. The second drill bit should be smaller than the first drill bit so that it fits within the existing casing string. In this respect, this method typically requires only one run into the wellbore per casing string that is set into the wellbore.
[0008] In some operations, the drill shoe disposed at the lower end of the casing is designed to be drilled through by the subsequent casing string. However, retrievable drill bits and drilling assemblies have been developed to reduce the cost of the drilling operation. These drilling assemblies are equipped with a latch that is operable to selectively attach the drilling assembly to the casing. In this respect, the drilling assembly may be preserved for subsequent drilling operations.
[0009] It is known in the industry to use top drive systems to rotate the casing string and the drill shoe to form a borehole. Top drive systems are equipped with a motor to provide torque for rotating the drilling string. Most existing top drives use a threaded crossover adapter to connect to the casing. This is because the quill of the top drive is not sized to connect with the threads of the casing.
[0010] More recently, top drive adapters has been developed to facilitate the casing running process. Top drive adapters that grip the external portion of the casing are generally known as torque heads, while adapters that grip the internal portion of the casing are generally known as spears. An exemplary torque head is disclosed in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/850,347, entitled Casing Running Head, which application was filed on May 20, 2004 by the same inventor of the present application. An exemplary spear is disclosed in U.S. patent application Publication No. 2005/0051343, by Pietras, et al. These applications are assigned to the assignee of the present application and are herein incorporated by reference in their entirety.
[0011] One of the challenges of drilling with casing is the retrieval of the drilling assembly. For example, the drilling operation may be temporarily stopped to repair or replace the drilling assembly. In such instances, a wireline may be used to retrieve the latch and the drilling assembly. However, many existing top drives are not equipped with an access for the insertion or removal of the wireline, thereby making the run-in of the wireline more difficult and time consuming. Additionally, during the temporary stoppage to retrieve the drilling assembly, fluid circulation and casing movement is also typically stopped. As a result, the casing in the wellbore may become stuck, thereby hindering the rotation and advancement of the casing upon restart of the drilling operation.
[0012] There is a need, therefore, for methods and apparatus for retrieving the drilling assembly during and after drilling operations. There is also a need for apparatus and method for fluid circulation during the drilling assembly retrieval process. There is a further need for apparatus and methods for running a wireline while drilling with casing using a top drive. There is yet a further need for methods and apparatus for accessing the interior of a casing string connected to a top drive.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0013] In one embodiment, a top drive system for forming a wellbore is provided with an access tool to retrieve a downhole tool. The top drive system for drilling with casing comprises a top drive; a top drive adapter for gripping the casing, the top drive adapter operatively connected to the top drive; and an access tool operatively connected to the top drive and adapted for accessing a fluid passage of the top drive system. In one embodiment, the top drive system is used for drilling with casing operations.
[0014] In another embodiment, a method for retrieving a downhole tool through a tubular coupled to a top drive adapter of a top drive system is provided. The method comprises coupling an access tool to the top drive system, the access tool adapted to provide access to a fluid path in the top drive system and inserting a conveying member into the fluid path through the access tool. The method also includes coupling the conveying member to the downhole tool and retrieving the downhole tool. In another embodiment, the method further comprises reciprocating the tubular. In yet another embodiment, the method further comprises circulating fluid to the tubular. Preferably, the tubular comprises a casing.
[0015] In another embodiment still, a method for releasing an actuating device during drilling using a top drive system is provided. The method comprises providing the top drive system with a top drive, a top drive adapter, and a launching tool, the launching tool retaining the actuating device, and operatively coupling the top drive, the top drive adapter, and the launching tool. The method also includes gripping a tubular using the top drive adapter and actuating the launching tool to release the actuating device.
[0016] In another embodiment still, a method for performing a cementing operation using a top drive system is provided. The method comprises providing the top drive system with a top drive, a top drive adapter, and a cementing tool and operatively coupling the top drive, the top drive adapter, and the cementing tool. The method also comprises gripping the casing using the top drive adapter and supplying a cementing fluid through the cementing tool.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0017] So that the manner in which the above recited features and other features contemplated and claimed herein are attained and can be understood in detail, a more particular description of the invention, briefly summarized above, may be had by reference to the embodiments thereof which are illustrated in the appended drawings. It is to be noted, however, that the appended drawings illustrate only typical embodiments of this invention and are therefore not to be considered limiting of its scope, for the invention may admit to other equally effective embodiments.
[0018] FIG. 1 shows an exemplary embodiment of a top drive system having an access tool.
[0019] FIG. 2 shows an alternative top drive system having another embodiment of an access tool.
[0020] FIG. 3 shows another embodiment of an access tool.
[0021] FIG. 4 shows yet another embodiment of an access tool.
[0022] FIG. 5 shows an alternative top drive system equipped with yet another embodiment of an access tool.
[0023] FIG. 6 shows yet another embodiment of an access tool.
[0024] FIG. 6A is a partial cross-sectional view of the access tool of FIG. 6 .
[0025] FIG. 7 is a partial cross-sectional view of another embodiment of an access tool.
[0026] FIG. 8 shows an embodiment of an access tool having a launching tool.
[0027] FIG. 8A is a cross-sectional view of the access tool of FIG. 8 .
[0028] FIG. 8B illustrates an embodiment of retaining a plug in a casing string.
[0029] FIG. 8C illustrates another embodiment of retaining a plug in a casing string.
[0030] FIG. 9 shows an alternative top drive system having a cementing tool.
[0031] FIG. 10 is a partial cross-sectional view of the cementing tool of FIG. 9 .
[0032] FIG. 10A is another cross-sectional view of the cementing tool of FIG. 9 .
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
[0033] In one embodiment, a top drive system for drilling includes a top drive adapter for gripping and rotating the casing and a top drive access tool. The top drive access tool is adapted to allow access into the various components connected to the top drive. The access tool is equipped with a sealing member to prevent leakage and hold pressure during fluid circulation. In another embodiment, the access tool is adapted to allow the top drive to reciprocate the casing during wireline work.
[0034] FIG. 1 shows an embodiment of a top drive system 100 fitted with a top drive access tool 110 . As shown, the system 100 includes a spear type top drive adapter 20 and a top drive 10 for energizing the spear 20 . The spear 20 includes radially actuatable gripping members 22 for engaging the inner diameter of the casing. Although a mechanically actuated spear is preferred, spears actuated using hydraulics, pneumatics, or electric are equally suitable. The lower portion of the spear 20 includes a valve 24 for supplying fluid and a seal member 26 to prevent leakage. Fluids such as drilling mud may be introduced into the top drive system 100 through a fluid supply line 5 disposed at an upper portion of the top drive 10 . An elevator 30 is suspended below the top drive 10 by a pair of bails 35 coupled to the top drive 10 . It must be noted that in addition to the spear, other types of top drive adapters such as a torque head are also contemplated.
[0035] In one embodiment, the top drive access tool 110 is coupled to the upper portion of the top drive 10 . The access tool 110 is adapted to allow wireline access into the interior of the casing in order to perform wireline operations such as retrieval of the drilling assembly or the latch attached to a drilling assembly. As shown in FIG. 1 , the access tool 110 includes a connection member 112 for connecting to the top drive 10 . The connection member 112 includes a bore to receive the wireline 15 and a pack-off assembly 114 for preventing leakage. The pack-off assembly 114 may comprise an elastomeric seal element and sized to accommodate different wireline sizes. A sheave assembly 116 is connected to the connection member 112 . The sheave assembly 116 facilitates and supports the wireline 15 for entry into the top drive 10 . Preferably, the sheave assembly 116 is arranged such that it does not obstruct the operation of the traveling block, which is typically used to translate the top drive 10 . In one embodiment, the sheave assembly 116 includes two wheels 117 A, 117 B adapted for operation with the top drive 10 . The wheels 117 A, 117 B may include grooves disposed around the circumference of the wheels 117 A, 117 B for receiving the wireline 15 . The wireline 15 may be routed around the wheels 117 A, 117 B of the sheave assembly 116 to avoid the traveling block and directed into the pack-off assembly 114 and the connection member 112 . In another embodiment, the fluid supply line 5 may be connected to the connection member 112 of the access tool 110 . A suitable access tool is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,735,351 issued to Helms, which patent is herein incorporated by reference in its entirety. During wireline operations, the top drive system 100 provided in FIG. 1 may be operated to reciprocate the casing in the wellbore and circulate fluid through the casing. It is believed that these operations will reduce the likelihood of the casing sticking to the wellbore. In addition to a wireline 15 , the embodiments described herein are equally applicable to a cable or other types of conveying members known to a person of ordinary skill in the art.
[0036] FIG. 2 illustrates another embodiment of a top drive system 200 equipped with an access tool 210 . Similar to the embodiment shown in FIG. 1 , the top drive system 200 includes a spear type top drive adapter 20 coupled to the top drive 10 . However, the elevator and the bails have been removed for clarity. In this embodiment, the access tool 210 is disposed between the top drive 10 and the spear 20 . The access tool 210 defines a tubular having a main portion 212 and one or more side portions 214 attached thereto. The upper end of the main portion 212 is connected to the top drive 10 , and the lower end is connected to the spear 20 . Extension subs or tubulars 220 A, 220 B may be used to couple the access tool 210 to the top drive 10 or the spear 20 . A central passage 213 in the main portion 212 is adapted for fluid communication with the top drive 10 and the spear 20 . The side entry portions 214 have side entry passages 215 in fluid communication with the central passage 213 . In the embodiment shown, the access tool 210 includes two side portions 214 . Each side portion 214 may include a pack-off assembly 230 to prevent leakage and hold pressure. In this respect, the pack-off assembly 230 also functions as a blow out preventer. In operation, the wireline 15 accesses the casing through one of the side portions 214 . Additionally, the access tool 210 allows the top drive system 200 to reciprocate the casing and circulate drilling fluid using the spear 20 during wireline operation. Fluid may be supplied to the top drive 10 through the fluid supply line 5 . In another embodiment, the access tool 210 may optionally include a valve 216 to isolate the fluid in the top drive 10 from fluid supplied through one of the side entry passages 215 . Exemplary valves include a ball valve, one-way valves, or any suitable valve known to a person of ordinary skill in the art.
[0037] In another embodiment, the top drive system 240 may include a sheave assembly 250 attached to the pack-off assembly 245 , as illustrated in FIG. 3 . The sheave assembly 250 may include a sheave wheel 255 to reduce the friction experienced by the wireline 15 . In yet another embodiment, the top drive system 240 may include two spears 261 , 262 , two torque heads, or combinations thereof to increase the speed of modifying the top drive 10 for wireline operation. As shown, a first spear 261 is connected to the top drive 10 and initially retains a casing string for drilling operations. When wireline operation is desired, the first spear 261 may release the casing and retain an access assembly 270 having an access tool 275 , an extension tubular 277 , and a spear 262 . The spear 262 of the access assembly 270 can now be used to retain the casing string and reciprocate the casing string and/or circulate fluid during the wireline operation. After completion of the wireline operation, the access assembly 270 may be quickly removed by disengagement of the spears 261 , 262 . It should be appreciated the spears may be torque heads or a combination of spears and torque heads.
[0038] FIG. 4 is a partial cross-sectional view of another embodiment of the access system 230 . The access system 230 is attached to a spear 20 having gripping members 22 adapted to retain a casing. The access system 230 includes a main portion 231 and a side portion 233 . It can be seen that the side entry passage 234 is in fluid communication with the main passage 232 . The side portion 233 is equipped with a pack-off assembly 235 and a sheave assembly 236 . The sheave assembly 236 includes a sheave wheel 237 supported on a support arm 238 that is attached to the main portion 231 . As shown, a cable 15 has been inserted through the pack-off assembly 235 , the side entry passage 234 , the main passage 232 , and the spear 20 .
[0039] In yet another embodiment, a top drive system 280 may include an external gripping top drive adapter 285 for use with the top drive 10 and the access tool 290 , as illustrated in FIG. 5 . An exemplary top drive adapter is disclosed in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/850,347, entitled Casing Running Head, filed on May 20, 2004 by Bernd-Georg Pietras. The application is assigned to the same assignee as the present application and is herein incorporated by reference in its entirety. In this embodiment, the top drive adapter 285 , also known as a torque head, may release the casing and retain the access tool 290 . The access tool 290 , as shown, is adapted with one side entry portion 292 having a pack-off assembly 293 and a sheave assembly 294 . A casing collar clamp 295 attached to the access tool 290 is used to retain the casing string 3 . It must be noted that other types of casing retaining devices such as an elevator or a cross-over adapter may be used instead of the casing collar clamp, as is known to a person of ordinary skill in the art.
[0040] FIG. 6 illustrates another embodiment of the access system 300 . The access system 300 includes an upper manifold 311 and a lower manifold 312 connected by one or more flow subs 315 . Each manifold 311 , 312 includes a connection sub 313 , 314 for coupling to the top drive 10 or the spear 20 . FIG. 6A is a cross-section view of the access system 300 . Fluid flowing through the upper connection sub 313 is directed toward a manifold chamber 317 in the upper manifold 311 , where it is then separated into the four flow subs 315 . Fluid in the flow subs 315 aggregates in a chamber 318 of the lower manifold 312 and exits through the lower connection sub 314 , which channels the fluid to the spear 20 . Although the embodiment is described with four flow subs, it is contemplated any number of flow subs may be used.
[0041] The lower manifold 312 includes an access opening 320 for insertion of the wireline 15 . As shown, the opening 320 is fitted with a pack-off assembly 325 to prevent leakage and hold pressure. Preferably, the opening 320 is in axial alignment with the spear 20 and the casing 3 . In this respect, the wireline 15 is centered over the hoisting load, thereby minimizing wireline wear, as shown in FIG. 6 . The access system 300 may also include a sheave assembly 330 to facilitate the axial alignment of the wireline 15 with the opening 320 . The sheave wheel 331 is positioned with respect to the upper manifold 311 such that the wireline 15 routed therethrough is substantially centered with the opening 320 .
[0042] In another embodiment, a swivel may be disposed between the access system 300 and the spear 20 . An exemplary swivel may comprise a bearing system. The addition of the swivel allows the casing string 3 to be rotated while the sheave assembly 330 remains stationary. The casing string 3 may be rotated using a kelly, a rotary table, or any suitable manner known to a person of ordinary skill in the art.
[0043] FIG. 7 illustrates another embodiment of an access tool 335 . The access tool 335 includes a housing 337 having an upper connection sub 338 and a lower connection sub 339 . The connection subs 338 , 339 are adapted for fluid communication with a chamber 336 in the housing 337 . The housing 337 includes an access port 340 for receiving the wireline 15 . The access port 340 is equipped with a pack-off assembly 341 to prevent fluid leakage and hold pressure. In one embodiment, a sheave assembly 345 is installed in the chamber 336 to facilitate movement of the wireline 15 . Preferably, the sheave assembly 345 is positioned such that the wireline 15 is aligned with the lower connection sub 339 . In another embodiment, a fluid diverter 342 may be installed at the upper portion of the chamber 336 to divert the fluid entering the chamber 336 from the upper connection sub 338 . The fluid diverter 342 may be adapted to diffuse the fluid flow, redirect the fluid flow, or combinations thereof.
[0044] In another embodiment, the top drive system 350 may be equipped with a tool 360 for releasing downhole actuating devices such as a ball or dart. In one embodiment, the launching or releasing tool 360 may be used to selectively actuate or release a plug 371 , 372 during a cementing operation, as shown in FIGS. 8-8A . FIG. 8A is a cross-sectional view of the access tool 350 with the launching tool 360 . The access tool 350 is similar to the access tool 300 of FIG. 6 . As shown, the access tool 350 includes an upper manifold 377 and a lower manifold 376 connected by one or more flow subs 375 . Each manifold 377 , 376 includes a connection sub 373 , 374 for coupling to the top drive 10 or the spear 20 . In FIG. 8A , the launching tool 360 has replaced the packing-off assembly 325 shown in FIG. 6 . The launching tool 360 is adapted to selectively drop the two balls 361 , 362 downhole, thereby causing the release of the two plugs 371 , 372 attached to a lower portion of the spear 20 . The launching tool 360 includes a bore 363 in substantial alignment with the bore of the connection sub 374 . The balls 361 , 362 are separately retained in the bore by a respective releasing pin 367 , 368 . Fluids, such as cement, may be pumped through upper portion 364 of the launching tool 360 and selectively around the balls 361 , 362 . Actuation of the releasing pin 367 , 368 will cause these balls 361 , 362 , aided by the fluid pumped behind, to be launched into the flow stream to release the plugs 371 , 372 . It must be noted that any suitable launching tool known to a person of ordinary skill in the art may also be adapted for use with the access tool. In addition, the components may be arranged in any suitable manner. For example, the launching tool 360 may be disposed between the access tool 350 and the spear 20 . In this respect, fluid exiting the access tool 350 will flow through the launching tool 360 before entering the spear 20 .
[0045] In operation, the first release pin 367 is deactivated to allow the first ball 361 to drop into the lower manifold 376 and travel downward to the spear 20 . The first ball 361 is preferably positioned between the drilling fluid and the cement. The first ball 361 will land and seat in the first, or lower, plug 371 and block off fluid flow downhole. Fluid pressure build up will cause the first plug 371 to release downhole. As it travels downward, the first plug 371 functions as a buffer between the drilling fluid, which is ahead of the first plug 371 , and the cement, which is behind the first plug 371 . When sufficient cement has been introduced, the second release pin 368 is deactivated to drop the second ball 362 from the launching tool 360 . The second ball 362 will travel through the bore and land in the second, or upper, plug 372 . Seating of the ball 362 will block off fluid flow and cause an increase in fluid pressure. When a predetermined fluid pressure is reached, the second plug 372 will be released downhole. The second plug 372 will separate the cement, which is in front of the second plug 372 , from the drilling fluid or spacer fluid, which is behind the second plug 372 .
[0046] In another embodiment, the plugs may be coupled to the casing string instead of the top drive adapter. As shown in FIG. 8C , a plug 400 is provided with a retaining member 410 for selective attachment to a casing string 3 . Preferably, the retaining member 410 attaches to the casing string 3 at a location where two casing sections 403 , 404 are threadedly connected to a coupling 405 . Particularly, the retaining member 410 includes a key 412 that is disposable between the ends of the two casing sections 403 , 404 . The plug 400 , in turn, is attached to the retaining member 410 using a shearable member 420 . The plug 400 and the retaining member 410 include a bore 422 for fluid flow therethrough. The plug 400 also includes a seat 425 for receiving an actuatable device such as a ball or dart. Preferably, the retaining member 410 and the plug 400 are made of a drillable material, as is known to a person of ordinary skill in the art. It must be noted that although only one plug is shown, more than one plug may be attached to the retaining member for multiple plug releases.
[0047] In operation, a ball dropped from the launching tool 360 will travel in the wellbore until it lands in the seat 425 of the plug 400 , thereby closing off fluid flow downhole. Thereafter, increase in pressure behind the ball will cause the shearable member 420 to fail, thereby releasing the plug 400 from the retaining member 410 . In this manner, a plug 400 may be released from various locations in the wellbore.
[0048] FIG. 8B shows another embodiment of coupling the plug to the casing string. In this embodiment, the retaining member comprises a packer 440 . The packer 440 may comprise a drillable packer, a retrievable packer, or combinations thereof. The packer 440 includes one or more engagement members 445 for gripping the wall of the casing 3 . An exemplary packer is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,787,979, which patent is herein incorporated by reference in its entirety. As shown, two plugs 451 , 452 are selectively attached to the packer 440 and are adapted for release by an actuatable device such as a ball. Preferably, the first, or lower, plug 451 has a ball seat 453 that is smaller than the ball seat 454 of the second, or upper, plug 452 . In this respect, a smaller ball launched from the launching tool may bypass the second plug 452 and land in the seat 453 of the first plug 451 , thereby releasing the first plug 451 . Thereafter, the second plug 452 may be released by a larger second ball. In this manner, the plugs 451 , 452 may be selectively released from the packer 440 . After the plugs 451 , 452 have been released, the packer 440 may be retrieved or drilled through.
[0049] In another embodiment, the launching tool may be installed on an access tool similar to the one shown in FIG. 3 . For example, the sheave assembly 236 and pack-off 235 may be removed and a launching tool such as a ball launcher with a top entry may be installed on a side portion 233 . In this respect, one or more balls may be launched to release one or more cementing plugs located below the spear or torque head.
[0050] In another aspect, the top drive system 500 may include a top drive 510 , a cementing tool 515 , and a top drive adapter, as illustrated in FIG. 9 . As shown, the top drive adapter comprises a spear 520 . The cementing tool 515 is adapted to selectively block off fluid flow from the top drive 510 during cementing operations.
[0051] FIG. 10 is a partial cross-sectional view of an embodiment of the cementing tool 515 . The cementing tool 515 includes a central bore 522 for fluid communication with the top drive 510 and the spear 520 . A valve 525 is disposed in an upper portion of the bore 522 to selectively block off fluid communication with the top drive 510 . The valve 525 is actuated between an open position and a close position by operation of a piston 530 . As shown, the piston 530 is biased by a biasing member 532 to maintain the valve 525 in the open position. To close the valve 525 , an actuating fluid is introduced through a fluid port 541 to move the piston 530 toward the valve 525 . In this respect, movement of the piston 530 compresses the biasing member 532 and closes the valve 525 , thereby blocking off fluid communication of the cementing tool 515 and the top drive 510 . Thereafter, cement may be introduced into the bore 522 through the cementing port 545 .
[0052] In another aspect, the cementing tool 515 may be adapted to release one or more actuating devices into the wellbore. In the embodiment shown in FIG. 10 , the cementing tool 515 is adapted to selectively launch three balls 561 . It must be noted that the cementing tool 515 may be adapted to launch any suitable number or type of actuating devices. Each ball 561 is retained by a release piston 550 A before being dropped into the wellbore. The piston 550 A is disposed in an axial channel 555 formed adjacent to the bore 522 . In one embodiment, the piston 550 A has a base 551 attached to the body of the cementing tool 515 and a piston head 552 that is extendable or retractable relative to the base 551 . The outer diameter of a portion of the piston head 552 is sized such that an annulus 553 is formed between the piston head 552 and the wall of the axial channel 555 . Seal members or 0 -rings may be suitably disposed in the base 551 and the piston head 552 to enclose the annulus 553 . The annulus 553 formed is in selective fluid communication with an actuating fluid port 542 A. In this respect, the actuating fluid may be supplied into the annulus 553 to extend the piston head 552 relative to the base 551 , or relieved to retract the piston head 552 . Preferably, the piston head 552 is maintained in the retracted position by a biasing member 557 , as shown FIG. 10 .
[0053] The release piston 550 A is provided with an opening 563 to house the ball 561 and a cement bypass 565 . In the retracted position shown, the cement bypass 565 is in fluid communication with a radial fluid channel 570 A connecting the cement port 545 to the bore 522 . In this respect, cementing fluid may be supplied into the bore 522 without causing the ball 561 to release. When the piston head 552 is extended, the opening 563 is, in turn, placed in fluid communication with the radial fluid channel 570 A.
[0054] As discussed, the cementing tool 515 may be adapted to release one or more actuating devices. In the cross-sectional view of FIG. 10A , it can be seen that three release pistons 550 A, 550 B, 550 C are circumferentially disposed around the bore 522 . Cementing fluid coming in from either of the cementing ports 545 , 545 A is initially circulated in an annular channel 575 . Three radial fluid channels 570 A, 570 B, 570 C connect the annular channel 575 to the bore 522 of the cementing tool 515 . Each radial fluid channel 570 A, 570 B, 570 C also intersect the cement bypass 565 of a respective release piston 550 A, 550 B, 550 C.
[0055] To release the first ball 561 , actuating fluid is introduced through the fluid port 542 A and into the annulus 553 of the first release piston 550 A. In turn, the piston head 552 is extended to place the opening 563 in fluid communication with the radial fluid channel 570 A. Thereafter, cement flowing through the cementing port 545 , the annular channel 575 , and the radial channel 570 A urges to the ball 561 toward the bore 522 , thereby dropping the ball 561 downhole. Because either position of the piston head 552 provides for fluid communication with the cementing port 545 , the piston head 552 may remain in the extended position after the first ball 561 is released.
[0056] To release the second ball, actuating fluid is introduced through the second fluid port 542 B and into the annulus 553 of the second release piston 550 B. In turn, the piston head 552 is extended to place the opening 563 in fluid communication with the radial fluid channel 570 B. Thereafter, cement flowing through the radial channel 570 B urges to the ball 561 toward the bore 522 , thereby dropping the ball 561 downhole. The third ball may be released in a similar manner by supplying actuating fluid through the third fluid port 542 C.
[0057] In another aspect, the cementing tool 515 may optionally include a swivel mechanism to facilitate the cementing operation. In one embodiment, the fluid ports 541 , 542 A, 542 B, 542 C and the cementing port 545 may be disposed on a sleeve 559 . The sleeve 559 may be coupled to the body of the cementing tool using one or more bearings 558 A, 558 B. As shown in FIG. 10 , two sets of bearings 558 A, 558 B are disposed between the sleeve 559 and the body of the cementing tool 515 . In this respect, the body of the cementing tool 515 may be rotated by the top drive 10 without rotating the ports 541 , 542 A, 542 B, 542 C, 545 and the fluid lines connected thereto. During the cementing operation, the swivel mechanism of the cementing tool 515 allows the top drive 10 to rotate the drill string 3 , thereby providing a more efficient distribution of cementing in the wellbore.
[0058] In another embodiment, the cementing tool 515 may include additional fluid ports to introduce fluid into the top drive system. For example, hydraulic fluids may be supplied through the additional fluid ports to operate the spear, torque head, weight/thread compensation sub, or other devices connected to the top drive. Additionally, operating fluids may also be supplied through one of the existing ports 541 , 542 A, 542 B, 542 C, 545 of the cementing tool 515 .
[0059] While the foregoing is directed to embodiments of the present invention, other and further embodiments of the invention may be devised without departing from the basic scope thereof, and the scope thereof is determined by the claims that follow.
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In one embodiment, a top drive system for drilling with casing is provided with an access tool to retrieve a downhole tool. The top drive system for drilling with casing comprises a top drive; a top drive adapter for gripping the casing, the top drive adapter operatively coupled to the top drive; and an access tool coupled to the top drive and adapted for accessing a fluid passage of the top drive system. In another embodiment, a method for retrieving a downhole tool through a tubular coupled to a top drive adapter of a top drive system is provided. The method comprises coupling an access tool to the top drive system, the access tool adapted to provide access to a fluid path in the top drive system and inserting a conveying member into the fluid path through the access tool.
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TECHNICAL FIELD
The present invention relates to methods and compositions for temporarily blocking a flow pathway, and more particularly relates, in one embodiment, to methods and compositions for temporarily blocking a flow pathway to subterranean formations during hydrocarbon recovery operations.
BACKGROUND
There are a number of procedures and applications that involve the formation of a temporary seal or plug while other steps or processes are performed, where the seal or plug must be later removed. Often such seals or plugs are provided to temporarily block a flow pathway or inhibit the movement of fluids or other materials, such as flowable particulates, in a particular direction for a short period of time, when later movement or flow is desirable.
The recovery of hydrocarbons from subterranean formations often involves applications and/or procedures employing coatings or plugs. In instances where operations must be conducted at remote locations, namely deep within the earth, equipment and materials can only be manipulated at a distance. One such operation concerns perforating and/or well completion operations incorporating filter cakes and the like as temporary coatings.
Generally, perforating a well involves a special gun that shoots several relatively small holes in the casing. The holes are formed in the side of the casing opposite the producing zone. These perforations, or communication tunnels, pierce the casing or liner and the cement around the casing or liner. The perforations go through the casing and the cement and a short distance into the producing formation. Formations fluids, which include oil and gas, flow through these perforations and into the well.
The most common perforating gun uses shaped charges, similar to those used in armor-piercing shells. A high-speed, high-pressure jet penetrates the steel casing, the cement, and the formation next to the cement. Other perforating methods include bullet perforating, abrasive jetting, or high-pressure fluid jetting.
The characteristics and placement of the communication tunnels can have significant influence on the productivity of the well. Technology has been developed which eliminates the need for perforating guns and enables significantly more controlled perforation through the use of fluid conduits installed within casings. These fluid conduits may be extended out from the casing to contact a formation wall, thereby forming “perforations” at desired locations along the length of the casing. Temporary plugs in the conduits form fluid barriers, and the conduits are pushed out from the casing via fluid pressure. The plugs may be made of a porous filter structure on which a degradable barrier material is coated. After the fluid conduits are extended, the degradable material may be removed, thereby allowing the flow of fluids through the filter structure. This technology, known as TELEPERF™ from Baker Hughes Inc, is described in more detail in U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,527,103 and 7,461,699, each incorporated by reference herein its entirety.
In some instances, it may be necessary or desirable to fracture a formation to enable or promote the flow of fluids therethrough. For example, in low-permeability reservoirs, it may be beneficial to fracture the well formation and inject proppants into the fractures to stimulate the flow of fluids (such as oil, gas, water, and the like) through the formation. When hydraulic fracturing is performed, the viscous fracturing fluids mixed with proppant are flowed into the formation through the casing and associated perforations. However, filters in the above-described TELEPERF™ devices may obstruct or impede the high-viscosity fluids and proppants utilized in hydraulic fracturing from entering the formation.
Accordingly, it may be desirable to temporarily block, fill, or plug the fluid conduits without employing a filter structure in the conduits while still enabling the conduits to telescope outward via fluid pressure.
SUMMARY
There is provided, in one non-limiting form, a method for hydraulic fracturing which includes drilling a wellbore through a subterranean reservoir and positioning a pipe within the wellbore. The pipe has orifices through at least a region of its wall, and flow conduits, pathways, channels, passages, outlets, or the like are situated within the orifices in a retracted position within the pipe. The flow conduits have temporary plugs which block, inhibit, or prevent the flow of fluid through the conduits. The hydraulic fracturing method further involves applying hydraulic pressure to the temporary plugs by pumping an extension fluid into the pipe and the flow conduits. The hydraulic pressure extends the flow conduits radially outward from the pipe in the direction of the wellbore wall. The temporary plugs may then be removed from the flow conduits via an acidic solution. In an exemplary non-limiting embodiment, the extension fluid may be an acidic solution which serves to both extend the flow conduits out from the pipe and to dissolve the temporary plugs. Hydraulic fracturing fluid may then be injected into the subterranean reservoir via the pipe and the flow conduits.
In another non-limiting embodiment of the present disclosure, a plug may be provided for use in a conduit, pathway, channel, passage, or the like that is radially extensible from a pipe. The plug may be made of a material that has an acid solubility greater than 70% and permeability of less than 10 mD. The plug may additionally have a compressive Young's modulus of at least 5,000 MPa. For example, the plug may be made of a natural, low cost material, like Indiana limestone, other natural limestones with similar properties, or another material. In addition, the plug may have a matrix formation that is augmented with nanoparticles disposed within the matrix.
In a further non-limiting embodiment, the present disclosure provides a pipe for use in well completions. The pipe may have flow conduits, pathways, channels, passages, outlets, or the like which provide fluid communication between the interior and the exterior of the pipe. The flow conduits may be at least partially disposed within the pipe and extensible from the pipe in a direction relatively perpendicular to a longitudinal axis of the pipe. Additionally, fluid flow through the flow conduits may be temporarily blocked, inhibited, or prevented by acid-soluble plugs disposed within the flow conduits. In an exemplary embodiment, the acid-soluble plugs may be made of a material having an acid solubility greater than 70%, permeability of less than 10 mD, and/or a compressive Young's modulus of at least 5,000 MPa.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1 is a cross-section schematic view of an oil well casing or conduit in a borehole having two sleeves or tubes, one on either side of the casing, each in a retracted position in an orifice in the casing and having a dissolvable plug therein;
FIG. 2 is a cross-section schematic view of the oil well casing in the wellbore of FIG. 1 having two flow pathways on either side thereof, where the sleeves or tubes have been extended or expanded in the direction of the wellbore wall; and
FIG. 3 is a cross-section schematic view of the oil well casing in the wellbore of FIG. 1 where the dissolvable plugs in the flow pathways have been removed, and hydrocarbons may flow from the reservoir into the casing.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
In accordance with a present embodiment, an oil well casing or liner may contain pre-formed perforations, or holes, therethrough. Further, installed in each perforation may be a moveable fluid conduit or pathway which enables fluid communication between the interior and the exterior of the casing or liner. Although illustrated as a one-piece pipe which moves relative to the casing or liner, the fluid conduit or pathway may be made up of multiple pieces which move relative to each other. For example, the fluid conduit may be several generally cylindrical conduits arrange coaxially with a limited range of motion relative to each other along the commonly shared axis, e.g. in a telescoping configuration.
