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1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to articles formed from multiple metal layers used in electronic devices, and more particularly, to processes for providing multiple metal layers in registry on substrates to provide circuitry or circuit boards. The invention is especially advantageous when applied to manufacturing processes for thin circuit boards, particularly circuit boards with multiple layers of individually prepared circuits. These circuit boards provide physically durable structures, even when including fragile microstructure such as air bridges. These multi-layer circuit subelements are then laminated in registry, preferably in roll form, with controlled registration of the circuit elements between and across layers by the use of various registration systems.
2. Background of the Art
A technique for forming a tri-layer metal structure is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,428,250 to Ikeda et al. The tri-layer metal structure is formed on a glass substrate. The first layer is a Ta-M-N film, the second layer is a Ta film and the third (top) layer is a Ta-M-N film, where M is at least one atom selected from the group consisting of Molybdenum, Niobium, and Tungsten.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,153,754 to Whetten described a tri-layer metal structure formed on an LCD substrate where the first layer is a titanium (Ti) film, the second layer is a molybdenum (Mo) or aluminum (Al) film, and the third (top) layer is a titanium (Ti) film. In addition, column 6, lines 56-70 describe a process to taper etch the tri-layer metal structure. When the second layer is a molybdenum film, the tri-layer structure is formed by wet etching the titanium first layer with fluoroboric acid (HBF4), wet etching the molybdenum second layer with PAWN (phosphoric acid, acetic acid, water and nitric acid), and dry etching the titanium third layer in a plasma barrel etcher with an atmosphere of CF4 and O2 (or SF6 and O2). When the second layer is an aluminum film, the tri-layer structure is formed in a single etch step by an RIE (reactive ion etching) etch of BCl3, CCl4 and O2.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,464,500 to Tsujimura et al. describes a tri-layer metal structure formed on a glass substrate. A silicon oxide layer is formed on the glass substrate. The first metal layer of Aluminum (Al) is formed on the silicon oxide layer. The second metal layer of aluminum oxide is formed on the first metal layer. The third metal layer of molybdenum is formed in the aluminum oxide layer. Beginning at column 3, line 60, a process for taper etching the tri-metal layer is described. As a result, the cross section of the first metal layer of aluminum is formed with a taper angle.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,824,803 to Us et al. describes a tri-layer metal structure formed on a glass layer wherein the first metal layer is a titanium (Ti) film, the second metal layer is an Aluminum (Al) film, and the third metal layer is a titanium film. As described beginning at column 2, line 45, the tri-metal structure is formed in a single RIE etch step of a chlorine based chemistry. As shown in FIGS. 1a and 1b, the RIE etch step results in a non-tapered structure with vertical sidewalls.
U.S. Patent No. 4,650,543 teaches a GaAs FET electrode wiring layer or bonding pad having a three-layered structure of Au/Pt/Ti or a two-layered structure of Al/Ti. The electrode wiring layer or the bonding pad is sometimes formed by a wet etching method but mainly by a lift-off method. A method of forming a bonding pad by wet etching is described. In this case, an insulating film is formed on a GaAs semiconductor substrate by CVD, and thereafter a contact hole is selectively formed in the insulating film. A metal film for forming a bonding pad is deposited on the overall surface of the substrate, and a resist pattern is formed thereon. Finally, the metal film is etched by wet etching using the resist pattern as a mask so as to form a bonding pad of the metal film on the hole of the insulating film. In this method, since the GaAs semiconductor layer is highly sensitive to chemical treatment, when the wet etching method is used, side etching occurs. For this reason, this method is inappropriate for forming a micropattern such as a gate electrode. Note that in a GaAs FET, a submicron micropattern must be formed. Therefore, a lift-off method was developed for micropatterning. This method is described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,994,758. However, the metal film formed by this method was formed by CVD (Chemical Vapor Deposition) at a low temperature because of a resist film. For this reason, bonding between a metal multilayer and a semiconductor substrate constituting an electrode pattern was inadequate. Therefore, the electrode pattern was easily removed during lifting off or wire bonding, thus degrading the yield in manufacturing of the GaAs FET. This Patent asserted an advance in the technology by the electrode pattern having a multilayer structure selected from the group consisting of Au/WN, Au/W/TiW and Au/Mo/TiW (elements on the left side are positioned uppermost with respect to the semiconductor substrate). In an ion milling technique used in that invention, etching is performed by bombarding a member to be etched with ions of an inert gas such as Ar or At+O2 gas using a shower or beam type device. This technique is inert dry etching and is also called ion etching. This ion milling technique has been disclosed in, e.g., Solid State Tech. March 1983, Japanese Edition p. 51 to 62. In a reactive ion etching technique, by using a parallel-plate, microwave or ion-shower type device, dry etching is performed by reactive plasma using a reactive gas mixture such as CF4+O2 or CF4+Cl while activating a member to be etched using an inert gas such as Ar gas.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,912,506 addresses perceived problems of
(a) thinning of additional metal layers crossing the edges of the multi-layer metal structure;
(b) shorts or pinholes formed in one or more insulator layers above multi-layer metal structure due to near vertical or undercut edges; and
(c) controlling the effective width of the multi-layer structure when using an extended non-directional over-etch.
These problems are variously addressed by the invention of that Patent. A multi-layer metal sandwich structure formed on a substrate includes a first metal layer formed on the substrate and a second metal layer formed on the first metal layer. The second metal layer has tapered side walls. The width of the first metal layer is different than the width of the second metal layer at the interface of the first metal layer and the second metal layer. The multi-layer metal sandwich may also include a third metal layer formed on the second metal layer. The second metal layer may also be substantially thicker than the first or third metal layers. A method for forming the multi-layer metal sandwich with taper and reduced etch bias on a substrate includes the steps of forming a three-layer sandwich of metal on the substrate by forming a first metal layer on the substrate, forming a second metal layer on the first metal layer, and forming a third metal layer on the second metal layer. A resist pattern is formed on the three-layer sandwich, wherein the resist pattern defines etch areas in the three-layer sandwich. The etch areas are exposed to a first etchant that taper etches the second metal layer while not attacking the first metal layer. The etch areas are then etched using a directional etch process, which etches the first metal layer. The resist pattern in then removed. The third metal layer may be removed. Preferably, the first metal layer is titanium (or a titanium alloy), the second metal layer is Aluminum (or an Aluminum alloy), and the third metal layer is Molybdenum (or Molybdenum alloy) or Copper (or a Copper alloy) or other refractory metal (or alloy). In this case, the first etching process for taper etching the aluminum second layer utilizes a wet etchant that is a mixture of phosphoric acid, nitric acid, acetic acid, and water, and the second etching process for etching the titanium first metal layer utilizes an RIE etching process.
Each of these references emphasizes the fact that each multiple layer element has its own unique properties and tends to require unique processing solutions and processing controls. It is desirable to be able to provide different multi-layer sandwiches with unique properties, both within individual layers and within the functional ability of the composite. However, each such different system requires fundamental investigation of the properties and the processing necessities.
A significant manufacturing problem in every form of printed circuit manufacture is the assurance of appropriate registration of the circuitry, and especially the connect points, in the layers of circuits that are combined. Each different system of manufacture has its own unique complexities in attempting to obtain registration, and each manufacturing process requires its own specific type of controls and steps to provide good registration. For example, even in stacking circuits by etching layers in place, there can be significant registration problems. Some circuits boards are manufactured by stack etching individual layers of circuitry by providing a base layer with a first metal layer and first resist layer. The resist is imagewise exposed and the metal layer etched in correspondence to the pattern provided to form a first circuit. A second metal layer (with an insulating layer interposed between the etched first metal layer circuit and the second metal layer) is placed over the first etched circuit with a second resist on the exterior surface of the second metal layer. A second circuit layer is formed by imagewise exposure, development and etching of the second metal layer. This sequence of metal layer application, resist development and etching is repeated for each of the layers of circuitry required in the complete patterning and design of the circuit board. Through holes, pins or vias are used to connect contact points or leads of the circuitry of the individual layers of etched metal to the appropriate circuitry in other layers (either adjacent layers or in layers separated by other layers of circuitry). For the manufacturer to connect the circuit elements and contact points with straight line holes or pins, it is necessary that the contact points be aligned vertically. If the contact points are not aligned vertically through the stacked array of circuits in the circuit board, the electrical connectors passing through the layers may not make the required contact with the circuit elements and the circuit board will be partially non-functional. The smaller and finer the elements of the circuit board, the higher must be the resolution of the circuit elements and the higher must be the degree of alignment for the layers in the circuit board.
Many different features and phenomena in each of the processes add to the uncertainty of registration. For example, in forming the stacked arrays by stacking circuits and by etching layers in place, registration can be compromised by a) temperature changes occurring during processing causing layers to thermally expand and then contract, distorting the circuit image, b) physical mislaying of layers on top of each other, c) misalignment of the stack within the exposure area of a photoresist imaging systems, d) vibration shifting either the circuit element or the imaging element (e.g., the laser diode for the imaging of the resist), and the like. In the development of new systems and processes for the manufacture of circuit boards, the nature of registration problems must be addressed early in the development cycle or severe problems will be encountered during scale-up. Another likely cause of misregistration e) is a volume change in adhesives during curing or setting.
A process allows the manufacture of circuitry from multi-layer metallic elements, the multi-layer metallic elements preferably comprising tri-metal subelements, such as copper/aluminum/copper sub-elements (hereinafter referred to as xe2x80x9ctri-metal sub-elements,xe2x80x9d even though more than three layers may be present) which are created, as by etching, to form individual sub-elements of circuits. These individual sub-elements of circuitry are formed by multiple-step processing (e.g., multiple layer plating up or multiple layer plating down, lamination, or preferably by etching of tri-metal sub-elements). Intermediate or completed circuits are formed by the lamination of the formed (e.g., etched or partially etched) tri-metal sub-elements to a base intermediate layer (support or ground plane, for example), and then electrically connecting the appropriate points of the circuitry through intermediate layers to form the circuit board. These individual sub-elements are then electrically connected (e.g., with any electrical connecting means known in the art, including but not limited to posts, vias or plated through-holes) to form larger circuit elements. Circuitry may be formed by any method including the following, not necessarily sequential, steps of a) providing a multiplicity of the (preferably tri-metal) sub-elements, b) providing a separator sub-element between the (preferably) tri-metal sub-elements, c) drilling, plating, inserting posts, or coating through-holes to electrically connect at least two of the (preferably) tri-metal sub-elements, d) providing a resist layer on at least one surface of at least one of the (preferably) tri-metal sub-elements, e) exposing or otherwise activating the resist (e.g., exposing a radiation sensitive resist to appropriate radiation in an image-wise pattern, thermally exposing a thermal resist in an image-wise pattern, printing on a resist in an image-wise pattern, etc.), f) developing the resist pattern to expose an underlying surface of at least one (preferably tri-metal) sub-element (of course, one resist layer can expose only one underlying tri-metal sub-element at a time), g) etching at least one layer of the tri-metal sub-element through openings in the developed resist layer, and h) stripping the resist from the surface. After the first layer has been etched, the next layer (the preferably aluminum layer) may be etched, with the copper layer remaining as at least part of a resist surface. The remaining copper, after the second or third etch, may be coated with an organic solderability preservative (as that class of composition, often including rosin, is known in the art) or metallized, such as silvered to increase its solderability and/or conductivity. By this method, not only may conventional circuits be manufactured, but air bridges may also be constructed within the flow of process steps. The second exterior metal layer (e.g., the second copper layer) may be etched before or at the same time as the first metal layer (first copper layer), after the etching of the first layer but before etching of the interior aluminum layer, or after the etching of the first metal layer but after etching of the aluminum layer. Solder mask may be added at any of various stages of the process for the purpose of electrical insulation, underfilling of air bridges and encapsulation of cores, edges and traces, etc. Flexible, rigid, and segmented flexible and rigid (rigid-flex) circuit boards may be manufactured by the selection of appropriate layer thicknesses and support layer materials.
As the individual layers of circuit elements must be interconnected on the circuit board, it is desirable or even essential that a sufficient degree of registration is effected between each of the layers to be connected. This is difficult enough where only two (e.g., tri-metal) sub-elements are connected on opposite sides of a support, but the difficulty is magnified with more layers or when sheets of (preferably tri-metal) material are used from rolls or coils, and the lamination of the (e.g., etched tri-metal) sub-elements occurs in a continuous fashion. In the last process, misregistration can readily creep and increase in the layers as they are laminated due to the multiplying effect of slightly misregistered panels or circuits in coil or roll form. Rather than losing a single circuit board in that circumstance, an entire run of circuit boards could be lost. As part of the process of this invention, numerous points of registration can be integrated into the system by providing registration marks, using through holes as registration marks, optical feedback mechanisms, electrical connection checks during manufacture, registration marks in the original coils or rolls, registration marks added to the coils or rolls during the etching step, mechanical registration elements built or processed into the coils or rolls during processing or at the time of the original supply. Multiple numbers of etched tri-metal subelements also may be directly laminated together without intermediate supports or ground plane layers. This would be accomplished by applying adhesive to an outer surface (or remaining outer surface) of the etched tri-metal subelements. The adhesive would be a dielectric for best performance of the bonded multiple tri-metal subelements without an intervening distinct layer. | {
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Carboxymethylcellulose (CMC) is a water soluble, biocompatible and bioresorbable semi-synthesized polysaccharide. The safety of commercially available CMC having high purity has been identified and approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for incorporation into many products. CMC is able to react with various polymers by way of electrostatic interaction, ionic cross-linking, hydrogen bonding, Van der Waals interactions, and physical interpenetration. Because of its safety, convenience and diversity of physico-chemical properties, CMC has demonstrated applications in the pharmaceutical, food and cosmetic industries.
CMC is one type of carboxypolysaccharide (CPS). CPSs have also been used in the manufacture of implantable polymers. CPSs are polymers made of saccharide monomers in which some of the hydroxyl (—OH) groups are replaced with carboxyl groups (—COOH or —COO—). Thus, CPSs such as CMC have some hydroxyl groups and some carboxyl groups present. Carboxylation can permit ionic interaction within a polymer chain or can permit interaction between polymer chains, thereby forming a gel. Such gels have been used for a variety of applications, including implantable medical polymers. | {
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As IC technology advances, the complexity of chips increases and higher performance is required. As the industry moves towards a system on a chip model (SoC), uncertainties such as interface requirements and integration of analog blocks must be addressed and resolved. In considering an IC design flow, companies face two major issues: cost and risk.