The flow conduits or pathways may further contain temporary plugs which inhibit or prevent the flow of fluid through the conduits. The moveable flow conduits or pathways may be telescoped out from the casing or liner into the wellbore annulus via fluid pressure within the casing or liner. That is, as fluid is pumped into the casing, the temporary plugs inhibit the fluid from exiting the casing via the flow conduits. Rather, as the pressure inside the casing increases, the flow conduits are pushed outward from the casing. Optimally, the flow conduits contact the wellbore wall, thereby forming a flow pathway through the annulus from the interior of the casing to the formation. In this manner, the described structure may be used as a completion tubular to avoid using a cementing and perforation process. After the assembly is in place across the producing zone location, the temporary plugs may be dissolved using an acidic solution.
The invention will now be described more specifically with respect to the figures, where in FIG. 1 there is shown a cross-section of a vertically oriented, cylindrical casing or liner 10 having multiple orifices 12 therethrough. The orifices 12 may be created by machining or other suitable technique. The casing 10 is placed in a borehole or wellbore 14 through a subterranean reservoir 16 . The subterranean reservoir 16 may be a flow source from which gas and/or oil is extracted or, alternatively, a flow target into which gas or water is injected. The wellbore 14 has a wall 18 coated with a filter cake 20 deposited by a drilling fluid or, more commonly, a drill-in fluid 22 . In some non-limiting embodiments, the filter cake 20 may be optional. The casing 10 and the wall 18 define an annulus 24 there between.
Fluid conduits 26 are disposed within the orifices 12 . These fluid conduits 26 are shown in FIG. 1 in a retracted position within the casing 10 . The flow conduits 26 may be generally hollow structures open on opposing ends having an enveloping wall defining their shape. It is expected that in most cases the flow conduits 26 will have a cylindrical shape, but there is no particular requirement that they have such a shape. The fluid conduits 26 contain a temporary plug 28 made of a soluble substance having low permeability and high strength. For example, the plug 28 may have an acid solubility greater than 70% and permeability of less than 10 mD. An exemplary substance is Indiana limestone, which is a relatively inexpensive material that is readily available in the United States and has permeability of less than 3 mD in laboratory studies. Indiana limestone is generally composed of greater than 98% calcite, which has high acid solubility. Additionally, literature data has shown that the compressive Young's modulus of Indiana limestone is approximately 30,600 MPa, which is comparable to high strength concrete. Limestone with similar properties is also easily available in other countries and on other continents. Although the present disclosure refers to the soluble substance of the plugs 28 as limestone, it should be understood that other materials having similar solubility, permeability, and strength may be utilized in the disclosed methods and systems.
In a non-limiting embodiment, the plugs 28 may be pre-formed and secured at an end of the conduits 26 via a threaded hollow cap. In other embodiments, the plugs 28 may be force fit into the conduits 26 or inserted into the conduits 26 and abutted against the inside of a flange (not shown) on an end of the conduit 26 . The permeability of the plugs 28 may be further reduced by filling the limestone matrix with another acid-soluble substance, such as a nanoparticle slurry. For example, nanoparticle slurry may be optionally used to fill in the limestone matrix to make the acid-soluble plug 28 tighter, further reducing the permeability of the plug 28 . The nanoparticles may have relatively large surface charges per volume, thereby permitting the crystal particles to associate, link, connect, group, or otherwise relate together to further reduce the permeability of the plug 28 . Exemplary acid-soluble nanoparticle slurries include, in non-limiting embodiments, ConFINE™, available from Baker Hughes, or a high-concentration slurry of approximately 35 nm magnesium oxide (MgO).
Once the casing 10 is placed or positioned in the wellbore 14 , a fluid 30 may be pumped through the casing 10 and the conduits 26 , as shown in FIG. 2 . As noted above, the plugs 28 within the conduits 26 have a very low permeability; accordingly, the fluid 30 does not flow through the plugs 28 or flows through the plugs 28 very slowly. As the fluid 30 is pumped into the casing 10 , high enough hydraulic pressure is built up to radially extend the flow conduits 26 out from the casing 10 into the annulus 24 to contact the producing formation 16 . That is, the conduits 26 may be extended out from the casing 10 in a direction generally perpendicular to a longitudinal axis 32 of the casing 10 . In a non-limiting embodiment, the conduits 26 may be several generally cylindrical coaxial conduits which telescope outward from the casing 10 as pressure is applied to the plug 28 . The hydraulic pressure of the fluid 30 typically causes the conduits 26 to extend to a position in which the conduits 26 touch the wall 18 .
An acidic solution may then be pumped into the casing 10 to dissolve the plugs 28 , thereby forming flow paths 34 through the annulus 24 between the casing 10 and the formation 16 , as shown in FIG. 3 . The acidic solution may also dissolve the portions of the filter cake 20 (if present) with which it comes into contact. Fracturing fluids containing proppants may then be flowed through the casing 10 at high pressure to fracture the formation 16 in accordance with techniques well known in the art. Because the limestone plugs 28 may be substantially removed and do not leave behind a porous substrate to act as a filter, the proppants, such as grains of sand or the like, are not hindered from flowing into the fractures (not shown) created in formation 16 . After the well is fractured, the well may be produced or injected. For instance, hydrocarbons may flow through the pathways 34 from the formation 16 into the casing 10 , or water may be injected into the casing 10 , through the flow pathways 34 , and into the formation 16 .
In a non-limiting embodiment, the fluid 30 used to extend the conduits 26 may also be utilized to dissolve the plugs 28 . That is, the fluid 30 may be an acidic solution having a low enough chemical reaction rate with the limestone plugs 28 that the plugs 28 begin slowly dissolving while the hydraulic pressure of the extension fluid 30 pushes the conduits 26 outward toward the wellbore wall 18 . After the conduits 26 are extended out to touch the face of the reservoir 16 , the acidic fluid 30 may continue to be pumped into the casing 10 to substantially dissolve the plugs 28 . It should be understood that the method herein is considered successful if the plugs 28 dissolve sufficiently to open up the flow conduits 26 enough to enable flow of viscous fracturing fluids and proppants therethrough.
An exemplary acidic solution for use as the extension and dissolving fluid 30 may be a dicarboxylic acid, as described in U.S. Pat. No. 6,805,198, incorporated by reference herein in its entirety. Dicarboxylic acid, also known as HTO (high temperature organic) acid, has a very low corrosion rate on metal components used in well production, such as tubing, casing, and downhole equipment. Exemplary dicarboxylic acids include, but are not necessarily limited to, oxalic acid (ethanedioic acid), malonic acid (propanedioic acid), succinic acid (butanedioic acid), glutaric acid (pentanedioic acid), adipic acid (hexanedioic acid), pimelic acid (heptanedioic acid), and mixtures thereof. In a non-limiting embodiment, the extension and dissolving fluid 30 may be dibasic acid composed of 51-61 weight percent glutaric acid, 18-28 weight percent succinic acid, and 15-25 weight percent adipic acid. Suitable solvents or diluents for the acidic fluid 30 may include, but are not limited to, water, methanol, isopropyl alcohol, alcohol ethers, aromatic solvents, and mixtures thereof. Laboratory tests show that the solubility of Indiana limestone in 10 weight percent HTO acid is about 98.86 percent. Accordingly, given enough time to contact all of the limestone plugs 28 , essentially all of the acid-soluble plugs 28 will be removed.
In another non-limiting embodiment, a stronger acid, such as, for example, 15 weight percent hydrochloric acid (HCl), may be pumped into the casing 10 to dissolve the plugs 28 more quickly after the conduits 26 are extended out to touch the face of the reservoir 16 . Laboratory tests show that the solubility of Indiana limestone in 15 weight percent HCl is about 99.01 percent. Further exemplary acids which may be used in the present disclosure include, but are not limited to, sulfuric acid (H 2 SO 4 ), hydrofluoric acid (HF), formic acid (HCOOH), acetic acid (CH 3 COOH), fluoroboric acid (HBF 4 ), phosphoric acid (H 3 PO 4 ), citric acid, sulfonic acid, glycolic acid, and other acids. In addition, the plugs 28 may be dissolved with chelating agents, such as, for example, ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid (EDTA), disodium EDTA (Na 2 EDTA), hydroxyethylethylenediaminetriacetic acid (HEDTA), docosatetraenoic acid (DTA), nitrilotriacetic acid (NTA), hydroxyaminopolycarboxylic acid (HACA), diethylenetriaminepentaacetic acid (DTPA), hydroxyethyliminodiacetic acid (HEIDA), polyaspartic acid (PASP), and the like.
CONCLUSION
It will be evident that various modifications and changes may be made to the foregoing specification without departing from the broader spirit or scope of the invention as set forth in the appended claims. Accordingly, the specification is to be regarded in an illustrative rather than a restrictive sense. For example, specific materials, fluids, acidic solutions, and combinations thereof falling within the claimed parameters, but not specifically identified or tried in a particular composition, are anticipated to be within the scope of this invention. Additionally, various components and methods not specifically described herein may still be encompassed by the following claims.
The words “comprising” and “comprises” as used throughout the claims is to be interpreted as “including but not limited to”. The present invention may suitably comprise, consist of, or consist essentially of the elements disclosed and may be practiced in the absence of an element not disclosed. For example, in one non-limiting embodiment, a pipe used in well completions may consist of or alternatively consist essentially of an interior space, an outer surface, at least one flow conduit and an acid-soluble plug disposed within the flow conduit, as described in the claims.
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Acid-soluble plugs may be employed within telescoping devices to connect a reservoir face to a production liner without perforating. Such technology eliminates formation damage and debris removal associated with perforating, as well as reducing risk and time. The plugs may provide enough resistance to enable the telescoping devices to extend out from the production liner under hydraulic pressure. The plugs may then be dissolved in an acidic solution, which may also be used as the hydraulic extension fluid. After the plugs are substantially removed from the telescoping devices, the reservoir may be hydraulically fractured using standard fracturing processes.
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CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION
This application claims priority to Japanese Patent Application No. 2011-213091, filed on Sep. 28, 2011, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated by reference herein in its entirety.
BACKGROUND
This disclosure relates to an embroidery frame that is configured to be attachable to a sewing machine.
An embroidery frame for a sewing machine is widely known. The embroidery frame is a circular form and the embroidery frame can be rotated to an intended angle. For example, the embroidery frame comprises a pair of embroidery frames and an outer frame. The pair of embroidery frames is configured to hold a work cloth. The outer frame can hold the pair of embroidery frames such that the pair of embroidery frames is rotatable. Indicators which represent angles are provided on the outer frame. The outer frame is mountable to outside of the pair of embroidery frames. For example, the pair of embroidery frame and the outer frame is mountable to the sewing machine.
SUMMARY
As described above, the indicator is provided on the outer frame. As a user of the sewing machine looks at the indicators, the user may rotate the pair of the embroidery frames which holds the work cloth. The user has to fix the pair of embroidery frames at an intended angle by using a screw. Accordingly, the operability of the embroidery frame may not be good.
Various exemplary embodiments of the general principles herein provide an embroidery frame, whose operability is good.
Exemplary embodiments herein provide an embroidery frame that comprises an inner frame, a middle frame, an outer frame, and a grip portion. The inner frame is a circular form. The middle frame is configured to be detachably attachable to a radial outside of the inner frame. The middle frame is a circular form. The outer frame is configured to rotatably hold the middle frame. The outer frame is a circular form. The outer frame is configured to be detachably attachable to a radial outside of the middle frame. The grip portion is provided to the middle frame.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
Embodiments will be described below in detail with reference to the accompanying drawings in which:
FIG. 1 is an oblique view of a sewing machine;
FIG. 2 is an oblique view of an embroidery frame in which a grip portion is in a use position;
FIG. 3 is an exploded oblique view of an inner frame, a middle frame, and an outer frame;
FIG. 4 is a side view for explaining an arrangement of the inner frame, the middle frame, the outer frame, and a work cloth;
FIG. 5 is a side view or the embroidery frame in a state in which the grip portion is in the use position and the work cloth is clamped;
FIG. 6 is a side view of the embroidery frame in a state in which the grip portion is in a stowed position and the work cloth is clamped; and
FIG. 7 is an oblique view of the embroidery frame in which the grip portion is in the stowed position.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
Hereinafter, an embroidery frame 2 that is an embodiment will be explained with reference to the drawings. In FIG. 1 , the side where a user of the sewing machine 1 is positioned is defined as the front side of a sewing machine 1 , and the opposite side is defined as the rear side. The left-right direction as seen by the user is defined as the left-right direction of the sewing machine 1 . That is a face on which a switch cluster 14 (described below) is provided is the front face of the sewing machine 1 . The longitudinal direction of a bed 3 and an arm 5 is the left-right direction of the sewing machine 1 . A side on which a pillar 4 is provided is the right side of the sewing machine 1 . The direction in which the pillar 4 extends is the up-down direction of the sewing machine 1 .
As shown in FIG. 1 , the sewing machine 1 includes the bed 3 , the pillar 4 , the arm 5 , and a head 6 . The bed 3 is the base of the sewing machine 1 and extends in the left-tight direction. The pillar 4 extends upward from the right end of the bed 3 . The arm 5 extends to the left from the upper end of the pillar 4 . The head 6 is provided on the left end of the arm 5 . A needle plate (not shown in the drawings) is provided in the top face of the bed 3 . A feed dog, a cloth feed mechanism, a feed adjustment pulse motor, and a shuttle mechanism, which are not shown in the drawings, are provided inside the bed 3 below the needle plate. The feed dog may move a work cloth that is sewn by a specified feed amount. The cloth feed mechanism may drive the feed dog. The feed adjustment pulse motor may adjust the feed amount.
In a case where embroidery sewing is performed with the sewing machine 1 , an embroidery frame 2 that holds a work cloth 100 may be disposed on the top side of the bed 3 . An area inside the embroidery frame 2 is an embroidery area in which stitches of an embroidery pattern can be formed. An embroidery frame moving unit 7 that is configured to move the embroidery frame 2 can be mounted on and removed from the bed 3 . A carriage cover 8 , which extends in the front-rear direction, is provided on the top portion of the embroidery frame moving unit 7 . A Y axis moving mechanism (not shown in the drawings) is provided inside the carriage cover 35 . The Y axis moving mechanism may move a carriage (not shown in the drawings) in a Y axis direction (the front-rear direction of the sewing machine 1 ). The embroidery frame 2 can be mounted on and removed front the carriage. A mounting portion (not shown in the drawings), where the embroidery frame 2 can be mounted, is provided to the right side of the carriage. The mounting portion projects to the right from the right side face of the carriage cover 8 . An attachment portion 235 (refer to FIG. 2 ) that is provided on the embroidery frame 2 may be mounted on the mounting portion. The carriage, the Y axis moving mechanism, and the carriage cover 8 may be moved in an X axis direction (the left-right direction of the sewing machine 1 ) by an X axis moving mechanism (not shown in the drawings). The X axis moving mechanism is provided within the body of the embroidery frame moving unit 7 .
The X axis moving mechanism and the Y axis moving mechanism may be respectively driven by an X axis motor and a Y axis motor, which are not shown in the drawings. As the embroidery frame 2 is moved in the X direction and the Y direction, a needle bar (not shown in the drawings) and the shuttle mechanism (not shown in the drawings) may be driven. In this manner, an embroidery sewing operation may be performed that sews a specified embroidery pattern on the work cloth 100 that is held by the embroidery frame 2 . In a case where an ordinary pattern, which is not an embroidery pattern, is sewn, the embroidery frame moving unit 7 may be removed from the bed 3 . Then ordinary sewing may be performed as the work cloth 100 is moved by the feed dog.
A vertically rectangular liquid crystal display 10 is provided on the front face of the pillar 4 . Images of various types of items, such as a plurality of the types of patterns, names of commands that cause various types of functions to be performed, various types of messages, and the like, may be displayed on the liquid crystal display 10 . A transparent touch panel 11 is provided on the front face of the liquid crystal display 10 . Using a finger or a special touch pen, the user may perform a pressing operation on the touch panel 11 . Hereinafter, this operation is referred to as a panel operation. The touch panel 11 detects a position that is pressed by a finger or a special touch pen etc., and the sewing machine 1 determines the item that corresponds to the detected position. Thus, the sewing machine 1 recognizes the selected item. By performing the panel operation, the user can select a pattern to be sewn or a command to be executed.
The structure of the arm 5 will be explained. A cover 12 is attached to the top portion of the arm 5 . The cover 12 is axially supported such that the cover 12 can be opened and closed by being rotated about an axis that extends in the left-right direction along the upper rear edge of the arm 5 . A thread container portion (not shown in the drawings) is provided underneath the cover 12 , that is, in the interior or the arm 5 . The thread container portion may contain a thread spool (not shown in the drawings) that supplies an upper thread. The upper thread may be supplied from the thread spool to a sewing needle (not shown in the drawings) through a thread guide that includes a tensioner, a thread take-up spring, a thread take-up lever, and the like, which are not shown in the drawings. The tensioner is provided in the head 6 and is configured to adjust the thread tension. The thread take-up lever may be driven reciprocally up and down and pulls up the upper thread. The sewing needle may be attached to the needle bar (not shown in the drawings). The needle bar is driven such that the needle bar may be moved up and down by a needle bar up-and-down moving mechanism (not shown in the drawings), which is provided inside the head 6 . The needle bar up-and-down moving mechanism may be driven by a drive shaft (not shown in the drawings) that is rotationally driven by a sewing machine motor (not shown in the drawings). The switch cluster 14 , which includes a sewing start/stop switch 13 and the like, is provided on the lower portion of the front face of the arm 5 . The sewing start/stop switch 13 may be used to start or stop the operation of the sewing machine 1 , that is, to issue commands to start or stop the sewing.
The embroidery frame 2 will be explained in detail with reference to FIGS. 2 to 7 . In the explanation that follows, the up-down direction in FIGS. 2 to 7 is defined as the up-down direction of the embroidery frame 2 . As shown in FIGS. 2 and 3 , the embroidery frame 2 is formed by combining an inner frame 21 , a middle frame 22 , and an outer frame 23 , each of which is circular. The inner frame 21 and the middle frame 22 can be rotated about a rotation axis R in relation to the outer frame 23 . In the embroidery frame 2 according to the present embodiment, the rotation axis R (refer to FIGS. 2 to 7 ) passes thorough the center of each circle that is formed by each of the inner frame 21 , the middle frame 22 , and the outer frame 23 (specifically, frame portions 211 , 225 , and 233 , which are described below). Hereinafter, the direction of the rotation axis R is referred to as an “axis direction”. The inner frame 21 , the middle frame 22 , and the outer frame 23 are each formed from a synthetic resin material with comparatively high rigidity. In the embroidery frame 2 , the middle frame 22 is disposed to the outside of the inner frame 21 in the radial direction, and the outer frame 23 is disposed to the outside of the middle frame 22 in the radial direction. As shown in FIG. 3 , the inner frame 21 includes the circular frame portion 211 . The frame portion 211 has a thickness in the axial direction (the up-down direction in FIG. 3 ).
As shown in FIG. 3 , the middle frame 22 includes the frame portion 225 , a supporting portion 226 , an adjustment portion 221 , and a grip portion 227 . The frame portion 225 has an inside diameter that is larger than the outside diameter of the frame portion 211 of the inner frame 21 . The frame portion 225 has a thickness in the axial direction (the up-down direction in FIG. 3 ). The frame portion 225 of the middle frame 22 may be mounted on and removed from the outer side in the radial direction of the frame portion 211 of the inner frame 21 . Thus, the middle frame 22 may be mounted on and removed from the inner frame 21 . The middle frame 22 may be mounted on the inner frame 21 . In this case, the work cloth 100 may be clamped between the inner frame 21 and the middle frame 22 (refer to FIGS. 1 , 5 , and 6 ). The supporting portion 226 projects toward the inside in the radial direction along the entire inner circumferential side face of the lower edge of the frame portion 225 . The supporting portion 226 is a portion that may support the bottom edge face of the inner frame 21 .
The adjustment portion 221 may adjust the diameter of the middle frame 22 according to the thickness of the work cloth 100 that is clamped between the inner frame 21 and the middle frame 22 . The adjustment portion 221 includes a parting portion 222 , a pair of screw mounting portions 223 , and an adjusting screw 224 . The parting portion 222 is a location where a portion of each of the frame portion 225 and the supporting portion 226 of the middle frame 22 is discontinuous in the thickness direction (i.e. the axial direction). The pair of the screw mounting portions 223 are provided on opposite sides of the parting portion 222 . The pair of the screw mounting portions 223 projects to the outside in the radial direction and is positioned such that the screw mounting portions 223 are opposite one another. Holes 2231 , 2232 are provided in the pair of the screw mounting portions 223 . Each of the holes 2231 , 2232 passes through one of the pair of the screw mounting portions 223 in a direction that is orthogonal to the axial direction (the up-down direction in FIG. 3 ). Of the two holes 2231 , 2232 , a threaded hole is formed in the hole 2232 . The adjusting screw 224 is provided with head portion 2241 , which projects outward in the radial direction of the adjusting screw 224 at one end of the adjusting screw 224 . In a case where the diameter of the middle frame 22 is adjusted according to the thickness of the work cloth 100 , first, the adjusting screw 224 may be inserted from the hole 2231 , in which a threaded hole is not formed, toward the hole 2232 , in which the threaded hole is formed. Then the adjusting screw 224 may be rotated and may pass through the inside of the hole 2232 . At this time, the head 2241 of the adjusting screw 224 may press against the screw mounting portions 223 , so that the size of the gap between the pair of the screw mounting portions 223 may be changed. That is, the adjusting screw 224 may connect the pair of the screw mounting portions 223 and may adjust the gap between the pair of the screw mounting portions 223 . The diameter of the middle frame 22 may be adjusted according to the thickness of the work cloth 100 by adjusting the gap between the pair of the screw mounting portions 223 . For example, the diameter of the middle frame 22 becomes greater to the extent that the gap between the pair of the screw mounting portions 223 becomes wider. Therefore, in this case, a thicker work cloth 100 may be clamped between the middle frame 22 and the inner frame 21 .
As shown in FIGS. 2 and 3 , the grip portion 227 extends to the outside in the radial direction from an edge in the axial direction of the frame portion 225 (the upper edge of the frame portion 225 in the present embodiment). As described above, in the present embodiment, the axial direction corresponds to the up-down direction of the embroidery frame 2 . The grip portion 227 is provided on one of the upper edge and the bottom edge of the frame portion 225 (the upper edge in the present embodiment). The user may grip the grip portion 227 and may rotate the middle frame 22 in relation to the outer frame 23 . The grip portion 227 includes a supporting portion 2271 , a window portion 2277 , a hinge portion 2272 , a first arm portion 2273 , a second arm portion 2274 , a lug portion 2275 , a projecting portion 2276 , and a hook portion 2278 .
The supporting portion 2271 has a rectangular plate shape and extends toward the outside in the radial direction from the upper edge of the frame portion 225 of the middle frame 22 , at least as far as an outer edge of an outer circumferential portion 231 of the outer frame 23 . The window portion 2277 is a rectangular through-hole that is provided in the supporting portion 2271 . The hinge portion 2272 is provided on the outer edge of the supporting portion 2271 . The hinge portion 2272 includes a first hole 2272 A, a second hole 2272 B, a shaft portion 2272 C, a first projecting portion 2272 D, and a second projecting portion 2272 E. The first hole 2272 A and the second hole 2272 B are provided at opposite ends of the outer edge of the supporting portion 2271 such that the first hole 2272 A and the second hole 2272 B face one another. The cylindrical shaft portion 2272 C is provided along an edge of the rectangular plate-shaped first arm portion 2273 . The shaft portion 2272 C is shorter than the edge of the first arm portion 2273 . The first projecting portion 2272 D and the second projecting portion 2272 E project outward from opposite ends of the shaft portion 2272 C. The shaft portion 2272 C, the first projecting portion 2272 D, the second projecting portion 2272 E, the first arm portion 2273 , the second arm portion 2274 , the lug portion 2275 , the projecting portion 2276 , and the hook portion 2278 are formed as a single unit from a synthetic resin material that has lower rigidity than the middle frame 22 and that is slightly flexible. The first arm portion 2273 is axially supported by the supporting portion 2271 by taking advantage of the flexibility of the material to fit the first projecting portion 2272 D into the first hole 2272 A and then fit the second projecting portion 2272 E into the second hole 2272 B. In other words, the supporting portion 2271 and the first arm portion 2273 are connected via the hinge portion 2272 such that the first arm portion 2273 can be rotated.
The second arm portion 2274 is connected to the edge of the first arm portion 2273 that is on the opposite side from the edge where the shaft portion 2272 C is provided. The second arm portion 2274 extends at a right angle from the first arm portion 2273 . The lug portion 2275 is provided in the location where the first arm portion 2273 and the second arm portion 2274 are connected. The lug portion 2275 projects in the same direction as the direction in which the first arm portion 2273 extends and at a right angle to the direction in which the second arm portion 2274 extends. The projecting portion 2276 is provided in a central portion of the edge of the second arm portion 2274 . The projecting portion 2276 projects in a direction that is orthogonal to the direction in which the second arm portion 2274 extends, such that the projecting portion 2276 is opposite the first arm portion 2273 . The hook portion 2278 projects from the edge of the projecting portion 2276 in a direction that is orthogonal to the direction in which the projecting portion 2276 projects, such that the hook portion 2278 is opposite the second arm portion 2274 . As described above, the first arm portion 2273 can be rotated around the hinge portion 2272 . Therefore, the grip portion 227 can be switched between a use position and a stowed position. Specifically, the grip portion 227 is in the use position in a case where the first arm portion 2273 is oriented in the same direction as the direction in which the supporting portion 2271 extends, as shown in FIG. 2 . The grip portion 227 is in the stowed position in a case where the first arm portion 2273 is oriented in a direction that is parallel to a side face of the outer circumferential portion 231 and is orthogonal to the direction in which the supporting portion 2271 extends, as shown in FIG. 7 . The operations of the grip portion 227 when the grip portion 227 is in the use position and when the grip portion 227 is in the stowed position will be described in detail below.
As shown in FIG. 3 , the outer frame 23 includes the frame portion 233 , the outer circumferential portion 231 , a plurality of throughholes 232 , a supporting portion 234 , and the attachment portion 235 . The frame portion 233 has an inside diameter that is larger than the outside diameter of the frame portion 225 of the middle frame 22 . The frame portion 233 has a thickness in the axial direction (the up-down direction in FIG. 3 ). The outer circumferential portion 231 is a ring-shaped member that extends toward the outside in the radial direction around the entire circumference of one edge of the frame portion 233 in the axial direction (the upper edge in the present embodiment) that is on the same side as the grip portion 227 of the middle frame 22 . The plurality of the through-holes 232 are provided in positions that respectively correspond to a plurality of predetermined rotation angles around the circumference of the middle frame 22 (angles of rotation in relation to the outer frame 23 ). The plurality of the through-holes 232 are holes that pass through the outer circumferential portion 231 of the outer frame 23 in the up-down direction. The through-holes 232 are provided at 45-degree intervals as seen from the central axis of the outer frame 23 . The rotation angle of each of the through-holes 232 is indicated, on the upper face of the outer circumferential portion 231 , at the outside of the through-hole 232 in the radial direction. In the present embodiment, the middle frame 22 can be locked in relation to the outer frame 23 at any one of the predetermined rotation angles (zero degrees, 45 degrees, 90 degrees, 135 degrees, 180 degrees, 225 degrees, 270 degrees, 315 degrees) by engaging the projecting portion 2276 of the grip portion 227 of the middle frame 22 with the corresponding one of the plurality of the through-holes 232 .
The supporting portion 234 is provided on the inner circumferential face of the frame portion 233 . The supporting portion 234 projects, in the center of the up-down direction of the frame portion 233 , toward the inside in the radial direction along the entire circumference of frame portion 233 . The supporting portion 234 is a portion that may support the bottom face of the supporting portion 226 of the middle frame 22 . The attachment portion 235 is provided to the outside of the frame portion 233 in the radial direction. The attachment portion 235 includes a body portion 235 A, a first connecting portion 235 B, a second connecting portion 235 C, and a third connecting portion 235 D. The body portion 235 A, which has a long, narrow, rectangular shape, may be mounted on the mounting portion (not shown in the drawings) of the carriage, which is provided inside the carriage cover 8 of the sewing machine 1 . The first connecting portion 235 B, the second connecting portion 235 C, and the third connecting portion 235 D have rectangular columnar shapes and connect the body portion 235 A to the frame portion 233 of the outer frame 23 .
The form in which the embroidery frame 2 is used when the work cloth 100 is held by the embroidery frame 2 will be explained with reference to FIGS. 2 and 4 to 7 . As shown in FIG. 4 , in the embroidery frame 2 , starting from the top in the axial direction of the inner frame 21 (the up-down direction in FIG. 4 ), the inner frame 21 , the work cloth 100 , the middle frame 22 , and the outer frame 23 may be disposed in order. First, the parting portion 222 of the middle frame 22 may be widened as necessary by rotating the adjusting screw 224 . That is, the middle frame 22 may be adjusted such that the diameter of the middle frame 22 is increased as necessary. Next, the work cloth 100 may be placed between the middle frame 22 and the inner frame 21 , and the inner frame 21 may be fitted into the middle frame 22 . Then the adjusting screw 224 may be rotated in the direction that reduces the diameter of the middle frame 22 in accordance with the thickness of the work cloth 100 . The work cloth 100 may thus be clamped between the middle frame 22 and the inner frame 21 . Next, in a state in which the grip portion 227 of the middle frame 22 is in the use position, the middle frame 22 , into which the inner frame 21 has been fitted such that the work cloth 100 is clamped, may be fitted into the outer frame 23 . In the state in which the grip portion 227 is in the use position, the first arm portion 2273 of the grip portion 227 extends in the same direction in which the supporting portion 2271 extends. The bottom face of the supporting portion 226 of the middle frame 22 may thus be a state of being supported by the supporting portion 234 of the outer frame 23 .
A case in which the grip portion 227 is in the use position and a case in which the grip portion 227 is in the stowed position will be explained with reference to the drawings. The grip portion 227 is in the use position in a case where the first arm portion 2273 extends in the same direction in which the supporting portion 2271 extends and the first arm portion 2273 projects to the outside in the radial direction from the upper edge of the middle frame 22 , as shown in FIGS. 2 and 5 . In this case, the grip portion 227 projects from the middle frame 22 in a way that allows the grip portion 227 to be gripped. At this time, the second arm portion 2274 is set apart from the outer circumferential portion 231 and extends downward. The projecting portion 2276 cannot be engaged with any one of the plurality of the through-holes 232 . Therefore, the middle frame 22 can be rotated in relation to the outer frame 23 . In this case, the user may rotate the middle frame 22 in relation to the outer frame 23 by gripping one of the first arm portion 2273 and the second arm portion 2274 . While rotating the middle frame 22 , the user may look through the window portion 2277 and may visually check one of the rotation angles that are indicated, on the upper face of the outer circumferential portion 231 , at the outside of the plurality of the through-holes 232 in the radial direction. In contrast, as shown in FIGS. 6 and 7 , the grip portion 227 is in the stowed position in a case where the first arm portion 2273 extends at a right angle to the supporting portion 2271 and extends downward parallel to the side face of the outer circumferential portion 231 , and the second arm portion 2274 is placed below the bottom face of the outer circumferential portion 231 . In addition, the projecting portion 2276 and the hook portion 2278 are engaged with one of the plurality of the through-holes 232 , which are provided in the outer circumferential portion 231 of the outer frame 23 . In this case, the middle frame 22 cannot be rotated in relation to the outer frame 23 . In other words, the grip portion 227 is in a state in which the grip portion 227 cannot be gripped. As described above, the projecting portion 2276 and the hook portion 2278 are formed from a synthetic resin material that has flexibility. Therefore, when the projecting portion 2276 and the hook portion 2278 are engaged with one of the through-holes 232 , the hook portion 2278 is slightly caught on the edge of the through-hole 232 . The state in which the projecting portion 2276 and the hook portion 2278 are engaged with the one of the through-holes 232 is thus maintained. In this ease, the embroidery frame 2 may be mounted on the sewing machine 1 , and the work of embroidery sewing may be performed.