Cost
Chip design and manufacturing costs for 0.13 μm and 90 nm technologies are estimated to be, respectively in the range of 14 million and 30 million dollars. Costs of this magnitude inhibit many startup companies, and even established companies, from developing products in 0.13 μm and below technologies. Cost components associated with chip design and manufacturing include, without limitation, design resources, acquisition and development of intellectual property (IP), EDA tools, fabrication masks, manufacturing, assembly, validation and verification.
Risk
As chip complexity increases, driven by industry SOC migration, the level of risk increases as well. Set forth below are some of the risk factors associated with development of advanced mixed signal ICs.
Time to Market. Development cycles have increased along with the complexity of the ICs, delaying product introduction cycles by 18 months or more.
Market Acceptance. Market acceptance is a fundamental problem, and can be achieved only by successful chip definition, low cost and short introduction time (time to market).
IP Availability. Complex, mixed signal ICs require many analog and digital IP components. In most cases, all required IPs are not available from the same source. Based on diverse levels of required expertise and depending on project requirements, IP design and development may need to be contracted out. IC manufacturers, fabrication houses and foundries develop multiple flavors of process technologies, i.e., low power, high performance, etc., to address customer requirements, which in turn affects IP availability across all processes.
IP Quality. Price erosion, downward pressure on the cost of IP development, lack of validation and lack of understanding of the overall system have led to serious IP quality issues. Complex analog blocks are sensitive to their surrounding environments, and analog IP is often developed without an understanding of the environment in which it will be incorporated. Advanced technologies and high speed signaling result in narrow design margins and, due to validation time and cost, analog IP providers have no means of validating their IP prior to its usage by end users. It is noteworthy that no analog IP vendor has managed to prove a successful business model.
Design Parameters. In 0.13 μm technologies and below, leakage, noise margin, reduced supply voltage and device mismatches have created a new set of design parameters that further complicate design of high performance analog circuits, causing more emphasis to be placed on silicon verified IP and system validitation.
Validation. Verification and validation of high performance ICs introduces another risk factor due to system environment and complexity. Many IP vendors are now required to validate their IPs in silicon. While this is a partial answer to the problem, validation increases cycle time and does not address solidity of design over process corners which, in effect, translates to yield. Moreover, validation of mixed signal IPs by IP vendors is done in a completely different environment and does not eliminate many risk factors. It is noteworthy that validation of complex IP blocks requires infrastructure, a characterization lab, which is costly and most IP providers do not have.
Yield. Before advanced technologies reach a maturation point, process parameters change and, depending on design time, performance and yield problems may manifest themselves. The overall IC yield is a product of the individual integrated IP yields, design marginalities and manufacturing yields. At present, there are no means for analyzing the yield of acquired IP blocks. Should IP be acquired from multiple sources, there is no guarantee that different IPs will provide a consistent yield across different manufacturing corners, resulting in serious yield loss at the chip level.
Development Cost. Development cost directly affects market acceptance and profit margins, which in turn drives cost structure and system quality.
Analog/Digital Integration. Because IP designers cannot consider all parameters associated with chip level integration, i.e., package, transistor count, supply noise, etc., IC designers must have a good understanding of circuit sensitivity in order to integrate the analog and digital blocks of the chip. The risk factors associated with analog/digital integration at the chip level, and the sensitivity of IP blocks and dependencies at the chip and system levels, are the reasons that many successful IC companies develop analog IPs internally.
Redesign. Redesign lengthens the development cycle, thereby delaying time to market and increasing cost, resulting in lower profit margins, reduced market acceptance and the possibility of missing the potential market window. This emphasizes the importance of first time silicon success without redesign.
Due to these many cost and risk factors, migration to advanced technologies and SOCs has become a barrier that many companies cannot overcome and has created a roadblock in the industry. While several “band aid” solutions have been developed, which are discussed below, there is a clear need for a different and revolutionary design platform that allows easy migration to advanced technologies and SOC design.
Attempted Solutions
The engineering community has attempted to address these problems by forming standards bodies to create standard platforms for specification and validation, and to lower the barriers to adoption and improve overall system quality. Standards are developed across different technologies addressing different bottlenecks. Examples include input and output standards, memory controller standards, parallel and serial link standards such as USB, PCI, Infiniband, IEEE 802.11, and so on.
IC manufacturers have adopted large foundry rule sets and device performance to minimize manufacturing variability in advanced technologies. An example is the adoption of TSMC design rules as a standard by many independent device manufacturers (IDMs) and manufacturing houses. By consolidating processes, barriers to technology portability are reduced and overall energy is focused on bringing up fewer technologies through collaboration. Many IC companies are also developing their designs based on merged rule sets to allow for second sourcing and reduction of possible manufacturing issues and cost.
Other design concepts have also been developed to address the aforementioned risk and cost issues. The proposed solutions, discussed below, while addressing some aspects of the problems, fail to provide a platform that addresses all issues.
Field Programmable Gate Array (FPGA) Design Flow
A field programmable gate array (FPGA) is an IC that can be programmed in the field after manufacture to carry out a specific function. FPGAs are readily available in different configurations and sizes. FPGAs are similar in principle to, but have vastly wider potential application than, programmable read-only memory (PROM) chips.
FPGAs provide a cost effective solution for concept validation and address many aspects of time to market and IP availability. Recent FPGAs provide complex IP blocks in advanced technologies, and reduce risks associated with IP integration and quality. The shortfalls of FPGAs, however, are in the areas of potential usage, performance and production costs. Potential usage is limited to the rigid FPGA structure and its pre-defined IP blocks. Due to the nature of FPGA design, performance is limited and in general only lower frequency ranges can be accommodated. Relative to COT and ASIC flow (discussed below) in the same technologies, FPGAs provide only ⅕ to ⅓ of the performance. High production costs prohibit moderate to high volume designs from having competitive ASPs. Increased cost of development has helped FPGA companies in recent years, such as Xilinx, Altera and so on. More FPGA companies are forming to meet the market demand.
Structural Array (SA) Design Flow
Structural arrays were developed to address the production cost associated with FPGAs and to reduce the performance gap between FPGAs and COT flow. SAs typically have a lower cost for larger production volumes than FPGAs. In some instances, structural arrays can provide larger gate counts, better performance and wider IP selection than FPGAs. Depending on the definition of the SA, companies providing these platforms may experience success. One successful example is LSI's Rapid Chip.
Like FPGAs, however, SAs have a rigid structure that reduces the possibility of their use in productions. Also, there is a longer design time associated with SAs (typically 2–6 months) than there is with FPGAs (typically 1–3 months). In general, SAs do not provide great added advantage relative to FPGAs and, consequently, have not been the subject of widespread acceptance in the industry. This may change as cost of development and performance issues take on even greater weight.
ASIC Design Flow
Design and manufacturing services are provided by major chip manufacturers such as IBM, TI, ST, Phillips, etc. System houses normally provide specifications for Application Specific Integrated Chips (ASICs) to these ASIC providers. ASIC providers deliver finished products according to the specification. ASIC design flow has been gaining momentum recently because it minimizes the risk factors associated with advanced technologies, required knowledge and the availability of IP. The primary issues associated with ASIC flow are the cost of production, which relatively few manufacturers can afford, and the transferability of the finished ASIC to a COT flow (described below). Hence, ASIC design flow is primarily used where cost of production is secondary to minimizing risk, and the design is used in a system that does not require market validation.
Customer Owned Tooling (COT)
COT is the most commonly used design flow for high performance products that have demanding time-to-market requirements. In a typical COT flow, a system house works directly with a pure-play foundry for silicon manufacture. A COT flow generally means that the system house takes its design with all the associated risk all the way through to physical implementation. The resulting GDSII representation of the design is, in theory, ready for silicon fabrication and packaging.
COT flow has been shown to deliver the highest performance and smallest die size. COT data pathways typically have 30–50% faster performance and 25–50% smaller die size relative to an equivalent ASIC. COT design flow, from the IC specification, typically involves the steps of RTL codification, synthesis, static timing analysis and place and route. Of importance, and a major contributing factor to the typical design cycle time of 12–24 months, COT design flow also requires the steps of IP design, acquisition, integration and floor planning.
The greatest advantage provided by COT flow is control: the chip designer is exclusively in control of the process and makes its own decisions about tools, flows, etc. The chip designer has complete control over the timetable and may intervene at any stage in the process without significant loss of time. In an ASIC flow, by contrast, information must be exchanged between different organizations, and the timing and availability of such interventions is at the mercy of the ASIC vendor. Once the initial investment in the COT flow is made, production volume and turnaround times are greatly enhanced. Another significant advantage of COT flow is that all design experience, IP and knowledge is internally owned.
Along with the high rewards of COT flow comes high risk. In COT flows, the chip design and integration of IP are not guaranteed to work properly on the first revision of the silicon, as in ASIC flow. This exposes system houses to a tremendous amount of financial and product introduction risk. In most cases, in order to get the silicon working properly, system houses must iterate the IC design 1–3 times, which adds development costs and delays product introduction. The cost of developing an IC via a COT flow requires a significant and costly infrastructure investment. It takes more tools, personnel and expertise to manage the end-to-end flow. A broad knowledge base is required. Hence, the shortcomings of COT flow include acquiring the knowledge for different aspects of the design, acquiring or developing the required IP, management of risk and cost, and inadequate support for concept and market validation, which results in higher risk and potential need for multiple redesigns. | {
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In the known generator designs in which an inner or outer stator acts as the armature, the stator is loaded with a plurality of windings or coils, and a corresponding rotor is loaded with magnets or magnet pole pieces. The armature itself is usually made by stacking laminate sheets of a suitable material such as electrical steel or silicon steel, and arranging these about a supporting structure. A laminate sheet is pre-cut or punched in the desired shape according to the required number of stator windings and stator teeth, and, when mounted on the supporting structure, will extend radially outward. In the case of very large electric motors or generators, a laminate sheet can comprise an arc segment of the stator, with a number of armature teeth protrusions that define the winding slots. Each winding is arranged in a slot formed between adjacent stator teeth. A laminate sheet serves to fulfill various important functions such as reducing eddy currents, lowering hysteresis, and providing a path for magnetic flux. For this reason, a laminate sheet is usually realized as an uninterrupted area with a main body and a number of stator tooth protrusions. Ideally, the metal of the laminate sheet provides the magnetic flux with an uninterrupted path through the body of the laminate sheet.
During operation of a generator such as a wind turbine generator, high levels of electrical current are induced in the windings, and these become very hot as a result. A high temperature in the windings is undesirable for a number of reasons. The resistance of the windings increases at higher temperatures, with a detrimental effect on the generator's output power. Also, the heat from the generator is passed to the magnets and can have an adverse effect on their performance. Other components in the generator, such as electrical circuitry for auxiliaries, can also be affected by the high temperatures. Therefore, much effort is invested in attempting to cool the generator.
In some prior art approaches to cool the windings, a cooling fluid is brought as close as possible to the stator windings. For example, a cooling airflow can be directed into the air-gap between rotor and stator, so that some heat can be transported away by the cooling airflow. Heat dissipation elements such as cooling fins may be mounted onto an exterior surface, for example onto the outer surface of an outer rotor, in an effort to transfer heat away from the magnets that have in turn been heated by the windings across the air-gap. Other cooling techniques involve arranging a heat exchanger in an interior space of the generator in an attempt to reduce the heat in the generator. However, these approaches are all limited to some extent by the generator design, specifically by constraints that affect the stator design. For example, in most designs it is not possible to access the hot windings directly since each winding is closely packed between adjacent stator teeth. In other designs it is not possible to access the windings or the stator supporting structure for cooling purposes. Effectively, the narrow airgap and the laminate stack of the stator inhibit access to the hot windings. Therefore, the effectiveness of the known designs is limited by the inability to draw heat away from the windings as well as the supporting structure. In one approach, channels are formed to extend through the stator teeth between the generator airgap and the stator interior, and the purpose of the channels is to allow cooling air to pass through the body of the stator. However, to be effective in cooling the hot stator, a large number of such channels are required. Since the channels effectively remove metal from the body of the stator, the magnetic flux is adversely affected. Furthermore, such channels are formed in the stator teeth and are therefore not close to the stator windings, so that their effectiveness at drawing heat away from the winding is limited. | {
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This invention relates to polymeric compositions that are processible and may be photochemically cured to produce crosslinked compositions useful in coating, sealants, adhesive and many other applications
For coating, sealant and adhesive applications, much research has focused on acrylic pressure sensitive adhesives (PSAs), which exhibit good adherence to high energy (i.e., polar) substrates such as metal and painted steel surfaces and which have good performance properties at high temperatures (i.e., 100xc2x0 C. or greater), are known in the art. Crosslinking acrylic compositions to form crosslinked PSAs are an area of much interest and research.
Solvent-processed acrylic PSA compositions can be crosslinked through the addition of polyfunctional crosslinking agents that react with functionalities within the polymer. See, e.g., Japanese Kokoku No. 58[1983]-046236. However, such processes result in the emission of solvent vapors.
The difficulty of additional processing steps, necessary to incorporate polyfunctional crosslinking agents into acrylic PSAs, can be avoided by the use of latent crosslinking reactions. This technique is exemplified in U.S. Pat. No. 4,812,541, where synergistic amounts of an N-vinyl lactam monomer and a glycidyl monomer are incorporated into an acrylate polymer to provide a high performance PSA; however, these latent crosslinked polyacrylates require post-curing that requires additional heat and/or time. Pendent functional group-containing polymers are also described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,908,229, 5,122,567, and 5,274,063.
The problems associated with solvent processing and crosslinking bulk-processed acrylate PSAs can be avoided through the use of actinic radiation processing. PSAs made by photopolymerizing an alkyl acrylate and a polar copolymerizable monomer (e.g., acrylic acid, N-vinyl pyrrolidone, etc.) are known in the art. See, e.g., U.S. Pat. Nos. RE 24,906, 4,181,752, 4,364,972, and 4,243,500. The cohesive strength of an acrylic PSA prepared in this manner can be increased if a photoactive crosslinking agent such as an aldehyde, a quinone, or a chromophore-substituted halomethyl-s-triazine is used in conjunction with a photoinitiator. See, e.g., U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,329,384, 4,330,590, 4,391,687, and 5,202,361. However, this type of photocrosslinking process is affected by the thickness of the composition.
In addition to actinic radiation processing, acrylate PSAs can be applied to substrates by solvent and hot-melt coating techniques. Although solvent coating techniques are widely used, hot-melt coating techniques provide some environmental and economical advantages. However, unlike solvent coating techniques where the polymer coating and crosslinking are performed simultaneously, hot-melt coating requires that coating and crosslinking be performed sequentially. This is due to competing considerations a polymer cannot be hot-melt coated effectively if it is crosslinked, yet the polymer needs to be crosslinked to achieve certain desirable performance properties (e.g., cohesive strength where the polymer is a PSA). Therefore, hot-melt coating is performed prior to crosslinking of the coated polymer.
Because hot-melt coating techniques involve high amounts of thermal energy and shear, the subsequent crosslinking procedure usually involves non-thermal energy sources. Electron beam (E-beam) and ultraviolet (UV) energy sources have been used traditionally, although E-beam techniques often are too energy intensive to be practical. Accordingly, much interest has been focused on UV radiation techniques.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,741,543 (Winslow et al.) describes a syrup polymer process in which a composition containing monomers is coated onto a substrate and crosslinked so as to form a PSA by means of polymerizing free radically polymerizable monomers from covalently attached pendent unsaturation in the polymer component of the composition. The coating can be carried out by a wide variety of industrial methods because the process of the invention allows for compositions with a wide degree of possible viscosities.
Briefly, the present invention provides novel melt-processible compositions prepared from a first polymer having a plurality of pendent polymerizable functional groups and a polymeric photoinitiator. The composition may further comprise a second component with co-reactive pendent polymerizable groups. The functional groups are reactive by free-radical addition (e.g. free radical addition to a carbon-carbon double bond). In addition, reactions involving polymeric reactants of the instant invention are controlled and precise in that they result in polymer-polymer coupling reactions only by reaction between the pendent free-radically polymerizable functional groups. The novel composition has been discovered to provide low shrinkage, low residual compositions whose properties are easily tailored to the desired end-uses. Residuals include monomers, solvents, or other volatile components.
In one aspect this invention provides crosslinkable composition comprising
a) a first component having a plurality of pendent free-radically polymerizable functional groups;
b) a polymeric photoinitiator, and
c) a residual content of less than 2.0 wt. %, preferably less than 1.0 wt. %, most preferably less than 0.1 wt. %,
wherein said composition is melt processible at temperatures of less than or equal to 100xc2x0 C.
The first component is selected from:
1) a first polymer having a plurality of pendent polymerizable functional groups, and
2) a first polyfunctional compound having a plurality of pendent polymerizable functional groups.
The composition may further comprise a second component that may be selected from a second polymer having a plurality of pendent polymerizable functional groups, and a second polyfunctional compound having a plurality of pendent polymerizable functional groups.
In another aspect this invention provides a UV crosslinkable composition that produces no or minimal by-products, and that achieves crosslink density by chain-growth addition. This invention has several advantages. The composition is low in viscosity, readily melt processible and coatable, and has minimal residuals content such as solvents, monomers, plasticizers and/or viscosity modifiers. The compositions can rapidly and reliably be prepared without requiring specialized equipment and without generating concerns about potentially toxic or irritating unreacted low molecular weight monomeric species.
The compositions may be used as coatings, including hard surface coatings, clear coatings, powder coatings and pattern coatings; as adhesives, including pressure sensitive adhesives and hot melt adhesives; as sealants; as optical coatings; as blown microfibers (BMF); as high refractive index optical materials; as barrier films; in microreplication; as low adhesion backsizes, (LABs) and as release coatings.
As used herein, the term xe2x80x9cmelt processiblexe2x80x9d or simply xe2x80x9cprocessiblexe2x80x9d is used to refer to polymer compositions that possess or achieve a suitable low viscosity for coating or extrusion at temperatures less than or equal to 100xc2x0 C., using conventional extrusion equipment without the need for addition of solvents, monomers, plasticizers and/or viscosity modifiers and without the need for extraordinary pressures.
The crosslinked compositions are useful as adhesives, including pressure sensitive adhesives, as sealants, as foams and as coatings. In one embodiment the invention provides an adhesive article comprising the crosslinked composition coated on a substrate, such as a tape backing. The novel compositions of the present invention cure by means of polymerizable functional groups to form crosslinked compositions possessing tailorable properties such as shear, peel, release and strength through selection of the particular constituents, and by control of the crosslink density. The crosslink density is predetermined by the percentage of free-radically polymerizable functional groups incorporated into the crosslinkable composition.
In another aspect this invention provides a process for making a substrate bearing a coating of a crosslinked composition (such as a pressure-sensitive adhesive) on at least one surface thereof, comprising the steps of:
a) coating the crosslinkable composition of the invention onto a substrate, and
b) subjecting said coated crosslinkable composition to sufficient energy to activate said initiator and to crosslink said composition.
For performance, environmental, and economic considerations, photoinitiated polymerization is a particularly desirable method for preparing a pressure sensitive adhesive (psa) directly on the tape backing (or release liner in the case of a so-called transfer tape in which the psa is ultimately transferred to a substrate instead of a tape backing to provide for adhesion of the bonded article or adherend). With this bulk polymerization technique, it is advantageous to create a composition having coatable viscosity of 50,000 centipoise or less (when measured at or below 100xc2x0 C.), coat the composition on the substrate, then crosslink the components to build strength and adhesive properties.
Advantageously, the present invention provides crosslinkable compositions that are readily processed without appreciable residual content (as in syrup polymer compositions). Curable systems containing monomeric species or solvent can give rise to a significant increase in density when transformed from the uncured to the cured state causing a net shrinkage in volume. As is well known, shrinkage can cause a general loss of adhesion in many instances as well as significant movement and unpredictable registration in precise bonding operations such as those required in microcircuit applications.
The composition of the present invention minimizes shrinkage due to solvent evaporation and/or monomer polymerization. The low shrinkage compositions of this invention are particularly useful in dental, molding applications or in any application where accurate molding and/or registration is required. The present invention provides a new class of reactive polymers that may be formulated as 100% solids, cured by photochemical means and that exhibit properties that meet or exceed those of solvent-borne or syrup polymers. The present invention provides compositions that exhibit less than 2% shrinkage, and preferably less than 1%.
Further, the purity of the materials and clean environment for processing are also important to produce high performance materials. Polymers used for coatings and adhesives are often desirably delivered without significant amounts of volatile materials (such as monomeric species) to eliminate any contamination. However, the problems of residual volatile materials constitute a much more formidable challenge especially when acceptable limits of migratable, volatile impurities are on the order of a few parts per million. Industries such as medical and food packaging require materials of high purity and lower cost. The composition of the present invention avoids problems due to species contamination.
The present invention provides crosslinkable compositions useful in the preparation of adhesives, coatings and sealants. The compositions are prepared from polymers having free-radically polymerizable, pendent functional groups and are formed from ethylenically unsaturated monomers. The compositions comprise a crosslinkable mixture comprising:
a) a first component having a plurality of pendent free-radically polymerizable functional groups;
b) a polymeric photoinitiator, and
c) a residual content of less than 2.0 wt. %, preferably less than 1.0 wt. %, most preferably less than 0.1 wt. %,
wherein said composition is melt processible at temperatures of 100xc2x0 C. or less.
The first component is selected from:
1) a first polymer having a plurality of pendent polymerizable functional groups, and
2) a first polyfunctional compound having a plurality of pendent polymerizable functional groups.
The first polymer comprises a polymer of at least 500 Mn comprising:
1) from 0.01 to 99.99 parts by weight of polymerized units of free radically polymerizable ethylenically-unsaturated monomers, and
2) from 99.99 to 0.01 parts by weight of a polymerized monomer units derived from an ethylenically-unsaturated monomer possessing polymerizable functional groups.
The free radically polymerizable ethylenically-unsaturated monomers of the first polymer (having a plurality of pendent polymerizable functional groups) may comprise any of the free radically polymerizable ethylenically-unsaturated monomers, examples of which include one or more of the vinyl aromatic monomers such as styrene, xcex1-methylstyrene, 2- and 4-vinyl pyridine, and the like; xcex1,xcex2-unsaturated carboxylic acids and their derivatives such as acrylic acid, methacrylic acid, itaconic acid, maleic acid, fumaric acid, crotonic acid, methyl methacrylate, butyl methacrylate, 2-ethylhexyl methacrylate, ethyl acrylate, butyl acrylate, iso-octyl acrylate, octadecyl acrylate, cyclohexyl acrylate, tetrahydrofurfuryl methacrylate, phenyl acrylate, phenethyl acrylate, benzyl methacrylate, xcex2-cyanoethyl acrylate, maleic anhydride, diethyl itaconate, acrylamide, methacrylonitrile, N-butylacrylamide, and the like; vinyl esters of carboxylic acids such as vinyl acetate, vinyl 2-ethylhexanoate, and the like; vinyl halides such as vinyl chloride, vinylidene chloride, and the like; N-vinyl compounds such as N-vinylpyrrolidone, N-vinylcaprolactam, N-vinylcarbazole, and the like; vinyl ketones such as methyl vinyl ketone and the like.
A preferred embodiment of the first polymer comprises:
1) from 75.00 to 99.99 parts by weight of polymerized monomer units derived from (meth)acrylic acid esters of non-tertiary alkyl alcohols containing 1-14 carbon atoms;
2) from 0.01 to 5.00 parts by weight of polymerized monomer units derived from an ethylenically-unsaturated monomer possessing polymerizable functional groups;
3) from 0 to 10 parts by weight of at least one polar monomer; (i.e. xe2x80x9cpolar monomersxe2x80x9d) and
4) from 0 to 10 parts by weight of other monomers (described below).
The composition of this invention may further comprise a second component of the composition that may be a second polymer having polymerizable functional groups, or may be a second polyfunctional compound having a plurality of co-reactive functional groups. The crosslinked composition of the invention results from the polymerization of the pendent functional groups of the first and second components, with the polymeric photoinitiator.
The first polymer component of the composition comprises (and the second polymer component if present) independently comprises one or more pendent groups that include free-radically polymerizable unsaturation. Preferred pendent unsaturated groups include (meth)acryloyl, (meth)acryloxy, propargyl, and (meth)acrylamido. Such pendent groups can be incorporated into the polymer in at least two ways. The most direct method is to include among the monomer units of ethylene di(meth)acrylate, 1,6-hexanediol diacrylate (HDDA), or bisphenol-A di(meth)acrylate. Useful polyunsaturated monomers include allyl, propargyl, and crotyl(meth)acrylates, trimethylolpropane triacrylate, pentaerythritol triacrylate, and allyl 2-acrylamido-2,2-dimethylacetate.
Using the xe2x80x9cdirect methodxe2x80x9d of incorporating the pendent, free-radically polymerizable functional group, useful functional monomers include those unsaturated aliphatic, cycloaliphatic, and aromatic compounds having up to about 36 carbon atoms that include a functional group capable of free radical addition such as those groups containing a carbon-carbon double bond including vinyl, vinyloxy, (meth)acrylic, (meth)acrylamido, and acetylenic functional groups.
Examples of polyethylenically unsaturated monomers that can be used include, but are not limited to, polyacrylic-functional monomers such as ethylene glycol diacrylate, propylene glycol dimethacrylate, trimethylolpropane triacrylate, 1,6-hexamethylenedioldiacrylate, pentaerythritol di-, tri-, and tetraacrylate, and 1,12-dodecanedioldiacrylate; olefinic-acrylic-functional monomers such as allyl methacrylate, 2-allyloxycarbonylamidoethyl methacrylate, and 2-allylaminoethyl acrylate; allyl 2-acrylamido-2,2-dimethylacetate; divinylbenzene; vinyloxy group-substituted functional monomers such as 2-(ethenyloxy)ethyl(meth)acrylate, 3-(ethynyloxy)-1-propene, 4-(ethynyloxy)-1-butene, and 4-(ethenyloxy)butyl-2-acrylamido-2,2-dimethylacetate, and the like. Useful polyunsaturated monomers, and useful reactive/co-reactive compounds that may be used to prepare a polymer having pendent unsaturation are described in greater detail in U.S. Pat. No. 5,741,543 (Winslow et al.), incorporated in its entirety herein by reference.
Preferred polyunsaturated monomers are those where the unsaturated groups are of unequal reactivity. Those skilled in the art recognize that the particular moieties attached to the unsaturated groups affect the relative reactivities of those unsaturated groups. For example, where a polyunsaturated monomer having unsaturated groups of equal reactivity (e.g., HDDA) is used, premature gellation of the composition must be guarded against by, for example, the presence of oxygen, which acts as a radical scavenger. Conversely, where a polyunsaturated monomer having unsaturated groups of differing reactivities is used, the more reactive group (such as (meth)acrylate as (meth)acrylamido) preferentially is incorporated into the polymer backbone before the less reactive unsaturated group (such as vinyl, allyl, vinyloxy, or acetylenic) reacts to crosslink the composition. The direct method is generally not preferred due to difficulty in control of branching and premature gellation.
An indirect, but preferred, method of incorporating pendent groups that comprise polymerizable unsaturation into the first polymer is to include among the monomer units of the polymer some that comprise a reactive functional group. Useful reactive functional groups include, but are not limited to, hydroxyl, amino (especially secondary amino), oxazolonyl, oxazolinyl, acetoacetyl, carboxyl, isocyanato, epoxy, aziridinyl, acyl halide, and cyclic anhydride groups. Preferred among these are carboxyl, hydroxyl and aziridinyl groups. These pendent reactive functional groups are reacted with unsaturated compounds that comprise functional groups that are co-reactive with the reactive pendent functional group. When the two functional groups react, a polymer with pendent unsaturation results.
Using the xe2x80x9cindirect methodxe2x80x9d of incorporating the pendent, free-radically polymerizable functional groups, useful reactive functional groups include hydroxyl, secondary amino, oxazolinyl, oxazolonyl, acetyl, acetonyl, carboxyl, isocyanato, epoxy, aziridinyl, acyl halide, vinyloxy, and cyclic anhydride groups. Where the pendent reactive functional group is an isocyanato functional group, the co-reactive functional group preferably comprises a secondary amino or hydroxyl group. Where the pendent reactive functional group comprises a hydroxyl group, the co-reactive functional group preferably comprises a carboxyl, isocyanato, epoxy, anhydride, or oxazolinyl group. Where the pendent reactive functional group comprises a carboxyl group, the co-reactive functional group preferably comprises a hydroxyl, amino, epoxy, isocyanate, or oxazolinyl group. Most generally, the reaction is between a nucleophile and electrophic functional groups.