For example, a case is considered in which the middle frame 22 is fixed in relation to the outer frame 23 in the position where the rotation angle is zero degrees. The user may place the work cloth 100 between the inner frame 21 and the middle frame 22 and may clamp the work cloth 100 with the inner frame 21 and the middle frame 22 . Next, the user may fit the middle frame 22 , into which the inner frame 21 has been fitted, into the outer frame 23 and may put the grip portion 227 into the use position, as shown in FIGS. 2 and 5 . The user may grip one of the first arm portion 2273 and the second arm portion 2274 and may rotate the middle frame 22 in relation to the outer frame 23 . Through the window portion 2277 , the user may visually cheek one of the rotation angles that is indicated on the upper face of the outer circumferential portion 231 and may rotate the middle frame 22 to the position where the rotation angle becomes zero degrees. Then the user may rotate the grip portion 227 around the hinge portion 2272 and may engage the projecting portion 2276 and the hook portion 2278 , which are provided on the edge of the second arm portion 2274 , with the through-hole 232 that corresponds to the rotation angle of zero degrees. This completes the switching of the grip portion 227 from the use position to the stowed position. The grip portion 227 may fix the middle frame 22 at the position where the rotation angle is zero degrees such that the middle frame 22 cannot rotate in relation to the outer frame 23 . The user may mount the embroidery frame 2 , in which the middle frame 22 has been fixed such that the middle frame 22 cannot be rotated, on the sewing machine 1 , and the embroidery sewing may be performed.
For example, a case is considered in which, after the embroidery sewing has been performed as described above, the middle frame 22 is fixed in relation to the outer frame 23 at the position where the rotation angle is 45 degrees, and the embroidery sewing is performed. The user may remove the embroidery frame 2 from the sewing machine 1 , may place the user's finger on the lug portion 2275 , and may rotate the first arm portion 2273 via the hinge portion 2272 . The projecting portion 2276 and the hook portion 2278 , which had been engaged with the through-hole 232 at the zero-degree position, may thus be separated from the through-hole 232 at the zero-degree position and may enter a disengaged state. In this way, the user may switch the grip portion 227 from the stowed position to the use position. The user may grip one of the first arm portion 2273 and the second arm portion 2274 and may rotate the middle frame 22 in relation to the outer frame 23 . Visually checking one of the rotation angles through the window portion 2277 , the user may switch the grip portion 227 from the use position to the stowed position at the position where the rotation angle is 45 degrees, then may mount the embroidery frame 2 on the sewing machine 1 . By utilizing the grip portion 227 in this manner, the user may repeat the rotating of the middle frame 22 and the performing of the embroidery sewing. Thus, it is possible to perform the embroidery sewing after the middle frame 22 is rotated to the desired angle.
As explained above, with the embroidery frame 2 according to the present embodiment, in a case where the grip portion 227 is in the use position, the user may rotate the middle frame 22 in relation to the outer frame 23 by gripping one of the first arm portion 2273 and the second arm portion 2274 , which are included in the grip portion 227 of the middle frame 22 . The operability when the middle frame 22 is rotated in relation to the outer frame 23 can thus be improved. In addition, the grip portion 227 can be switched from the use position to the stowed position by fitting the projecting portion 2276 and the hook portion 2278 , which are provided in the grip portion 227 , into one of the plurality of the through-holes 232 , which are provided in the outer circumferential portion 231 of the outer frame 23 such that the plurality of the through-holes 232 respectively correspond to the plurality of the rotation angles. The rotation angle of the middle frame 22 in relation to the outer frame 23 can thus be set accurately and easily. Furthermore, because the grip portion 227 is stowed along the outer frame 23 , it is possible to prevent the grip portion 227 from interfering with another member while the work of the embroidery sewing is being performed.
Various types of modifications may be made to the embodiment described above. For example, in the embodiment described above, the grip portion 227 that is provided on the middle frame 22 of the embroidery frame 2 , which includes the inner frame 21 , the middle frame 22 , and the outer frame 23 , can be switched between the use position and the stowed position. The grip portion 227 may not be switched between the use position and the stowed position, for example. A member that projects slightly farther to the outside of the frame portion 225 in the radial direction than does the supporting portion 2271 in the embodiment described above may be used as a grip portion, for example.
In the embodiment described above, an example is explained in which the supporting portion 2271 of the grip portion 227 projects to the outside of the middle frame 22 in the radial direction. The grip portion 227 may project from the middle frame 22 in any direction that at least does not interfere with the outer frame 23 when the grip portion 227 is in the use position. Furthermore, in the embodiment described above, the work cloth 100 may be clamped by the inner frame 21 and the middle frame 22 , as shown in FIGS. 5 and 6 . Considering the placement of the clamped work cloth 100 , is preferable for the grip portion 227 not to project to the inside of the frame portion 225 of the middle frame 22 . Therefore, the grip portion 227 may project upward in parallel to the axial direction of the middle frame 22 . The grip portion 227 may project in any direction within the range from outward in the radial direction of the middle frame 22 to the upward direction of the middle frame 22 , for example.
The angles at which the plurality of the through-holes 232 are provided are not limited to the 45-degree intervals in the embodiment described above. The intervals for the angles at which the plurality of the through-holes 232 are provided may be at an angle that is greater than 45 degrees or may be at an angle that is less than 45 degrees.
The apparatus and methods described above with reference to the various embodiments are merely examples. It goes without saying that they are not confined to the depicted embodiments. While various features have been described in conjunction with the examples outlined above, various alternatives, modifications, variations, and/or improvements of those features and/or examples may be possible. Accordingly, the examples, as set forth above, are intended to be illustrative. Various changes may be made without departing from the broad spirit and scope of the underlying principles.
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An embroidery frame comprises an inner frame, wherein the inner frame is a circular form. The embroidery frame comprises a middle frame which is configured to be detachably attachable to a radial outside of the inner frame. The middle frame is a circular form. The embroidery frame comprises an outer frame which is configured to rotatably hold the middle frame, wherein the outer frame is a circular form, and the outer frame is configured to be detachably attachable to a radial outside of the middle frame. The embroidery frame comprises a grip portion which is provided to the middle frame.
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FILED OF THE INVENTION
[0001] This invention relates to apparatus for and method of analysing a mixture comprising a fluid and a plurality of electrically charged particles contained therein.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0002] Particle concentrations in aerosols (a suspension of particles in a gas) are often measured by electrostatic techniques based on the principle of charging the particles in a sample of the aerosol and collecting them on one or several collection elements such as electrodes or filters. The current flowing to these electrodes or filters, here referred to as “collection electrodes”, is measured and indicates the quantity of particles collected and hence their concentration in the aerosol.
[0003] The particles may be charged by any one of a number of methods, such as ultraviolet irradiation or corona discharge; or natural charging (often associated with a combustion process) may be relied upon.
[0004] Frequently, differences in mobility (the readiness of particles to diff-use or drift through the gas) are used to separate different sizes of particles before collecting them on the collection electrodes. Some devices alternatively use differences in momentum for this discrimination.
[0005] Such devices are used to make measurements of the number of particles and sometimes the spectrum of particle sizes in aerosols, but are limited to resolving accurately only relatively slow changes in the particle concentration. This is because faster changes lead to transient discrepancies between the actual particle concentration and the measured current which are caused by the rate of change of the concentration of charged particles in the aerosol near the detectors.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0006] According to the present invention, modifications are made to the design of electrostatic particle measurement instruments to compensate for or eliminate the transient currents produced by the rate of change of charge near the sensing electrodes, and hence reduce the transient errors in measured particle concentrations.
[0007] According to a first aspect of the invention, this is achieved by apparatus for analysing a mixture comprising a fluid and a plurality of electrically charged particles therein, the apparatus comprising a collection element for collecting said particles and providing an output relating to the number of particles incident thereon, and compensation electrode means, spaced from the collection element, which is responsive to charged particles which pass in the vicinity of, but which are not collected by, the collection element, thereby to enable the output from the collection element to be used to determine the charge collected by the collection element.
[0008] Thus, by providing compensation electrode means the invention enables spurious measurements caused by particles which induce a current in the collection element, but are not themselves collected by that element, to be avoided. The collection element may comprise any suitable element for collecting charged particles so that the total charge or current resulting from the collection of charged particles can be measured.
[0009] For example, the apparatus may comprise an electrostatic low pressure impactor (ELPI) instrument which charges the particles in an aerosol to be measured and then passes the aerosol through a column of impactors. The impactors comprise perforated plates followed by collection plates which may be covered with grease. When the aerosol passes through the perforations, relatively massive particles are forced by their momentum to hit the collection plates where they are detected whereas the lighter particles are carried by the gas flow to the subsequent stages. The size of the perforations, size of the plates and the operating pressure are varied throughout the column such that the largest particles are detected on the earliest collection plates and successively smaller particles are detected on later collection plates. Measurement of the electrical current flowing to these collection plates indicates the number of particles detected by each and hence the concentration of size class of particles. Each collection plate thus functions as an electrode.
[0010] Alternatively, the apparatus may have a collection element which comprises an electrode to which is applied an accelerating voltage for attracting the charged particles. The apparatus may have a succession of such electrodes arranged along a conduit so as to provide an output representative of the size spectrum (i.e. the concentration of particles in each of a number of size classes).
[0011] In such a case, the compensation electrode means may to advantage comprise a shielding electrode which overlies each of the collection electrodes, the arrangement being such that charged particles on the other side of the shielding electrode from the collection electrodes are prevented or inhibited by the shielding electrode from inducing currents on the collection electrodes.
[0012] The shielding electrode may to an advantage comprise a conductive grid. Preferably, the conduit is cylindrical, each collection electrode is annular and is coaxial with said cylinder and the shielding electrode is also cylindrical and coaxial with the conduit.
[0013] Instead of shielding the collection electrode, the compensation electrode means may alternatively be so arranged as to provide an output which can be processed to provide a correction signal for removing or inhibiting components of the output from the collection electrode caused by induced current.
[0014] Such a compensation electrode means can be controlled so as to be maintained at a voltage which results in a collection of no significant number of particles. Alternatively, the compensation electrode means may collect all of the particles which pass in the vicinity of the collection electrode without being collected by the latter.
[0015] In arrangements which have a plurality of collection electrodes distributed along a conduit, the compensation electrode means for a given collection electrode may be constituted by all of the collection electrodes positioned downstream thereof. If the downstream collection electrodes between them, collect all of the particles which are not collected by the first said collection electrode, their outputs can be used to obtain an indication of the induced current on said collection electrode.
[0016] According to a second aspect of the invention, in a method of measuring the current flow to a collection electrode to indicate the quantity of charged particles in an aerosol, there is an improvement comprising the step of eliminating or compensating for the part of the current flowing to said collection electrode which is caused by the rate of change of charged density in said aerosol near said collection electrode.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
[0017] Three embodiments of apparatus and methods in accordance with the invention will now be described by way of example only and with reference to the accompanying drawings in which:
[0018] FIG. 1 is a cutaway diagram of a Differential Mobility Spectrometer (DMS) forming part of the first embodiment of apparatus in accordance with the invention;
[0019] [0019]FIG. 2 is a functional block diagram illustrating processing means connected to the DMS of FIG. 1;
[0020] [0020]FIG. 3 is a cutaway diagram of the a DMS of the second embodiment of apparatus the DMS having a shielding electrode;
[0021] [0021]FIG. 4 is a cutaway diagram of a DMS of the third embodiment of apparatus in accordance with the invention;
[0022] [0022]FIG. 5 is a schematic diagram of a part of the DMS of FIG. 1, and illustrates how charged particles can make different contributions to the current collected on a collection electrode of the DMS;
[0023] [0023]FIG. 6 is a further schematic diagram, illustrating how different particles are collected by different collection electrodes of the DMS of FIG. 1;
[0024] [0024]FIG. 7 is a schematic diagram of part of the DMS shown in FIG. 3; and
[0025] [0025]FIG. 8 is a schematic diagram of part of the DMS shown in FIG. 4.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
First Embodiment
[0026] The DMS shown in FIG. 1 is used to analyse aerosols, and comprises a hollow cylindrical outer casing 1 formed from an insulating material and which contains a solid cylindrical central electrode 2 which is coaxial with the housing 1 . The electrode 2 is spaced from the inner walls of the housing so as to define with the housing an annular conduit 4 extending along the length of the housing 1 . The electrode 2 is held at a positive potential by a voltage source 6 connected thereto. The inner wall of the housing 1 is provided with a series of annular, axially spaced recesses which are coaxial with the housing 1 and electrode 2 , and each of which houses a respective annular collection electrode (collectively denoted by reference numeral 8 ).
[0027] An inlet pipe 10 extends into one end of the housing 1 , and contains a particle charging device 12 . The pipe 10 is coaxial with the electrode 2 . As can be seen from FIG. 1, the pipe 10 fits over the end of the electrode 2 , which end has a conical portion 14 . However, the pipe 10 has an inner radius which is slightly larger than the radius of the electrode 2 so that the pipe 10 is spaced from the electrode 2 to define an annular inlet 16 for the aerosol to be analysed by the DMS. All of the collection electrodes 8 are, in use, held at earth potential, but for the sake of simplicity, the connection to earth is only shown in relation to one of those electrodes, labelled E 4 . Also specifically labelled are the electrodes E 1 , E 2 and E 3 which, together with E 4 , constitute the last four collection electrodes that a sample of aerosol passes on its way through the device from the inlet 16 through to the outlet 18 defined by the space between the bottom of the electrode 2 and the housing 1 .
[0028] The collection electrodes 8 are connected to signal processing means, as shown in FIG. 2, which is specifically adapted to compensate for currents induced in the electrodes 8 as the result of the change in number density of particles passing through the conduit.
[0029] For the sake of conciseness, the signal processing means is only shown in relation to the electrodes E 1 -E 4 , but it will be apparent from this description how the signal processing means interacts with each of the other electrodes 8 . The output of the electrode E 1 is connected to calculating means comprising a differentiator 20 the output of which is connected to a calculation device 22 for determining from the output of the differentiator the current which would have been induced on the electrode E 2 by the charges collected on E 1 .
[0030] The output of the calculation device 22 is fed to an adder 24 in which the value for the induced current is subtracted from the current measured on the electrode E 2 at a given time before the output on the electrode E 1 was measured so that the measured induced current and the measured output from the electrode E 2 are synchronised when fed to the adder. This synchronisation is achieved with the aid of delay circuitry 26 which comprises a memory for storing a succession of measured current values from the electrode E 2 and supplying them after a pre-determined delay to the adder 24 . The output of the adder 24 provides a signal representative of the current collected on the electrode E 2 (as indicated at 28 ), and this can be fed to a further differentiator 30 for determining the rate of change of charge collected on E 2 .
[0031] The output from the differentiator 30 is fed to further calculation device 32 which determines the current which was induced on the electrode E 3 as the result of change of number density of those charged particles subsequently collected on E 2 . The output of the differentiator 20 is also connected to a further calculator 34 which determines the current which would have been induced on the electrode E 3 by the charges collected by E 1 . This value is fed to an adder 36 , the other input of which is connected to a further delay device 38 which is similar in form and function to the device 26 . The output of the adder 36 is fed to a further adder 40 , the other input of which is connected to the output of the calculation device 32 so that the output of adder 40 is representative of the current caused by charges collected by the electrode E 3 , which is output as indicated at 42 .
[0032] Similarly, the calculation means comprises farther calculation devices 44 , 46 and 48 and a further differentiator 50 which calculate the components of current induced on E 4 attributable to the charges collected on E 1 -E 3 , and those components are subtracted (in adders 52 , 54 and 58 ) from the output of the delay circuitory 60 connected to E 4 so as to produce an indication of the current collected on E 4 (as represented by reference numeral 64 ) the output of the adder 58 is connected to a further differentiator 66 .
[0033] Considering now all of the collection electrodes in the DMS, the output from each of these electrodes (other than the first electrode, closest to the input) is connected to a respective differentiator, the output of which is in turn, connected to a respective series of calculation devices, each of which calculates the induced current, attributable to the charge collected on the collection electrode connected to that differentiator, on a respective one of the upstream electrodes. The output of each of the electrodes is also connected to a suitable delay device for synchronising the output of that electrode with the induced current values which are fed to each of the adders (each corresponding to a respective downstream electrode) connected to that delay device.
[0034] Thus, for each electrode other than E 1 , the charge collected on the or each downstream collection electrode is used to provide a correction to take into account the current which is induced by charges passing in the vicinity of the electrode (but which are not collected thereby).
[0035] This embodiment of this invention uses a system added to or incorporated in a particle measuring instrument and corrects for the effects of the rate of change of charged particle concentration, which is estimated from the variation over time of the currents measured on the collection electrode or electrodes. This embodiment may be used where a sample of the aerosol to be measured, which may optionally be diluted flows past or through the collection electrode or electrodes which are connected to a current measuring electrical circuit. This embodiment is preferably used in situations in which all or a fixed proportion of the total number of charged particles in the aerosol are collected on the collection electrodes.
[0036] The correction for the effects of the rate of change of charged particles concentration is based on the following model for the mechanism of current generation.
[0037] A charged particle near an electrode held at a fixed potential attracts a charge of the opposite sign onto the electrode from the connected circuit. The quantity of charge attracted is proportional to the charge on the particle but it is also a function of its distance from the electrode and the geometry of the other conductors nearby. As the particle approaches the electrode the charge attracted to the electrode increases and therefore there is a current flow in the connected circuit When the particle finally reaches the electrode, the total attracted charge due to that particle is equal and opposite to its charge. Therefore, when a large number of particles steadily flowing to the electrode is considered, the current measured is as if it were just produced at the time the particles were collected.
[0038] It will be appreciated that the particle is collected in the sense that it comes into contact with the electrode so that a charge can be exchanged between the particle and the electrode. The particle is not necessarily retained on the electrode.
[0039] If the concentration of charged particles in the aerosol near the electrode changes, however, this will lead to a change in the charge induced on the electrode and therefore an extra component of current in the connected circuit before the particles at the new concentration reach the electrode. If the change in concentration is a reduction, the magnitude of charge on the electrode will reduce producing a component of current in the opposite direction from that produced by collected particles.
[0040] Using this model, we can see that any current measured to the collection electrode is due to the sum of the effects of collected particles, new charged particles entering the vicinity of the electrode and those charged particles already near it approaching, less the effect of any particles which leave tile vicinity of the electrode. This embodiment of the invention uses this to estimate accurately the concentration of particles in the aerosol at any instant without errors which come from ignoring the effect of changing charge concentration near the electrode.
[0041] The sample aerosol flow 1 is passed through the charging device 12 , which applies a positive charge to the particles, and then flows along the centre of an annular channel surrounded by a sheath flow of clean gas entering between the inlet pipe 10 and housing 1 at the same flow velocity. While this happens the electrode 2 is held at a high positive potential, and the current flow from the collection electrodes 8 is measured. The collection electrodes 8 and centre electrode 2 set up an electrical field in the annular conduit 4 which causes the positively charged particles to drift from the sample aerosol, through tie sheath flow, towards the electrodes 8 . The smaller particles, with less aerodynamic resistance, drift faster, reaching the outside of the channel sooner and being collected on an electrode further upstream than the larger particles. For this embodiment of the invention to be applied to the DMS, either the voltages, flow rates and geometry of the instrument should be designed such that almost all the particles in the aerosol are collected before the flow exits the channel. In a modified version of this embodiment, additional mesh, gauze or functionally equivalent, electrodes are mounted at the exit end to collect any remaining particles, the current flow from these electrodes also being measured. (such an additional element would be treated as electrode E 1 ).
[0042] Generally more particles pass through an upstream collection electrode ring than are collected on it, so changes in the concentration of these larger particles which pass through can dominate the current from the particles actually collected on an upstream collection electrode. The signal processing means shown in FIG. 2 act as a correction system. The collection electrodes E 1 and E 4 in this diagram are the four most downstream of the collection electrodes in FIG. 1. E 1 is the collection electrode furthest downstream.
[0043] As very few charged particles leave the channel without being measured, the current on collection electrode E 1 indicates the number of particles per unit time (‘particle flux’) in the aerosol that passed through the previous electrode E 2 uncollected. To correct for the transient errors due to the change in particle concentration in the vicinity of E 2 , therefore, the rate of change of the current on E 1 (shown by the d/dt box) is multiplied by a constant of proportionality and subtracted from the current measured on E 2 . Preferably, this correction is applied to the value of the current measured on the penultimate electrode E 2 a short period earlier and stored, as indicated by the delay blocks in FIG. 2; this delay period being equal to the time taken for the aerosol and sheath flow to travel from the average position of the penultimate electrode to that of the final electrode.
[0044] Practically, the differentiation operation d/dt may be approximated, for example by finite difference The product δt 2 K 2.1 is the constant of proportionality between the rate of change of particle flux and the correction applied to the penultimate electrode. Both elements of the product are defined below. Preferably, the constant of proportionality is the integral over time of the influence factor along the path followed by the charged particle. The constant of proportionality may, alternatively, be derived from measurements of the particular instrument.
[0045] The influence coefficient of a charged particle near an electrode is the ratio of the magnitude of charge attracted onto the electrode by the charged particle divided by the charge on the particle. It is a function of the distance of the particle from the electrode and the geometry of the electrode and other conductive bodies (such as the centre electrode in the DMS) nearby. This can be calculated for the particular geometry of the instrument by conventional techniques such as Gauss's law and the principle of overall charge neutrality or widely available computer programmes.
[0046] The radial location of a charged particle at the penultimate ring can be estimated from the forces applied to it as it passes through along the channel 4 . The most important forces are aerodynamic and the electrostatic forces due to the applied electric field and charge image attraction to surfaces. For the DMS, the applied electric field Is large and therefore dominates the charge image effects in the bulk of the column. The radial entry location is approximately known, as the aerosol all enters near the centre of the channel, and one other point on the path is known to be the location of the final electrode. The electric field can be calculated from Gauss's law.
[0047] Along with Stokes' theorem (strictly modified by a Cunningham slip correction factor for these small particles) which states that the drift velocity of a particle is proportional to the force on it, this allows the path the particle follows through the channel to be predicted and thus the influence coefficient of any collected particle on any upstream ring to be evaluated. In FIG. 2, the coefficient δt m κ m,n the influence coefficient of particles collected at collection electrode Em on the charge on collection electrode En, multiplied by the time they spend in the vicinity of electrode En.
[0048] When this correction is applied to the current from the penultimate electrode E 2 , this then gives an accurate reflection of the particle flow collected at that electrode. Therefore, in the same way, the current measurement on the next electrode E 3 can be corrected for the change in particle concentration of particles collected at both downstream rings E 1 and E 2 (separately, as the radial location and hence coefficient δt m κ m,n of the two sizes of particles will be different at the axial position of the upstream electrode). The same process is then applied successively to all upstream electrodes each of which is corrected for the currents collected on all the downstream electrodes.
[0049] The operation of the DMS and the theory behind correction of detected currents will now be described in more detail. An aerosol formed of a spectrum of particle sizes from less than 5 nm to around 1000 nm at a flow rate of around 5 litres/min STP is charged in a prescribed manner and the resulting charged aerosol is classified according to electrical mobility in the annular column in the housing 1 . The size and number of the particles in the aerosol is inferred from the currents measured at various locations within the D)MS. The currents measured on the collection electrodes (typically>1>10 −15 A) can have a significant component which is due to the rate of change of charged particles entering the classifier. Methods to obtain a measurement which improves the accuracy of the classification are presented.
[0050] The aerosol is drawn into the instrument using a vacuum pump (not shown) with a swept capacity of about 25 m 3 /hr. Particles larger than about 1000 nm are collected on an impactor such that only particles less than 1000 nm are admitted to the instrument- The sample is then drawn through a restrictor such that the sample pressure is reduced from near to atmospheric pressure, to about 250 mbar.
[0051] Aerosol particles are charged in a unipolar diffusion charger with a residence time of around 500 ms and an average ion density of b 1 × 10 13 /m 3 . The sample flow of charged particles is admitted to the entry of the classifier in a cylinder immediately adjacent to the high Voltage electrode and is surrounded by a cylinder of the clean sheath air. The ratio of the sample flow to sheath flow is about 4:1. A section of the classifier is shown schematically in FIG. 5.
[0052] The particles move with the local gas flow speed at about 1 m/s, but experience a force due to a strong electric field maintained between the High Voltage electrode 2 and the collector electrode E 2 which is held near to earth potential. The electric field strength is in the range 0-10 kV/cm (High Voltage electrode voltage range is 0-10 kV) and the Current flows to the Collector electrodes are measured with sensitive electrometer amplifiers which are generally operated at near ground potential.
[0053] Column lengths of about 1 m, comprising 22 or 26 Collector electrodes with lengths of 15-35 mm and internal diameter about 55 mm have been found to give good performance. The diameter of the High voltage electrode of about 25 mm gives an annular gap of 15 mm. The ratio of sheath air to sample flow of around 4:1 has been used.
Theory
[0054] Consider the toroidal control volume bounded by the dotted box shown in FIG. 5 within the classifier and excluding the High Voltage electrode. The electric field force causes charged particles to drift outwards and some of the particles will hit the Collector electrode. In FIG. 5 the flow of charged particles into the control volume is I in ; the flow of particles out of the control volume is I out ; the flow of charge from particles incident on the Collector electrode leads to I collected ; the flow of induced charge to the Collector electrode leads to I induced ; the total charge flow to the Collector electrode is I measured ; the total of the positive charge within the volume is Σ+ and the total of the negative charge within the volume is Σ−.
[0055] Positive charge in the sample flow, Σ+ causes an equal and opposite negative charge to be induced, Σ−. This negative charge is split between the surface of the High Voltage electrode and the Collector electrode such that the potential difference between the High Voltage electrode and Collector electrode is unchanged.
Σ − =Σ − collector +Σ − HVelectrode 1
[0056] We may describe this split by a constant K which is solely a function of the radial distribution of the positive charge such that. K is known as the influence coefficient:
K = ∑ - collector ( ∑ - collector + ∑ - HVelectrode ) = fn ( radial location of ∑ + ) 2
[0057] Neglecting charge flow to the High Voltage electrode (which can only occur by diffusion against the strong electric field), the charge flow to the Collector Electrode carried by particles is given by:
I collected =I in −I out 3
[0058] Consider a cylindrical surface bounded by the dashed line in FIG. 5 which is located within the conductive Collector electrodes. The axial field is constant. Gauss's law states:
E • ds=∫ volume qdv 4
[0059] Where:
[0060] q is the charge in the volume enclosed by the surface
[0061] E is the electric field normal to the surface
[0062] [0062] ds and ids is the integral over the surface
[0063] The surface comprises a cylinder and 2 circular ends. Therefore Gauss's Law may be expressed as:
Area circular ends ×E axial +Area cylinder ×E radial =Σ q 5
[0064] Since the cylindrical surface is located inside the conductive Collector electrode, there is no field normal to this surface. Therefore:
Area circular end ×E axial =Σq=Σ + +Σ − 6
[0065] Therefore, substituting from 1 and 2
Σ − collector =K •(Area circular ends ×E axial −Σ + ) 7
[0066] Changes in Σ + at fixed r and hence fixed K cause the inducing of a current in the Collector electrode of the form:
I induced =dΣ − collector /dt=−K d(Σ + ) /dt 8
[0067] Therefore the total charge flow to the collector electrode, I measured has two components I collected and I induced . For the application described here, the required measurement of the classifier is I collected , which corresponds to impact of charged particles within a small band of electrical mobility such that their trajectories are incident onto the collector electrode. The charge flow I induced has a component from all particles within the control volume and is an unwanted artifact in this application. In certain circumstances, the magnitude of I induced can be significantly higher than I collected . In particulars collector electrodes near the entry of the column may have a small incident charge and a high induced charge, since most of the charged particles pass the electrode without hitting it.
[0068] In general:
I
measured
=I
collected
+I
induced
[0069] In FIG. 6, there are shown the trajectories of largest particles at end of classifier
[0070] Where Ux is the flow velocity ( − 1 m/s) and
[0071] L is the length of the Collector electrode ( − 30 mm)
[0072] The column 4 is arranged such that Collector electrode E 1 collects the particles with the lowest electrical mobility in the sample (these will be the largest particles—around 1000 nm diameter). These particles follow a trajectory which is within the envelope between A and B in FIG. 6.
[0073] I induced1 for Collector electrode E 1 is caused only by changes in the charge occurring in the flow field immediately adjacent to the ring (between trajectories A and B). All this charge is subsequently collected on the ring, which means that the induced component is negligible (I induced) ≈0) and:
I increased1 ≅I collected1 9
[0074] The current measured on the previous collector electrode (E 2 ) I measured2 , similarly has a component I collected2 due to particles with mobilities such that their trajectories fall between B and C in FIG. 6. However, the particles which pass Collector electrode E 2 without hitting it are the same as those which later hit Collector electrode E 1 . Changes in the charge on these particles give rise to an induced current on Collector electrode E 2 , I induced2 . This current is induced before the particles causing it are detected on the downstream collector electrode by a time equal to the transit time for gas between E 2 and E 1 . The delay time between a particle passing ring m and being collected on ring n is approximately:
δ t m , n = ∑ n = 1 m - 1 L n / Ux
[0075] Where L n is the length of the collector electrode n and Ux is the axial gas velocity.
[0076] The radial location of a charged particle which represents those falling between trajectories A and 8 (ie those that eventually hit the final collector electrode E 1 ) as they pass the penultimate collector electrode (E 2 ) can be estimated from the forces applied to it as it passes through along the classifier. The lost important forces are aerodynamic and the electrostatic forces due to the applied electric field and charge image attraction to surfaces. For the classifier, the applied electric field is large and therefore dominates the induced charge effects in the bulk of the column. The radial entry location is approximately known, as the aerosol all enters near to the High Voltage electrode, and one other point on the path is known to be the location of the final electrode. The electric field can be calculated from Gauss's law. Along with Stokes' theorem (strictly modified by a Cunningham slip correction factor for these small particles) which states that the drift velocity of a particle is proportional to the force on it, this allows the path which the particle follows through the channel to be predicted.
[0077] The radial location of particles eventually hitting Collector electrode E 1 can be determined along the column by solving:
r x = z p V x u x r ln ( r 2 r 1 ) 10
[0078] where r is the radial location of the particle within the classifier,
[0079] r2 is the radius of the surface of the High Voltage electrode
[0080] r1 is the radius of the Collector electrode
[0081] Vx is the Voltage between the High Voltage electrode and the Collector electrode at position x along the classifier
[0082] Ux is the axial flow velocity at position x along the classifier
[0083] For the annular geometry of the classifier, die proportion of charge induced on a given Collector electrode n for a particle at radius r (which is the influence coefficient, K) can be approximated as:
Km , n = [ 1 + ln ( r m , n r 2 ) ln ( r 2 r 1 ) ] 11
[0084] Where r m,n is the radial location at Collector electrode m of particles which subsequently hit Collector electrode n
[0085] Note that when the particle is close to the High voltage electrode, K is ˜0 and most of the charge is induced on the High Voltage electrode. When the particle is close to the Collector electrode, K is ˜1 and most of the charge is induced on the collector electrode. Therefore the component of current measured on Collector electrode E 2 (I measured2 ) due to the rate of change of charge passing Collector electrode E 2 (I induced2 ) can be calculated from this and the measured rate of change of current on Collector electrode E 1 (I measured1 ) using equation 8. The charge adjacent to E 2 , but not collected on it is (since all of this charge eventually hits E 1 ):
Σ + 2 =I measured1 ×δr 2,1 12
[0086] Therefore
I induced 2 =−δt 2,1 K 2,1 d(I measured 1 ) /dt 13
[0087] This principle is then extended upstream to the sample entry into the classifier as shown as the correction system in the block diagram in FIG. 2.
[0088] The collector electrodes E 1 to E 4 in this diagram are the four most downstream of the twenty two collector electrodes in the classifier. Collector electrode E 1 is furthest downstream, around 600 mm from the most upstream collector electrode. As very few charged particles leave the channel without being measured, the current on collector electrode E 1 , I measured1 indicates the number of particles per unit time (‘particle flux’) in the aerosol that passed the previous collector electrode E uncollected.
[0089] To correct for the transient errors due to the change in particle concentration in the vicinity of Collector electrode E 2 , the rate of change of the current on Collector electrode E 1 (shown by the d/dt box) is multiplied by the appropriate influence coefficient, K 2 (from equation 11) and subtracted from the current measured on Collector electrode E 2 (I measured2 ). This correction is applied to the value of the current measured on the penultimate electrode E 2 a short period earlier and stored, as indicated by the delay blocks in FIG. 2; this delay period being equal to the time taken for the aerosol and sheath flow to travel from the average position of the penultimate electrode to that of the final electrode (which is around 30 ms). Practically, the differentiation operation d/dt may be approximated, for example by a finite difference.
[0090] The trajectory down the classifier of charged particles incident on any given Collector electrode can be obtained by solving equation 10. Therefore, the appropriate value of influence coefficient, K m,n for Collector electrode m due to particles eventually hitting a downstream Collector electrode n can be determined from equation 11.
[0091] I induction (which is the component of induced current for Collector electrode m due to particles eventually hitting downstream collector electrodes) is a function of time and may be calculated as follows:
I induced m = - δ t m ∑ n = 1 m - 1 K m , n ( I measured m ( t + δ t m , n ) ) t 13
[0092] This compensation technique could be implemented as an analogue electric circuit, however the most practical implementation is a digitally sampled system as follows. Data may be sampled and stored digitally at intervals equal to δt (if δt is constant). In this case, the delay time effects are achieved by incrementally displacing the stored arrays. Alternatively, if data is sampled at rates either faster or slower than δt, or δt is not constant, then the arrays should be displaced to give close approximations to &t and where this cannot be achieved, an interpolation between datapoints may be required.
SUMMARY
[0093] For this embodiment 1 each measured current on a particular Collector electrode is adjusted by subtracting the induced current for that electrode which is determined as the sum of the induced currents due to particles landing on each of the downstream Collector electrodes.
Second Embodiment
[0094] The second embodiment of this invention is a modification to a standard electrostatic particle measuring consisting of an additional electrode which screens the sensing electrode or electrodes from the effect of changing charged particle concentrations in the aerosol nearby. This is shown in FIGS. 3 and 7, in which components substantially the same as those of the first embodiment are denoted by the corresponding reference numeral of FIGS. 1 and 5, raised by 100. The symbols used in FIG. 7 have the same meaning as the corresponding symbols used in the description of the first embodiment.
[0095] The existing collection electrodes 108 in the instrument are largely covered by an additional, cylindrical shielding electrode 109 which is constructed so that the majority of particles can still pass through it This might be achieved by making the shielding electrode of conductive mesh, gauze, perforated sheet, an array of wires, or similar. The electrical potential of the shielding electrode is controlled (possibly to electrical ground), probably by connecting it to a voltage supply 111 . The shielding electrode should be mounted close to the collection electrodes because it eliminates the effect on the collection electrode current of changes in the charged particle density in the aerosol beyond the shielding electrode but not in the volume between the shielding electrode and the collection electrodes. For practical reasons, one shielding electrode may screen one or more collection electrodes or several shielding electrodes may be used The shielding electrode should be designed to impede the flow of charged particles through it as little as possible, so for instance, the open fraction of the gauze should be maximised.
[0096] This example uses a single shielding electrode 109 to cover all the ring shaped collection electrodes 108 set unto the outer wall of the channel defined by housing 101 . The shielding electrode 109 takes the form of a gauze tube which is supported regularly on electrically insulating rings. The shielding electrode is connected to a voltage supply; the voltage on the shielding electrode should ideally be such that there is still a significant electrostatic field to attract particles from the vicinity of the shielding electrode to the collection electrodes, which must overcome the charge image force that will attract particles to the shielding electrode.
[0097] The shielding electrode in this example also reduces the sensitivity of the instrument to changes in the dielectric constant of the gas being measured and to noise in the high voltage supply. The collection electrodes in the DMS carry a constant charge due to the capacitance between them and the centre electrode 102 . In the case of the conventional DMS in FIG. 1, changes either in the electrostatic permittivity (due to, for example, water vapour concentration changes) of the aerosol or the voltage on the centre electrode will lead to a change in this charge which will be observed as an erroneous current. The shielding electrode will prevent changes in the permittivity of gas except in the gap between the shielding electrode and collection electrodes from affecting the charge on the collection electrodes, and in the DMS the sample flow remains near the centre of the channel, away from this region. With the shielding electrode fitted, the potential difference which determines the charge on the collection electrodes is now that between the shielding electrode and the collection electrodes, and as this potential difference is smaller, it may be easier to minimise the electrical noise on this voltage.
[0098] Collector electrodes 108 comprise rings with an internal diameter of 54 mm and the screen electrode 109 is a mesh tube of thickness about 0.2 mm with diameter 50 mm. Therefore, the screen electrode 109 is spaced from the collector electrodes 108 by about 2 mm.
[0099] The screen electrode 109 is maintained at a fixed voltage between that of the high voltage electrode 102 and collector electrodes 108 such that there is an electric field which attracts charged particles through the screen electrode 109 towards the collector electrodes 108 . We have operated the screen electrode with a voltage of around +100V.
[0100] The charge which is induced by the sample flow is now induced mainly on the high voltage electrode 102 and screen electrode 109 and not on the collector electrodes 108 . The primary current flow to the collector electrode 108 from charged particles in the sample passing through the screen 109 and hitting electrodes 108 .
[0101] The screen electrode 109 mesh size is optimised for reducing the currents induced on the collector electrode, while allowing charged particles to pass through the mesh to the collector electrode. It has been found that a satisfactory size for holes in the mesh is of the same order as the separation between the screen electrode and collector electrode. A mesh made up of triangular holes, with sides of 2 mm, separated by a web of metal of 0.2 mm has been found to give good performance. The screen electrode can be made from thin stainless steel sheet and with an open area of around 80%. =p The voltage stability of the screen electrode is very important since changes cause an induced signal on the collector electrode. The support of the screen electrode is important since vibration of the screen electrode relative to the high voltage electrode and collector electrode gives rise to large induced currents on the collector electrode.
SUMMARY
[0102] With this embodiment by interposing a screen electrode between the majority of the sample aerosol and the collector electrode, the current measured on the collector electrode is due solely to charged aerosol hitting the collector electrode.
Third Embodiment
[0103] A third embodiment of detector is shown in FIGS. 4 and 8, in which components corresponding to those of the first embodiment are denoted by the reference numerals of FIGS. 1 and 5 raised by 200, the third embodiment includes an addition of compensating electrodes 207 mounted near the collector electrodes 208 , in alternating sequence therewith. The electrodes 207 are held at a different potential from the electrodes 208 such that the compensating electrodes do not collect significant numbers of charged particles. The compensating electrodes 207 may be the same size as or a different size to the collection electrodes 208 and should be mounted as close to them as possible. The current flowing to these electrodes is then due only to the rate of change of charged particle density in the aerosol near the electrodes. With appropriate gain to take account of the different sizes of the electrodes, the current measured on the compensating electrodes is subtracted from the current measured on the collection electrodes and thus the effect of changing charged particle concentrations is eliminated.
[0104] As can be seen from FIG. 4, the compensating electrodes 207 are mounted between successive collection electrodes 208 in the channel 204 . The compensating electrodes 207 are controlled to a voltage such that there is little electric field attracting the charged particles towards them. In FIG. 4, only one such electrical connection is shown for clarity. For the DMS, the compensating electrode voltage should preferably be approximately equal to the voltage of the centre electrode 202 . In this example, the correction used for each collection electrode 208 , is preferably equal to the average of the currents measured flowing to the electrodes on either side, multiplied by approximately the ratio of the collection electrode length to the compensating electrode length.
[0105] In FIG. 8 the flow of charge from particles incident on the Compensation electrode leads to I′ collected +; the flow of induced charge to the Compensation electrode leads to I′ induced +; the total charge flow to the Compensation electrode is I′ measured +
[0106] In this implementation, one or more compensation electrodes are introduced adjacent to the collector electrodes. These are maintained at a voltage such that the field at the surface of the electrode acts to repel charged particles in the sample. This requires that the voltage be higher than that for the high voltage electrode. In practice smaller voltages may be used where the collected particles are a very small proportion of those which would have been collected on a ground potential electrode (e.g. 1%) i.e.
I′ collected +≈0
[0107] Since no charged particles are incident on the compensation electrodes, the signal measured is solely due to the induced charge particles moving in front of the electrodes. For compensation electrodes adjacent to collector electrodes, this means that the induced charge for the collector electrode may he estimated. Where the compensation is shorter than the collector electrode, the compensation should be made per unit length of the compensation electrode.
[0108] Where a collector electrode is between two compensation electrodes, the average of the two compensations could be used.
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An electrostatic instrument for measuring particle concentrations and possibly sizes in aerosols, such as an Electrostatic Low Pressure Impactor or Differential Mobility Analyser suffers from errors which limit the useful response bandwidth of the device. The invention minimises or eliminates these transient errors which are caused by changing particle concentrations in the aerosol. A system may be added to an otherwise conventional instrument to compensate for the transient effects based on a model of the charge production mechanism. Alternatively, a screening electrode placed over the sense electrodes in the instrument, and held at controlled electrical potential difference, is added to the instrument to eliminate the effect. A third embodiment adds compensating electrodes which provide a direct measurement of the transient effect which can be subtracted from the signal.
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This application is a continuation-in-part of Ser. No. 132,483 filed Mar. 21, 1980, and now abandoned.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The present invention relates to a nutritional method for reducing the incidence of frequently encountered health problems in periparturient cows and, more specifically, to an improved method for calcium administration in dairy cows.
Parturition and the onset of lactation impose severe physiological stresses on the dairy cow. It has long been recognized that severe hypocalcemia or low blood calcium, which is a common condition of periparturient cows, is a direct cause of milk fever. Also, calcium is very important for muscle contraction and is essential for normal uterine contractions in expelling the placenta.
Intravenous injections of a calcium solution have been used as a treatment for milk fever, after the onset thereof. However, a relatively high time and cost are involved in intravenous administration, as well as creating a new danger of death from the rapid increase thus produced in the blood calcium level. The practice of injecting calcium intravenously as a cure for milk fever is discussed in Yearbook of Agriculture "Keeping Livestock Healthy" U.S. Department of Agriculture, 1942, at page 584. The 1956 edition of the same publication, at page 244, also recognizes the calcium adminstration may be beneficial for cows that have had milk fever, but does not suggest the level of dosage, manner of administration, etc., and concludes that none of the previously attempted methods of preventing milk fever has had much success.
Among the various methods which have been suggested for maintaining or restoring blood-calcium levels to combat milk fever or other calving-related health disorders are those which involve prolonged dietary programs. That is, cows are given special supplements along with their usual rations over a prolonged period which may extend both before and after parturition. An example of this type of this type of dietary plan is that described in British Pat. No. 1,542,838. This method involves maintaining the available calcium intake of the cow at about 30 grams per day for a period of at least 4 to 5 weeks until at least one day prior to parturition, at which time the intake is increased to a level of 50 to 130 grams. Since the exact time of parturition is difficult to judge in advance, this method is subject to errors in estimating the future time of parturition. Furthermore, the method requires special delivery supervision and control over each cow in a herd in accordance with projected calving dates during a period of many weeks which is obviously a tedious and time consuming task, subject to further errors.
A principal object of the present invention is to provide improved methods of establishing blood calcium levels in periparturient dairy cows which significantly reduce health problems connected with hypocalcemia prior to the onset thereof.
Another object is to provide preventive methods of the aforementioned type which are fast, efficacious and easy to administer.
A further object is to provide methods of controlling health disorders prior to the onset thereof in periparturient dairy cows which employ inexpensive and readily accessible materials.
Still another object is to provide a method for significantly reducing the incidence of calving-related health disorders in dairy cows which does not involve estimation of future parturition dates while insuring that each cow receives the necessary dosage in a single step.
Other objects will in part be obvious and will in part appear hereinafter.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
In accordance with the foregoing object, the invention contemplates a preventive method comprising the administration to all cows within a period of 8 hours, and preferably within 2 hours, after parturition of a forced oral dosage of readily absorbable calcium. As used herein, the term "readily absorbable calcium" denotes any calcium source which produces within a period of not more than one hour after ingestion a blood calcuim level which prevents the onset of milk fever. The calcuim is preferably in the form of finely ground or powered calcium carbonate (CaCO 3 ) and is given in a single, forced, oral dosage of about 30 grams. The dosage may be administered in the form of a drench, i.e., in a water solution which is forcibly pumped into the cow's esophagus, or in gelatin capsules, but is preferably contained in a compacted pellet or bolus, one or more of which (forcibly administered together) may constitute a complete dosage. In this (bolus) form the nutritional supplement is convenient to package, store, handle, and administer, and may contain other dietary supplements. A preferred form of bolus contains about 20% by weight insert binder and about 80% active ingredients, 90% to 95 % of which is finely ground calcium carbonate.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
The present invention is based upon and is verified by certain in field tests which were performed on a number of herds of dairy cows. In each of three tests, described separately in the following paragraphs, dry cows on each farm were alternately assigned at the beginning of the trial period to either control or experimental groups based on projected calving date. No first-calf heifers were included. Cooperating dairymen had to have adequate cow identification and individual cow health records. The trial objective and procedures were discussed with the dairyman and his respective herd veterinarian prior to initiation of the trial. This practice was continued throughout the trial. It was requested that the dairyman not alter his "normal" feeding and management practices during the trial.
In one test, cows assigned to the experimental group were offered a mixture of 12 oz. of an experimental supplement in about two gallons of lukewarm water between 30 minutes and 2 hours postpartum. The supplement contained 80% calcium lactate, 16% dried skim milk, 1% sodium bicarbonate, 1% salt and 2% vitamin premix. About 35 grams of calcium was contained in each 12 oz. package. If the supplement could not be offered within the prescribed time, the cow was classified as "missed" and included with the control group in the test results. Control cows received no supplement at any time.
The test included a total of 417 control cows and 466 experimental cows, 121 of which were missed and thus tabulated with the control group. Of the 345 cows offered the experimental supplement, 128 consumed none, 61 about one-quarter, 44 about half, 26 about three-quarters, and 86 all of the water containing the supplement. Post-calving measurements and data were recorded through the first 60 days of lactation.
The incidence of milk fever in the control group was 12.2%. Of the cows consuming less than half the experimental supplement, 10.1% contracted milk fever; of those which consumed one-half or more, the incidence of milk fever was 5.8%. The effect of the supplement on retained placenta was similar, with the control group showing a 20.3% incidence and the experimental groups consuming less than half and more than half of the supplement having incidence rates of 16.9% and 7.1%, respectively. Consumption of at least half the experimental supplement appeared to have similar beneficial effects in lowering the incidence of other health disorders. For example, the control group, those consuming less than and more than half of the supplement averaged 5.8%, 3.7%, and 1.3%, respectively, in incidence of ketosis and 9.3%, 10.6% and 5.1%, respectively, for metritis.
Although the test demonstrated the effectiveness of the oral administration of the nutrient supplement within the prescribed period in a water solution, problems with acceptability in the form offered were encountered. While 62.9% of the cows consumed some portion of the supplement when offered, only 24.9% consumed all of it, and 45.2% consumed at least half. Thus, while oral administration in water solution is effective when consumed, the present invention encompasses only forced oral dosages which, in the case of liquid solutions, would be administered in the form of a drench, a conventional and accepted method of administering forced oral dosages of liquid medicaments.
In another test, the dosage was administered in the form of gelatin capsules filled with an experimental supplement which included 29.5% calcium, 3.11% phosphorus, 4.67% magnesium and fractional percentages of sodium, potassium, copper, iron, manganese and zinc. The experimental supplement was adminstered in a single dosage of three capsules, providing about 31 grams total available calcium, to assigned cows as soon as possible after calving. Time of administration were recorded as less than or more than two hours post-calving. Cows were eliminated from the experimental group if they were not administered the supplement within eight hours after parturition. A group of control cows within each herd tested received no supplement at any time. Post-calving measurements and data were recorded through the first 21 days of lactation.
This test was performed simultaneously at a total of 31 farms and included 322 experimental or test cows and 345 control cows. Of the test cows, 241 received the supplement within 2 hours after calving, and 81 in the period of 2 to 8 hours post-calving. Analysis of data showed significant reduction of retained placenta and milk fever in those animals having single births and receiving the supplement within 2 hours post-calving, actual count being a 54% reduction in the incidence of retained placenta and 55% reduction of milk fever over the control group cows. The experimental supplement appeared to have no effect in cows giving multiple births.
In a third field trial, data were collected from 90 herds, including a total of 1,710 cows. Within herds, dry cows which had milk fever following one or both of the two previous calvings were alternately assigned to the control and experimental groups. Additional dry cows were then assigned in the same manner.
The control cows received a single dosage of a placebo in the form of 3 gelatin capsules filled with solka-floc. The experimental cows received the special nutritional supplement in a single dosage of 3 boluses. The capsules and boluses were administered to assigned cows as soon as possible after calving. The nutritional supplement provided about 30 grams of calcium per administration. Time of administration was recorded as less than or more than 2 hours post-calving. Cows were eliminated from both groups if they were not administered the capsules or boluses within 8 hours post-calving.
The incidence of health problems is based on a total of 848 cows for the control group and 862 cows for the experimental group. A reduction of 65.1% in milk fever incidence between the control and experimental groups was comparable to that observed in the two previously described trials, the milk fever incidence being 6.3% in the control group and 2.2% in the experimental group. In those cows having a previous history of milk fever, those in the control group showed an incidence of 44% vs. 12.5% for the experimental group, a reduction of 71.6%.
The incidence of retained placenta for all cows in the control and experimental group was 21% and 12%, respectively, a reduction of 43% in the cows receiving the supplement. Although the greatest reduction in retained placenta was observed in cows having single births, cases of retained placenta showed a 33.7% reduction in cows having twins. In the two tests previously described, the incidence of retained placenta in cows having twins was similar for the control and experimental groups. This suggests an improvement in efficiency for the supplement in bolus form.
The composition of the boluses administered in this test was 70.12% limestone, 20% inert binder, 6.4% selenium premix and smaller amounts of other nutrients. The limestone was very finely ground, passing through a U.S. 200 mesh screen, and had a calcium content between 36 and 37 percent.
From the foregoing it may be seen that the present invention provides a method for the administration of preventive nutritional supplements which significantly reduces the incidence of milk fever and retained placenta in dairy cows, as well as having apparent beneficial effects on other common calving-related disorders such as ketosis, metritis, displaced abomasum and inappetance. Since the method invloves only a single, forced, oral dosage it is fast, inexpensive, safe and easy to adminster as opposed to prior art methods involving, for example, potentially dangerous injections or supervision and control of diet over a relatively long period of time. Also, the forced dosage is effective over a greater number of cows than prior art methods which depend upon voluntary consumption of the dosage, which often does not occur.
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The invention comprises an improved method for administering calcium dosages to periparturient dairy cows, resulting in significant decreases in the incidence of milk fever and retained placenta. The single dosage comprises 18 to 36 grams of readily absorbable calcium, preferably finely powdered calcium carbonate in an amount which provides about 30 grams of available calcium. The dosage, preferably in the form of one or more compacted pellets, is administered orally within a period of 0 to 8 hours (preferably 0-2 hours) after parturition. The oral dosage is forcefully administered, as opposed to being offered to the cow in the form of a feed or drinking water supplement.
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This is a division of application Ser. No. 7/897,027, filed Jun. 11, 1992, now U.S. Pat. No. 5,296,083.
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
The present invention is directed to a method and apparatus for removal of floor tile, and in particular the relatively safe removal of asbestos floor tile.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
It is often necessary to remove and replace asbestos floor tile with non-asbestos tile. Typically, the asbestos tile is manually removed by scraping and breaking sections of the tile with a knife and other blade devices, which can cause dangerous asbestos particles to become airborne. Simply forcing or breaking off the asbestos tile by mechanical means is laborious, relatively expensive, inefficient and hazardous to the workers and others within the general environment. In addition, the problem of containing/stacking, shipping and disposing of the hazardous scraps and pieces of waste material produced by the prior art methods is substantial. It is noted that such prior art methods produces numerous asbestos fiber surfaces about each broken-off piece of tile and, consequently, detectable airborne asbestos contamination of the air environment.
Since large quantities of scraps and pieces of tile are more difficult to containerize, transport, and store than uniform originally shaped tile sections, for example, flat square foot tiles, such prior art techniques and removal methods are relatively expensive and wasteful of our limited disposal sites for hazardous materials.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF FOUR RELATED PRIOR ART PATENTS
1. U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,934,379 issued Jan. 27, 1976, to Norman R. Braton and Jan R. Acker, describes a method for removal of layers of organic material built up on a support for articles during surface coating.
This patent does not teach the use of cryogens or any other temperature lowering method for the removal of hazardous asbestos floor tile, nor is this patent concerned with and does not recognize the problems of removal, handling, transporting and storing of hazardous asbestos materials.
2. U.S. Pat. No. 4,956,042 issued Sep. 11, 1990, to Jean-Lue Hubert, et al, describes a method of embrittling and removing an outer protective coating of a pipe or pipeline. The pipe is enclosed to define an annular space and a cryogen is expanded within this annular space to cause embrittlement of the coating to be removed.
Thus, it is an object of this patented invention to embrittle the coating material, i.e., the protective coating surrounding a pipe, to facilitate its removal. This patented invention does not appear to be concerned with nor does it teach a method to substantially reduce and/or eliminate the causes of airborne asbestos that may result from the breaking of embrittled floor tile sections.
In total contrast to the '042 patent discussed above, the present invention is directed not at the embrittlement of asbestos floor tile but rather the freeing or debonding of the floor tiles from the subflooring in substantially unbroken condition with its structural characteristics and asbestos fibers within the tile substantially unchanged from its condition prior to removal. In this manner, it is an object of the present invention to enable removal of intact floor tiles with their structural integrity substantially maintained, i.e., its properties to constrain the asbestos fibers unchanged.
3. U.S. Pat. No. 2,421,753 issued Jun. 10, 1947 to W. J. Joyce teaches a means for unblocking lenses. This patent does not show, describe, or suggest a method for removing floor tile while substantially reducing or eliminating the risk of causing the release of airborne asbestos fibers into the environment.
4. U.S. Pat. No. 2,399,679 issued May 7, 1946 to G. W. Jackson also shows a means for unblocking lenses. It is noted that this patent is not concerned with nor does it suggest or describe a method of handling hazardous waste materials such as asbestos.
SOME OF THE ADVANTAGES OF THE PRESENT INVENTION
In total contrast with the prior art patents noted above and the prior art related to the removal of floor tiles, the present invention provides a more efficient, cost effective and substantially safer method and means for the removal of floor tiles, and in particular, floor tiles which contain hazardous materials and fibers, such as asbestos. Another advantage of the present invention resides in the relative ease and less expensive handling of the removed tile which can be readily stacked in containers and shipped for safe disposal. Also, since the tiles are removed in one piece, i.e., the sections as installed which are typically one foot squares by approximately one eight inch thick, substantially less asbestos fiber exposed ragged edges are exposed to the air and the workers doing the removal, stacking, shipping and disposal work.
OBJECTIVES OF THE INVENTION
It is an object of the present invention to provide an improved method for the removal floor of tile.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a new method for the removal of asbestos floor tile.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a new method for preventing the release of asbestos fibers into the air while removing asbestos floor tile from subflooring.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a new method for the removal of asbestos floor tiles whereby each tile may be removed intact.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a method for preventing asbestos fibers from becoming airborne during the removal of asbestos containing tile from floors.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a method of replacing floor tiles.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a method of removing asbestos floor tile whereby broken tile edges are eliminated.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a method for the removal of floor tile whereby the removed tile may be stacked for relatively inexpensive transportation.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a method for the removal of asbestos containing floor tile from a subfloor without breaking or cracking the tile into pieces.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a new method for debonding a floor tile from a supporting structure.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a method for rendering the bonding and/or adhesive medium between a tile and a supporting surface ineffective as a bonding medium whereby the tile may be readily removed.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a new and improved method of altering the bonding and/or adhesive quality of the bonding agent between a floor tile and the subfloor supporting said tile whereby the floor tile may be more quickly and easily removed.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a more economical method for the removal of floor tile.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a substantially less laborious method and system for the removal of floor tile.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a new and improved method and system for removing and handling hazardous waste material asbestos floor tiles.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a new means whereby floor tile may be relatively more economically, easily and safely removed asbestos floor tiles.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a new and improved means whereby removed asbestos floor tile can be relatively more economically, easily and safely stacked, containerized and transported for disposal.
Further and other objects of the invention may be and may become apparent to one skilled in the art by a perusal of the disclosure in the present application, and it is to be understood that the present showings are by way of illustration only and are not to be considered as limitations.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
Dry ice is placed in a frame mounted on wheels. The dry ice is covered with, for example, wet burlap, which dry ice rests on the (asbestos) floor tiles. Electric fans mounted on the frame blows air over the covered dry ice, down onto the asbestos floor tiles. The gases created by this procedure, (dry ice turns to gas at 78.5 C./110 F.) causes the complete and clean separation of the (asbestos) floor tile from the subflooring.
When this process is monitored by approved Federal and State air monitoring equipment, a zero contaminant reading has been observed.
An asbestos floor tile removal system for uplifting asbestos floor tile from a subfloor, comprising:
means for reducing the temperature of the asbestos floor tile for a period of time to effect a substantial debonding between the asbestos tile and the underlying subfloor;
means for uplifting the debonded asbestos tile off the subfloor;
whereby the debonded and uplifted asbestos tile being removed substantially without degradation and virtually without emission of asbestos into the surrounding environment.
A relatively safe method for the removal and containerization of obsolete floor tile previously adhered to a subfloor by a bonding agent, which floor tile contains one or more hazardous materials such as asbestos, comprising the steps of:
applying a temperature reducing agent such as dry ice or a cryogen to one or more selected floor tile for a selected period of time for causing a reduction of the temperature of the selected floor tile and the underlying bonding agent to a level whereby the bonding agent being rendered substantially ineffective as a bonding medium;
uplifting the debonded floor tile in substantially uniform and unbroken floor tile sections;
stacking the uplifted uniform floor tile sections into container means;
sealing said container means for shipment;
whereby the debonded floor tile may be removed and containerized with virtually a zero hazardous material air contamination risk to the workers.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
A more complete appreciation of the invention and many of the attendant advantages thereof will be readily obtained as the same becomes better understood by reference to the following detailed description when considered in connection with the accompanying drawings, wherein:
FIG. 1 is a perspective view of embodying apparatus designed in accordance with the present invention and being shown in operational disposition on a tile floor;
FIG. 2 is a perspective view of the apparatus shown in FIG. 1, with the top cover means and blower removed;
FIG. 3 is a top diagrammatic view of the apparatus shown in 8 FIG. 1, with the top cover means and blower removed;
FIG. 4 is a perspective view of an alternative embodiment of apparatus designed in accordance with the present invention;
FIG. 5 is an exploded view of the alternative embodiment of apparatus illustrated in FIG. 4.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
A preferred embodiment and an alternative embodiment of the invention will now be described with reference to the attached drawings, in which the same reference numerals are used to represent the same or corresponding elements throughout the various views.
With particular reference to FIGS. 1, 2, and 3, the apparatus 10 of the invention has a main housing 11, which is formed of a rigid material such as wood, plastic or metal. The housing 11 is basically formed of two side board members 12, 13 having a length of approximately 72 inches, a height of approximately 9 inches and a thickness of approximately 3/4 inch, and two end board members 14, 15 each having a length of approximately 36 inches, height of approximately 9 inches and a thickness of approximately 3/4 inch. Although the housing 11 has a rectangular configuration in accordance with the preferred embodiment of the invention, other shapes such as a square may be utilized in which the side and end board members are of substantially equal dimensions. Lateral support beams 16 may be structurally affixed to the housing 11 in conventional manner, for example, with screws, nuts and bolts (not shown) to provide increased structural strength and integrity to housing 11.
Four rollers or casters 17 of conventional design are operatively mounted to housing 11 in conventional manner, for example, by means of screws (not shown), nuts and bolts and mounting brackets 18, to facilitate the ability of a worker/operator to move and deploy the inventive device or apparatus 10 on and about a tile floor 19. Each caster 17 is set within a respective alcove 20 of housing 11 to enable the inventive device 10 to be placed in close juxtaposition with the walls (not shown) of the building. In this manner, application to or treatment of the tiles close to such walls may be accomplished. Each caster 17 is recessed within the respective alcoves 20 whereby the housing 11 is held slightly above the floor tile 19 a predetermined distance. For example, the bottom edges 21 of the side and end members 12-15, are maintained approximately 1/8 to 3/4 inches above the floor tile 19.
A top cover 22 having peripheral dimensions substantially equal to the dimensions of housing 11 is provided atop housing 11. Top cover 22 may be formed of burlap or other suitable material to cover the upper openings 23 formed within housing 11.
A blower device 25 is placed or mounted atop cover member 22 and is supportably positioned over support beams 16. Blower device 25 may be of conventional design having one or more electrically powered fans (not shown) for directing a stream of air downwardly over portions of a coolant such as dry ice and thence unto the floor tile.
OPERATION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
The operation of the preferred embodiment of the invention will now be discussed with reference to FIGS. 1-4.
The housing 11 is placed on the tile floor selected for removal.
The interior spaces or alcove(s) 23 of housing 11 are substantially filled with dry ice 26.
Top cover 22, consisting of wet burlap, is placed over the dry ice 26 to substantially contain the gases being formed and the lower temperatures caused by the evaporating dry ice from freely escaping upwardly into the room environment.
The blower device 25, having one or more fans, is placed atop the burlap cover 22 and energized, via plug 24, to cause, a continuous flow of air through the wet burlap across the surface areas of the dry ice 26 and downwardly unto the tile floor beneath apparatus or debonder 10.
Debonder 10 is maintained in position over selected tile sections for a period of time sufficient to cause the bonding agent or cement glue 27 to substantially or completely lose its bonding or gluing properties between the treated tile and the underlying subfloor 28. The minimum time period may be determined empirically so as to enable an efficient and economical and quick debonding process.
Following the debonding process, debonder 10 is disposed over another selected portion of the tile floor 19 and the debonding process continues in a progressive section-by-section manner until all the tiles selected for removal have been debonded.
Following each sectional debonding, the debonded tiles, for example, tile 29 may be manually uplifted by a worker 30 (partially shown) with relative ease using standard tools, with the tiles 29,32 being generally intact. Since each tile is similarly removed intact, virtually no asbestos or other undesired and/or hazardous dust, and fibers are emitted into the rooms air environment. In addition, since the tiles 29,32 are not broken into numerous ragged smaller pieces which are relatively more hazardous to handle, the workers are at less risk from lung, skin and clothing exposure and, consequently, contamination from asbestos. Thus, not only are the workers' risks reduced but also the risk is reduced for the family members who may come into contact with his clothing.
Next, the worker 30 (partially shown) can stack the substantially uniform (generally square) tiles into relatively neat piles 32 for removal from the work site or directly into cartons 33.
As each stack 32 of tiles is containerized, the neatly packaged tile may be more economically transported to a government approved disposal site. It should now be appreciated that not only are the risks of asbestos fiber contamination at the floor tile uplifting and containerizing site reduced or virtually eliminated, but that the risk to the transporters-carriers is also substantially reduced. For example, it should be apparent that much less risk of asbestos contamination is likely to occur if a carton of intact tiles should rupture or open while in transit than if the transporting container was filled with numerous various sized and shaped bits and pieces of ragged edged asbestos tile.
DESCRIPTION OF ALTERNATIVE EMBODIMENT
With reference now to FIGS. 4 and 5, an alternative embodiment 39 of the invention apparatus and system will now be discussed.
Housing frame 34 basically comprises a rectangular shaped frame having elongated side walls 35,36, front end wall member 37, and rear end wall member 38. A pair of front and rear rollers or casters or roller bearing means 40 are mounted in conventional manner to housing 34. Roller-bearings 40 are mounted to facilitate the disposition of debonder 39 upon the tile floor 19, and to space the bottom edges 41 of housing 34 slightly higher, for example, between 1/8 inch to 1 inch, above the tile floor 19.
A skirt member 42 is affixed by conventional means, such as screws 43, about the lower periphery of housing 34. Skirt member 42 may be formed of rubber, plastic or other suitable material and a plurality of protruding fibers 44 similar to a brush or other suitable substances to form a flexible skirt means which extends downwardly into rubbing contact with the tile floor 19. The general purpose of the skirt member 42 is to form a flexible element with the contours of the tile floor 19, while constraining the refrigerant reduced temperature in contact with the tiles located below debonder 39.