Representative examples of useful co-reactive compounds include hydroxyalkyl(meth)acrylates such as 2-hydroxyethyl(meth)acrylate and 2-(2-hydroxyethoxy)ethyl(meth)acrylate; aminoalkyl(meth)acrylates such as 3-aminopropyl(meth)acrylate and 4-aminostyrene; oxazolinyl compounds such as 2-ethenyl-1,3-oxazolin-5-one and 2-propenyl-4,4-dimethyl-1,3-oxazolin-5-one; carboxy-substituted compounds such as (meth)acrylic acid and 4-carboxybenzyl(meth)acrylate; isocyanato-substituted compounds such as isocyanatoethyl(meth)acrylate and 4-isocyanatocyclohexyl(meth)acrylate; epoxy-substituted compounds such as glycidyl(meth)acrylate; aziridinyl-substituted compounds such as N-acryloylaziridine and 1-(2-propenyl)-aziridine; and acryloyl halides such as (meth)acryloyl chloride.
Preferred functional monomers have the general formula
wherein R1 is hydrogen, a C1 to C4 alkyl group, or a phenyl group, preferably hydrogen or a methyl group; R2 is a single bond or a divalent linking group that joins an ethylenically unsaturated group to polymerizable or reactive functional group A and preferably contains up to 34, preferably up to 18, more preferably up to 10, carbon and, optionally, oxygen and nitrogen atoms and, when R2 is not a single bond, is preferably selected from
in which R3 is an alkylene group having 1 to 6 carbon atoms, a 5- or 6-membered cycloalkylene group having 5 to 10 carbon atoms, or an alkylene-oxyalkylene in which each alkylene includes 1 to 6 carbon atoms or is a divalent aromatic group having 6 to 16 carbon atoms; and A is a functional group, capable of free-radical addition to carbon-carbon double bonds, or a reactive functional group capable of reacting with a co-reactive functional group for the incorporation of a free-radically polymerizable functional group.
It will be understood in the context of the above description of the first and second polymers, that the ethylenically-unsaturated monomer possessing a free-radically polymerizable group is chosen such that it is free-radically polymerizable with itself (i.e. with another functional group on the same polymer) and with the pendent functional group of the second component (if present). The reactions between functional groups provide a crosslink by forming a covalent bond by free-radical addition reactions of ethylenically-unsaturated groups between polymeric compounds. In the present invention the pendent functional groups react by an addition reaction in which no by-product molecules are created, and the exemplified reaction partners react by this preferred mode.
Where the crosslinkable composition is to be processed using high temperatures and the direct method of including pendent unsaturation has been used, care must be taken not to activate those pendent groups and cause premature gelation. For example, hot-melt processing temperatures can be kept relatively low and polymerization inhibitors can be added to the mixture. Accordingly, where heat is to be used to process the composition, the above-described indirect method is the preferred way of incorporating the pendent unsaturated groups.
Polymers of the present invention have a degree of polymerization generally less than about 300. The greater than expected viscosity (for polymers having a degree of polymerization greater than 300), is attributed to entanglements of polymer chains. It has been shown empirically that polymers with less than 300 repeat units are not entangled. Prior to the present invention, unentangled polymers have been shown to be processible but they have low strength. The polymers having relatively low molecular weight, then build molecular weight (and strength) by chain-growth addition of the polymers, through the pendent polymerizable functional groups.
As result of the relatively low molecular weight, the polymers are easily processible in operations such as coating, spraying, extrusion and injection molding, because of the low melt viscosity prior to crosslinking. With the present polymers, the slope of the log-log plot of viscosity vs. molecular weight (Mn) is about 1, whereas for high molecular weight polymers the slope is 3.4. The polymers of the present invention provide processibility, then crosslinking of the polymers provides the needed physical properties such as toughness, hardness, impact resistance and others that are manifested in the cured state. Unless other indicated molecular weight will refer to number average molecular weight.
The molecular weight (average) of the polymer is less than 500,000, and more preferably less than 100,000. Above this molecular weight the viscosity of the polymer is such that coating is very difficult without the use of solvents, viscosity modifiers, plasticizers or by using a xe2x80x9csyrup polymerxe2x80x9d technique, by which the polymer is dissolved in the component monomers, which react into the polymer backbone, further increasing the molecular weight. Molecular weight may be controlled through the use of chain transfer agents, such as are known in the art.
Monomers that are useful and that comprise the major portion of the first (and second if present) polymers are predominantly alkyl(meth)acrylate esters. Alkyl(meth)acrylate ester monomers useful in the invention include straight-chain, cyclic, and branched-chain isomers of alkyl esters containing C1-C14 alkyl groups. Due to Tg and sidechain crystallinity considerations, preferred alkyl(meth)acrylate esters are those having from C5-C12 alkyl groups, although use of C1-C4 and C13-C14 alkyl groups are also useful if the combinations provide a molecule averaged number of carbon atoms between C5 and C12. Useful specific examples of alkyl(meth)acrylate esters include: methyl acrylate, ethyl acrylate, n-propyl acrylate, 2-butyl acrylate, iso-amyl acrylate, n-hexyl acrylate, n-heptyl acrylate, isobornyl acrylate, n-octyl acrylate, iso-octyl acrylate, 2-ethylhexyl acrylate, iso-nonyl acrylate, decyl acrylate, undecyl acrylate, dodecyl acrylate, tridecyl acrylate, and tetradecyl acrylate. Most preferred (meth)acrylate esters include iso-octyl acrylate, 2-ethylhexyl acrylate, and isobornyl acrylate.
The first polymer (and second, if present) may comprise free-radically polymerizable monomer units derived from monomers having pendent fluorinated groups. Such xe2x80x9cfluorinated monomersxe2x80x9d are used in amounts sufficient to impart the desired degree of low surface energy and/or release properties to the resulting crosslinked composition, and are of the formula:
wherein R4 is hydrogen, halogen, or straight chain or branched chain alkyl containing 1 to about 4 carbon atoms;
each R5 is independently hydrogen or straight chain or branched chain alkyl containing 1 to about 4 carbon atoms;
each Q is a covalent bond or an organic linking group, such as a alkyleneoxycarbonyl group, or a sulfonamidoalkylene group;
Rf is a fully or partially fluorinated fluoroaliphatic group, such as xe2x80x94(CF2)3CF3.
A salient component of the fluorochemical monomers is the fluoroaliphatic group, designated herein as Rf. The fluorinated monomers contain from about 5 percent to about 80 percent, more preferably from about 20 percent to about 65 percent, and most preferably about 25 percent to about 55 percent fluorine by weight, based on the total weight of the compound, the loci of the fluorine being essentially in the Rf groups. Rf is a stable, inert, non-polar, preferably saturated, monovalent moiety which is both oleophobic and hydrophobic. Rf preferably contains at least about 3 carbon atoms, more preferably 3 to about 20 carbon atoms, and most preferably about 4 to about 14 carbon atoms. Rf can contain straight chain, branched chain, or cyclic fluorinated alkylene groups or combinations thereof or combinations thereof with straight chain, branched chain, or cyclic alkylene groups. Rf is preferably free of polymerizable olefinic unsaturation and can optionally contain catenary heteroatoms such as divalent oxygen, or trivalent nitrogen.
It is preferred that Rf contain about 35% to about 78% fluorine by weight, more preferably about 40% to about 78% fluorine by weight. The terminal portion of the Rf group contains a fully fluorinated terminal group. This terminal group preferably contains at least 7 fluorine atoms, e.g., CF3CF2CF2xe2x80x94, (CF3)2CFxe2x80x94, or the like. Perfluorinated aliphatic groups (i.e., those of the formula CxF2x+1, where x is 4 to 14 are the most preferred embodiments of Rf.
The fluoroaliphatic group Rf is linked to the organic portion (i.e. the oligomeric backbone or the unsaturated portion of the monomer) by a linking group designated as Q in the formulas used herein. Q is a linking group that is a covalent bond, divalent alkylene, or a group that can result from the condensation reaction of a nucleophile such as an alcohol, an amine, or a thiol with an electrophile, such as an ester, acid halide, isocyanate, sulfonyl halide, sulfonyl ester, or may result from a displacement reaction between a nucleophile and leaving group. Each Q is independently chosen, preferably contains from 1 to about 20 carbon atoms and can optionally contain catenary oxygen, nitrogen, sulfur, or silicon-containing groups or a combination thereof. Q is preferably free of functional groups that substantially interfere with free-radical oligomerization (e.g., polymerizable olefinic double bonds, thiols, easily abstracted hydrogen atoms such as cumyl hydrogens, and other such functionality known to those skilled in the art). Examples of suitable linking groups Q include straight chain, branched chain, or cyclic alkylene, arylene, aralkylene; oxy, oxo, hydroxy, thio, sulfonyl, sulfoxy, amino, imino, sulfonamido, carboxamido, carbonyloxy, urethanylene, ureylene, and combinations and multiples thereof such as sulfonamidoalkylene or polyoxyalkylene. Preferably linking group Q is a covalent bond, divalent alkylene or a sulfonamidoalkylene group.
Suitable linking groups Q include the following structures in addition to a covalent bond. For the purposes of this list, each k is independently an integer from 0 to about 20, R1xe2x80x2 is hydrogen, phenyl, or alkyl of 1 to about 4 carbon atoms, and R2xe2x80x2 is alkyl of 1 to about 20 carbon atoms. Each structure is non-directional, i.e. xe2x80x94(CH2)kC(O)Oxe2x80x94 is equivalent to xe2x80x94O(O)C(CH2)kxe2x80x94.
With reference to a formulation for a preferred embodiment of the first polymer, representative examples of free-radically polymerizable xe2x80x9cpolar monomersxe2x80x9d having at least one ethylenically unsaturated polymerizable group which are copolymerizable with acrylate and functional monomers include strongly polar copolymerizable monomers including but not limited to those selected from the group consisting of substituted (meth)acrylamides, N-vinyl pyrrolidone, N-vinyl caprolactam, acrylonitrile, tetrahydrofurfuryl acrylate, acrylamides, and mixtures thereof, and the like.
Again, in reference to the formulation for a preferred embodiment of the first polymer, where the desired product is a psa, the selection of the xe2x80x9cother monomersxe2x80x9d useful in preparing the composition is done in such a manner that the ultimate crosslinked pressure sensitive adhesive has sufficient conformability, tack, and adhesion to form a bond to a substrate at room temperature. One measure of a psa""s ability to conform to a substrate sufficiently at room temperature and to form an adhesive bond is the material""s glass transition temperature (Tg). A useful, guiding principal is that a psa interpolymer should have a Tg of xe2x88x9215xc2x0 C. (258xc2x0 K) or lower in order for effective adhesive application at room temperature. A useful predictor of interpolymer Tg for specific combinations of various monomers can be computed by application of Fox Equation (1) (obtained from W. R. Sorenson and T. W. Campbell""s text entitled xe2x80x9cPreparative Methods of Polymer Chemistryxe2x80x9d, Interscience: New York (1968), p. 209). Specific values for Tg""s of appropriate homopolymers can be obtained from P. Peyser""s chapter in xe2x80x9cPolymer Handbookxe2x80x9d, 3rd edition, edited by J. Brandrup and E. H. Immergut, Wiley: New York (1989), pp. VI-209 through VI-277.
Again, in reference to the formulation for a preferred embodiment of the first polymer, useful xe2x80x9cother monomersxe2x80x9d include vinyl monomers such as vinyl acetate, styrenes, and alkyl vinyl ethers; and alkyl methacrylates. Useful xe2x80x9cother monomersxe2x80x9d may also include various polyunsaturated monomers, including addition products or copolymers or polymers comprising two different functional monomers (as defined previously) such that the product/copolymer/polymer exhibits the functionality of both of the constituent starting materials/monomers.
The first component may comprise a polyfunctional compound having a plurality of pendent, free-radically polymerizable functional groups (instead of a first polymer). Useful polyfunctional compounds have an average functionality (average number of functional groups per molecule) of greater than one, preferably greater than two and most preferably greater than 3. The functional groups are chosen to be copolymerizable with the pendent functional groups on the first polymer, and are selected to be free-radically polymerizable. Useful functional groups include those described for the first polymer and include, but are not limited to vinyl, vinyloxy, acrylic and acetylenic functional groups.
Dendritic polymers are preferred polyfunctional compounds and include any of the known dendritic architectures including dendrimers, regular dendrons, dendrigrafts, and hyperbranched polymers. Dendritic polymers are polymers with densely branched structures having a large number of reactive end groups. A dendritic polymer includes several layers or generations of repeating units which all contain one or more branch points. Dendritic polymers, including dendrimers and hyperbranched polymers, can be prepared by condensation, addition or ionic reactions of monomeric units having at least two different types of reactive end groups.
Useful polyfunctional compounds have the general formula
Rxe2x80x94(Z)n
where Z is a functional group such as a carbon-carbon double bond, n is greater than 1 and R is an organic radical having a valency of n. Preferably R is an alkyl radical of valency n which may be linear or branched.
The preparation and characterization of dendrimers, dendrons, dendrigrafts, and hyperbranched polymers, is well known. Examples of dendrimers and dendrons, and methods of synthesizing the same are set forth in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,507,466; 4,558,120; 4,568,737; 4,587,329; 4,631,337; 4,694,064; 4,713,975; 4,737,550; 4,871,779 and 4,857,599, the disclosures of which are incorporated herein by reference. Examples of hyperbranched polymers and methods of preparing the same are set forth, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 5,418,301.
More generally, dendritic polymers or macromolecules are characterized by a relatively high degree of branching (DB), which is defined as the number average fraction of branching groups per molecule, i.e., the ratio of terminal groups plus branch groups to the total number of terminal groups, branch groups and linear groups. For dendrimers, the degree of branching is one. For linear polymers the degree of branching approaches zero. Hyperbranched polymers have a degree of branching that is between that of linear polymers and ideal dendrimers. The dendritic polymers used in this invention preferably have a degree of branching which is at least equal to 0.1, more preferably greater than 0.4, and most preferably greater than 0.5.
The polymeric photoinitiator may be the same polymer or a different polymer than the first component polymer (or may be a mixture of the two) having a plurality of pendent polymerizable functional groups. In other words, the first polymer may further comprise monomer units derived from the ethylenically unsaturated monomers having a photoinitiator group. In such cases the first polymer may comprise:
1) from 0.01 to 99.99 parts by weight of polymerized units of free radically polymerizable ethylenically-unsaturated monomers;
2) from 99.99 to 0.01 parts by weight of a polymerized monomer units derived from an ethylenically-unsaturated monomer possessing polymerizable functional groups, and
3) 0.1 to 5 parts by weight of ethylenically unsaturated monomers having a pendent photoinitiator group.