A cover plate 45 is provided to be mounted to frame 34, for example, by hinge means 46. Cover plate 45 is dimensioned to rest upon the peripheral ledge or edge 47 of frame 34. Cover plate 45 is affixed to frame 34 in conventional manner, for example, by screws and hinges 46. Cover plate 45 may be formed of metal, wood, plastic or other suitable material. A plurality of holes 48 are provided in cover plate 45 to accommodate nozzle means 49 discussed in more detail hereinafter.
Pipe network 50 is mounted atop cover plate 45. Pipe network 50 comprises a refrigerant or cryogen distribution means. Pipe network 50 may be formed of metal or plastic pipes having suitable properties as a conduit for the cryogen-refrigerant to nozzle means 49. Pipe network 50 is operatively connected to a source 51 of pressurized refrigerant or liquid cryogen such as, for example, liquid nitrogen or carbon dioxide. A control valve 52 is connected to pipe network 50 for controlling the flow rate of the refrigerant/cryogen to nozzle means 49.
Nozzle means 49 comprises a plurality of conventional nozzles operatively connected to pipe network 50 for applying or distributing the refrigerant/cryogen substances downwardly into chamber 53 which is defined by frame 34 and cover plate 45. Gasket means (not shown) may be provided as a seal between cover plate 45 and nozzle means 49.
A handle means 55 may be provided to facilitate placement and handling of debonded 39. A temperature gauge means 56 of conventional design may be operatively mounted to debonded 39 having a temperature measuring means 57 projection via hole 58 into the refrigeration chamber 53.
A mounting rack 57 comprises a plurality of bars 58 affixed, for example, welded 59, to cover plate 45 to form a container 33 receiving storage rack means.
OPERATION OF THE ALTERNATIVE EMBODIMENT
The operation of the alternative embodiment of the invention will now be discussed.
The debonder 39 is placed on the tile floor 19 with skirt means 42 contributing to form a substantial cooling chamber 53.
Control valve 52 is opened to permit the flow of the refrigerant/cryogen liquid/gas to flow through pipe network 50 and delivered, via nozzle means 49, into the cooling chamber 53. In this manner, the lowered temperature within chamber 53 is applied to the floor tiles positioned below chamber 53 and, thereby, to the bonding agent 27. Thus, in similar manner to the preferred embodiment, the bonding agent 27 is subjected to such lowered temperature for a period of time to cause the debonding effect. This time period may be empirically determined.
The other process steps and system is similar to that describe above with reference to the preferred embodiment.
Obviously, numerous modifications and variations of the present invention are possible in light of the above teachings. It is therefore to be understood that within the scope of the appended claims, the invention may be practiced otherwise that as specifically described herein.
In the appended claims the terms "debond" or "debonding" are used to define a process whereby air, gas, cryogen refrigerant agent or dry ice (having a relative low temperature) is applied to a floor tile to cause the substantial or total ineffectiveness of the bonding agent to bond or hold in place such tiles with the subfloor.
The term "Debonder" is used to describe apparatus designed in accordance with the present invention to apply or implement one or more steps in the debonding containerizing process of floor tiles.
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A method for removal of asbestos floor tile comprising the following steps: lowering the temperature of a selected tile section and the adhesive material between said tile(s) and the juxtaposed subflooring; maintaining the temperature reducing agent for a period of time sufficient to cause said adhesive material/layer to substantially lose its bonding properties; removing the de-bonded asbestos tile from the subflooring and disposing according to Governmental regulations.
A manually transportable housing dimensioned for receiving therewithin a quantity or block of dry ice. Said housing having a bottom section defining an opening for being aligned with a selected asbestos floor tile(s). Blower means mounted to said housing for directing an air stream over said dry ice and downwardly through said opening unto said tile(s).
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This application is a continuation of application Ser. No. 08/240,373, filed May 10, 1994, now abandoned.
FIELD OF THE INVENTION
This invention pertains to improved methods for inducing protective immunity against Bovine Respiratory Syncytial Virus (BRSV), specifically employing a modified live vaccine suitable for administration to recipient animals in a single dose.
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Bovine Respiratory Syncytial Virus (BRSV) is now recognized as an important etiologic agent in the Bovine Respiratory Disease Complex (BRDC). Disease is characterized by rapid breathing, coughing, loss of appetite, ocular and nasal discharge, and elevated temperatures. In an acute outbreak, death may follow within 48 hours of onset of symptoms.
BRSV infects cattle of all ages, including nursing calves. BRSV is considered the most common viral pathogen in enzootic pneumonia in calves, and has also been associated with pulmonary emphysema among newly weaned calves. Thus, there is a need for effective prophylaxis against this virus in cattle and dairy herds.
Establishing protective immunity against BRSV is problematic. As in some other virally-mediated diseases, the levels of serum antibodies against BRSV do not necessarily correlate with protection against disease. This phenomenon may reflect a role for locally produced IgA directed against BRSV (Kimman et al., J. Clin. Microbiol. 25:1097-1106, 1987), and/or a requirement for cell-mediated immunity to mount an effective defense against this virus. Establishing protective immunity in nursing calves presents additional obstacles, since maternal antibodies to BRSV may deplete the injected immunogen and effectively neutralize the vaccine. Finally, the inconvenience and expense of multiple vaccinations makes a single-dose vaccine desirable. Thus there is a need in the art for one-dose BRSV vaccine formulations that elicit a vigorous and multi-faceted immune response.
The standard administration regimen for prior art BRSV vaccines is two doses (Stott et al., J. Hyg. Camb. 93: 251-261, 1984; Thomas et al., Agri-Practice 5: 1986; and Syvrud et al., Vet. Med. 83: 429-430, 1988; Veterinary Pharmaceuticals & Biologicals, Edition 8 1993/94, pp. 484, 740-741,956-960, 982-983.) As shown in Kucera et al. (Agri-Practice, Vet. Med., Vol. 78, October 1983, pp. 1599-1604, 1983), a single experimental BRSV vaccination induced relatively low levels of serum neutralization (SN) antibody titer to BRSV, whereas two doses of the vaccine elicited 1:10 to 1:320 SN antibody titers. Furthermore, in herds apparently exposed to BRSV during field trials, approximately 48% of non-vaccinated animals required treatment for respiratory disease, compared with 27% and 21% among single-dose and double-dose vaccinates, respectively. However, the causative agent for respiratory disease in the field trials was not conclusively shown to be BRSV. Also, it was noted that a single-dose vaccine did not appear to be very immunogenic. Later evaluations concluded that two doses of this vaccine would be essential to obtain good protection (Bovine Vet. Forum 1:No.2 pp. 2-16, 1986; Syvrud, et al., Vet. Med. 429-430, 1988).
European Patent Application No. 129,923 (published Feb. 1, 1985 and issued as a patent Jul. 9, 1988) describes a method of preparing a live BRSV vaccine that involves dissolving the live vaccine in an inactivated vaccine containing one or more antigens (particularly inactivated influenza virus) formulated as an oil-in-water emulsion. A serological response was obtained in young animals still having maternal immunity. The application also describes a modified-live preparation including BRSV and adjuvant. However, no data were presented on the protective efficacy of any BRSV vaccine against BRSV challenge.
One object of the invention is to provide an effective vaccine against BRSV that elicits protective immunity and prevents disease caused by this virus.
A further object of the invention is to provide an adjuvant suitable for use in a BRSV vaccine, wherein the adjuvant enhances the immunogenicity of the virus so as to elicit protective immunity after a single dose of the vaccine.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The invention encompasses a composition for enhancing immune responses comprising a block copolymer, such as a polyoxypropylene-polyoxyethylene (POP-POE) block copolymer, preferably Pluronic® L121 (e.g. U.S. Pat. No. 4,772,466), and an organic component, such as a metabolizable oil, e.g. an unsaturated terpene hydrocarbon, preferably squalane (2,6, 10, 15, 19,23-hexamethyltetracosane) or squalene. The composition may also include a non-ionic detergent or surfactant, preferably a polyoxyethylene monooleate such as a Tween® detergent, e.g. Tween®-80.
In this stock adjuvant mixture, the block copolymer, organic oil, and surfactant may be present in amounts ranging from about 10 to about 40 ml/L, about 20 to about 80 ml/L, and about 1.5 to about 6.5 ml/L, respectively. In a preferred embodiment of the stock adjuvant, the organic component is squalane present in an amount of about 40 mL/L, the surfactant is polyoxyethylenesorbitan monooleate (Tween®-80) present in an amount of about 3.2 ml/L, and the POP-POE block copolymer is Pluronic® L121 present in an amount of about 20 ml/L. Pluronic® L121 is a liquid copolymer at 15-40 C., where the polyoxypropylene (POP) component has a molecular weight of 3250 to 4000 and the polyoxyethylene (POE) component comprises about 10-20%, preferably 10%, of the total molecule.
In another aspect, the present invention provides an immunogenic composition for immunizing an animal against infection by Bovine Respiratory Syncytial Virus (BRSV), comprising a modified live BRS Virus combined with the above adjuvant and a pharmaceutically acceptable stabilizer, carrier or diluent. The adjuvant is present in this vaccine composition at a final concentration of about 1-25% (v/v), preferably 5% (v/v). The composition may also include other viruses, such as Infectious Bovine Rhinotracheitis Virus (IBRV), Bovine Viral Diarrhea (BVDV), and Parainfiuenza 3 (PI-3V), and may be administered by intramuscular or subcutaneous routes.
In still another aspect, the present invention provides a method for protecting an animal against disease caused by Bovine Respiratory Syncytial Virus, by administering a single dose of the above vaccine comprising modified-live BRSV and adjuvant.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION
All patents, patent applications, and other literature cited herein are hereby incorporated by reference in their entirety. In the case of inconsistencies, the present disclosure will prevail.
As used herein, a "modified live vaccine" is a vaccine comprising a virus that has been altered, typically by passaging in tissue culture cells, to attenuate its ability to cause disease, but which maintains its ability to protect against disease or infection when administered to animals.
"Adjuvant" means a composition comprised of one or more substances that enhances the immunogenicity and efficacy of BRSV when combined with BRSV in a vaccine composition.
An "infectious unit" of BRSV is defined as a TCID 50 , or the amount of virus required for infecting or killing 50% of tissue culture cells.
The present invention provides a vaccine against BRSV that is suitable for single-dose administration. The vaccine is of the modified live virus variety. This provides the advantage of preserving the immunogenicity and/or efficacy of the virus while reducing its virulence.
The vaccine may be prepared from freshly harvested viral cultures by methods that are standard in the art (see Example 1 below.) That is, the virus may be propagated in tissue culture cells such as human diploid fibroblasts or preferably MDBK (Madin-Darby Bovine Kidney) or other bovine cells. The growth of the virus is monitored by standard techniques (observation of cytopathic effect, immunofiuorescence or other antibody-based assays), and harvested when a sufficiently high viral titer has been achieved. The viral stocks may be further concentrated or lyophilized by conventional methods before inclusion in the vaccine formulation. Other methods, such as those in described in Thomas, et al., Agri-Practice, V.7 No. 5, pp.26-30, can be employed.
The vaccine of the present invention comprises the modified live virus combined with one or more pharmaceutically acceptable stabilizers, carriers and adjuvants. Carriers suitable for use include saline, phosphate-buffered saline, Minimal essential media (MEM), or MEM with HEPES buffer. Stabilizers include but are not limited to sucrose, gelatin, peptone, digested protein extracts, such as NZ-Amine or NZ-Amine AS. In particular, the present invention includes an adjuvant that enhances the immunogenicity of the modified live virus and provides for a single administration to elicit protective immunity.
Non-limiting examples of suitable adjuvants include squalane and squalene (or other oils of animal origin); block copolymers such as Pluronic® (L121) Saponin; detergents such as Tween®-80; Quil® A, mineral oils such as Drakeol® or Marcol®, vegetable oils such as peanut oil; Corynebacterium-derived adjuvants such as corynebacterium parvum; Propionibacterium-derived adjuvants such as Propionibacterium acne; Mycobacterium bovis (Bacillus Calmette and Guerinn, or BCG); interleukins such as interleukin 2 and interleukin-12; monokines such as interleukin 1; tumor necrosis factor; interferons such as gamma interferon; combinations such as saponin-aluminum hydroxide or Quil®-A aluminum hydroxide; liposomes; iscom adjuvant; mycobacterial cell wall extract; synthetic glycopeptides such as murarnyl dipeptides or other derivatives; Avridine; Lipid A; dextran sulfate; DEAE-Dextran or DEAE-Dextran with aluminum phosphate; carboxypolymethylene, such as Carbopol®; EMA; acrylic copolymer emulsions such as Neocryl® A640 (e.g. U.S. Pat. No. 5,047,238); vaccinia or animal poxvirus proteins; subviral particle adjuvants such as orbivirus; cholera toxin; dimethyldiocledecylammonium bromide; or mixtures thereof.
The formulation of a preferred adjuvant mixture is described in Example 2 below.
The vaccine of the present invention can be administered preferably by intramuscular or subcutaneous routes, or less preferably by intranasal, intraperitoneal, or oral routes.
For single-dose administration, the vaccine should contain an amount of BRSV corresponding to from about 10 3 .0 to about 10 6 .0 TCID 50 /ml, preferably 10 4 to 10 5 TCID 50 /ml. About one to five ml, preferably 2 ml, may be administered per animal, intramuscularly, subcutaneously, or intraperitoneally. One to ten ml, preferably 2 to 5 ml, may be administered orally or intranasally.
The following examples are intended to further illustrate the invention without limiting its scope.
EXAMPLE 1
Growth and Harvesting of BRSV
A) Description of viral stocks
BRSV may be obtained from any number of readily available sources. In one embodiment, BRSV strain 375 may be used. This virulent strain of BRSV originated from Iowa State University, Ames Iowa. Any suitable BRSV strain is contemplated and included within the invention. Similarly, BHV-1, BVDV, and PI-3V are readily available viruses. When obtained in virulent form, these viruses can be attenuated, by known means, to provide modified-live viruses suitable for vaccine use. The viruses can also be killed by conventional methods to provide inactivated viruses suitable for vaccine use. Methods of attenuating or inactivating viruses for vaccine use are well known. Modified-live and/or killed BRSV, BHV-1, BVDV, and PI-3V virus vaccines are known and commercially available. See, for example, Thomas, et al., supra, and Veterinary Pharmaceuticals & Biologicals, supra and Appendix 2, A-31-45.
B) Cell culture
The MDBK (NBL-1) cell line, free of BVD, was purchased from the American Type Culture Collection. It was maintained in OptiMEM (Gibco, Grand Island, N.Y.), supplemented with up to 10% (v/v) bovine serum, up to 0.5% lactalbumin hydrolysate (JRH, Lenexa, Kans.), up to 30 mcg/ml polymixin B (Phizer, NY, N.Y.) and neomycin (Upjohn, Kalamazoo, Mich.), and up to 2.5 mcg/ml amphotericin B (Sigma Chemical Co., St. Louis Mo.) Sodium pyruvate, sodium bicarbonate, glucose, L-glutamine and calcium chloride may also be added as required to sustain cell growth.
For virus propagation, OptiMEM, Eagle's MEM, Medium 199, or equivalent medium is supplemented with up to 2% bovine serum, up to 0.5% bovine serum albumin, up to 0.5% lactalbumin hydrolysate, up to 30 mcg/ml polymyxin B and neomycin, and up to 2.5 mcg/ml amphotericin B. Sodium pyruvate, sodium bicarbonate, glucose, L-glutamine and calcium chloride may also be added as required to sustain cell growth.
C) Inoculation of cultures
Individual subconfluent cultures of MDBK cells were inoculated with BRSV, BVDV, PI-3V, or BHV-I V using a multiplicity of infection of 1:5 to 1:5,000 infectious units per cell. The growth medium of the cells was discarded and replaced with viral propagation medium (see above), after which the seed virus was added directly to the culture vessel. The virally-infected cultures were maintained at 36° C.
Viral growth was determined by microscopic examination of cytopathic effect or by fluorescent antibody staining. For BRSV, infected cells showed the formation of syncytia and elongated fusiform cells, which progressed until essentially the complete cell sheet was involved. For BHV-1 V, infected cells exhibit cytoplasmic granulation followed by rounding and/or ballooning of infected cells. For BVDV, infected cells form intracellular vacuoles, round up, and leave circumscribed areas devoid of cells. The cytopathic changes in PI-3V-infected cells are similar to those in BHV-1V-infected cells.
D) Harvesting of Virus
Culture fluids were harvested into sterile vessels. Multiple harvests may begin when 50% of the cell sheet displays characteristic cytopathology, and continue until 100% of the cells are affected. The virus fluids may or may not be clarified by centrifugation or filtration. Viral fluids are stored at -50 C. or colder, or are lyophilized and stored at 2 to 8 C.
For preparation of a final vaccine, viral stocks, either alone or in combination, are mixed with adjuvant.
When liquid viral stocks are used, 19 parts viral stock are mixed with one part adjuvant, preferably the adjuvant of Example 2. When lyophilized viral stocks are used, a dilute 5% (v/v) solution of adjuvant in saline is prepared (mix 1 part adjuvant with 19 parts saline). The lyophilized viral stock is reconstituted (rehydrated) with the diluted adjuvant to form the final vaccine composition. Thimerisol may be added to the final formulation, to a final concentration of 1:10,000.
EXAMPLE 2
Formulation of a Preferred Stock Adjuvant
A preferred adjuvant for use in the present invention was prepared according to the following formulation:
______________________________________polyoxypropylene-polyoxyethylene block copolymer 20 ml(e.g. Pluronic ® L121, BASF, Parsippany, NJ)Squalane (e.g., Kodak, Rochester, NY) 40 mlpolyoxyethylenesorbitan monooleate 3.2 ml80, Sigma Chemical, St. Louis, MO)buffered salt solution 936.8 ml(e.g. D-V PAS Solution, Ca, Mg Free)______________________________________
The ingredients are mixed and homogenized until a stable mass or emulsion is formed. Prior to homoginization, the ingredients or mixture can be autoclaved. The emulsion may be further sterilized by filtration. Formalin may be added up to a final concentration of 0.2%. Thimerosal may be added to a final dilution of 1:10,000.
EXAMPLE 3
Enhancement of a Modified Live BRSV Vaccine
For this study, two BRSV vaccines were prepared, one with and one without the adjuvant mixture described in Example 2. The vaccine lacking adjuvant contained 2.52 log infectious units of BRSV per 2 ml, while the vaccine containing adjuvant contained 2.96 log infectious units per 2 ml and 5% (v/v) adjuvant.
Each of twenty cattle received a 2-ml dose of vaccine lacking adjuvant, ten intramuscularly and ten subcutaneously. Five additional cattle received a 2-ml dose of vaccine containing adjuvant. All vaccinations were repeated at 21 days. Serum samples were obtained on the sixth day following the second vaccination, and were tested for the presence of anti-BRSV serum neutralization antibodies. The serum neutralization antibody assay is described in Example 4.
The results of this study indicated that 4 of the 5 calves inoculated with the adjuvant-containing BRSV vaccine showed evidence of anti-BRSV antibodies (seroconversion), while none of the twenty animals inoculated with adjuvant-lacking BRSV vaccine showed evidence of antibodies. This indicates that the adjuvant described in Example 2 has the property of enhancing the immunogenicity of modified live BRSV vaccines.
EXAMPLE 4
Single-dose Administration of Improved BRSV Vaccine
The following vaccination and challenge study was performed in order to determine whether a single immunization modified-live Bovine Respiratory Syncytial Virus (BRSV) formulated with an adjuvant would induce protective immunity in cattle. Secondly, the study was designed to determine whether concurrent administration of modified-live Bovine Viral Diarrhea Virus (BVDV), Bovine Herpesvirus, Type 1 (BHV-1 or IBRV), and Bovine Parainfluenza Virus (PI3) would interfere with the induction of protective immunity to BRSV.
A) Experimental Vaccines
Modified-live Bovine Respiratory Syncytial Virus (BRSV) at five passages beyond the master seed was grown on Madin Darby Bovine Kidney (MDBK) cells at master cell stock passage 20. Briefly, MDBK cells were planted in 850 cm 2 roller bottles at a density of 3×10 7 cells per roller bottle in Minimum Essential Media (MEM) containing 5% bovine serum, 0.5% LAH, and 30/μg/mL Gentamycin. Cells were allowed to grow at 37° C. for 2 days prior to infection with virus. Media was decanted from the roller bottles and virus added at a Multiplicity of Infection of 1:600 in 100 mL of virus propagation media per bottle (MEM containing 2% bovine serum, 0.5% LAH, and 30 μg/mL Gentamycin). Seven days after infection, 100% cytopathotogy was present and supernatant fluids were harvested. The virus was stabilized with 25% (v/v) SGGK3 stabilizer and lyophilized. On the day of vaccination, the lyophilized virus was reconstituted with 5% (v/v) adjuvant diluted in saline diluent (See, Example 2). Reconstituted BRSV virus was combined with PI3, BVDV, and BHV-1 viruses. The titer of each component of the vaccine was determined by replicate titration on the day of vaccination.
B) Experimental Animals Used
A total of 30 cattle were used for this study. These cattle were susceptible to BRSV as indicated by a serum neutralizing (SN) antibody titer of <2 on the day of vaccination for test animals and on the day of challenge for controls. Animals were housed outside with access to a three sided shelter, open to the south. Controls were housed separately from vaccinates prior to challenge in order to avoid exposure to vaccine virus. A complete ration was provided once each day, hay and water were supplied ad libitum.
C) Vaccination
A two mL volume of the combination vaccine was administered once to each vaccinate. Twenty (20) animals were vaccinated (ten by subcutaneous route and ten by intramuscular route) and the remaining ten animals were not vaccinated and served as challenge controls.
D) Experimental Challenge
Animals were challenged with virulent BRSV virus fourteen days following the vaccination. A minimum of 10 5 .7 TCID 50 of virulent BRSV virus was administered to each calf by aerosol challenge on three consecutive days.
E) Clinical Observations
Cattle were observed daily from -2 to 14 days following challenge for clinical signs of disease and fever (rectal temperature). Cattle were observed for signs of BRSV infection including, but not limited to, nasal and ocular discharge, conjunctivitis, coughing, dyspnea, anorexia, and depression. Rectal temperature was recorded daily throughout the observation period.
F) Assays:
1. Serum Neutralizing Antibody Assay (SN)
Serial dilutions of heat-inactivated serum were mixed with equal volumes of viral suspensions, in a varying serum-constant virus neutralization test using 100 to 500 TCID 50 of BRSV. The serum virus mixture was incubated at 37° C. for 1 hour then inoculated onto VERO cells in 96 well microtiter plates. The presence of SN antibody titers was indicated by the absence of virus as detected by cytopathic effect. For the determination of SN antibody titers, 50% neutralization endpoints were calculated according to the method of Reed and Muench.
2. Titration of Virus in Final Dilution of Vaccine
The BRSV virus titer in the vaccine was determined by replicate titration on the day of vaccination. Briefly, the combination vaccine was combined with appropriate neutralizing antisera. The vaccine and antisera mixture was incubated at 37° C. for 45 to 60 minutes. Serial dilutions of the vaccine and antisera were made and inoculated onto VERO cells. The presence of virus was indicated by the presence of cytopathic effect and confirmed by specific immunofluorescence (FA). Virus titer was calculated on each replicate by the method of Reed and Muench. The mean titer of BRSV fraction of the vaccine was 10 3 .4 TCID 50 per dose. 3. Titration of Challenge Virus
The dilution of the BRSV challenge virus administered was serially diluted and inoculated onto MDBK cells in 96 well microtiter plates. The presence of virus was indicated by the presence of cytopathic effect and confirmed by specific immunofiuorescence as described for virus isolation.
To interpret the results, clinical scores were assigned as follows:
______________________________________Clinical sign Score/observation______________________________________Nasal DischargeSevere serous 2Mild mucopurulent 2Moderate mucopurulent 3Severe mucopurulent 4Ocular DischargeSevere serous 1Mild mucopurulent 2Moderate mucopurulent 3Severe mucopurulent 4Conjunctivitis 2Coughing 2Dyspnea 2Anorexia 1Hyperemia and reddening of nasal mucosa 1Fever (must be at least 1° F. above baseline)103.5 to 103.9° F. 1104.0 to 104.9° F. 2105.0 to 105.9° F. 3≧106.0° F. 4______________________________________
Mild serous nasal or ocular discharge was considered to be normal for cattle housed outside. Fever was considered significant only if it was at least one degree above the baseline body temperature. The baseline body temperature was determined as the average body temperature for each animal on the day prior to and day of challenge.
Total clinical scores for each animal were summed. Clinical scores of the vaccinates and controls were compared by Mann Whitney Ranked Sum Analysis.
Clinical signs of disease were observed in the control cattle from days 5 through 10 after challenge (Table 1). All of the controls (100%) were observed to have signs of respiratory disease on multiple days. Specific signs of respiratory disease included severe serous nasal discharge (discharge actually dripping from nostril), mucopurulent nasal discharge, ocular discharge, and coughing. The average clinical score for control calves was 3.7.
By comparison, respiratory signs were much less prevalent in vaccinated animals. Only 40% of the vaccinates had any signs of respiratory disease and only two (10%) had clinical signs on multiple days. The average clinical score for the vaccinated group was 1.0. There was a statistically significant reduction in clinical disease in the vaccinates compared to the controls by Mann Whitney Ranked Sum Analysis (p<0.05).
These data show that a single-dose administration of adjuvanted modified-live BRSV virus vaccine, according to the invention, provides protection against virulent BRSV challenge. This vaccine and method is effective, even when other vaccines are coadministered with the BRSV vaccine.
Thus, the invention provides a vaccine composition for immunizing an animal against infection by Bovine Respiratory Syncytial Virus (BRSV). The vaccine comprises a modified live BRS Virus, an adjuvant, and a pharmaceutically acceptable carrier, such that the combination provides immunity from BRSV infection after a single administration, and elicits an immune response specific to BRSV and selected from cell-mediated immunity and local (secretory IgA) immunity.
Cell mediated immunity includes the stimulation of T-Helper Cells, T-Killer Cells, and T-Delayed Hypersensitivity Cells, as well as stimulation of macrophage, monocyte, and other lymphokine and interferon production. The presence of cell mediated immunity can be determined by conventional in vitro and in vivo assays. Local immunity, such as secretory IgA, can be determined by conventional ELISA or IFA assays showing a serum neutralizing antibody titer of 1-2 or greater. According to the invention, the cell mediated or local immunity of consequences is specific to or associated with BRSV.
TABLE 1 - CLINICAL OBSERVATIONS FOLLOWING BRSV CHALLENGE CLINICAL OBSERVATIONS ON THE INDICATED DAYS AFTER BRSV CHALLENGE Cow ID Master Tag V/C -2 -1 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 Total Score 654 9612 C MMN3 MMN2 5 685 9596 C MMN2 SSN2 4 731 9589 C MMN3 C2 SSN2 7 732 9579 C SSN2 2 737 9575 C MMN2 SSN2 4 742 9580 C MMN2 2 754 9578 C SSN2 2 766 9586 C MMN2 MMN3 MMN2 7 868 9577 C MD2 ,SSO1 MMN3,SSO1 5 871 9594 C C2, 2 967 9600 C MMN2 2 975 9585 C SSN2 2 999 9576 C ,MD2 SSN2 SSN2 6 AVERAGE 3.8 669 9512 M MMN2 2 853 9729 M SSO1 1 875 9754 M 0 886 9737 M 0 895 9770 M 0 899 9723 M 0 933 9782 M 0 934 9749 M 0 952 9779 M SSN2 2 954 9725 M SD3 0 No Tag 9735 M 0 AVERAGE 0.5 717 9520 SQ 0 835 9753 SQ 0 840 9736 SQ MMN2 2 863 9724 SQ MD2 0 872 9743 SQ 0 881 9776 SQ SSN2 MMN2 4 887 8775 SQ MMN3 MMN2 MMN2 7 945 9750 SQ 0 994 9719 SQ ,C2 2 996 9746 SQ SSN2 2 AVERAGE 1.7 ALL VACCINATES AVERAGE 1.0 Ocular Discharge: SSO1 Severe Serous MMO2 Mild Mucopurulant MMO3 Moderate Mucopurulant SMO4 Severe Mucopurulant Diarrhea: MD2 Moderate, Runny SD3 Severe, Splattered ED4 Extreme, Explosive Nasal Discharge: MSN1 Moderate Serous SSN2 Severe Serous MMN2 Mild Mucopurulant MMN3 Moderate Mucopurulant SMN4 Severe Mucopurulant IM = Vaccinated Intramuscularly C = Control SQ = Vaccinated Subcutaneous Coughing C2 Labored Breathing LB2 Poor Appetite PA1 Sallvation S1 Oral Lesions OL1
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The invention provides an improved BRSV vaccine composition, which advantageously provides immunity from infection after a single administration. The composition comprises a modified live BRS virus and an adjuvant, which in combination provide immunity from BRSV infection after a single administration, and elicit an immune response specific to BRSV and including cell-mediated immunity and local (secretory IgA) immunity. In a preferred embodiment, the BRS virus is strain 375, and the adjuvant comprises an unsaturated turpin hydrocarbon, preferably squalene or squalane, and a polyoxypropylene-polyoxyethylene block copolymer, most preferably one where the copolymer has a polyoxypropylene (POP) component with an average molecular weight of about 3250 to 4000 and the polyoxyethylene (POE) component comprises about 10-20% of the total molecule. The adjuvant may optionally include a surfactant, preferably a polyoxyethylenesorbitan monooleate.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
Kaolin clay pigments used by the paper and paint industry are available in both uncalcined (hydrated) and calcined (dehydrated) grades. When preparing aqueous coating or paper filling compositions containing such pigments, it is frequently desirable to provide the clay in the form of a concentrated suspension (slurry) which is sufficiently fluid at both high and low rates of shear to be handled by conventional mixers and pumps.
When the clay is hydrated and has a limited content of particles larger than 2 microns (equivalent spherical diameter), it is relatively simple to produce a stable high solids (70%) suspension of the clay. A strong deflocculant (dispersant) such as tetrasodium pyrophosphate (TSPP) is added to a filter cake of the acid clay. The cake of hydrated clay is typically at about 60% solids. Additional dry clay is incorporated with mild agitation to such cake until the suspension has the desired high solids content. The TSPP is usually employed in amount within the range of 0.3% to 0.5% based on the dry clay weight. This corresponds to the use of 6 to 10 lbs. TSPP/ton of clay. The resulting suspension is stable in the sense that when the suspension is allowed to stand there is minimal settling of particles to form a dense sediment and minimal formation of a clear or cloudy supernatant liquid layer. This is attributable to the fact that suspensions of fine hydrated clay are fairly viscous and contain only small amounts of coarse particles. Few particles of clay, if any, have sufficient mass to settle under the influence of gravity.
In the case of clay pigments that contain significant amounts of coarse particles, especially particles larger than 2 microns, and which contain a low content of ultrafine particles, there is a marked tendency of coarse particles to settle out of deflocculated suspensions of the clay. For example, 70% solids deflocculated suspensions of relatively coarse filler grades of hydrated kaolin clay tend to form hard sediments during shipment or storage. These filler clays usually contain at least 20% by weight of particles larger than 5 microns and at least 35% larger than 2 microns.
A conventional method for maintaining various particulate solids in suspension in fluid media is to thicken the suspending media with suitable colloidal additives. This principle has been advocated to prevent sedimentation in high solids suspensions of filler grades of clay. In accordance with the teachings of U.S. Pat. No. 3,130,063 to Millman et al, an inorganic polymeric thickening agent, preferably CMC, is added to a previously deflocculated suspension of coarse filler clay in amount sufficient to thicken (and thereby stabilize) the suspension. However, organic polymers such as CMC are subject to bacterial degradation. Consequently, clay slurries stabilized with such polymers may arrive at their destination in the form of gray or black masses having a putrid odor. Obviously it is desirable to avoid stabilizing a deflocculated clay suspension with such thickening agents since preservatives are costly.
High solids deflocculated suspensions of calcined clay pigments have particle size distributions similar to those of hydrated filler clays. Such suspensions tend to form hard sediments during storage. Furthermore, calcined clay pigments have unusual rheological properties. The production of stable high solids suspensions is more difficult to achieve than when a typical hydrated clay is involved. In fact, calcined kaolin clays usually cannot be prepared into suspensions containing more than 60% solids by conventional techniques without producing systems which are highly dilatant. These dilatant systems resemble quicksand. When a ruler is dropped into a fluid concentrated slurry of calcined clay, it may be impossible to remove the ruler unless the ruler is removed very slowly. The shearing force applied to the suspension results in the conversion of the originally fluid system into a mass which becomes increasingly viscous at the rate of shear increases. Processing equipment such as mixers and pumps would be damaged by such highly dilatant suspensions or the equipment would stop operating.
The unusual dilatancy of concentrated aqueous suspensions of calcined kaolins is not the only difficulty to be resolved in the production of slurries suitable for shipment, handling and storage. Calcined kaolin pigments exhibit the undesirable settling characteristics of coarse hydrated filler clays. In fact, sediments of calcined clay which form during storage frequently tend to be even more difficult to break up.
PRIOR ART
It has been suggested (U.S. Pat. No. 3,014,836 to Proctor) to reduce the viscosity of calcined clay by milling the calcined clay under wet or dry conditions. The preferred procedure, as set forth in the Proctor patent, is to deflocculate a 55% to 60% solids suspension of the calcined clay with a conventional amount of a dispersant (0.3% TSPP) and ball mill the suspension for 12 to 24 hours. The slip of ball milled clay is then flocculated by adding acid or alum. The flocculated calcined clay is subsequently dried and then it is mixed with water and dispersing agent to produce a 70% solids suspension. Proctor did not attempt to produce directly the desired 70% solids suspensions of calcined clay and he was not concerned with the sedimentation properties of his suspensions.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,754,712 to Cecil discloses a method for preparing fluid high solids suspensions of calcined clay which are stable without the necessity for adding a colloidal thickening agent. The Cecil method involved pebble milling a slurry of calcined kaolin on a batch basis, gradually adding more clay to increase solids. In the illustrative example milling was carried out in a ball mill loaded with a mixture of "Burundum" cylinders, some of which were 13/16 × 13/16 inch and the others 1/2 × 1/2 inch. Total milling time to produce a 70.5% solids suspension of SATINTONE® No. 1 calcined kaolin pigment was 7 hours. Principal disadvantages of this method are that it requires excessively long grinding times and is wasteful of energy since, in practice, the grinding media tend to stick together and running time is wasted while the media that stick together break loose. Furthermore, the technique is geared towards batch operation and would be difficult and expensive to scale up to a continuous process. While the Cecil technique does bring about a modest decrease in the particle size of the calcined clay, it does not significantly reduce the abrasiveness characteristic of calcined clay pigments.
An object of applicant's invention is to overcome the limitations of the Cecil process.
THE INVENTION
Applicants have invented a method or procedure for preparing stable high solids slurries of calcined kaolin clay which require substantially less time -- typical only about 1/5 of that required using the prior art batch pebble milling technique. Applicants utilize a grinding medium which does not stick in operation so that no running time is wasted while aggregates of the media break loose. Applicants' method may be carried out on a batch scale but it can be simply and economically scaled up to a continuous process. In addition, the processing brings about a significant reduction in the abrasiveness of the calcined clay, thus substantially enhancing the value of the product.
Applicants' invention involves the use of one or more vertical impeller agitated mills of the type known as a RED HEAD® mill and widely used with an Ottawa silica sand grinding medium for dispersing pigments at low solids (e.g., 30%). Instead of the media normally used with the mill, applicants utilize a relatively heavy media, preferably 10/20 mesh zircon beads. In carrying out their invention, a low solids slurry of calcined clay, typically at 50 to 55% solids, is recirculated through the RED HEAD MILL and the solids level of the slurry is gradually increased by adding portions of dry calcined clay until the desired solids level, usually in the range of about 65 to 70%, is obtained. Optionally, circulation through the mill is continued after the desired solids level is reached when it is desired to produce suspensions highly stable and fluid without the need to add a colloidal stabilizer.
Applicants' results represent a marked improvement over 60 to 70% slurries of the original calcined clay that are obtained by conventional mixing techniques since the latter slurries exhibit severe shear thickening when subjected to stress and consequently cannot be pumped or stored.
The accompanying FIGURE illustrates schematically a system for applying the invention on a continuous production scale.
DESCRIPTION OF PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS
RED HEAD MILLS are well-known sand grinding units in the pigment dispersion art. The so-called "P" series machines which are preferred in practice of our invention are covered by U.S. Pat. No. 3,134,549 to Quackenbush et al, assigned to Chicago Boiler Company. Reference is made to this patent for its disclosure of details of the construction and mode of operation of such mills. Generally, the mills comprise a vertical cylindrical mixing vessel having an inlet at or near the base and adapted to house a charge of particulate grinding media that substantially fills the vessel. A cylindrical screen enclosed area at the top of the vessel has a diameter greater than that of the vessel and serves to prevent the grinding media from passing out of the vessel while permitting unimpeded flow of the slurry being pumped upwardly therethrough. A vertical rotatable shaft extends through the screen enclosed area and into the vessel along its cylindrical axis. A plurality of impellers are mounted on the part of the shaft that is disposed with the vessels. A smaller number of impellers having a larger diameter are mounted on the part of the shaft that extends through the screen enclosed area.
The preferred grinding medium is 10 to 20 mesh (Tyler) spherical zirconia which fills about 2/3 of the mill, the voids between the media comprising the remaining 1/3 of the total volume. Feed slurry in an agitated slurry tank is pumped upwardly through the mill and through a screen at the top which prevents egress of the media. The overflow is discharged to the top of an agitated slurry tank to which dry clay may be continuously metered. Slurry is discharged from an outlet near the bottom of the agitated slurry tank to the bottom of the RED HEAD MILL.
Calcined clays used in practice of the invention include kaolin clay pigments produced by calcination at temperatures within the range of about 1350° to 2200° F. Commercial products are known as "SATINTONE"® clay and "ANSILEX"® clay. Prior to slurry formation, the calcined clay may be blended with minor amounts (e.g., 1% to 20% based on the weight of the clay) of mineral pigments such as titania, hydrated kaolin clay, calcium carbonate or mixtures thereof.
Known clay dispersants such as alkali metal condensed phosphates, exemplified by tetrapotassium (or tetrasodium) pyrophosphate, sodium citrate, sodium naphthalene formaldehyde condensates examplified by Tamol 850, are used as the deflocculating agent to prepare the feed to the mill. The dispersant is usually employed in amount within the range of 0.01% to 0.1%, based on the dry weight of the clay. When appreciably less than about 0.02% is used, 70% solids suspensions of desired viscosity cannot be prepared. On the other hand, when appreciably more than 0.05% dispersant is used, an undesirable hard sediment may form when the high solids slurry of calcined clay is allowed to stand. It will be noted the preferred dispersant level of 0.02% to 0.05% corresponds to 0.1 to 1.0 pounds dispersant per ton of clay. As mentioned above, clay dispersants are normally used in proportions corresponding to 6 to 10 lbs./ton.
Typically commercial calcined clay pigments contain from 10% to 30% by weight of particles larger than 5 microns (e.s.d.) and at least 35% larger than 2 microns.
In putting our invention into practice, the initial slurry is prepared at a calcined clay solids (wt.) level in the range of 45% to 60%, usually 50 to 55%. This initial slurry is produced by adding dispersant and clay to an appropriate quantity of water in an agitated vessel. The ingredients may be prepared into a slurry before adding them to the mill or they may be charged separately to the mill. If the solids content of the charge to the mill is too high, the mill will fail to operate after a short time because of the dilatant nature of the calcined clay. Provided the initial slurry is sufficiently dilute for the mill to operate, the clay will be reduced in viscosity as the slurry is recirculated and pumped upwardly through the particulate grinding medium in the mill.
Generally from 11/2 to 2 hours total milling time is required to produce 65 to 70% solids slurry having an apparent Brookfield viscosity of 1000 cp. or below (No. 3 spindle). During milling, the temperature of the slurry increases, generally reaching 120° to 150° F. by the end of the milling period.
As mentioned, an advantage of the process is that the abrasiveness of the calcined clay pigment is reduced. This is especially desirable when the pigment is used as a paper filling or coating material. For example, a commercial calcined kaolin pigment having a Valley Abrasion (U.S. Pat. No. 3,014,836) of 200 has been converted to a more desirable material having an abrasion value of 40. A calcined clay pigment widely selected for paper use because of its low abrasiveness (30 by the Valley method) has been further improved by reducing abrasiveness to 20.
The high solids slurries produced by practice of the invention do not require addition of a suspending agent such as CMC provided recirculation time is sufficiently long.
Referring to the FIGURE which illustrates schematically a suggested method of applying this invention on a continuous, production scale, dry calcined clay, stored in a conventional silo 1, is conveyed through pipe 2 to a bin 3 which is discharged with a conventional vibrating bin discharger (not shown) to a conventional volumetric or gravimetric feeder 4. This feeder feeds into two makedown tanks 5, 7, independently. The first makedown tank 5 is continuously fed with a solution of water and dispersants (such as TSPP and AMP 95), which is prepared in a separate mix tank 6. The feed rates of dry calcined clay and aqueous dispersant solution are adjusted to give a 50 to 55% solids slurry in tank 5. Tank 5 is agitated with a conventional, low energy input mixer.
The second makedown tank 7 is part of a system whereby calcined clay slurry is milled in one or more RED HEAD-type mills connected in series [four (9, 11, 12 and 13) are shown in the FIGURE]. Part of the slurry passing through this system is removed as product 15 and part is recycled through piping 16 back into tank 7. Tank 7 is also fed with dry clay from the volumetric feeder 4 and with 50 to 55% slurry from tank 5. The flow rates of dry clay, recycle and 50 to 55% slurry from tank 5 are adjusted to give a 66 to 68% solids slurry in tank 7. Tank 7 contains a relatively high horsepower agitator in order to impart some work input to the slurry.
Slurry is pumped out of tank 7 through a density cell (which measures percent solids) and into the first RED HEAD MILL 9. Overflow from this mill is stored in a small agitated tank 10 before being pumped into the next mill 11. Any number of mills can be arranged in this series configuration. Part of the slurry pumped from the last RED HEAD MILL mix tank 14 is taken out of the system as product 15, and part is recycled back to tank 7. The ratio of product to recycle will determine not only production rate but the rheological properties of the slurry; a lower ratio will result in more work input being applied per ton of clay produced, hence lower dilatancy and better settling properties.
The following example illustrates the preparation of a stable slurry of SATINTONE NO. 1 calcined clay pigment at 68% solids by practice of the invention. Seven hours was required to produce a 70.5% solids suspension by the batch pebbling milling technique in the illustrative example of the Cecil patent.
The mill was a "L5-P" continuous feed RED HEAD MLL. The height of the cylindrical mill was 15 inches, of which 5 inches was an upper enlarged screen enclosed area. The inner diameter of the portion of the mill below the screen enclosed area was 4 inches. The inner diameter of screen enclosed area was 5 inches. Mill capacity was 0.19 gallons of liquid, with rotor and media in place. A κ-inch vertical rotatable shaft extended through the screen enclosed area at the top of the mill and was set with a clearance of about 5/8-inch from the bottom of the mill. The mill had four 3-inch nylon disc impellers mounted on the part of the shaft below the screen enclosed area and 4-inch nylon disc within the screen enclosed area. The mill was equipped with a variable speed feed pump capable of handling up to 20 gallons per hour. The pump was in communication with an outlet near the base of a 2 gallon tank located to receive overflow from the top of the RED HEAD MILL and pumped the charge in the tank to the bottom of the mill. The mill was charged with 4800 grams of Zirbeads, a commercial spherical zircon grinding medium, of 10/20 mesh size.
Five grams tetrasodium pyrophosphate was dissolved in 1/2 gallon of deionized water. The solution was charged to a makedown vessel and 1880 grams SATINTONE NO. 1 was added with agitation, producing a 50% solids slurry. The slurry was charged to a 2 gallon agitator tank open at the top. The impeller agitator in the tank was turned off and operated at a speed of 200 r.p.m., sufficient to maintain the solids in suspension. The RED HEAD MILL was turned on and operated at a shaft speed of 2400 r.p.m. The slurry was pumped from the agitator tank upwardly through the mill and then back into the tank and recirculated through the mill at the rate of 250 ml./min. The 50% solids slurry was recirculated through the mill for about 15 minutes to reduce the viscosity sufficiently to permit additional clay to be added while maintaining the viscosity of the slurry at a level at which the slurry could be pumped and recirculated. Dry SATINTONE clay (2120 g.) was then gradually charged over a period of about 1/2 hour to the 2 gallon tank where it was immediately mixed with the charge circulating between this tank and the mill. The total charge of clay was 4000 grams. After all of the clay was added, the slurry was continuously circulated to the tank and pumped through the zircon medium in the mill for 2 hours. Small amounts of water were added to compensate for evaporation loss resulting from the fact that slurry temperature approached 130° F. The pump was shut off and residual slurry was discharged from the mill.
The Valley abrasion value of the original SATINTONE pigment was 200 mg. The abrasion value of the pigment in the processed slurry was about 60 mg.
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Method for manufacturing a stable, fluid, highly concentrated aqueous suspension of calcined clay which has satisfactory rheological properties and calcined clay particles having desirable low abrasiveness. A dispersed fluid aqueous suspension of the clay containing about 50 to 55% solids is recirculated through one or more vertical agitated mills containing a particulate grinding medium such as 1/16-inch zirconia spheres. Portions of dry calcined clay are added in increments to the suspension during recirculation until the desired high clay solids level, usually 60 to 70%, is obtained.
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CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION
This application is a divisional of application Ser. No. 14/459,433, filed Aug. 14, 2014, which is a divisional of application Ser. No. 12/535,489, filed Aug. 4, 2009, which is based upon and claims the benefit of priority of the prior Japanese Patent Application No. 2008-209121 filed on Aug. 15, 2008, the entire contents of which are incorporated herein by reference.
FIELD
An aspect of the embodiments discussed herein is directed to a semiconductor device having a multilayer interconnection structure.
BACKGROUND
In current semiconductor integrated circuit devices, a multilayer interconnection structure has been used to interconnect among semiconductor elements. In ultrafine and ultra high-speed semiconductor devices, in order to reduce the problem of signal delay (RC delay), a low-resistance copper (Cu) pattern is used as a wiring pattern.
In order to form a copper wire, a so-called damascene method or dual-damascene method has been used. The damascene method is a method of forming a wire in which a Cu layer is buried in a wire groove or a via hole formed in an interlayer insulating layer using chemical mechanical polishing (CMP).
When the Cu wire is formed, a diffusion-reducing barrier is formed to reduce the diffusion of Cu atoms into an interlayer insulating layer. For the diffusion-reducing barrier, in general, refractory metals, such as tantalum (Ta), titanium (Ti), and tungsten (W), and conductive nitrides of the above refractory metals have been used.
However, the above materials have a higher resistivity than that of Cu; hence, in order to further decrease the wiring resistance, the thickness of the diffusion-reducing barrier may be decreased as small as possible. Accordingly, Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2007-59660 discusses a technique that a Cu—Mn alloy is used instead of the diffusion-reducing barrier. The reason for this is that MnSi x O y is formed in a self-alignment manner at the interface between an interlayer insulating layer and a Cu wire by a reaction of Mn with O 2 and Si, which are contained in the interlayer insulating layer, and that Mn oxides function as a diffusion-reducing layer. However, at the interface between the interlayer insulating layer and the Cu wire, when Mn which is not allowed to react with O 2 contained in the interlayer insulating layer dissolves in the Cu wire, the resistance of the Cu wire may increase.
SUMMARY
According to an aspect of an embodiment, a semiconductor device includes an insulating layer formed over a semiconductor substrate, the insulating layer including oxygen, a first wire formed in the insulating layer, and a second wire formed in the insulating layer over the first wire and containing manganese, oxygen, and copper, the second wire having a projection portion formed in the insulating layer and extending downwardly but spaced apart from the first wire.
The object and advantages of the invention will be realized and attained by means of the elements and combinations particularly pointed out in the claims.
It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are exemplary and explanatory and are not restrictive of the invention, as claimed.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
FIG. 1A is a plan view illustrating the structure of a semiconductor device 50 a according to a first embodiment;
FIG. 1B is a cross-sectional view of the semiconductor device 50 a taken along the line X-Y illustrated in FIG. 1A ;
FIGS. 2A-2B are views each illustrating a method of manufacturing the semiconductor device 50 a according to the first embodiment;
FIGS. 3A-3B are views each illustrating the method of manufacturing the semiconductor device 50 a according to the first embodiment;
FIGS. 4A-4B are views each illustrating the method of manufacturing the semiconductor device 50 a according to the first embodiment;
FIGS. 5A-5B are views each illustrating the method of manufacturing the semiconductor device 50 a according to the first embodiment;
FIG. 6A is a plan view illustrating the structure of a semiconductor device 50 b according to a second embodiment;
FIG. 6B is a cross-sectional view of the semiconductor device 50 b taken along the line X-Y illustrated in FIG. 6A ;
FIG. 7A is a plan view illustrating the structure of a semiconductor device 50 c according to a third embodiment; and
FIG. 7B is a cross-sectional view of the semiconductor device 50 c taken along the line X-Y illustrated in FIG. 7A .
DESCRIPTION OF EMBODIMENTS
Hereinafter, a first embodiment, a second embodiment, and a third embodiment will be described. However, the present technique is not limited to the embodiments mentioned above.
In the first embodiment, FIGS. 1A to 6B are views illustrating a semiconductor device 50 a and a method of manufacturing the same in detail.
According to the structure of the semiconductor device 50 a of the first embodiment and to the method of manufacturing the same, a contact area between an insulating layer containing oxygen and a second barrier layer containing Mn may be increased. Hence, Mn may be sufficiently consumed by the formation of Mn oxides at a portion at which the contact area between the insulating layer and the second barrier layer is increased, and an increase in resistance of a copper wire may be reduced.
FIGS. 1A and 1B each illustrate the structure of the semiconductor device 50 a of the first embodiment. FIG. 1A is a plan view of the semiconductor device 50 a . FIG. 1B is a cross-sectional view taken along the line X-Y illustrated in FIG. 1A .
In the semiconductor device 50 a of the first embodiment illustrated in FIG. 1A , a fourth interlayer insulating layer is represented by reference numeral 15 b , second wires (Cu wire) are each represented by reference numeral 19 b , and a third wire is represented by reference numeral 19 c . The fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b is formed so as to cover an n-type MOS transistor forming region 30 a and a p-type MOS transistor forming region 30 b . The fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b is preferably formed of SiO 2 . As a material forming the interlayer insulating layer 15 b , a material is preferably used which has a higher resistance against chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) than that of a third interlayer insulating layer 14 b which will be described later.
The second wires 19 b are formed so as to be partly overlapped with the n-type MOS transistor forming the region 30 a and the p-type MOS transistor forming the region 30 b . The second wires 19 b each have an approximately rectangular shape or an approximately circular shape. The second wires 19 b are each preferably formed so as to be electrically connected to the n-type MOS transistor forming the region 30 a and the p-type MOS transistor forming the region 30 b . The second wires 19 b are preferably formed of copper (Cu) which has a low resistivity.
The third wire 19 c is formed in the vicinity of the p-type MOS transistor forming the region 30 b . The third wire 19 c has an approximately rectangular shape. The third wire 19 c is not electrically connected to the n-type MOS transistor forming the region 30 a and the p-type MOS transistor forming the region 30 b . The third wire 19 c is preferably formed of Cu which has a low resistivity.
In FIG. 1B , the semiconductor device 50 a according to the first embodiment includes a transistor forming layer 60 and a multilayer interconnection structure 40 a . The transistor forming layer 60 has the n-type MOS transistor forming the region 30 a and the p-type MOS transistor forming the region 30 b . The multilayer interconnection structure 40 a has first wires 19 a , the second wires 19 b , and the third wire 19 c . In addition, in FIG. 1B , constituents similar to those described with reference to FIG. 1A are designated by the same reference numerals.
As illustrated in FIG. 1B , a silicon substrate 1 has an n-type conductivity. An element isolation region 2 has a shallow trench isolation structure. The n-type MOS transistor forming region 30 a and the p-type MOS transistor forming region 30 b are defined by the element isolation region 2 .
In the n-type MOS transistor forming region 30 a , a p-type well region is represented by reference numeral 3 a , a gate insulating film is represented by reference numeral 4 a , a gate electrode is represented by reference numeral 5 a , a source region is represented by reference numeral 7 a , a drain region is represented by reference numeral 8 a , and a silicide layer is represented by reference numeral 9 a.
The p-type well region 3 a is formed by performing ion-implantation of a p-type impurity in the silicon substrate 1 . The gate insulating film 4 a is formed on the silicon substrate 1 in the p-type well region 3 a . The gate electrode 5 a is formed on the silicon substrate 1 with the gate insulating film 4 a interposed therebetween. Sidewalls 6 a are formed on side walls of the gate electrode 5 a . The sidewalls 6 a may be formed using silicon oxide (SiO 2 ) which is an insulating material. The source region 7 a and the drain region 8 a are formed in the p-type well region 3 a of the silicon substrate 1 . The silicide layers 9 a are provided on the gate electrode 5 a and in the surface of the silicon substrate 1 in the source region 7 a and the drain region 8 a.
In the p-type MOS transistor forming region 30 b , an n-type well region is represented by reference numeral 3 b , a gate insulating film is represented by reference numeral 4 b , a gate electrode is represented by reference numeral 5 b , a source region is represented by reference numeral 7 b , a drain region is represented by reference numeral 8 b , and a silicide layer is represented by reference numeral 9 b.
The n-type well region 3 b is formed by performing ion-implantation of an n-type impurity in the silicon substrate 1 . The gate oxide film 4 b is formed on the silicon substrate 1 in the n-type well region 3 b . The gate electrode 5 b is formed on the silicon substrate 1 with the gate oxide film 4 b interposed therebetween. Sidewalls 6 b are formed on side walls of the gate electrode 5 b . The sidewalls 6 b may be formed using silicon oxide (SiO 2 ) which is an insulating material. The source region 7 b and the drain region 8 b are formed in the n-type well region 3 b of the silicon substrate 1 . The silicide layers 9 b are provided on the gate electrode 5 b and in the surface of the silicon substrate 1 in the source region 7 b and the drain region 8 b.
A protective layer 11 is formed so as to cover the silicon substrate 1 , that is, so as to cover the n-type MOS transistor forming region 30 a and the p-type MOS transistor forming region 30 b on the silicon substrate 1 . The protective layer 11 is preferably formed, for example, of silicon nitride (SiN). The protective layer ills formed to protect the n-type MOS transistor forming region 30 a and the p-type MOS transistor forming region 30 b.
A first interlayer insulating layer 12 is formed on the protective layer 11 . The first interlayer insulating layer 12 is preferably formed, for example, of silicon oxide (SiO 2 ). The first interlayer insulating layer 12 is formed to ensure the insulation between the n-type MOS transistor forming region 30 a and the p-type MOS transistor forming region 30 b.
Openings 24 a are formed to penetrate the protective layer 11 and the first interlayer insulating layer 12 so that conductive materials to be filled in the openings 24 a are electrically connected to the gate electrode 5 a , the source region 7 a , and the drain region 8 a of the n-type MOS transistor forming region 30 a . Openings 24 b are formed to penetrate the protective layer 11 and the first interlayer insulating layer 12 so that conductive materials to be filled in the openings 24 b are electrically connected to the gate electrode 5 b , the source region 7 b , and the drain region 8 b of the p-type MOS transistor forming region 30 b.
A wire 10 a is formed by burying a conductive material in each opening 24 a . A wire 10 b is formed by burying a conductive material in each opening 24 b . The conductive materials are each preferably formed, for example, of copper (Cu). In addition, the wire 10 a and the corresponding opening 24 a are collectively called a contact via, and the wire 10 b and the corresponding opening 24 b are also collectively called a contact via.
In the multilayer interconnection structure 40 a , a second interlayer insulating layer is represented by reference numeral 13 a , a third interlayer insulating layer is represented by reference numeral 14 a , a fourth interlayer insulating layer is represented by reference numeral 15 a , a second interlayer insulating layer is represented by reference numeral 13 b , a third interlayer insulating layer is represented by reference numeral 14 b , a fourth interlayer insulating layer is represented by reference numeral 15 b , a first barrier layer is represented by reference numeral 16 a , a second barrier layer is represented by reference numeral 17 a , a conductive layer is represented by reference numeral 18 a , the first wire is represented by reference numeral 19 a , a first barrier layer is represented by reference numeral 16 b , a second barrier layer is represented by reference numeral 17 b , a conductive layer is represented by reference numeral 18 b , the second wire is represented by reference numeral 19 b , a first barrier layer is represented by reference numeral 16 c , a second barrier layer is represented by reference numeral 17 c , a conductive layer is represented by reference numeral 18 c , the third wire is represented by reference numeral 19 c , a dummy plug is represented by reference numeral 20 c , and openings are represented by reference numerals 21 a , 21 b , and 21 c.
The second interlayer insulating layer 13 a is formed on the first interlayer insulating layer 12 . The second interlayer insulating layer 13 a is preferably formed, for example, of silicon carbide (SiC). The second interlayer insulating layer 13 a preferably has a thickness of 15 nm to 30 nm. The second interlayer insulating layer 13 a functions as an etching stopper when the openings 21 a , which will be described later, are formed.
The third interlayer insulating layer 14 a is formed on the second interlayer insulating layer 13 a . The third interlayer insulating layer 14 a is preferably formed, for example, of a low dielectric-constant material having a relative dielectric constant of 3.2 or less. As the low dielectric-constant material, for example, methylated-hydrogen silsesquioxane (MSQ) having a relative dielectric constant of 2.6, SiLK K or porous SiLK K, which are the registered trade names of Dow Chemical Company, a hydrocarbon-based polymer, or carbon-containing SiO 2 (SiOC) may be preferably used. The third interlayer insulating layer 14 a is used to reduce the problem of signal delay (RC delay) in the multilayer interconnection structure. The third interlayer insulating layer 14 a preferably has a thickness of 100 nm to 300 nm.
The fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a is formed on the third interlayer insulating layer 14 a . The fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a is preferably formed, for example, of SiO 2 . The fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a functions as a protective layer for the third interlayer insulating layer 14 a having a low resistance against chemical mechanical polishing (CMP). The fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a preferably has a thickness of 15 nm to 30 nm.
The openings 21 a are formed to penetrate the second interlayer insulating layer 13 a , the third interlayer insulating layer 14 a , and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a so that conductive materials to be filled in the openings 21 a are electrically connected to the respective wires 10 a . The first wire 19 a is formed of the conductive layer 18 a buried in the opening 21 a . The conductive layer 18 a is preferably formed, for example, of copper (Cu).
The first barrier layer 16 a and the second barrier layer 17 a are sequentially provided between the opening 21 a and the conductive layer 18 a . The first barrier layer 16 a is formed at the opening 21 a side. The second barrier layer 17 a is formed at the conductive layer 18 a side.
Since the Cu wire is formed in the opening 21 a , a material which reduces Cu diffusion and which has superior adhesion to Cu is used for the first barrier layer 16 a . As the material described above, for example, titanium (Ti), titanium nitride (TiN), titanium silicide nitride (TiSiN), tungsten (W), tungsten nitride (WN), tantalum (Ta), or tantalum nitride (TaN) may be used. In addition, the first barrier layer 16 a may be formed using a laminate including at least two layers of the above materials. The first barrier layer 16 a preferably has a thickness of 3 nm to 10 nm. Incidentally, the first barrier layer 16 a may only be formed when it is necessary.
The second barrier layer 17 a is formed between the first barrier layer 16 a and the conductive layer 18 a . Since the third interlayer insulating layer 14 a is formed of SiOC, the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a is formed of SiO 2 , and Mn also reacts with Si, the composition of Mn-containing oxides forming the second barrier layer 17 a is represented by Mn x Si y O z (x:y:z is in the range of 1:1:3 to 1:3:5). In addition, the second barrier layer 17 a preferably has a thickness of 1 nm to 5 nm.
The second interlayer insulating layer 13 b is formed on the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a . The second interlayer insulating layer 13 b is preferably formed, for example, of silicon carbide (SiC) as with the second interlayer insulating layer 13 a . The second interlayer insulating layer 13 b preferably has a thickness of 15 nm to 30 nm.
The third interlayer insulating layer 14 b is formed on the second interlayer insulating layer 13 b . As with the third interlayer insulating layer 14 a , the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b is preferably formed, for example, of a low dielectric-constant material having a relative dielectric constant of 3.2 or less. The third interlayer insulating layer 14 b preferably has a thickness of 100 nm to 300 nm.
The fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b is formed on the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b . As with the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a , the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b is preferably formed, for example, of SiO 2 . The fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b functions as a protective layer for the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b having a low CMP resistance. The fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b preferably has a thickness of 15 nm to 30 nm.
The openings 21 b are formed to penetrate the second interlayer insulating layer 13 b , the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b , and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b so that conductive materials to be filled in the openings 21 b are electrically connected to the respective first wires 19 a . The second wire 19 b is formed of the conductive layer 18 b buried in the opening 21 b . The conductive layer 18 b is preferably formed, for example, of copper (Cu).
The first barrier layer 16 b and the second barrier layer 17 b are sequentially provided between the opening 21 b and the conductive layer 18 b . The first barrier layer 16 b is formed at the opening 21 b side. The second barrier layer 17 b is formed at the conductive layer 18 b side.
Since the Cu wire is formed in the opening 21 b as with the first barrier layer 16 a , a material which reduces Cu diffusion and which has superior adhesion to Cu is used for the first barrier layer 16 b . The first barrier layer 16 b preferably has a thickness of 3 nm to 10 nm. Incidentally, the first barrier layer 16 b may only be formed when it is necessary.
As with the second barrier layer 17 a , the second barrier layer 17 b is formed between the first barrier layer 16 b and the conductive layer 18 b . Since the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b is formed of SiOC, the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b is formed of SiO 2 , and Mn also reacts with Si, the composition of Mn-containing oxides forming the second barrier layer 17 b is represented by Mn x Si y O z (x:y:z is in the range of 1:1:3 to 1:3:5). In addition, the second barrier layer 17 b preferably has a thickness of 1 nm to 5 nm.
The opening 21 c is formed to penetrate the second interlayer insulating layer 13 b , the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b , and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b . Unlike the opening 21 b , a conductive material to be filled in the opening 21 c is not electrically connected to the first wire 19 a . The third wire 19 c is formed by burying the conductive layer 18 c in the opening 21 c . The conductive layer 18 c is preferably formed, for example, of copper (Cu).
The dummy plug 20 c is formed in a lower part of the opening 21 c . The dummy plug 20 c has, for example, a cylindrical shape and is formed to have a width smaller than that of the opening 21 c . The dummy plug 20 c is formed to increase formation areas of the second interlayer insulating layer 13 b , the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b , the conductive layer 18 c , and the second barrier layer 17 c . Accordingly, at a portion at which the contact area of the third wire 19 c with the second interlayer insulating layer 13 b and the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b is increased, Mn may be sufficiently consumed by the formation of Mn oxides. Hence, the resistance of the Cu wire may be maintained at a low level.
In addition, although the resistivity of Cu is 1.55 Ω·cm, the resistivity of Mn is 136 Ω·cm. Hence, it is understood that the resistivity of Mn is significantly larger than that of Cu. Accordingly, when Mn is not sufficiently consumed between the third wire 19 c and the third and fourth interlayer insulating layers 14 b and 15 b , and when Mn dissolves in the Cu wire, the resistance of the Cu wire disadvantageously increases.
The first barrier layer 16 c and the second barrier layer 17 c are sequentially provided between the opening 21 c and the conductive layer 18 c . The first barrier layer 16 c is formed at the opening 21 c side. The second barrier layer 17 c is formed at the conductive layer 18 c side.
Since the Cu wire is formed in the opening 21 c , a material which reduces Cu diffusion and which has superior adhesion to Cu is used for the first barrier layer 16 c as with the first barrier layer 16 b . The first barrier layer 16 c preferably has a thickness of 3 nm to 10 nm. Incidentally, the first barrier layer 16 c may only be formed when it is necessary.