In a preferred embodiment, said first polymer may comprise:
1) from 75.00 to 99.99 parts by weight of polymerized monomer units derived from (meth)acrylic acid esters of non-tertiary alkyl alcohols containing 1-14 carbon atoms;
2) from 0.01 to 5.00 parts by weight of polymerized monomer units derived from an ethylenically-unsaturated monomer possessing polymerizable functional groups;
3) from 0 to 10 parts by weight of polymerized monomer units derived from a polar monomer;
4) from 0 to 10 parts by weight of polymerized monomer units derived from other monomers (as previously described) and
5) from 0.1 to 5 parts by weight of ethylenically unsaturated monomers having a photoinitiator group.
In another preferred embodiment, the polymeric photoinitiator may be a separate polymer that comprises:
1) from 0.01 to 99.99 parts by weight of polymerized units of free radically polymerizable ethylenically-unsaturated monomers; and
2) from 99.99 to 0.01 parts by weight of a polymerized monomer units derived from an ethylenically-unsaturated monomer having a pendent photoinitiator group.
It will be understood with respect to the above formula, that the polymeric photoinitiator may have a photoinitiator group on essentially each repeat unit of the polymer (i.e. greater than 90% of the repeat units).
In a preferred embodiment the separate polymeric photoinitiator comprises
(1) from 75.00 to 99.99 parts by weight of polymerized monomer units derived from (meth)acrylic acid esters of non-tertiary alkyl alcohols containing 1-14 carbon atoms;
(2) from 0 to 10 parts by weight of polymerized monomer units derived from a polar monomer; (i.e. xe2x80x9cpolar monomersxe2x80x9d);
(3) from 0 to 10 parts by weight of polymerized monomer units derived from other monomers (as previously described) and
(4) from 0.01 to 5 parts by weight of polymerized monomer units derived from ethylenically unsaturated monomers having a photoinitiator group.
Ethylenically unsaturated monomers that comprise a radiation-sensitive group, preferably an xcex1-cleaving photoinitiator group and that are copolymerizable with the aforementioned free radically-polymerizable ethylenically unsaturated monomers (hereinafter xe2x80x9cphotoinitiator monomersxe2x80x9d) constitute from 0.0001 to about 5 pbw, preferably 0.01 to 3 pbw, of the crosslinkable composition. Preferred photoinitiator monomers include free-radically polymerizable, ethylenically unsaturated compounds having the functionality represented by the structure:
wherein Rxe2x80x2 is H or a C1 to C4 alkyl group,
R1, R2, and R3 are independently a hydroxyl group, a phenyl group, a C1 to C6 alkyl group, or a C1 to C6 alkoxy group.
A variety of photoinitiator monomers can be made by reacting an ethylenically unsaturated monomer comprising a first reactive functional group with a compound that comprises a radiation-sensitive group and second reactive functional group, the two functional groups being co-reactive with each other. Preferred co-reactive compounds are ethylenically unsaturated aliphatic, cycloaliphatic, and aromatic compounds having up to 36 carbon atoms, optionally one or more oxygen and/or nitrogen atoms, and at least one reactive functional group. When the first and second functional groups react, they form a covalent bond and link the co-reactive compounds.
Examples of useful reactive functional groups include hydroxyl, secondary amino, oxazolinyl, oxazolonyl, acetyl, acetonyl, carboxyl, isocyanato, epoxy, aziridinyl, acyl halide, and cyclic anhydride groups. Where the pendent reactive functional group is an isocyanato functional group, the co-reactive functional group preferably comprises a secondary amino, carboxyl, or hydroxyl group. Where pendent reactive functional group comprises a hydroxyl group, the co-reactive functional group preferably comprises a carboxyl, isocyanato, epoxy, anhydride, or oxazolinyl group. Where the pendent reactive functional group comprises a carboxyl group, the co-reactive functional group preferably comprises a hydroxyl, amino, epoxy, vinyloxy, or oxazolinyl group.
Representative examples of useful co-reactive compounds include hydroxyalkyl(meth)acrylates such as 2-hydroxyethyl(meth)acrylate and 2-(2-hydroxyethoxy)ethyl(meth)acrylate; aminoalkyl(meth)acrylates such as 3-aminopropyl(meth)acrylate and 4-aminostyrene; oxazolinyl compounds such as 2-ethenyl-1,3-oxazolin-5-one and 2-propenyl4,4-dimethyl-1,3-oxazolin-5-one; carboxy-substituted compounds such as (meth)acrylic acid and 4-carboxybenzyl(meth)acrylate; isocyanato-substituted compounds such as isocyanatoethyl(meth)acrylate and 4-isocyanatocyclohexyl(meth)acrylate; epoxy-substituted compounds such as glycidyl(meth)acrylate; aziridinyl-substituted compounds such as N-acryloylaziridine and 1-(2-propenyl)-aziridine; and acryloyl halides such as (meth)acryloyl chloride.
Representative examples of co-reactive compounds include functional group-substituted compounds such as 1-(4-hydroxyphenyl)-2,2-dimethoxyethanone, 1-[4-(2-hydroxyethyl)phenyl]-2,2-dimethoxyethanone, (4-isocyanatophenyl)-2,2-dimethoxy-2-phenylethanone, 1-{4-[2-(2,3-epoxypropoxy)phenyl]}-2,2-dimethyl-2-hydroxyethanone, 1-[4-(2-aminoethoxy)phenyl]-2,2-dimethoxyethanone, and 1-[4-(carbomethoxy)phenyl]-2,2-dimethoxyethanone. Such photoinitiator monomers (and polymeric photoinitiators derived therefrom) are described, for example, in U.S. Pat. No. 5,902,836 (Babu et al.) and U.S. Pat. No. 5,506,279 (Babu et al.), the disclosures of which are herein incorporated by reference.
As previously described, the composition of the present invention comprises a first component with a plurality of pendent polymerizable functional groups (which may be a first polymer or a polyfunctional compound), an optional second component with a plurality of pendent polymerizable functional groups (which may also be either a second polymer or a polyfunctional compound), and a polymeric initiator, which may be a separate polymer or may be the first polymer. The physical form of the composition may be a viscous liquid or low melting solid or a powder, which is related to the glass transition temperature and the molecular weight. The glass transition temperature and molecular weight of the polymer component(s) may be adjusted to obtain compositions having desired properties useful for a myriad of applications ranging from hot-melt adhesives to protective films. Liquid polymers may be obtained if the glass transition temperature of the polymer component (or the melting point of the polyfunctional compound) is below ambient temperature and the molecular weight of the polymer component is below entanglement molecular weight (i.e. a degree of polymerization of less than about 300). Low melting solids may be obtained when the Tg is at or below ambient temperature. Powders may be obtained when the Tg is above ambient temperature.
The first polymer can be prepared (e.g., by solution polymerization followed by isolation) and then added to a separately prepared second polymer (if present) and polymeric initiator. Any residual monomer and/or solvents used in the preparation are generally removed by conventional techniques such as distillation, vacuum evaporation, etc. The order of addition of the individual components of the composition is not important since the polymerizable functional groups do not react prior to initiation by the polymeric initiator. Thus the useful shelf life or xe2x80x9copen timexe2x80x9d is maximized, i.e. the time during which the composition is applied to a substrate (such as a tape backing) and remains sufficiently tacky to effect a bond between the first substrate and a second substrate. Once the open time has been exceeded, a second substrate cannot be readily bonded to the first substrate. Long open times are generally preferred. Shelf life refers to the amount of time the composition may be stored without premature gellation.
The composition may be coated onto backings at useful and relatively time-stable thicknesses ranging from 25-500 micrometers or more. Coating can be accomplished by any conventional means such as roller, dip, knife, or extrusion coating. Stable thicknesses are necessary to maintain the desired coating thickness prior to crosslinking of the composition to form the crosslinked composition.
A preferred method of preparing a pressure sensitive adhesive article comprises partially crosslinking the novel composition to a useful coating viscosity, coating the partially crosslinked composition onto a substrate (such as a tape backing) and further crosslinking the composition. Partial reaction provides a coatable composition in instances where the melt strength of the first polymer (and second component, if present) is too low. Useful coating viscosities are generally in the range of 500 to 10,000 cps.
Polymerization can be accomplished by exposing the composition to energy in the presence of a polymeric photoinitiator. These photoinitiators can be employed in concentrations ranging from about 0.0001 to about 5.0 pbw, preferably from about 0.001 to about 3.0 pbw, and more preferably from about 0.005 to about 0.5 pbw, per 100 pbw of the composition.
Once configured into the desired construction, the composition including the first component, optional second component and the polymeric photoinitiator may be irradiated with activating UV radiation to crosslink the composition. UV light sources can be of two types: 1) relatively low light intensity sources such as blacklights which provide generally 10 mW/cm2 or less (as measured in accordance with procedures approved by the United States National Institute of Standards and Technology as, for example, with a UVIMAP(trademark) UM 365 L-S radiometer manufactured by Electronic Instrumentation and Technology, Inc., in Sterling, Va.) over a wavelength range of 280 to 400 nanometers and 2) relatively high light intensity sources such as medium pressure mercury lamps which provide intensities generally greater than 10 mW/cm2, preferably between 15 and 450 mW/cm2. Where actinic radiation is used to fully or partially crosslink the polymer composition, high intensities and short exposure times are preferred. For example, an intensity of 600 mW/cm2 and an exposure time of about 1 second may be used successfully. Intensities can range from about 0.1 to about 150 mW/cm2, preferably from about 0.5 to about 100 mW/cm2, and more preferably from about 0.5 to about 50 mW/cm2.
Accordingly, relatively thick coatings (e.g., at least about 0.025 mm) can be achieved when the extinction coefficient of the photoinitiator is low. Coatings from of 0.5 or more mm thick are possible and are within the scope of the present invention. Additional advantages of the photopolymerization method are that 1) heating the composition is unnecessary and 2) photoinitiation is stopped completely when the activating light source is turned off.
If so desired, measuring the refractive index of the composition material especially in bulk can be used to monitor the extent of polymerization. The refractive index changes linearly with respect to conversion. This monitoring method is commonly applied in polymerization kinetics work. See discussions about the method in, for example, G. P. Gladyshev and K. M. Gibov, Polymerization at Advanced Degrees of Conversion, Keter Press, Jerusalem (1970).
When preparing a crosslinked composition of the invention, it is expedient for the photoinitiated polymerization reactions to proceed to virtual completion, i.e., depletion of the pendent polymerizable functional groups, at temperatures less than about 70xc2x0 C. (preferably at 50xc2x0 C. or less) with reaction times less than 24 hours, preferably less than 12 hours, and more preferably less than 6 hours. These temperature ranges and reaction rates obviate the need for free radical polymerization inhibitors, which are often added to acrylic systems to stabilize against undesired, premature polymerization and gelation. Furthermore, the addition of inhibitors adds extraneous material that will remain with the system and inhibit the desired polymerization of the polymer and formation of the crosslinked pressure sensitive adhesives of the invention. Free radical polymerization inhibitors are often required at processing temperatures of 70xc2x0 C. and higher for reaction periods of more than about 6 hours.
The crosslinked composition is characterized as a polymer having a first polymer chain having the residue of at least one pendent, ethylenically unsaturated moiety chemically bonded to the residue of at least one photoinitiator moiety that is pendent from a second polymer chain. Preferably each polymer chain comprises an acrylate polymer chain. Thus, during exposure to UV energy, the free radical resulting from the photoinitiator adds to the pendent ethylenically unsaturated moiety to form a crosslink between the polymer chains upon coupling or propagation with another polymerizable group on another polymer chains. When the composition further comprises a second component polymer or polyfunctional compound, the crosslinked composition is characterized as a polymer having a first polymer chain having the residue of at least one pendent, ethylenically unsaturated moiety chemically bonded to the residue of at least one photoinitiator moiety that is pendent from a second polymer chain and/or the ethylenically unsaturated moiety pendent from the second component polymer or polyfunctional compound. In general, the present crosslinked composition has effective molecular weight between crosslinks, (Mc), of greater than or equal to 1,000 and preferably greater than 3,000. Effective molecular weight between crosslinks (Mc), may be measured by dynamic mechanical analysis.
The degree of crosslinking may be easily controlled by the number and concentration of pendent unsaturated groups and by the number and concentration of photoinitiator groups that are pendent from polymer chains. The ratio of photoinitiator groups to pendent, free-radically polymerizable, unsaturated groups can vary from about 1:10,000 to 1:1, depending on the degree of crosslinking desired. Generally the smaller the Mc, the lower the elasticity and hence harder the film. On the other hand, non-crosslinked films exhibit greater flexibility.
In addition to the ingredients mentioned above, the polymer composition may include certain other materials such as pigments, tackifiers, foaming agents and reinforcing agents. However, the addition of any such material adds complexity and hence expense to an otherwise simple, straightforward, economical composition and process and is not preferred except to achieve specific results. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a siphon coffee maker or like beverage making device, wherein a lower container containing water is heated to obtain hot water, which is fed, by the force of vapor pressure, to an upper container containing material such as coffee powder, thereby extracting coffee or other beverage.
2. Description of the Prior Art
One of conventional siphon coffee makers of the above-described type is shown in FIG. 7. A flask-shaped lower container 3 is supported by a support arm 2 and disposed on a heater 1. An upper container 4 is disposed over the lower container 3 and has an open bottom to which a water feed tube 5 is secured. The water feed tube 5 is inserted into the lower container 3 so as to air-tightly communicate between the containers 3 and 4. The upper open end of the water feed tube 5 is covered by a filter 6 provided on the bottom of the upper container 4.
When coffee is extracted with the above-described siphon coffee maker, a desired amount of water and coffee powder is supplied into the lower and upper containers 3 and 4, respectively. The heater 1 is thereafter energized to apply heat to the lower container 3 containing water. When the water is boiled, the aerial pressure in the lower container 3 is increased, whereby the hot water is fed to the upper container 4 through the water feed tube 5 and filter 6. The hot water is mixed with coffee powder in the upper container 4. Thereafter, when the heater 1 is deenergized, the lower container 3 is cooled and the aerial pressure therein is decreased, whereby the hot water mixed with coffee powder in the upper container 4 is filtered by the filter 6 and falls into the lower container 3 through the water feed tube 5. The upper container 4 is then removed from the lower container 3 and coffee obtained in the lower container 3 is poured into a cup or cups.