As with the second barrier layer 17 b , the second barrier layer 17 c is formed between the first barrier layer 16 c and the conductive layer 18 c . Since the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b is formed of SiOC, the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b is formed of SiO 2 , and Mn also reacts with Si, the composition of Mn-containing oxides forming the second barrier layer 17 c is represented by Mn x Si y O z (x:y:z is in the range of 1:1:3 to 1:3:5). In addition, the second barrier layer 17 c preferably has a thickness of 1 nm to 5 nm.
FIGS. 2A to 5B are views illustrating a method of manufacturing the semiconductor device 50 a according to the first embodiment.
FIG. 2A is a view illustrating the state in which a part of the multilayer interconnection structure 40 a is formed on the transistor forming layer 60 illustrated in FIG. 1B .
First, on the first interlayer insulating layer 12 (not illustrated in FIG. 2A ) of the transistor forming layer 60 , the second interlayer insulating layer 13 a composed, for example, of SiC having a thickness of 15 nm to 30 nm is formed by a chemical vapor deposition (CVD) method or the like. The first interlayer insulating layer 12 functions as an etching stopper when the openings 21 a are formed which will be described later.
Next, the third interlayer insulating layer 14 a composed, for example, of SiOC having a thickness of 100 nm to 300 nm is formed on the second interlayer insulating layer 13 a . The fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a is formed using a silane gas (such as trimethylsilane), for example, by a plasma chemical vapor deposition (CVD) method. The third interlayer insulating layer 14 a is preferably formed, for example, from a low dielectric constant material having a relative dielectric constant of 3.2 or less.
Subsequently, on the third interlayer insulating layer 14 a , the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a is formed, for example, from SiO 2 having a thickness of 15 nm to 30 nm. The fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a is formed using a silane gas (such as SiH 2 Cl 2 , SiH 4 , Si 2 H 4 , or Si 2 H 6 ) by a CVD method or the like. The fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a functions as a protective layer for the third interlayer insulating layer 14 a having a low CMP resistance.
Next, by a lithography operation and an etching operation, the openings 21 a are formed which penetrate the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a , the third interlayer insulating layer 14 a , and the second interlayer insulating layer 13 a and which communicate with the wires 10 a and 10 b (not illustrated in FIG. 2A ). The fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a is etched, for example, by a reactive ion etching (RIE) method using a C 4 F 6 /Ar/O 2 mixed gas including C 4 F 6 which is a fluorine-containing gas. The third interlayer insulating layer 14 a is etched, for example, by an RIE method. The second interlayer insulating layer 13 a is etched, for example, by an RIE method using a CH 2 F 2 /N 2 /O 2 mixed gas including CH 2 F 2 which is a fluorine-containing gas. For this etching, the chamber temperature is set to room temperature or the like, and the gas flow rates are set, for example, to 10 to 35 sccm for CH 2 F 2 , 50 to 100 sccm for N 2 , and 15 to 40 sccm for O 2 .
Subsequently, for example, by a physical vapor deposition (PVD) method, such as a sputtering method, the first barrier layer 16 a composed, for example, of Ta having a thickness of 2 nm to 5 nm is formed. Since the Cu wire is formed in the opening 21 a , a material which reduces Cu diffusion and which has superior adhesion to Cu is used for the first barrier layer 16 a . Incidentally, the first barrier layer 16 a may only be formed when it is necessary.
Next, a CuMn alloy layer (not illustrated) composed, for example, of an alloy of Cu and manganese (Mn) having a thickness of 5 nm to 30 nm is formed so as to cover an inside wall of the opening 21 a provided with the first barrier layer 16 a . The CuMn alloy layer contains 0.2 to 1.0 atomic percent of Mn atoms and preferably contains 0.5 atomic percent or less thereof. Besides the CuMn alloy layer, a layer composed of a mixture containing Mn in Cu may also be used. In addition, when the CuMn alloy layer reacts, the second barrier layer 17 a which will be described later is formed, and hence the CuMn alloy layer may not be illustrated in FIG. 2A . However, in a manufacturing process which will be described later, the CuMn alloy layer is illustrated.
Next, in a subsequent operation, by a heat treatment performed after the conductive layer 18 a is buried in the opening 21 a , before Cu is diffused to the second interlayer insulating layer 13 a , the third interlayer insulating layer 14 a , and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a , which are exposed to the side wall of the opening 21 a , Mn is diffused to the second interlayer insulating layer 13 a , the third interlayer insulating layer 14 a , and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a . In addition, since Mn is allowed to react with oxygen contained in the third interlayer insulating layer 14 a and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a , the second barrier layer 17 a composed of Mn-containing oxides is formed.
In the operation described above, although Mn is used as a metal material forming the alloy layer other than Cu, when a metal material is available which has a higher diffusion rate in Cu that that of Cu, and whose oxide has a Cu diffusion-reducing effect and superior adhesion to Cu, the above metal material may also be used as well as Mn. As the metal material described above, for example, besides Mn, niobium (Nb), zirconium (Zr), chromium (Cr), vanadium (V), yttrium (Y), technetium (Tc), or rhenium (Re) may be mentioned.
Since the CuMn alloy layer also functions as a seed layer of electrolytic plating, the thickness thereof is controlled to an appropriate value to form a buried wire in accordance with the wire dimension. In this embodiment, a CuMn alloy layer having a thickness, for example, of 5 nm to 30 nm is formed.
In this operation, the second barrier layer 17 a is formed so as to cover the side wall of the opening 21 a . However, since Mn in the second barrier layer 17 a is diffused by a subsequent heat treatment and is allowed to react with oxygen in the third interlayer insulating layer 14 a and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a , a CuMn alloy layer including Mn-containing oxides is formed; hence, the CuMn alloy layer covering the inside wall of the opening 21 a may not have a uniform thickness.
Next, by an electrolytic plating method, the conductive layer 18 a composed of Cu having a thickness of 0.5 μm to 2.0 μm is deposited so as to be buried in the opening 21 a . In this embodiment, although the conductive layer 18 a composed of Cu is formed, the conductive layer 18 a may be an alloy layer composed of Cu and a metal other than Cu, and as the metal other than Cu, a material is used which does not increase the resistance of a wire even when it is contained in Cu.
Subsequently, a heat treatment is performed at 100 to 250° C. for 1 to 60 minutes. By this heat treatment, Mn is diffused from the CuMn alloy layer and is allowed to react with oxygen contained in the third interlayer insulating layer 14 a and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a exposed to the side wall of the opening 21 a . In addition, the second barrier layer 17 a composed of Mn-containing oxides is formed to have a thickness of 1 nm to 5 nm on the side wall of the opening 21 a provided with the first barrier layer 16 a.
Next, for example, by a CMP method, the first barrier layer 16 a , the second barrier layer 17 a , and the conductive layer 18 a are partly removed approximately to the middle of the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a by polishing, so that the first wire 19 a composed of Cu is formed in the opening 21 a.
FIG. 2B is a view illustrating the state in which the second interlayer insulating layer 13 b , the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b , and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b are sequentially formed in that order on the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a.
First, as in the case illustrated in FIG. 2A , the second interlayer insulating layer 13 b composed, for example, of SiC having a thickness of 15 nm to 30 nm is formed on the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a (not illustrated in the figure) by a CVD method or the like. The fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a functions as an etching stopper when the openings 21 b and 21 c are formed which will be described later.
Subsequently, as in the case illustrated in FIG. 2A , the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b composed, for example, of SiOC having a thickness of 100 nm to 300 nm is formed on the second interlayer insulating layer 13 b by a plasma CVD method or the like.
Next, the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b composed, for example, of SiO 2 having a thickness of 15 nm to 30 nm is formed on the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b by a CVD method or the like.
FIG. 3A is a view illustrating the state in which openings 21 g are formed by a lithography operation and an etching operation which penetrate the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b and which each have a grooved shape in the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b.
As in the case illustrated in FIG. 2A , the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b is etched, for example, by an RIE method using a C 4 F 6 /Ar/O 2 mixed gas including C 4 F 6 which is a fluorine-containing gas.
As in the case illustrated in FIG. 2A , the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b is etched, for example, by an RIE method. By these etching operations, the openings 21 g are formed which penetrate the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b and which each have a grooved shape in the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b.
FIG. 3B is a view illustrating the state in which the openings 21 b and 21 c are formed by a lithography operation and an etching operation which penetrate the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b and which each have a via shape in the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b.
As in the case illustrated in FIG. 2A , the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b is etched, for example, by an RIE method using a C 4 F 6 /Ar/O 2 mixed gas including C 4 F 6 which is a fluorine-containing gas.
As in the case illustrated in FIG. 2A , the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b is etched, for example, by an RIE method. By this etching operation, the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b located under the openings 21 g is etched. By this etching operation, the second interlayer insulating layer 13 b is exposed at the bottom of the openings 21 b and 21 c.
The second interlayer insulating layer 13 b is etched, for example, by an RIE method using a CH 2 F 2 /N 2 /O 2 mixed gas including CH 2 F 2 which is a fluorine-containing gas. For this etching, the chamber temperature is set to room temperature or the like, and the gas flow rates are set, for example, to 10 to 35 sccm for CH 2 F 2 , 50 to 100 sccm for N 2 , and 15 to 40 sccm for O 2 . By this etching operation, the via-shaped openings 21 b and 21 c are formed in the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b and the second interlayer insulating layer 13 b.
The opening 21 b is formed so that a conductive material to be filled in the opening 21 b is electrically connected to the first wire 19 a . On the other hand, the opening 21 c is formed on the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 a under which the first wire 19 a is not provided. That is, in the opening 21 c , the third wire 19 c is formed which will be described later. The width of the via shape is not particularly limited. Since it is intended to increase the surface area of the opening, a width smaller than that of the opening 21 g is preferable.
FIG. 4A is a view illustrating the state in which a first barrier layer 16 d composed, for example, of Ta having a thickness of 3 nm to 10 nm is formed, for example, by a PVD method, such as a sputtering method, so as to cover the openings 21 g , 21 b , and 21 c , and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b . Since the Cu wire is formed in the openings 21 g , 21 b , and 21 c , as in the case of the first barrier layer 16 a , a material which reduces Cu diffusion and which has superior adhesion to Cu is used for the first barrier layer 16 d . Incidentally, the first barrier layer 16 d may only be formed when it is necessary.
FIG. 4B is a view illustrating the state in which while the first barrier layer 16 d covers inside walls of the openings 21 g , 21 b , and 21 c , a CuMn alloy layer 17 g composed, for example, of an alloy of Cu and manganese (Mn) having a thickness of 5 nm to 30 nm is formed. Since the CuMn alloy layer 17 g also functions as a seed layer of electrolytic plating which will be described later, the thickness thereof is controlled to an appropriate value to form a buried wire in accordance with the wire dimension. In this embodiment, a CuMn alloy layer having a thickness of 5 nm to 30 nm is formed. The CuMn alloy layer contains 0.2 to 1.0 atomic percent of Mn atoms and preferably contains 0.5 atomic percent or less. In addition, as the CuMn alloy layer 17 g , a layer composed of a mixture including Cu and Mn may also be used as well as the alloy.
In addition, since the surface area of the CuMn alloy layer 17 g is increased by the presence of the openings 21 g , 21 b , and 21 c , the CuMn alloy layer 17 g formed to cover the openings 21 g , 21 b , and 21 c has a small thickness as compared to that of the CuMn alloy layer which is formed to cover the openings 21 a by a sputtering method.
In this operation, the second barrier layer 17 a is formed so as to cover the side walls of the openings 21 g , 21 b , and 21 c . However, in a subsequent operation, since Mn in the second barrier layer 17 a is diffused by a heat treatment and is allowed to react with oxygen in the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b , a CuMn alloy layer including Mn-containing oxides is formed; hence the CuMn alloy layer covering the inside walls of the openings 21 g , 21 b , and 21 c may not have a uniform thickness.
In addition, since the opening 21 c is formed, the CuMn alloy layer 17 g may be formed to have a small thickness as compared to that obtained when the opening 21 c is not formed, that is, when the surface area of the opening is not increased. The total amount of the CuMn alloy layer sputtered on the inside walls of the openings 21 g , 21 b , and 21 c is constant in one sputtering operation. Hence, when the surface area, that is, sputtered area, is large, the thickness of the CuMn alloy layer 17 g formed by sputtering may be decreased.
FIG. 5A is a view illustrating the state in which a conductive layer 18 d composed of Cu having a thickness of 0.5 μm to 2.0 μm is deposited by an electrolytic plating method so as to be buried in the openings 21 g , 21 b , and 21 c . In this embodiment, the conductive layer 18 d composed of Cu is formed; however, the conductive layer 18 d may be an alloy layer including Cu and a metal other than Cu, and as the metal other than Cu, a material is used which does not increase the resistance of a wire even when it is contained in Cu.
Next, a heat treatment is performed at 100 to 250° C. for 1 to 60 minutes. By the heat treatment performed after the conductive layer 18 d is buried in the openings 21 g , 21 b , and 21 c , before Cu is diffused to the second interlayer insulating layer 13 b , the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b , and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b exposed to the side walls of the openings 21 g , 21 b , and 21 c , Mn is diffused to the second interlayer insulating layer 13 b , the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b , and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b . Subsequently, Mn is allowed to react with oxygen in the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b , and a second barrier layer 17 h composed of Mn-containing oxides is formed.
In addition, by this heat treatment, Mn is diffused from the CuMn alloy layer 17 g and is allowed to react with oxygen in the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b exposed to the side walls of the openings 21 g , 21 b , and 21 c . Subsequently, the second barrier layer 17 h composed of Mn-containing oxides is formed on the side walls of the openings 21 g , 21 b , and 21 c each provided with the first barrier layer 16 d to have a thickness of 1 nm to 5 nm. In this embodiment, since the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b is formed of SiOC, the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b is formed of SiO 2 , and Mn also reacts with Si, the composition of the Mn-containing oxides forming the second barrier layer 17 h is represented by Mn x Si y O z (x:y:z is 1:1:3 to 1:3:5).
In this case, since the CuMn alloy layer 17 g having a small thickness is formed as described above, the ratio of Mn of the CuMn alloy layer 17 g forming the second barrier layer 17 h on the side walls of the openings 21 g , 21 b , and 21 c is large than that of Mn dissolved in Cu. Hence, an increase in resistance of the Cu wire caused by dissolution of Mn in the conductive layer 18 d may be suppressed.
FIG. 5B is a view illustrating the case in which, for example, by a CMP method, the first barrier layer 16 d , the second barrier layer 17 h , and the conductive layer 18 d are partly removed approximately to the middle of the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b by polishing, so that the second wire 19 b composed of Cu is formed in the opening 21 b , and the third wire 19 c composed of Cu is formed in the opening 21 c . The operations described above with reference to FIGS. 2B to 5B are repeatedly performed, so that the semiconductor device 50 a including the multilayer interconnection structure 40 a is formed.
According to the semiconductor device 50 a of the first embodiment, the contact area between the insulating layers containing oxygen and the second barrier layer containing Mn may be increased. Hence, Mn may be sufficiently consumed by the formation of Mn oxides at a portion at which the contact area between the insulating layers and the second barrier layer is increased. As a result, an increase in resistance of the copper wire may be reduced.
In the second embodiment, FIGS. 6A and 6B are views each illustrating the structure of a semiconductor device 50 b having a multilayer interconnection structure 40 b . In the second embodiment, constituents similar to those described in the first embodiment will be designated by the same reference numerals, and a description thereof will be omitted.
FIGS. 6A and 6B each illustrate the structure of the semiconductor device 50 b of the second embodiment. FIG. 6A is a plan view of the semiconductor device 50 b . FIG. 6B is a cross-sectional view taken along the line X-Y illustrated in FIG. 6A .
As illustrated in FIG. 6A , in the semiconductor device 50 b of the second embodiment, reference numeral 15 b indicates a fourth interlayer insulating layer, reference numeral 19 b indicates a second wire (Cu wire), reference numeral 19 c indicates a third wire, and reference numeral 19 e indicates a fourth wire.
The fourth wire 19 e has a concavo-convex portion 22 in a plane direction of a Cu wire. The concavo-convex portion 22 is formed to increase the surface area of the fourth wire 19 e and that of the Cu wire.
As illustrated in FIG. 6B , the semiconductor device 50 b of the second embodiment has a transistor forming layer 60 and the multilayer interconnection structure 40 b . The multilayer interconnection structure 40 b has first wires 19 a , the second wires 19 b , the third wire 19 c , and the fourth wire 19 e . Constituents illustrated in FIG. 6B similar to those described with reference to FIG. 6A are designated by the same reference numerals.
The fourth wire 19 e is formed by burying a conductive layer 18 e in an opening 21 e . The opening 21 e is formed by opening a third interlayer insulating layer 14 b and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b . The opening 21 e is formed so that a conductive material to be filled therein is not electrically connected to the first wire 19 a . The conductive layer 18 e is preferably formed, for example, of copper (Cu).
The concavo-convex portion 22 is formed along the periphery of the opening 21 e . The concavo-convex portion 22 is formed to have an X-Y direction width smaller than the width of the opening 21 e in the X-Y direction. The concavo-convex portion 22 is formed to increase a contact area between insulating layers containing oxygen and a second barrier layer 17 e which will be described below. Hence, as in the first embodiment, Mn may be sufficiently consumed by the formation of Mn oxides at a portion at which the contact area of the second barrier layer 17 e with the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b and the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b is increased. Accordingly, the resistance of the Cu wire may be maintained at a low level.
A first barrier layer 16 e and the second barrier layer 17 e are sequentially formed between the opening 21 e and the conductive layer 18 e . The first barrier layer 16 e is formed at the opening 21 e side. The second barrier layer 17 e is formed at the conductive layer 18 e side.
Since the Cu wire is formed in the opening 21 e , a material which reduces Cu diffusion and which has superior adhesion to Cu is used for the first barrier layer 16 e . The first barrier layer 16 e preferably has a thickness of 3 nm to 10 nm. Incidentally, the first barrier layer 16 e may only be formed when it is necessary.
The second barrier layer 17 e is formed between the first barrier layer 16 e and the conductive layer 18 e . Since the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b is formed of SiOC, the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b is formed of SiO 2 , and Mn also reacts with Si, the composition of Mn-containing oxides forming the second barrier layer 17 e is represented by Mn x Si y O z (x:y:z is 1:1:3 to 1:3:5). In addition, the second barrier layer 17 e preferably has a thickness of 1 nm to 5 nm.
According to the structure of the semiconductor device 50 b of the second embodiment, besides the structure of the semiconductor device 50 a of the first embodiment, the fourth wire 19 e having a concavo-convex portion in a plane direction of the Cu wire is formed. Hence, even in the case in which a dummy plug may not be formed under the Cu wire, the contact area between the interlayer insulating layers and the second barrier layer containing Mn may be increased. Accordingly, Mn may be sufficiently consumed by the formation of Mn oxides at a portion at which the contact area of the second barrier layer with the insulating layers is increased. As a result, the resistance of the Cu wire may be maintained at a low level.
In the third embodiment, FIGS. 7A and 7B are views each illustrating the structure of a semiconductor device 50 c having a multilayer interconnection structure 40 c . In the third embodiment, constituents similar to those described in the first embodiment will be designated by the same reference numerals, and a description thereof will be omitted.
FIGS. 7A and 7B each illustrate the structure of the semiconductor device 50 c of the third embodiment. FIG. 7A is a plan view of the semiconductor device 50 c . FIG. 7B is a cross-sectional view taken along the line X-Y illustrated in FIG. 7A .
As illustrated in FIG. 7A , in the semiconductor device 50 c of the third embodiment, reference numeral 15 b indicates a fourth interlayer insulating layer, reference numeral 19 b indicates a second wire (Cu wire), reference numeral 19 c indicates a third wire, and reference numeral 19 f indicates a fifth wire.
Slit portions 23 are formed inside the fifth wire 19 f . The slit portions 23 are formed, for example, of an insulating material such as SiO 2 .
However, when the slit portions 23 are formed, since the cross-sectional area of the wire is decreased, an increase in wiring resistance unfavorably occurs. Hence, the rate of decrease in cross-sectional area caused by the formation of the slit portions 23 may be set lower than the rate of increase in resistance caused by Mn intrusion. The slit portions 23 are formed to increase the surface area between the insulating layer containing oxygen and a second barrier layer, which will be described later, in the fifth wire 19 f . For example, the slit portions 23 are preferably formed so as to decrease a 1 μm-wide fifth wire 19 f by approximately 2.5% and so as to decrease a 3 μm-wide fifth wire 19 f by approximately 5%. In addition, the surfaces of the slit portions 23 may be formed inside the fifth wire 19 f . That is, the slit portions 23 may have a grooved shape formed inside the fifth wire 19 f.
As illustrated in FIG. 7B , the semiconductor device 50 c of the third embodiment has a transistor forming layer 60 and the multilayer interconnection structure 40 c . The multilayer interconnection structure 40 c has first wires 19 a , the second wires 19 b , the third wire 19 c , and the fifth wire 19 f . In this embodiment, constituents illustrated in FIG. 7B similar to those described with reference to FIG. 7A are designated by the same reference numerals.
The fifth wire 19 f is formed by burying a conductive layer 18 f in an opening 21 f . The opening 21 f is formed by opening a third interlayer insulating layer 14 b and a fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b . A conductive material to be filled in the opening 21 f is not electrically connected to the first wire 19 a . The conductive layer 18 f is preferably formed, for example, of copper (Cu).
In the fifth wire 19 f , the slit portions 23 are formed. The slit portions 23 are formed of an insulating material containing oxygen, such as SiO 2 .
However, when the slit portions 23 are formed, since the cross-sectional area of the wire is decreased, an increase in wire resistance unfavorably occurs. Hence, the rate of decrease in cross-sectional area caused by the formation of the slit portions 23 may be set lower than the rate of increase in resistance caused by Mn intrusion. The slit portions 23 are formed to increase the surface area between the insulating material containing oxygen and a second barrier layer 17 f , which will be described below, in the fifth wire 19 f . For example, the slit portions 23 are preferably formed so as to a decrease a 1 μm-wide fifth wire 19 f by approximately 2.5% and so as to decrease a 3 μm-wide fifth wire 19 f by approximately 5%.
A first barrier layer 16 f and the second barrier layer 17 f are sequentially formed between the opening 21 f and the conductive layer 18 f . The first barrier layer 16 f is formed at the opening 21 f side. The second barrier layer 17 f is formed at the conductive layer 18 f side.
Since the Cu wire is formed in the opening 21 f , a material which reduces Cu diffusion and which has superior adhesion to Cu is used for the first barrier layer 16 f . The first barrier layer 16 f preferably has a thickness of 3 nm to 10 nm. Incidentally, the first barrier layer 16 f may only be formed when it is necessary.
The second barrier layer 17 f is formed between the first barrier layer 16 f and the conductive layer 18 f . Since the third interlayer insulating layer 14 b is formed of SiOC, the fourth interlayer insulating layer 15 b is formed of SiO 2 , and Mn also reacts with Si, the composition of Mn-containing oxides forming the second barrier layer 17 f is represented by Mn x Si y O z (x:y:z is in the range of 1:1:3 to 1:3:5). In addition, the second barrier layer 17 f preferably has a thickness of 1 nm to 5 nm.
According to the structure of the semiconductor device 50 c of the third embodiment, besides the structure of the semiconductor device 50 a of the first embodiment, the slit portions 23 are formed. Hence, even when a dummy plug may not be formed under the Cu wire, the contact area between the second barrier layer containing Mn and the insulating material containing oxygen may be increased. Accordingly, Mn may be sufficiently consumed by the formation of Mn oxides at a portion at which the contact area of the second barrier layer with the insulating material is increased. As a result, the resistance of the Cu wire may be maintained at a low level.
All examples and conditional language recited herein are intended for pedagogical purposes to aid the reader in understanding the embodiment and the concepts contributed by the inventor to furthering the art, and are to be construed as being without limitation to such specifically recited examples and conditions, nor does the organization of such examples in the specification relate to a illustrating of the superiority and inferiority of the embodiment. Although the embodiment(s) of the present invention has (have) been described in detail, it should be understood that the various changes, substitutions, and alterations could be made hereto without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention.
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A semiconductor device includes an insulating layer formed over a semiconductor substrate, the insulating layer including oxygen, a first wire formed in the insulating layer, and a second wire formed in the insulating layer over the first wire and containing manganese, oxygen, and copper, the second wire having a projection portion formed in the insulating layer and extending downwardly but spaced apart from the first wire.
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This application is a division of U.S. application Ser. No. 12/901,636, filed Oct. 11, 2010, which is currently pending.
The present disclosure is directed to an automated mix in-cup apparatus and the related method of operation. The disclosure relates generally to the field of mixing consumable material. More specifically, the disclosure relates to a mixer that is automatically operable to lower a mixing blade into a cup or vessel that contains material to be blended/mixed when the cup is positioned on cup-receiving position of the apparatus. A shield and lid surround the sides and top of the mixing blade. For a mixing operation, the shield and lid are automatically lowered to close and at least partially surround the cup. After mixing, the shield and blade are automatically retracted, and the cup is removed from the apparatus. The shield and blade may be automatically lowered again to enclose the cup-receiving position on the apparatus in order to perform a cleaning operation. The apparatus contains various structural and safety elements that provide a unique construction and method of operating the apparatus. The apparatus is effective, fast, easy to operate, safe, and clean.
BACKGROUND
In a commercial food environment, it is often important to prepare items as quickly as possible. This objective runs counter to the mandate that all food preparation devices remain as sanitary as possible. That is, in the rush to deliver an item to a customer, it is possible that best practices regarding sanitation are not observed. It is also understood that human error increases as a person more quickly repeats a repetitive task. In other words, the person preparing the food or drink may “get sloppy” as the food or drink preparation is accelerated.
A conventional blender requires that the food/drink components are separately loaded into a blender jar. The jar is closed and placed on a blender base. The machine is activated to blend the contents, which are then placed into another receptacle. The blender and/or blender base is cleaned between consecutive blending operations.
Other commercial food preparation and drink delivery units include drink and ice dispensers and mixers for frozen drinks or confections. Drink and ice dispensers can be manually operated by a customer, as found in many ‘fast food’ establishments, or they can include the automated filling of various cup sizes.
Commercial mixers for frozen drinks or confections typically involve a user (i.e., employee) loading a metal cup with the beverage ingredients onto a machine. The cup is positioned so that a mixing blade is located in the cup. The user then activates the machine in order to spin the blade. In this conventional machine, it is possible to remove the cup while the mixing blade is still spinning, which results in the beverage/confection splashing onto the machine and/or user. To achieve a more even mix, a user may also manually move the cup up-and-down during the mix cycle. However, this practice increases the chances that the beverage or confection will splash out of the cup. Basically, the operation becomes less sanitary and less safe as the operator attempts to more quickly complete the task. The mixed material must be transferred to another receptacle.
Machines for automatically accomplishing the mixing operation have also been envisioned. For the automated units, there is still the question of cleaning the blade and apparatus used in the mixing operation. It is important that a flavor from one mix cycle does not contaminate the next mix cycle, which might be for a different flavor. In addition, the drink or confection must be cleaned from the machine regularly to avoid build up and contamination on the machine. It is thought that the operation of known automated machines is relatively slow and complex.
There remains a need for an apparatus for mixing consumable material in-cup, and a method of operating the same, that is fast, effective, safe, clean, and easy to operate. An automated mix in-cup apparatus and the method of operating the same as disclosed below addresses at least one of these or other needs.
SUMMARY
The present disclosure is directed to an automated mix in-cup apparatus adapted to mix consumable material. An ‘in-cup mixer’, ‘mix in-cup’ or ‘blend in-cup’ apparatus is understood to be a mixer where the consumable contents are not transferred to another vessel after the mix cycle and prior to consumption. Conventional mixers and blenders use dedicated mixing vessels and then all or part of the mixed material is transferred to a serving vessel (glass, Styrofoam cup, etc.).
Among other advantages, the automated mix in-cup apparatus disclosed herein is thought to be fast, clean, easy to operate, safe, and effective. The automated mix in-cup apparatus for mixing consumable material includes a frame supporting a stepper motor to move a carriage up and down on the frame. The carriage supports a mixing motor, a shield prop, and a combined splash shield and lid. The frame comprises a vertically aligned stand and a horizontal, cup-supporting leg. An optional cup-receiving holder is positioned on the leg of the frame.
In one embodiment, movement of the carriage is accomplished via the stepper motor and a lead screw. The lead screw passes though the carriage, and the carriage is supported on the lead screw via a nut. The stepper motor rotates the lead screw, also known as a translation screw, to translate the radial motion imparted by the stepper motor into a linear movement for the carriage. Rotation of the lead screw either raises or lowers the carriage on the frame. One or more guide rails pass through the carriage to keep the carriage aligned on the frame.
The mixing motor is attached to the carriage, and a rotatable mixing blade extends downwardly from the mixing motor. The mixing motor moves along with the carriage. The mixing blade is reciprocally moveable along with the mixing motor and carriage. When engaged, the mixing motor is operable to rotate the mixing blade in order to mix the consumable contents of the cup.
The horizontal portion of the frame may comprise a flat floor to support a cup or a cup-receiving holder. The floor may include liquid nozzles (small diameter apertures) from a manifold to eject a fluid upwardly from the floor. A drain aperture might also be employed in the floor as a liquid outlet. The drain is preferably proximate the cup-receiving position.
In another embodiment, the horizontal portion of the frame further comprises a liquid well comprising a recessed floor and a sidewall. The well could further include a liquid inlet manifold having at least one nozzle fluidly connecting the manifold and well. The well might further include a drain to serve as at least one liquid outlet for the well. In this embodiment, the optional cup-receiving holder is positioned above the floor of the well. The cup is positioned in the well or on the cup-receiving holder above the floor of the well. The cup-receiving holder may be selectively removed from the apparatus for cleaning.
The splash shield includes at least one sidewall, a closed lid or top, and a lower opening. The lid and shield might be integral parts or the shield might be secured to the lid via known fasteners. The splash shield and lid surround the mixing blade. The blade is connected to the mixing motor via a shaft that extends through an aperture in the shield's top end. A seal can be employed about the shaft in the lid aperture to prevent a fluid escaping upwardly from the shield. The seal is in close proximity to the shaft and may contain an internal helix groove. The helical groove on the inside surface of the seal directs any liquid between the shaft and seal downwardly.
The subject splash shield, mixing blade, and mixing motor are all reciprocally movable along a shared axis via the movement of the carriage on the lead screw. However, the splash shield can be moved independently of the mixing blade and motor via the shield prop, as described below.
Once engaged, the apparatus automatically moves the mixing blade, mixing motor, and splash shield from a home position to a mixing position. In the mixing position, the mixing blade is located within the dimensions of the cup. The shield rests on the cup, and the lid of the shield closes the cup. During a mix cycle, the blade can move up and down through the consumable material without displacing the shield.
The mixing motor, mixing blade, and splash shield return to the home position. The user removes the cup, and the apparatus moves the carriage to a cleaning position whereby the shield comes into contact with the frame, such as at the well floor, to selectively encase the cup-receiving position and optional cup-receiving holder on the frame. The blade can be positioned so as to pass through the cup-receiving holder during a cleaning cycle.
In one embodiment, a pulley system acts as a cord a cord management system for a power cord connected to the mixing motor. The power cord, which might also enclose sensor wires, is fixedly secured to the carriage at a first end and is fixedly secured to the frame at a second end. The carriage moves up and down on the frame. As a cord management system, the pulley system includes one stationary and one moveable, spring-biased pulley to manage slack in the power cord as the carriage moves up and down. As the carriage moves down on the frame, the moveable pulley is lifted by the tension placed on the power cord. As the carriage moves up on the frame, a spring biases the moveable pulley down to take up slack in the power cord.
In use, the machine starts at a first home or open position. A user places a cup with consumable material on the cup-receiving holder and activates the apparatus. The stepper motor rotates the lead screw in order to lower the carriage. The downward movement of the carriage lowers the mixing motor, mixing blade, and splash shield to a mixing position. As a result, the shield is lowered around the cup until the lid contacts and closes the open top of the cup. Similarly, the mixing blade enters the interior space of the cup.
In this mixing position, the shield at least partially isolates the cup from the user. The lid also prevents the material in the cup from exiting the cup during a mix cycle. Once the apparatus is in the mixing position, the motor is activated to rotate the mixing blade thereby causing the consumable material to be mixed. The speed of the blade may be variable, and a speed sensor can be included so as to output motor speed feedback to a control board. In addition, the blade may move up and down within the cup during the mix cycle without displacing the splash shield.