The heating capacity of the heater 1 is conventionally set at a relatively large value in order to accelerate the making of hot water. When an input power of the heater 1 is set and maintained at the maximum value through a hot water making step to obtain hot water, the heater 1 is led into an over-heating condition as the temperature of water in the lower container 3 reaches the boiling point. Accordingly, the boiling phenomenon in the lower container 3 is rendered too intense at the last stage of the hot water making step. Therefore, when the hot water nearly finishes transferring from the lower container 3 to the upper container 4, the vapor generation is particularly intensified in the lower container 3. The vapor bursts up into the upper container 4 and overstirs the hot water and coffee powder therein. Consequently, coffee extracted becomes cloudy or unnecessary ingredients spoiling the flavor of coffee are extracted from coffee powder. | {
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The present invention concerns apparatuses for transdermal delivery or transport of therapeutic agents, typically through iontophoresis. Herein the terms "iontophoresis" and "iontophoretic" are used to refer to methods and apparatus for transdermal delivery of therapeutic agents, whether charged or uncharged, by means of an applied electromotive force to an agent-containing reservoir. The particular therapeutic agent to be delivered may be completely charged (i.e., 100% ionized), completely uncharged, or partly charged and partly uncharged. The therapeutic agent or species may be delivered by electromigration, electroosmosis or a combination of the two. Electroosmosis has also been referred to as electrohydrokinesis, electro-convection, and electrically-induced osmosis. In general, electroosmosis of a therapeutic species into a tissue results from the migration of solvent, in which the species is contained, as a result of the application of electromotive force to the therapeutic species reservoir.
As used herein, the terms "iontophoresis" and "iontophoretic" refer to (1) the delivery of charged drugs or agents by electromigration, (2) the delivery of uncharged drugs or agents by the process of electroosmosis, (3) the delivery of charged drugs or agents by the combined processes of electromigration and electroosmosis, and/or (4) the delivery of a mixture of charged and uncharged drugs or agents by the combined processes of electromigration and electroosmosis.
Iontophoretic devices for delivering ionized drugs through the skin have been known since the early 1900's. Deutsch U.S. Pat. No. 410,009 (1934) describes an iontophoretic device which overcame one of the disadvantages of such early devices, namely that the patient needed to be immobilized near a source of electric current. The Deutsch device was powered by a galvanic cell formed from the electrodes and the material containing the drug to be transdermally delivered. The galvanic cell produced the current necessary for iontophoretically delivering the drug. This device allowed the patient to move around during iontophoretic drug delivery and thus imposed substantially less interference with the patient's daily activities.
In presently known iontophoresis devices, at least two electrodes are used. Both of these electrodes are disposed so as to be in intimate electrical contact with some portion of the skin of the body. One electrode, called the active or donor electrode, is the electrode from which the ionic substance, agent, medicament, drug precursor or drug is delivered into the body via the skin by iontophoresis. The other electrode, called the counter or return electrode, serves to close the electrical circuit through the body. In conjunction with the patient's skin contacted by the electrodes, the circuit is completed by connection of the electrodes to a source of electrical energy, e.g., a battery. For example, if the ionic substance to be driven into the body is positively charged, then the positive electrode (the anode) will be the active electrode and the negative electrode (the cathode) will serve to complete the circuit. If the ionic substance to be delivered is negatively charged, then the cathodic electrode will be the active electrode and the anodic electrode will be the counter electrode.
Furthermore, existing iontophoresis devices generally require a reservoir or source of the beneficial agent or drug, preferably an ionized or ionizable species (or a precursor of such species) which is to be iontophoretically delivered or introduced into the body. Examples of such reservoirs or sources include a pouch as described in the previously mentioned Jacobsen U.S. Pat. No. 4,250,878, a pre-formed gel body as disclosed in Webster U.S. Pat. No. 4,382,529 and a generally conical or domed molding of U.S. Pat. No. 4,722,726 to Sanderson et al. Such drug reservoirs are connected to the anode or the cathode of an iontophoresis device to provide a fixed or renewable source of one or more desired species or agents.
Perhaps the most common use of iontophoresis today is in diagnosing cystic fibrosis by delivering pilocarpine transdermally. Iontophoretically delivered pilocarpine stimulates sweat production, the sweat is collected, and is analyzed for its chloride ion content. Chloride ion concentration in excess of certain limits suggests the possible presence of the disease.
A variety of methods for attaching an iontophoretic delivery device to the skin of a patient have been disclosed, including straps, adhesive overlays, and in-line ion-conducting adhesives. For example, Sibalis U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,557,723; 4,640.689; 4,622,031; 4,708,716; 4,713,050; and 4,878,892 describes transdermal iontophoretic drug applicators having a return electrode which is secured to the skin with a layer of an electrically conductive adhesive material (i.e., the layer designated 36 in FIG. 2 of U.S. Pat. No. 4,557,723). None of the above Sibalis patents disclose a specific composition for the skin-contacting, electrically conductive adhesive material.
PCT published application WO 90/09413 discloses ion-conducting skin contacting adhesives for securing iontophoretic drug delivery devices to the skin. The contact adhesives (eg., silicone adhesives) disclosed therein have a predominantly hydrophobic character which is modified by the addition of a hydrophilic, usually polymeric, material to the hydrophobic adhesive. The hydrophilic additive provides a plurality of water retaining pathways through the otherwise hydrophobic adhesive matrix. Drug ions or molecules are transported through the adhesive by way of these water retaining pathways by electromigration and/or electroosmosis. Thus, these adhesives can be used as "in-line" adhesive layers positioned between a drug-containing (donor) reservoir, or a salt-containing (counter) reservoir, and the skin.
In the devices of these patents, the electrical coupling of the various electronic components (e.g., resistors, current regulators, pulse generators, batteries, etc) has been accomplished using conventional electrical coupling means such as soldered electrical connections. Unfortunately, soldered electrical connections have a very poor tolerance for flexing. This is a serious disadvantage in devices such as iontophoretic drug delivery devices adapted to be worn on the skin for extended periods of time, e.g., as long as a week or more. When flexible (i.e., nonrigid) iontophoretic drug delivery devices having conventional soldered electrical connections are worn for such extended periods of time, there is a tendency for the electrical connections to break due to the flexing encountered during the patient's body movements. Breakage of an electrical connection can render the device completely inoperative.
Another approach described by Sibalis in U.S. Pat. No. 4,856,188 uses a flexible plastic sheet coated on one side with an electrically conductive coating to connect a battery of an iontophoresis apparatus to the electrodes. The opposite side of the sheet has an adhesive coating. The sheet is folded to permit the conductive coating to contact the battery terminal and the electrode. This approach tends to produce stress points at the folds which can cause the conductive coating to crack which can render the device completely inoperative.
Thus, there has been a need in the art for a means for electrically connecting or coupling electrical components in a flexible iontophoretic delivery device, which connections are not susceptible to breaking upon flexing of the device and which provide good electrical continuity at low cost.
More recently, there has been an effort to develop miniaturized iontophoretic drug delivery devices which are adapted to be worn on the skin unobtrusively under a patient's clothing. The electrical components in such miniaturized iontophoretic drug delivery devices are also preferably miniaturized and may be in the form of either microchips or small printed circuits. While printed circuits are desirable from a cost standpoint, there have been difficulties encountered in electrically connecting the printed circuit to the electrode assemblies containing the agent to be delivered. Specifically, printed electronic circuits are formed by printing or otherwise depositing electrically conductive pathways on a flexible substrate, usually in the form of a polymer sheet. Electronic components, e.g., batteries, resistors, pulse generators, capacitors etc, are then electrically connected, e.g., by soldering, to the printed or deposited electrically conductive pathways to form a complete circuit. Thus, in a typical case, both the printed electrically conductive pathways, as well as all of the electronic components electrically connected thereto, are located on one side of the flexible substrate. Because of the non-uniform height and cross-section presented by the various electrical components within the completed circuit, there have been difficulties encountered in laminating drug and/or electrolyte reservoirs to the side of the flexible circuit having the printed electrically conducted pathways and the electrical components mounted thereon.
One solution to this problem is to laminate the drug and electrolyte reservoirs to the opposite side of the flexible substrate. Unfortunately, this presents a problem in electrically connecting the drug and electrolyte reservoirs to the circuit. Thus, there has been a need in the art for a means for electrically connecting or coupling electrode assemblies, including drug and electrolyte reservoirs, of an iontophoretic delivery device to an electronic circuit having electrically conductive pathways and individual electronic components provided on one surface thereof, which connections are not susceptible to breaking upon flexing of the device and which provides good electrical continuity at low cost. | {
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The present invention relates to the field of photography and, more specifically, to electronic strobe lighting units adapted to be built into or detachably mounted on cameras, and to reflectors and reflector assemblies forming part of such strobe units.
Compact, highly-efficient, electronic strobe lighting units are rapidly becoming the preferred source of artificial illumination for making flash and fill flash exposures with automatic cameras designed for the mass amateur market. The availability of high-speed color films (ASA 400-600) for amateur use has substantially reduced the light output requirements for these lighting units and, coupled with efficiency improvements in the light emitting gas discharge tubes and associated reflectors, their size has been scaled down to the point where it is practical to build them into compact cameras without inhibiting portability. Also, quenchable strobe units have been integrated into automatic exposure control systems which operate in both flash and proportional fill flash modes thereby substantially increasing the utilization of these lighting units for photographing both indoor and outdoor scenes.
Quantitatively, strobe units are rated in terms of peak light output power (effective range), recycle time, and the number of flashes per set of batteries. Qualitative figures of merit, however, define the light output characteristics in terms of wavelength spectrum, color temperature and optical performance in terms of field coverage (as it relates to the field of view of the camera lens) and the distribution of light intensity over the field of coverage.
These last-mentioned optical parameters are defined by the design of the reflector, the location of the light emitting gas discharge tube in relation thereto, the design of the light transmissive face plate (usually a Fresnel lens) and another factor that is not quite so obvious, the manufacturing tolerances to which the individual components are made and thereafter assembled.
For representative examples of contemporary optical design activity in this field, reference may be had to commonly-assigned copending applications, U.S. Ser. No. 183,105 filed on Sept. 2, 1980; U.S. Ser. No. 172,778 filed on July 28, 1980; and U.S. Ser. No. 175,060 filed on Aug. 4, 1980.
The first application discloses a reflector having a parabolic cross-section shape in the form of a seventh order polynomial which, when used with an artificial source of illumination of predetermined geometry, projects a light beam having substantially uniform intensity within a given solid angle.
The latter applications relate to a strobe unit having a reflector cross-section shape in the form of a high order polynomial and a strobe tube which is disposed with its center offset with respect to the reflector's plane of symmetry to provide a vertically asymmetric distribution of illumination intensity over the field of coverage so that higher intensities occur at the central upper part of the picture area where the most important subject matter of a scene is most often found. By selectively concentrating the light output in this manner, the effective range of the strobe unit is extended.
The nature of the technical problems encountered in the manufacture and assembly of such a high quality strobe unit to insure that the optical benefits of such a sophisticated design will be realized when the unit is incorporated into a camera is disclosed in commonly-assigned copending applications U.S. Ser. No. 175,250 filed on Aug. 4, 1980 and U.S. Ser. No. 187,311 filed on Sept. 15, 1980.
The strobe unit described therein comprises a housing; a main reflector section having a high order polynomial cross section; a pair of side reflector plates enclosing the open lateral ends of the main reflector section; a flash tube; and a Fresnel lens face plate that snaps onto the housing in front of the reflector and tube assembly.
The latter application is directed to a method for making a metal stamping die for forming the concave-shaped main reflector section in a manner to compensate for the spring back characteristics of the sheet metal used to form the reflector. First, a test die is made and the resultant reflector section is measured to determine a calibration function which is then used to determine a final die shape that will produce the desired polynomial curve following die forming and spring back.
The former application relates to a high quality strobe unit comprising a multi-component reflector (i.e., a generally parabolic main section and two flat side pieces) that is adapted to be assembled on a mandrel and then inserted into a receiving cavity in the housing wherein tabs on the reflector assembly fit into receiving notches to accurately locate it therein. After the reflector is located in the housing, the strobe tube is inserted through elongated openings in the reflector side pieces and is urged against tapered locating surfaces thereof by elastic rings or grommets for accurately positioning the tube in predetermined offset relation to the apex of the parabola. Thereafter, a face plate, having an integrally formed lenticular section thereon, is snap fitted onto the housing.
While this type of assembly performs satisfactorily, it is relatively expensive to produce because the reflector components must be first separately formed and preassembled and the general assembly technique employed (e.g., having to elongate the elastic grommets and hook them over capturing detents on the housing) do not readily lend themselves to automatic assembly methods.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,223,372 discloses several different embodiments of a small compact strobe unit. In some embodiments, the reflector is a one piece stamping made of aluminum which is inserted into a receiving cavity or frame in the strobe housing. Other embodiments employ a molded plastic housing, or plastic insert therefor, having an integrally molded plastic member that has the curved surface of a reflector. This reflector surface is then coated with a thin layer of aluminum, using a vapor deposition process, to give it the required reflective property.
Both types of construction have certain characteristics which inhibit cost effective automatic assembly. If the reflector is formed separately, before initiation of the assembly process, labor and material costs accummulate for post-forming steps such as removing the reflector from the forming die or mold; inspecting it for defects; loading it into a tote tray or other container to protect the reflector from damage during storage and transport to the assembly area, and then once again handling the reflector to insert it into its housing. Reflectors that are coated with a thin aluminum film must be batch processed for the vapor deposition step thereby precluding the use of more cost-effective continuous in-line assembly methods.
Also, when the strobe tube is flashed, a significant amount of heat is generated which must be effectively dissipated without causing distortion or other damage to the strobe unit components. Because the vapor deposited aluminum film is so thin, it does not have sufficient thermal mass to serve as an adequate heat sink. Therefore, in order to prevent the film from charring or discoloring, especially near the parabola apex, it is usually necessary to provide a relatively thick metal heat sink on the back side of the molded plastic reflector. This just adds another component and assembly step which increase manufacturing costs.
Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide a high-quality strobe unit and reflector assembly forming part thereof which are simple in construction and easy to assemble.
It is another object to provide such a strobe unit and reflector assembly which can be produced at relatively low manufacturing cost while maintaining high performance standards.
Another object is provide such a strobe unit and reflector assembly which are compatible with automatic assembly techniques.
Yet another object is to provide a high quality strobe unit and reflector assembly forming part thereof wherein the reflector is formed during and is an integral part of the assembly process.
Another object of the invention is to provide a strobe unit and reflector assembly wherein the reflector serves as a heat distribution member for facilitating the dissipation of heat generated when the strobe tube is fired.