After the mix cycle is completed, the shield and blade automatically retract to an open or home position so as to allow access to the cup. The cup is then removed. A cleaning cycle is then manually or automatically activated. The carriage is again lowered. In the cleaning position, the shield comes into contact with the frame to create a sealed, enclosed space. For the cleaning cycle, the blade can be positioned at various distances from the floor of the frame/well, including beneath the level of the cup-receiving holder.
Fluid is injected into the interior of the shield via the inlet manifold so as to contact the shield and blade during the cleaning cycle. The fluid is used to rinse the shield and blade. The blade may rotate during the cleaning cycle to increase fluid distribution or force. The rinse fluid is removed via the drain. In this manner, the automated mixing of the material and subsequent cleaning of the apparatus can be achieved. The cleaning cycle is fast and effective. The blade is isolated from the user during the mixing and cleaning operations. The cleaning operation is thought to remove all food or drink material and to prevent any flavor contamination between mix cycles.
In at least one embodiment, it is also envisioned that a number of sensors could be employed. The sensors are used to electronically determine the position of the motor, blade, and/or shield and to act as interlock mechanisms to disengage the mixing motor if a user displaces the shield during the mixing or cleaning cycles. In other words, the feedback from the sensors is used to automatically prevent the rotation of the blade unless the splash shield is properly positioned. In one embodiment, the failure to remove a cup from the cup-receiving position prior to initiating the cleaning cycle would also prevent the movement of the mixing blade to the blade's cleaning position. The blade or blade shaft would contact the cup. In response, the unit would return the shield to the home position.
Further features and advantages of the present disclosure will become apparent to those of skill in the art from the following detailed description of a preferred embodiment taken in conjunction with the accompanying drawings.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS
The features and objects of the subject mix in-cup apparatus and related method will be better understood from the following detailed description taken in conjunction with the drawings wherein:
FIG. 1 is a perspective view of the housing for a combined fluid or ice dispensing and mixing unit wherein the mixing apparatus is envisioned as the apparatus disclosed herein;
FIG. 2 is a perspective view of the automated mix in-cup apparatus as disclosed herein wherein a mixing blade and a splash shield are shown in an elevated or home position;
FIG. 3 is a side cut-away view of the same wherein a well, a cup-receiving holder, and a drain are further illustrated;
FIG. 3A is a side view of a seal member as further disclosed herein;
FIG. 4 is a perspective, semi-transparent view of one embodiment of the subject apparatus wherein a mixing blade and splash shield are shown in an mixing or down position so that the shield is in the well and at least partially encloses the opening of a cup;
FIG. 5 is a side cut-away view of the same;
FIG. 5A further illustrates a cord management pulley system as disclosed herein;
FIG. 6 is a perspective, semi-transparent view of an embodiment of the subject apparatus wherein the splash shield is in a mixing or down position and the blade is in a mixing position so as to engage the contents of a cup;
FIG. 7 is a side cut-away view of the same;
FIG. 8 is a perspective, semi-transparent view of an embodiment of the subject apparatus wherein the splash shield and blade are in a cleaning position;
FIG. 9 is a side cut-away view of the same;
FIG. 10 is a top-down view of the well and the cup-receiving holder as disclosed herein in at least one embodiment;
FIG. 11 is a top-down cut-away view of the a water inlet manifold and the drain as disclosed herein;
FIG. 12 is an exploded view of the selectively removable cup-receiving holder, a liquid well, and a manifold cover as found in one embodiment disclosed herein;
FIG. 13 is a perspective view of the subject apparatus further illustrating a selectively removable cup-receiving holder as found in one embodiment disclosed herein
FIG. 14 is a close-up, semi-transparent view of the splash shield in the well and a related interlock safety mechanism; and
FIG. 15 is a three quarter front view of one embodiment of the subject apparatus illustrating sensors located on the apparatus.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
The present disclosure is directed to an automated mix in-cup apparatus and the method of using the same. In general, the automated mix in-cup apparatus is thought to be more effective, safer, faster, cleaner and easier to operate than known devices. The apparatus and method are described and illustrated in terms of various embodiments. Of course, the present disclosure is not limited to the embodiments disclosed herein but also includes variations and equivalent structures that would be apparent to one of skill in the art, having studied the subject disclosure.
Turning now to the drawings, FIG. 1 illustrates a combined commercial fluid/ice dispensing and mixing unit 2 . Unit 2 comprises an outer housing to cover both the dispensing and mixing machinery. Unit 2 may also include a cabinet 6 accommodating a plurality of fluid containers 8 fluidly connected to a dispenser. An ice or frozen slurry dispenser and/or hopper may also be included in the unit.
The overall operation of unit 2 comprises a user selecting the cup 4 , which may be selected from a single size or a plurality of differently sized cups, and placing cup 4 on unit 2 proximate to a dispensing mechanism (not illustrated or described further herein). The dispensing mechanism is actuated to at least partially fill cup 4 from fluid containers 8 and/or a frozen fluid dispenser. The fluid containers 8 could contain various flavors of consumable drink mix. The cup would also at least partially be filled with ice or other frozen consumable material from unit 2 .
One or more automated mix in-cup apparatuses 10 are located next to the dispensing apparatus for mixing/blending drinks such as smoothies, milkshakes, ice coffee drinks, or the like. After the step of dispensing a fluid into the cup, the user positions cup 4 containing the selected flavor and frozen material at a cup-receiving position on mix in-cup apparatus 10 . Mix in-cup apparatus 10 is then engaged to commence an automated mixing operation of the cup contents, as explained further below. The user does not contact the apparatus 10 other than to select mix cycles or otherwise actuate the switches or buttons necessary to begin the operation of the unit.
With respect to FIGS. 2-14 , there is illustrated one or more embodiments of the mix in-cup apparatus and the method of operation of the same as described herein. The apparatus moves between three operational positions, as detailed further below with specific reference to the figures and labeled elements.
In general, the first position is the open or “home” position where a mixing blade, a mixing motor, and a splash shield are elevated above a cup-receiving position so as to allow a user access to the cup-receiving position. In the mixing position, the splash shield is lowered until it engages and closes cup 4 . The shield is held on the cup by gravity. While the shield always surrounds the sides and top of the mixing blade, the shield also surrounds the sides of cup 4 and closes the top of cup 4 in the mixing position. The mixing blade is positioned inside cup 4 when the apparatus is in the mixing position. During a mix cycle, the blade may move up and down within the cup independent of the movement of the splash shield.
In a cleaning position, the cup is first removed from the cup-receiving position, and the shield is again lowered until it contacts a floor. The floor and shield act to create a sealed interior space. In the cleaning position, the blade is moved into a position that may be below the cup-receiving position. A user cannot access the mixing blade in the cleaning or mixing positions without manually displacing the shield.
Turning to FIGS. 2 and 3 in further detail and with specific reference to the labeled elements, there is illustrated a mix in-cup apparatus 10 in accordance with at least one embodiment of this disclosure. The automated mix in-cup apparatus 10 for mixing consumable material includes a frame 12 supporting a stepper motor 13 . Frame 12 in this embodiment is generally an L-shaped, substantially vertical structure with sufficient width to support mechanical components as described below. Frame 12 could in turn be mounted to the structure of the combined unit 2 and be largely enclosed behind a housing. It is also envisioned that mix in-cup apparatus 10 might instead serve as a standalone device for mixing consumable material in cup 4 .
FIGS. 2 and 3 illustrate the home position of apparatus 10 . As illustrated, the horizontal portion of the L-shaped frame 12 supports cup 4 at a cup-receiving position. The stand portion of frame 12 supports a vertically aligned lead screw 15 connected to stepper motor 13 . Stepper motor 13 is positioned at the top of frame 12 . The distal end of lead screw 15 is mounted in a bearing (not illustrated).
One or more guide rails 16 are vertically aligned on frame 12 and are parallel to lead screw 15 . Lead screw 15 and guide rails 16 pass through a carriage 17 . A nut (not illustrated) under carriage 17 on lead screw 15 retains carriage 17 in place on lead screw 15 . As stepper motor 13 rotates lead screw 15 , the nut moves up and down on the screw. As a result, carriage 17 moves up and down relative to frame 12 . Guide rails 16 further support carriage 17 and maintain the alignment of carriage 17 as it moves. Overall, activating stepper motor 13 rotates lead screw 15 , and lead screw 15 translates the rotational movement into the linear up-and-down movement of carriage 17 .
In one embodiment, as explained further below, a pulley system acts as a cord management system for a power cord 19 connected to carriage 17 . Power cord 19 , which might also enclose sensor wires, is fixedly secured to carriage 17 at a first end and is fixedly secured to frame 12 at a second end. To account for the movement of carriage 17 , the pulley system includes one stationary pulley 18 and one moveable, spring-biased pulley 21 .
Moveable pulley 21 is at least partially placed within a pulley housing that slides within a vertical track defined by frame 12 . Moveable pulley 21 includes an axle mounted to the sliding housing. A spring 23 is secured to the housing a proximate end. Distal end of spring 23 is attached to a point on frame 12 beneath the pulley housing so as to maintain a tension force on the pulley housing. As carriage 17 moves down on lead screw 15 , moveable pulley 21 is lifted by the tension placed on power cord 19 . That is, the downward force on carriage 17 overcomes the tension force of spring 23 . As carriage 17 is lifted on lead screw 15 so as to move up relative to frame 12 , spring 23 biases moveable the pulley housing downwards so that pulley 21 move down within the frame's track. In this manner, any slack in cord 19 is controlled by the pulley system.
Carriage 17 supports a mixing motor 14 , a shield prop 70 , and a splash shield 50 . Any suitable type of electric motor may be employed as mixing motor 14 , as would be known or used in the mixing art. A mixing motor housing 54 surrounds and supports mixing motor 14 and housing 54 , in turn, is secured to carriage 17 . In this manner, carriage 17 supports motor 14 . Mixing motor 14 is axially aligned above cup 4 when cup 4 is in the cup-receiving position. The horizontal portion of the frame defines a floor to support cup 4 or an optional cup-receiving holder 40 may be positioned on frame 12 at the cup-receiving position. In an embodiment where frame 12 defines a fluid-receiving well, holder 40 is at least partially placed in the well. With the holder, a cup never contacts a drain or floor of the apparatus, which is thought to be more sanitary.
A rotatable mixing blade 20 extends vertically downwardly from mixing motor 14 via a shaft 22 . Blade 20 is used for mixing a consumable material in cup 4 . Motor 14 is operable to rotate mixing blade 20 and shaft 22 . Blade 20 moves relative to frame 12 when mixing motor 14 is raised or lowered via carriage 17 . Shaft 22 extends from mixing motor 14 at a fixed length. As such, blade 20 is reciprocally moveable along a shared axis with mixing motor 14 .
In one embodiment, frame 12 further comprises a liquid well 30 sharing a vertical axis with cup 4 , mixing motor 14 , shaft 22 , and splash shield 50 . Well 30 is a recess in the horizontal portion of the L-shaped frame 12 including a floor 32 and a sidewall 34 . In this embodiment, floor 32 is considered to be a part of frame 12 . Well 30 may be a plastic molded part inserted into frame 12 .
A liquid inlet manifold 36 is integral to or connected to frame 12 , and manifold 36 includes at least one nozzle fluidly connecting the manifold to the exterior of frame 12 (see also FIGS. 10 and 11 ). In the illustrated embodiments where an optional recessed well 30 is employed, manifold 36 is integral to or connected to well 30 . A cleaning liquid, which might be water or a combination of water and a known cleaning agent, is selectively ejected from manifold 36 . A drain 38 acts as at least one liquid outlet. In the embodiment containing the well, drain 38 is integral to or connected to well 30 . In either embodiment, a drainpipe would connect to the drain so that the cleaning fluid is removed from apparatus 10 .
The optional cup-receiving holder 40 is positioned to support a cup above frame 12 , such as above floor 32 of well 30 . Holder 40 may be selectively removable from the apparatus for cleaning, as further described below (see also FIG. 14 ).
Splash shield 50 may consist of an opaque, semi-transparent or transparent material. In the cup-receiving position, such as when cup 4 is placed on holder 40 , cup 4 is axially aligned beneath shield 50 .
Shield 50 comprises a shield lid 52 and a cylindrical sidewall 56 depending from lid 52 . Shield 50 defines an open bottom end 60 into which cup 4 and/or cup-receiving holder 40 can be placed. Shield 50 is suspended from motor housing 54 by a shield prop 70 . Prop 70 includes two guide rods 72 and upper stop plate 74 . In a home position, stop plate 74 rests atop mixing motor 14 or mixing motor housing 54 with guide rods 72 securely fixed to shield lid 52 .
As carriage 17 moves to a mixing position, shield lid 52 engages the open top of cup 4 so as to close the lid. Shield sidewall 56 at least partially surrounds cup 4 at the cup-receiving position. In the mixing position, the downward movement of shield 50 is limited by the height of cup 4 , and shield 50 rests atop cup 4 . However, carriage 17 may continue to move downward along lead screw 15 after shield 50 engages cup 4 . The continued downward motion of carriage 17 causes motor housing 54 to move along shield god rods 72 . The upper stop plate separates from mixing motor 14 and motor housing 54 . Carriage 17 can continue downwards until motor housing 53 engages the top of lid 52 .
Moving carriage 17 upwards will not displace shield 50 until mixing motor 14 and/or motor housing 54 engage upper stop plate 74 . Once engaged, the continued upward movement of carriage 17 lifts stop plate 74 . Guide rods 72 , which are fixed at a first end to plate 74 and at a second end to shield 50 , then lift shield 50 . For aesthetic purposes, an outer housing 53 can selectively nest over motor housing 54 . Outer housing 53 is supported atop lid 52 . As motor housing 54 moves away from shield 50 , outer housing 53 encases guide rods 72 and shaft 22 between motor housing 54 and lid 52 . As the motor housing 54 is brought into closer proximity to lid 52 , outer housing 53 nests over motor housing 54 .
Splash shield 50 surrounds blade 20 on all sides and covers the top of blade 20 . Shaft 22 extends through an aperture 62 in the shield's top end. A seal 63 is employed to prevent the escape of a fluid up and through lid 52 . One embodiment of seal 63 is illustrated in FIG. 3A . Seal 63 is in the lid aperture 62 through which shaft 22 passes. Seal 63 reduces or prevents fluid from passing around shaft 22 upwardly through the shield's top end. Shaft 22 can move independently of shield 50 so seal 63 allows for the linear movement of shaft 22 into and out of shield 50 . The inside face of seal 63 in contact or close proximity with shaft 22 includes a helical groove 64 . Groove 64 permits and encourages the downward flow of fluid were any fluid to enter seal 63 .
FIGS. 2 and 3 illustrate motor 14 and shield in the home position whereby a user can access cup 4 and the cup-receiving position. In this home position, mixing motor 14 cannot be activated, as further described below.
Turning then to FIGS. 4 and 5 , there is illustrated the embodiment of FIGS. 1 and 2 but where carriage 17 has been moved downwards to the mixing position. In the mixing position, as briefly referenced above, shield 50 comes to rest on a cup 4 . In the absence of a cup, shield 50 would rest on frame 12 . In this illustrated embodiment, shield 50 does not contact frame 12 or floor 32 of well 30 due to the height of the cup. In the mixing position, cup 4 is closed by lid 52 and is at least partially surrounded by shield 50 .
In one embodiment, the connection of shield sidewall 56 to closed top end 58 forms a frustoconical shape or portion 59 . That is, the connection between sidewall 56 and lid 52 is sloped as if to form a cone. However, the cone tip is truncated.
Conical portion 59 creates an effective seal on cup 4 despite the use of cups that might be of different diameters. Conical portion 59 also serves to center cup 4 on the cup-receiving position or holder. Where the conical portion engages a cup disproportionally on one side, the slope of lid 52 translates the downward motion of shield 50 into a lateral motion to better position cup 4 within shield 50 .
FIG. 5A further illustrates the pulley-based cord management system. A portion of frame 12 , which helps to define a vertical track, is removed to better illustrate the cord management system. Moveable pulley 21 is secured via an axle to the moveable pulley housing. The pulley housing slides within the vertical track defined by frame 12 .
The downward movement of carriage 17 places tension on cord 19 . This tension exceeds the spring bias provided by spring 23 . As a result, pulley 21 moves up within frame 12 . As carriage 17 is lifted on lead screw 15 so as to move up relative to frame 12 , spring 23 biases pulley 21 , via the pulley housing, downwards. In this manner, any slack in cord 19 is controlled by the pulley system.
With respect to FIGS. 6 and 7 , it is evident that blade 20 and motor 14 may continue to move down relative to frame 12 even after shield 50 comes into contact, and is stopped by, cup 4 . Prop 70 is fixed to shield 50 by guide rods 72 . Motor 14 slidably moves along guide rods 72 . As carriage 17 continues to move mixing motor 14 closer to shield 50 , upper stop plate 74 moves away from mixing motor 14 . In this manner, mixing motor 14 can be reciprocally moved up and down without displacing shield 50 during the mix cycle. The ability to move blade 20 up and down during a mix cycle increases the quality and consistency of the blended product.
Following the mix cycle, which can comprise a pre-programmed sequence of blade movements and variable blade speed changes, stepper motor 13 is actuated to rotate lead screw 15 to lift carriage 17 . The motor engages the stop plate 74 . As a result, shield 50 and blade 20 are withdrawn from cup 4 . Cup 4 is then removed.
Turning now to FIGS. 8 and 9 , apparatus 10 or a user then engages a cleaning cycle. Carriage 17 is positioned, via the stepper motor and lead screw, in a cleaning position. In the cleaning position, shield 50 brought into contact with frame 12 (such as well 30 ) to create an enclosed space about the cup-receiving position. Cup-receiving holder 40 would be encased by shield 50 and well floor 32 , for example.
As further illustrated in FIGS. 8 and 9 , with cup 4 removed, motor 14 can be lowered past the lowest mix position. As a result, blade 20 and/or shaft 22 extend below the cup-receiving position. For example, blade 20 can pass through the cup-receiving holder 40 . During the cleaning operation or cycle, it would again be possible to reciprocally move blade 20 up and down without displacing shield 50 .
In the cleaning operation, and with reference to FIGS. 10 and 11 , fluid enters a manifold 36 via pipe 35 . The fluid is transmitted to the space enclosed by shield 50 via manifold 36 and fluid nozzles 37 . The fluid will strike blade 20 , which can be rotated during the cleaning cycle to further disperse the fluid. The cleaning operation rinses the interior of shield 50 (including shield lid 52 ), cup-receiving holder 40 , blade 20 , and shaft 22 . Cleaning fluid exits the frame via the drain 38 , which is tied to an outlet pipe. The cleaning operation is automatic and requires little to no user involvement. As such, the automated mix in-cup apparatus is self-cleaning, which permits a user to fill another cup during the cleaning operation.
FIG. 12 illustrates the underside of well 30 with manifold 36 in an exploded view. A bottom plate 39 of manifold 36 is removed to reveal one embodiment of the interior of manifold 36 . Holder 40 is illustrated as being removed from well 30 .
Turning to FIG. 12 , cup-receiving holder 40 includes an open ring 42 upon which cup 4 rests. Ring 42 provides an aperture through which blade 20 passes when carriage 17 is in the cleaning position.
As briefly noted above, holder 40 may be selectively removable from frame 12 . Holder 40 could include one or more hollow posts 44 that engage vertical posts 46 on frame 12 . For instance, vertical posts 46 might be integral to well floor 32 . Vertical posts 46 nest within hollow posts 44 of the holder in order to frictionally retain holder 40 in place. A user could lift holder 40 off frame 12 to independently clean holder 40 , if necessary. Removing holder 40 provides the means to further clean the holder and/or the drain and frame that are located beneath holder 40 .
Overall, apparatus 10 is easy to operate, safe, and fast in that shield 50 and mixing blade 20 automatically move into and out of the mix position. A user is provided one-handed operation in that they merely need to place the cup before the mix cycle and remove the cup after the mix cycle. There is no need to manually manipulate the cup, the shield, or any other components of the apparatus besides cup 4 . Nevertheless, a user may mistakenly attempt to access or manipulate the splash shield or to otherwise access the cup during a mix cycle.
Turning now to FIG. 14 , there is illustrated a close-up view of shield 50 in the mixing position. In the illustrated embodiment, a magnetic strip 80 is integrated into or otherwise secured to sidewall 56 of shield 50 . Corresponding shield sensors 82 on frame 12 (e.g., in well 30 ) are operable to detect magnetic strip 80 . In the mix and cleaning positions, mixing motor 14 will not rotate blade 20 unless shield sensors 82 detect magnetic strip 80 . A control unit will disengage mixing motor 14 once strip 80 is displaced. As such, a user cannot lift shield 50 to access cup 4 without disengaging mixer motor 14 .
Additional sensors provide feedback to the control unit, as further illustrated in FIG. 15 . A home sensor 84 is used to determine if carriage 17 is properly returned to the home position after each mix and cleaning cycle. Home sensor 84 is operable to detect a magnet 86 located on carriage 17 . Stepper motor 13 runs until home sensor 84 detects magnet 86 or until there is a time-out condition. For example, if carriage 17 is obstructed, stepper motor 13 will run for a predetermined period of time that is longer than it takes for carriage 17 to return to the home position. If the magnet 86 is not detected within that time period, stepper motor 13 is deactivated and apparatus 10 would be reset.
Once home sensor 84 detects magnet 86 , stepper motor 13 reverses lead screw 15 until magnet 86 is no longer detected. Carriage 17 is then raised a second time until magnet 86 is detected by home sensor 84 . This provides an optional calibration mechanism so that the position of carriage 17 is calibrated prior to a mix or cleaning cycle.
A cup sensor 88 also works in conjunction with magnet 86 and the control unit. The failure to detect magnet 86 at cup sensor 88 indicates to the control unit that shield 50 is not in the cleaning position. As referenced above, in the cleaning position, shield 50 contacts frame 12 (e.g., well floor 32 ). Shield 50 creates an enclosed interior space to capture the cleaning fluid during the cleaning cycle. With the cup in place, shield 50 does not reach the frame or well floor. As a result, shield 50 will not properly rest against frame 12 or well floor 32 . The shield will not create an enclosed interior space so that the cleaning fluid will not be fully contained during the cleaning cycle. Cup sensor 88 prevents the initiation of the cleaning cycle where a user leaves the cup in place.
In addition, carriage 17 moves blade 20 to a cleaning position that is below the blade's “mixing position” and below the cup-receiving portion of holder 40 . If a user forgets to remove cup 4 , blade 20 will move downwardly until it contacts the floor of the cup. The floor will resist the further movement of blade 20 on shaft 22 . The extra load on the stepper motor causes it to stall. As a result, carriage 17 will not be in the proper position for cup sensor 88 to detect magnet 86 on carriage 17 .
The method of using the subject apparatus provides for one-handed operation that is fast, safe, clean, easy to use, and effective. In use, a user places a cup with consumable material at the cup-receiving position, such as on the cup-receiving holder, and activates the apparatus via a switch, button, touchpad, or the like. The apparatus automatically lowers the carriage to the mixing position. In the mixing position, the shield lid closes the top of the cup, and the mixing blade is positioned within the cup and consumable material.
The mixing motor is automatically activated to rotate the mixing blade thereby causing the consumable material to be mixed. The speed of the blade may be variable, and the blade may move up and down within the cup during the mix cycle without displacing the splash shield.
After the mix cycle is completed, the carriage is returned to the home position whereby the splash shield and mixing blade are lifted from the cup. The user can access and remove the cup from the cup-receiving position.
A cleaning cycle is then manually or automatically activated. The splash shield, which still surrounds the blade, is again lowered into contact with the frame. The splash shield and frame (such as well floor 32 ) create an enclosed entire space. The cup-receiving position and/or cup-receiving holder are encased by the splash shield and frame. The blade can be positioned at various distances from the frame including beneath the level of the cup-receiving holder. Mixing blade could be moved during the cleaning cycle without displacing the splash shield.
The cleaning cycle is initiated, and fluid is injected into the interior of the shield via an inlet manifold. The fluid contacts and cleans the shield (including the lid), blade, cup-receiving position, and optional cup-receiving holder. The mixing motor can be engaged to rotate the mixing blade during the cleaning cycle to increase fluid distribution or force. The rinse fluid is removed via the drain. In this manner, the automated mixing of the material and subsequent cleaning of the apparatus can be achieved. A user may select the flavors to be dispensed for the next order while the mix in-cup apparatus mixes a previous order and executes a self-clean operation. The mixing blade is isolated from the user during the mixing and cleaning operations. An attempt to displace the splash shield during the mixing or cleaning cycles deactivates the mixing motor.
While the disclosure has been described with reference to specific embodiments thereof, it will be understood that numerous variations, modifications and additional embodiments are possible, and all such variations, modifications, and embodiments are to be regarded as being within the spirit and scope of the disclosure.
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The present disclosure describes an automated blend in-cup apparatus and the related method of operation. The disclosure relates generally to the field of mixing consumable material. More specifically, the disclosure relates to a mixer that is automatically operable to lower a mixing blade into a cup or vessel that contains material to be blended/mixed. A shield is automatically lowered to at least partially isolate the cup. After mixing, the shield and blade are automatically retracted, and the cup is removed from the apparatus. The shield and blade may be automatically lowered again for a cleaning operation. Overall, the apparatus contains various structural and safety elements that provide a unique construction and method of operating the apparatus.
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BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
The instant invention relates to glucosamine compositions capable of exerting a more rapid beneficial effect of the glucosamine and to the method of increasing the effectiveness of such compositions.
Glucosamine is an amino sugar known to normalize cartilage metabolism, inhibit degradation, and stimulate the synthesis of proteoglycans. The proteoglycans are important constituents of articular cartilage. Thus, glucosamine is given to assist in the healing of joint and connective disease damage.
Although known to have this function for many years and to be administered for certain types of injuries and degenerative conditions where there has been damage to articular cartilage discs and connective tissue, it has been found that it takes an extended period of time after administration before it can exercise its beneficial effect. For reasons not clearly understood, it is difficult to get an immediate response on the administration of glucosamine and, accordingly, it may be a period of several months before any physiologically beneficial effect can be realized.
Thus, while compositions are available which utilize glucosamines for treatment of articular disorders, it is found that they are not immediately effective and in some instances must be given for periods of months before they can exercise their desired effect.
SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
While not completely understood, it is believed that the very slow-acting effect of existing glucosamine compositions is due to the fact they are given in forms that are not readily utilizable to form proteoglycans and that the inflammatory conditions associated with articular damage may complicate the bodies' ability to rapidly utilize the same.
The present invention overcomes the problems of prior glucosamine preparations and results in compositions that enable a more rapid uptake of glucosamine, permitting the healing effects of glucosamine to occur.
Briefly stated, the present invention comprises a composition with physiologically effective amounts of a glucosamine and an anti-inflammatory proteolytic composition.
The invention also comprises a method of increasing the rapidity of physiological availability of a physiologically active glucosamine by utilizing therewith an anti-inflammatory proteolytic composition.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION
The two essential components of the instant composition are a physiologically active glucosamine in conjunction with the anti-inflammatory proteolytic composition.
As used herein, the term "physiologically active glucosamine" means any glucosamine which can be utilized by the body. Glucosamine per se and glucosamine salts such as glucosamine sulfate and glucosamine hydrochloride are suitable examples with glucosamine hydrochloride being especially preferred in the instant invention.
As used herein, the term "anti-inflammatory proteolytic enzyme composition" means a combination of at least one protease and at least one acid-stabilized protease. While it is known that proteolytic enzymes possesses anti-inflammatory properties, it has been found that a combination of acid-stabilized proteases and unstabilized proteases is most effective. The proteases are preferably broad spectrum proteases prepared, as is conventionally known, from various strains of Aspergillus Oryzae. The preferred protease is trypsin, with pepsin, and other proteases utilizable therewith. Such proteases and acid-stabilized proteases are commercially available under the marks NUTRASE® and NUTRASE®PB18.
As to proportions, the glucosamine and proteolytic enzymes are each added in amounts effective to exert their beneficial effect, i.e., a pharmacologically effective amount. In the case of glucosamine an amount effective for assisting the body in the repair of articular damage, i.e., damage to connective tissues, including articular cartilage and discs due to traumatic and degenerative problems. In the case of the anti-inflammatory proteolytic enzyme composition an amount effective to assist the body in reducing inflammation. While it has been found that about 1,500 milligrams per day of glucosamine is a suitable dose for repair of articular damage, the amount can vary widely dependent mainly on such factors as weight, age, sex, severity of injury, and like factors always considered in prescribing optimum dosages. The amount of the proteolytic enzyme composition can also vary widely based on these same factors and also upon the titer. Thus, for example, for acid stabilized proteases at 750 U and proteases at 1750 HUT an equal blend thereof can be given in an amount of about 10 to 20 parts by weight for each 100 parts by weight of the glucosamine.
It has also been found that the more rapid physiological availability; i.e., more rapid availability of the glucosamine by the body can be assisted by including an amylase and a lipase with the proteolytic enzymes. Any commercially available amylase can be utilized and the same is true with respect to the lipase. As is known, the amylases are enzymes which convert starch into sugars and the lipases are a class of enzymes that hydrolyze fats to glycerol and fatty acids. A particular blend of the protease, amylase and lipase enzymes is available commercially under the mark "NUTRASE"®PB-18.
With respect to the amylase and lipase utilized, they are each present in minor amounts, preferably in more than about 1 to 2.5 parts by weight for each 100 parts by weight of the glucosamine.
It is found for best repair of the articular disorders to include manganese in the composition, manganese being known to be essential for normal skeleton connective tissue development. As in the case with many metals utilized in biological preparations, it is preferred to use it in the form of a chelate. Any commercially available magnesium chelate can be utilized, a preferred one being amino acid chelated manganese sold under the mark "CHELAZOME"® The manganese is utilized in the amount of about 2 to 15 parts by weight, for each 100 parts by weight of the glucosamine.
Also preferably included is a source of ascorbic acid, preferably calcium ascorbate, for its usual effect. Ascorbic acid aids in tissue healing and the calcium form is used to ensure there is no loss thereof from the body due to the adverse effects on calcium by proteolytic enzymes. It is used in amounts of about 10 to 20 parts by weight for each 100 parts by weight of glucosamine. It is evident that calcium or any suitably active calcium compound and ascorbic acid or other suitably active ascorbate can be separately added to the composition.
Other materials conventionally used in pharmaceutical products such as inert fillers can be utilized with the instant composition to form tablets and capsules and to give the composition the desired level of glucosamine.
While not completely understood, it is believed that the utilization of the proteolytic enzymes with the glucosamine makes the glucosamine more readily absorbed and utilized by the body due to the proteolytic enzyme effect on reducing inflammatory conditions. As a consequence, with the adverse effects of inflammation being ameliorated, the body is able to immediately utilize the glucosamine for the repair of the articular damage, rather than having to have, as at present, a one-month or more buildup period before it can start exercising its beneficial effects.
The invention will be further described in connection with the following example which is set forth for purposes of illustration only.
EXAMPLE
A composition was formed by admixing 15,000 parts by weight of glucosamine hydrochloride, 2,350 parts by weight of a proteolytic enzyme blend of "NUTRASE"® and "NUTRASE"® PB-18, 2,000 parts by weight of calcium ascorbate and 1,250 parts of manganese chelate (CHELAZOME®).
After being thoroughly admixed in dry form, the dry pulverulent material was formed into capsules containing 375 milligrams of glucosamine hydrochloride, 750 U of acid stabilized protease, 1750 HUT of protease, 250 DU of amylase, 4 LU of lipase, 50 mg. of calcium ascorbate, and 31.25 mg. of the manganese chelate.
At the present time it is also believed that it is beneficial to include a kinase in the composition, because such can assist in accelerating the anti-inflammatory effect of the proteolytic enzymes.
While the invention has been described in connection with a preferred embodiment, it is not intended to limit the scope of the invention to the particular form set forth, but on the contrary, it is intended to cover such alternatives, modifications, and equivalents as may be included within the spirit and scope of the invention as defined by the appended claims.
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A glucosamine-containing composition that includes an anti-inflammatory proteolytic enzyme composition to increase the rapidity of physiological availability of the glucosamine and the method of increasing such availability by the use of proteolytic enzymes.
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