It is yet another object of the invention to provide an effective method for reducing the manufacturing cost of a high quality strobe unit and reflector assembly forming part thereof.
Other objects of the invention will, in part, be obvious and will, in part, appear hereinafter. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Generally, XML (extensible markup language) has become an important standard for data exchange. The exchange or transmission of large XML streams has become increasingly common, and often the preference is to consume such streams “on the fly”, as opposed to storing them for future use.
One of the core operations of such consumption processes of XML streams is tuple extraction. Generally, tuple extraction lies at the core of XML data integration. One of the most common ways to retrieve information from XML is to “shred” them in relational format. Once shredded, queries can be applied to present an aggregate view for BI (business intelligence). Another important application related to XML streams is for data transformation in schema mapping.
Surprisingly, tuple extraction over streams has not hitherto been widely addressed. Thus, there have been few if any sub-optimal algorithms presented for extracting single tuple types over XML streams. Further, little if any work has been done in the area of extracting multiple tuple types by way of optimal algorithms. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Under certain circumstances, and with appropriate authorization, law enforcement agencies (LEA) are permitted to legally intercept and monitor communications between individuals that may be targets of an investigation. A common technique, known as wiretapping, involves intercepting telephonic communications between individuals by “tapping” into the communication.
Plain old telephone systems (POTS) and early wireless communication systems incorporating, Class 4 or Class 5 exchanges, a Mobile Switching Center (MSC) and the like, employ circuit switching techniques to connect a calling party to a called party via a communication network. The call is completed upon successfully establishing the circuit between the parties, and the circuit becomes a dedicated link between the parties for carrying on the telephonic communications. All voice communication between the parties is then carried on this circuit.
To provide surveillance, or wiretapping, in such circuit switched systems required only determining and “tapping” the circuit at an appropriate location along the circuit. A circuit is dedicated to the call, and because all of the communications are carried on this circuit, the LEA can be assured of intercepting the entire communication, including in-band and out-of-band call signaling, between the individuals under surveillance from this one tap.
Evolution of communications technology will render obsolete the circuit switched network for both voice and data communication networks. In fact, circuit switched networks are being replaced by packet-based communication networks. In packet-based networks, the information carried by the network, for example data or encoded voice, is organized into packets, and the network carries these packets from the sending party to the receiving party. Within the network there is no single path or “circuit” that carries the packets from the sending party to the receiving party. Instead, the network may be considered a fabric of links, switches and routers that carry packets in an efficient manner. Packets associated with the communications of a first party with a second party may travel on any number of paths. This arrangement of the packet based communication network permits more efficient utilization of communication resources, and hence, permits the communication network to carry more information, with greater stability. Thus, the packet based communication network can service a greater number of users communicating greater amounts of information, i.e., both voice and data.
The Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act of 1994 (CALEA) requires that all US based wireline, cellular and broadband personal communication services (PCS) carriers provide the capability of legal, undetectable, bearer and call signaling intercept to law enforcement agencies for any subscriber utilizing their network. CALEA implementation, which is governed by Federal Communication Commission (FCC) regulations, must be completed by Jun. 30, 2000 for non-packet-based networks and by Sep. 30, 2001 for packet-based networks. While the FCC has specified the required functionality, it has not specified or recommended architecture for achieving compliance with its regulations.
As described above in connection with circuit-based, or non-packet-based networks, providing surveillance capability generally requires only determining the particular circuit established for a communication, and intercepting both the bearer and call signaling information carried on that circuit. However, in packet-based networks no single circuit or path carries the data packets which include the bearer and call signaling information. To ensure complete surveillance, it is necessary to ensure that all packets associated with a communication are identified regardless of the path assigned to any particular packet.
Additionally, the FCC regulations specify certain functional requirements beyond bearer and call signaling intercept that must be met for compliance with the CALEA legislation. The regulations are completely set forth in the interim standard J-STD-025, available from the Federal Communication Commission, 445 12th Street S.W., Washington, D.C., 20554. Among these requirements are a capability to provide: content of subject-initiated conference calls, party hold, join, drop on conference call, in-band and out-of-band signaling, timing information, dialed digit extraction, and no interruption of call performance, billing, etc. as a result of CALEA implementation.
Thus, there is a need for a communication network and method that includes surveillance capability and which utilizes packet switched data techniques for providing communication services. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The present invention relates to communication systems, communication devices, wired communication devices, and communication methods. More particularly, the invention relates to a communication system, a communication device, a wired communication device, and a communication method that can perform wired communication with a simple configuration of the devices by minimizing the number of lines for connecting the devices.
Integrated circuit (IC) cards that can perform near field communication, which is one type of wireless communication, are coming into widespread use because of its utility. Such IC cards that perform near field communication are used in, for example, an automatic ticketing system in a station or an electronic settlement system that conducts settlement by using e-money.
Due to the spread of near field communication IC cards, the standardization of near field communication protocols that can be used by IC cards is in progress. A typical example of such communication protocols is Near Field Communication Interface and Protocol (NFCIP)-1, which is defined as ISO/IEC 18092.
NFCIP-1 defines two communication modes, i.e., an active mode and a passive mode. In the active mode, to send data, a plurality of communication devices each output electromagnetic waves and modulate them by themselves. In the passive mode, to send data, one of a plurality of communication devices outputs electromagnetic waves and modulates them, and another communication device receives the electromagnetic waves and performs load modulation on them. Communication devices based on NFCIP-1 perform communication either in the active mode or the passive mode (see, for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2004-215225 and “Information Technology Telecommunications and Information Exchange between Systems Near field Communication Interface and Protocol (NFCIP-1)”, First Edition 2004-04-01, ISO/IEC 18092:2004(E)).
In addition to IC cards, cellular telephones are now widely used, and a device integrating an IC card and a cellular telephone therein, i.e., a cellular telephone having a built-in IC card that performs near field communication, is already put to practical use. More precisely, a cellular telephone integrates an IC chip rather than an IC card therein, that is, the shapes of the IC card and the IC chip are different although the functions thereof are similar. For the convenience of description, however, IC chips having functions similar to those of IC cards are also referred to as “IC cards”.
Some cellular telephones are designed to allow users to install and remove subscriber identity module (SIM) cards (which include SIM chips) storing subscriber information (for example, telephone numbers) necessary for the users to use the cellular telephones. Such cellar telephones are hereinafter referred to as “SIM-compatible cellular telephones”.
If the user replaces a currently used SIM-compatible cellular telephone by another SIM-compatible cellular telephone, he/she can remove the SIM card from the old one to insert it into the new one to use the new cellular telephone.
As the standards superior to SIM, user identity module (UIM) is available. UIM cards (which include UIM chips) can handle, not only user subscriber information, but also personal information, such as credit card numbers and authentication information used for conducting authentication. SIM cards and UIM cards are defined in ISO7816.
SIM cards or UIM cards have terminals (pins) for performing wired communication with other devices to send and receive signals. When a SIM card or a UIM card is installed in a cellular telephone, the terminals of the SIM card or the UIM card are brought into contact with the terminals of the cellular telephone so that the circuit in the cellular telephone can send and receive signals to and from the SIM card or the UIM card by wired communication.
It is necessary that SIM cards or UIM cards be small since they are installed in portable machines, such as cellular telephones. Accordingly, only a small number of terminals, for example, about 8 terminals, are provided for sending and receiving signals to and from other devices, and some of the terminals are used for sending and receiving signals to and from the circuit in a cellular telephone.
As discussed above, currently, there are two types of cellular telephones, i.e., one type of which has a built-in IC card that performs near field communication, and the other type of which allows users to install and remove SIM cards or UIM cards (hereinafter simply referred to as “SIM cards”). It can be therefore expected that cellular telephones having built-in IC cards that perform near field communication and are compatible with SIM cards will be put to practical use and become popular.
In such cellular telephones, a communication interface used for performing near field communication by using an IC card is probably used for sending and receiving signals between a built-in SIM card and external devices.
In this case, it is necessary that such a near field communication interface be connected with the SIM card by physical lines (wires).
As stated above, however, only a small number of terminals are provided for the SIM card and some of them are already used. Accordingly, it is necessary to minimize the number of physical lines for connecting the near field communication interface with the SIM card.
On the other hand, if the number of lines is reduced, it is necessary that signals be sent and received with such a small number of lines, which increases the complexity of the communication interface and the SIM card.
More specifically, if signals are sent from the communication interface to the SIM card and also from the SIM card to the communication interface by using only one connecting line, it is necessary to change the impedance (impedance when viewed from an external source) in the communication interface or the SIM card between when a signal is sent and when a signal is received. Impedance changes further change voltages or currents, in which case, the detection of signals (for example, detecting the levels of received signals) should be performed by precisely considering such voltage or current changes. Additionally, when the SIM card is installed in a cellular telephone, the impedance when viewed from one of the communication interface and the SIM card to the other one may be changed depending on the condition of contact between the terminals of the cellular telephone and those of the SIM card. It is thus necessary to design the communication interface and the SIM card to cope with the above-described impedance changes or voltage or current changes. Thus, the configuration of the communication interface and the SIM card become complicated.
As the configuration of the communication interface or the SIM card becomes complicated, the size thereof is also increased. This is not preferable since the communication interface and the SIM card, in particular, the SIM card, should be small, as discussed above. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The present invention relates to a semiconductor integrated circuit, particularly to a semiconductor integrated circuit applicable to LSI for a general use processor, a signal processing processor, an image processing processor or the like partially including logical operation circuits.
Conventionally, in realizing a large scale logical operation circuit, there has widely been used systems of gate array, standard cell (or cell base integrated circuit) and the like. In these integrated circuits, a partial circuit referred to as cell is prepared previously. A cell signifies a small scale logical operation circuit in which layout of a mask pattern has been completed, normally, a plurality of them are arranged on the same chip. In respect of a cell, normally, other than mask layout, positions and areas of input and output terminals, an operational speed, power consumption and the like are prepared. A cell library stores information with regard to the cell in a storage device for assisting design of an integrated circuit. There has been known a design system using such cells, which is combined with a circuit referred to as a pass transistor circuit.
Pass transistor circuits have been introduced as xe2x80x9cDifferential Pass-transistor Logicxe2x80x9d in IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, Vol. sc-22, No. 2, April 1987 pp216-pp222 (hereinafter, referred to as a first conventional technology) and as xe2x80x9cComplementary Pass-transistor Logicxe2x80x9d in IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, Vol. sc-25, No. 2, April 1990 pp388-pp395 (hereinafter, referred to as a second conventional technology).
Further there has been shown a circuit design method in which a pass transistor circuit is combined with a standard cell system, mentioned above, in Custom Integrated Circuits Conference 1994 Digest pp603-pp606 (hereinafter, referred to as a third conventional technology).
Further, there has also been introduced a design method in which a pass transistor circuit is combined with the standard cell system by utilizing a logical expressing method referred to as xe2x80x9cBinary Decision Diagramxe2x80x9d in Proceedings of the 1994 IEICE fall conference (basic and boundary region) of the Institute of Electronics, Information and Communication Engineers (IEICE), pp64 (hereinafter, referred to as a fourth conventional technology).
Further, there has been shown a logical operation circuit cell using a pass transistor circuit in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 130856/1995 (hereinafter, referred to as a fifth conventional technology).
FIG. 10 and FIG. 11 illustrate plane views (a) for explaining layout of cells of conventional CMOS logical operation circuits and circuit diagrams thereof (b). Notations p1001 through p1003, n1001 through n1003, p110 through p1103 and n1101 through n1103 designate transistors. According to the layout of a cell of a CMOS logical operation circuit which has widely been used in a conventional gate array or standard cell system shown by FIG. 10 or FIG. 11, it is general to regularly arrange on a straight line input and output terminals In1001 through In1003 and In1101 through In1103 for outputting a signal to outside of the cell. This is because in the case of a CMOS logical operation circuit, a portion of a gate can be enlarged on an insulating film (not formed with transistor) present between a first type of a field effect transistor (for example, P-channel MOS) and a second type of a field effect transistor (for example, N-channel MOS) which are in a complementary relationship and accordingly, input and output terminals (In1001, In1002, In1003 and Out10 in FIG. 10, In1101, In102, In1103 and Out11 in FIG. 11) can easily be enlarged therefrom by a conductor layer.
In the meantime, a pass transistor logical operation circuit cell is constituted by one set or more of pairs of two pass transistors, a gate of each of which responds to a complementary signal and an output signal amplifier. It is a significant feature of a pass transistor logical operation circuit cell that a logical circuit portion and an amplifying circuit portion are separated in this way. In cell layout of such a pass transistor circuit, when input and output terminals are arranged on a straight line similar to a cell of the conventional CMOS logical operation circuit, there poses a problem in which an area efficiency is deteriorated by a restriction of a design rule concerning a conductor layer. Accordingly, in a pass transistor logical operation circuit cell, it is not well known how these input and output terminals are to be arranged.
Further, in laying out a pass transistor logical operation circuit having the above-described constitution, it has not been well known with regard to a problem of how to arrange the output signal amplifier and the pairs of pass transistors.
Further, in the case of laying out a pass transistor logical operation circuit cell having the above-described constitution and a CMOS logical operation circuit cell on the same chip, it has not been well known with regard to how to arrange a semiconductor region surrounding each transistor and having a type reverse to a type of the transistor (for example, n well in the case of pMOS transistor) in the cell.
Further, it has not been well known with regard to at which portion in a layout inside of a cell as well as outside of a cell, a circuit for generating complementary signals provided to respective gates in a pair of two pass transistors in the above-described pass transistor logical operation circuit cell, is to be arranged.
Further, in laying out field effect transistors constituting respectives of a signal polarity inverting circuit for forming complementary signals provided to respective gates of a pair of two pass transistors of the above-described pass transistor logical operation circuit and the above-described output signal amplifier, it has not been well known with regard to at which positions and in what magnitude relationship they are to be laid out.
Therefore, it is an object of the present invention with regard to a cell using a pass transistor circuit, to provide a semiconductor integrated circuit having a layout arrangement of input and output terminals, an output signal amplifier, pairs of pass transistors, well regions and a complementary signal generating circuit capable of reducing an area, reducing a delay time period and facilitating wirings outside of the cell.
In order to achieve the above-described object, a semiconductor integrated circuit according to the present invention is laid out under the following thought.
According to the present invention, there is used a cell having a portion constituted by at least one pass transistor circuit for forming a logic and at least one output signal amplifier. In this case, as a typical example of the present invention, an explanation will be given of a pass transistor logical operation circuit cell in the case in which three of pass transistor circuits are present in respect of a single output signal amplifier. As will be shown later in an embodiment of FIG. 1 through FIG. 3, each pass transistor circuit includes a first input node, a second input node and a third input node, an output node, a field effect transistor of a first type or a second type, a source/drain path of which is connected between the first input node and the output node and a field effect transistor of the first type or the second type, a source/drain path of which is connected between the second input node and the output node.
In this case, an output signal amplifier includes a circuit comprising an input node, an output node, a field effect transistor of a first type, a drain/source path of which is connected between the output node and first potential and a gate of which responds to the input node and a field effect transistor of a second type, a drain/source path is connected between the output node and second potential and a gate of which responds to the input node.
The output node of the pass transistor circuit is connected to the input of the output signal amplifier, an input signal is applied from outside of the cell to the third input node of the pass transistor circuit and the input signal from outside cell is applied to at least two of all of the first input node and the second input node of the pass transistor circuit.
The output node of the output signal amplifier operates to output an output signal to outside of the cell. One aspect of the thought of the present invention is characterized in arranging respective terminals by a conductor layer for drawing an input signal from outside of the cell and an output signal to outside of the cell. These are arranged as follows. That is, when a coordinate system (coordinate axes) is determined in a direction of running a supply line of the first potential and a supply line of the second potential and a direction orthogonal thereto, the terminals are arranged to include terminal grid points disposed at constant intervals in the coordinate system and at least one of terminal grid coordinates of the respective terminals differ from terminal grid coordinates arranged with at least two or more of the terminals other than the above terminals.
According to the above-described semiconductor integrated circuit of the present invention, when the coordinate system is disposed in the running direction of the potential supply line and the direction orthogonal thereto, input and output terminals are not disposed on the same coordinates. In other words, the input and output terminals are not aligned in a row, more specifically, these are not aligned in a row in a direction in parallel with the potential supply lines or a boundary line (contour) of the cell. Therefore, by providing an input to the gate of the pass transistor and an input to the source/drain of the pass transistor in directions of the coordinate system under the space rule of the conductor layer, the size of the cell can be reduced with regard to the direction of potential supply lines. In this case, the space rule refers to a rule of a minimum distance to prevent shortcircuit from causing in consideration of a deviation in matching a mask and a deviation in a process fabrication accuracy. Generally, with regard to the direction orthogonal to the direction of running the potential supply lines, the size of the cell is determined commonly in respect of all of cell groups used in blocks in the chip and accordingly, being capable of reducing the size in the direction of the potential supply lines, signifies being capable of reducing the area of the cell. Further, when wirings are provided among cells at an upper layer, the wirings need to draw from the input and output terminals and also in this case, since the input and output terminals are not disposed on the same coordinates, the wirings can be drawn from the respective terminals not only in the longitudinal direction but also in the transverse direction and there is achieved an advantage of promoting the degree of freedom of wirings.
According to a preferable embodiment of the present invention, when the coordinate system is determined in the direction orthogonal to the direction of running the supply line of the first potential and the supply line of the second potential, a terminal from outside of the cell for inputting an input signal applied to the third input node of the pass transistor circuit, is arranged to shift to a larger side or a smaller side in view of the coordinate system than a terminal from outside of the cell for inputting an input signal applied to the first input node and the second input node of the pass transistor circuit.
That is, according to the above-described semiconductor integrated circuit of the present invention, as will be explained later in the example of FIG. 1 through FIG. 3, the layout can be conducted reasonably since a wiring drawn from source/drain of a transistor of the pass transistor circuit to an input terminal and a wiring drawn from gate to the input terminal do not intersect with each other, whereby the size of the cell can be reduced.
Further, according to other preferable embodiment of the present invention, when two types of field effect transistors constituting the output signal amplifier determine the coordinate system in the direction of running the supply line of the first potential and the supply line of the second potential, the transistors are arranged to shift to at least one of the boundaries of the cell on a side where the coordinate values are minimized or on a side where the coordinate values are maximized.
That is, according to the above-described embodiment of the present invention, the output signal amplifier is arranged to shift to the cell boundary with regard to the direction of running the potential supply line and accordingly, even when a plurality of the pass transistor circuits are present, the output signal amplifier does not hinder wire connection among the plurality of pass transistor circuits and accordingly, the cell can reasonably be laid out to a small area.
Further, according to other preferable embodiment of the present invention, when a plurality of pass transistors circuit are present, the pass transistor circuits are developed to arrange successively in the direction of running the supply line of the first potential and the supply line of the second potential.
According thereto, even when the plurality of pass transistor circuits are present, a number thereof can be increased flexibly in the developing direction and accordingly, even when the number of the pass transistor circuits is increased, a cell library can regularly be laid out. Thereby, a time period consumed in layout design of the pass transistor logical operation circuit cell can be reduced.
Further, when the plurality of pass transistor circuits are present and the pass transistor circuits are developed to arrange in the direction of running the supply line of the first potential and the supply line of the second potential, a width of a source/drain region of a field effect transistor constituting the pass transistor circuit in the direction of running the supply line of the first potential and the supply line of the second potential is changed in accordance with locations in the same source/drain region. That is, the width is widened at a portion having contact and is narrowed at a portion having no contact.
According to the above-described constitution, the layout can be conducted such that the width of the source/drain region becomes a necessary source/drain width simply for constituting the transistor rather than a width prescribed by source/drain including contact and accordingly, in applying a space rule between source and drain (referred to as SD space rule), a source/drain region of a contiguous pass transistor circuit is made contiguous to the source/drain region of a portion having no contact by which the size in the running direction of the potential supply line can be reduced.
Further, the above-described cell is preferably constituted as follows. When a field effect transistor of a first type and a field effect transistor of a second type are arranged contiguously to a CMOS logical operation circuit cell constituting a logic by coupling them in a complementary relationship, the following constitution is preferable.
That is, a boundary of a semiconductor region of the second type surrounding the first type of the field effect transistor constituting the CMOS logical operation circuit and a semiconductor region of the first type surrounding the second type of the field effect transistor, and a boundary of a semiconductor region of the second type surrounding the first type of the field effect transistor constituting the pass transistor logical operation circuit and a semiconductor region of the first type surrounding the second type of the field effect transistor, are constituted to linearly connect at a connecting portion.
According to the above-described semiconductor integrated circuit of the present invention, when the cells are contiguous to each other, the well boundaries are linearly connected and therefore even when a minimum width of a region surrounding a transistor (referred to as a well minimum width) prescribed by the design rule, is not satisfied by a single cell, the rule can be satisfied by contiguously arranging a plurality of cells. Accordingly, as a result, the cell area can be reduced. When the embodiment according to the present invention is not used, in the case of arranging a pass transistor logical operation circuit cell and a CMOS logical operation circuit cell within the same block on the same chip, design rule error may be caused, for example, at a location where a single cell which cannot satisfy the rule of the well minimum width is arranged isolatedly. However, when the cell layout according to the present invention is carried out, the problem is resolved.
Further, as will be explained later in reference to FIG. 4 and FIG. 5, other preferable aspect of the present invention is characterized in that a boundary (referred to as well boundary) of a semiconductor region of the second type (referred to as second well) surrounding a field effect transistor of the first type constituting the pass transistor logical operation circuit and a semiconductor region of the first type (referred to as first well) surrounding the field effect type transistor of the second type, is brought to a side of the first semiconductor or to a side of the second semiconductor at inside of the cell and is arranged to be nonlinear at inside of the cell.
Thereby, regions of the field effect transistors constituting the pass transistor circuit can effectively be provided within the cell. That is, according to the CMOS logical operation circuit cell, normally, a transistor of the first type and a transistor of the second type are in a complementary relationship and their numbers coincide with each other. Therefore, transistors having the same numbers can be laid out on both sides of a well boundary drawn linearly with no problem. However, in the case of the pass transistor logical operation circuit cell, a number of transistors of a type the same as a type of transistors constituting the pass transistor circuit, is larger than a number of transistors of a type different therefrom. Meanwhile, when the boundary of the well is linearly laid out in the cell to be linearly connected to the CMOS logical operation circuit cell, even when there is constituted a distribution ratio of the first well and the second well suitable for the CMOS logical operation circuit, it becomes a distribution ratio which is not suitable for the pass transistor logical operation circuit cell in which a number of one type is larger than a number of other type. However, when the above-described embodiment of the present invention is used, a region for a transistor constituting the pass transistor circuit can be widened at inside of the cell and accordingly, a difference in the numbers of transistors can successively be realized.
Further, as will be explained in details in reference to FIG. 2, the semiconductor integrated circuit according to the present invention uses a cell comprising a pass transistor logical operation circuit having at least one set of pairs each of a pass transistor circuit and an inverter circuit of the signal polarity and at least one output signal amplifier. According to the pass transistor operation circuit of the logical operation circuit, there are provided a first input node, a second input node and a third input node, an output node, a field effect type transistor of a first type or a second type, a source/drain path of which is connected between the first input node and the output node and a field effect transistor of the first type or the second type, a source/drain path of which is connected between the second input node and the output node.
In this case, the signal polarity inverting circuit includes a circuit comprising, for example, an input node, an output node, a field effect type transistor of a first type, a drain/source path of which is connected between the output node and first potential and a gate of which responds to the input node and a field effect transistor of a second type, a drain/source path of which is connected between the output node and the second potential and a gate of which responds to the input node.
In this case, the output signal amplifier includes a circuit comprising an input node, an output node, a field effect transistor of a first type, a drain/source path of which is connected between the output node and first potential and a gate of which responds to the input node and a field effect transistor of a second type, a drain/source path of which is connected between the output node and second potential and a gate of which responds to the input node.
Further, the output node of the pass transistor circuit is connected to the input of the output signal amplifier. In this way, it signifies that by inserting the signal polarity inverting circuit to inside of the cell, one of input terminals constituting signal connection to outside of the cell is reduced in respect of a set of a pair of the pass transistor circuits and the signal polarity inverting circuit. This signifies that an amount of wiring at outside of the cell is reduced in comparison with the case in which the signal polarity inverting circuit is laid out at outside of the cell and connected therefrom to two of the input terminals of one pass transistor circuit and wiring is easy to carry out since a crowdedness of wiring at outside of the cell can be reduced, which is effective. Further, it is preferable that a difference between delay times of complementary signals which are to be inputted to two input terminals of one pass transistor circuit, is small. Because, when the difference between the delay times is large, although the above-described pass transistor circuits are originally fabricated by assuming that only one of them is made ON, there causes a case in which both are made ON or the case both are made OFF. Now, when gate inputs of two pass transistors to which the above-described complementary signals are inputted, are drawn to outside of the cell independently from each other, it is conceivable that complementary signals are transmitted to these two inputs by using separate wirings. In such a case, when there is considerable discrepancy in arrival times of signals by reason in which lengths of the separate wirings differ, there can be brought about an unpreferable situation in which both are made ON or both are made OFF as mentioned above. However, according to the semiconductor integrated circuit of the above-described embodiment of the present invention, the signal polarity inverting circuit is inserted to inside of the cell and accordingly, the difference between the delay times to the gate inputs of the two pass transistors can be restrained to a small value of only a delay time of the signal polarity inverting circuit at most.
Further, as in later detailed explanation of a constitution in reference to FIG. 1 and FIG. 2, in a cell comprising a pass transistor logical operation circuit having at least a set of pairs each of a pass transistor circuit and a signal polarity inverting circuit and at least one output signal amplifier, the signal polarity inverting circuit in the logical operation circuit includes a circuit comprising an input node, an output node, a field effect transistor of a first type, a drain/source path of which is connected between the output node and first potential and a gate of which responds to the input node and a field effect transistor of a second type, a drain/source path of which is connected between the output node and second potential and the gate of which responds to the input node.
The output signal amplifier in the logical operation circuit includes a circuit comprising an input node, an output node, a field effect transistor of a first type, a drain/source path of which is connected between the output node and first potential and a gate of which responds to the input node and a field effect transistor of a second type, a drain/source path is connected between the output node and second potential and a gate of which responds to the input node.
The output node of the pass transistor circuit is connected to the input of the output signal amplifier, the first type of the field effect transistor constituting the output signal amplifier is provided with a gate width larger than that of the first type of the field effect transistor constituting the signal polarity inverting circuit and the second type of the field effect transistor constituting the output signal amplifier is provided with a gate width larger than that of the second type of the field effect transistor constituting the signal polarity inverting circuit.
One aspect of the present invention clearly provides a guiding principle in how to design the channel width of the field effect transistor constituting the signal polarity inverting circuit. That is, a circuit outside of the cell driven by the output signal amplifier is not known at a time point of the layout, in consideration of fan-out or a wire capacity at outside of the cell, there must be assumed a case of driving a comparatively large load capacity, in contrast thereto, the signal polarity inverting circuit may only drive the gate of the pass transistor circuit at inside of the cell. When the channel width of the field effect transistor constituting the signal polarity inverting circuit is made larger than the channel width of the field effect transistor constituting the output signal amplifier, regardless of the relationship of the load capacity, large capacity is driven by a small transistor and small load capacity is driven by large capacity, as a result, there poses a problem in which a delay time period of a total is increased. In contrast thereto, by conducting layout such that the channel width of the field effect transistor constituting the signal polarity inverting circuit is made smaller than the channel width of the field effect transistor constituting the output signal amplifier, the respectives can be constituted by transistor sizes pertinent to driven load capacities and the delay time period can be reduced.
Further, according to a preferable embodiment of the present invention, the output node of the pass transistor circuit is connected to the input of the output signal amplifier and the field effect transistor constituting the pass transistor circuit, is arranged between field effect transistors of a first type and a second type constituting the signal polarity inverting circuit with regard to a direction orthogonal to a direction of running a supply line of the first potential and a supply line of the second potential.
By arranging them in this way, the space rule in view of layout between the source/drain region and the semiconductor region (well or substrate) surrounding thereof is not adopted unnecessarily, wire connection among pass transistor circuits and installation of an electricity feeding line to the source of the signal polarity inverting circuit can reasonably be carried out and accordingly, as a result, the cell area can be reduced.
Further, preferably, the output signal amplifier in the logical operation circuit includes a circuit comprising an input node, an output node, a first field effect transistor of a first type, a drain/source path of which is connected between the output node and first potential and a gate of which responds to the input node, a second field effect transistor of a second type, a drain/source path of which is connected between the output node and second potential and a gate of which responds to the input node and a third field effect transistor of the first type, a drain/source path of which is connected between the input node and the first potential and a gate of which responds to the output node. Further, according to the output signal amplifier, wire connection from the drain of the third field effect transistor to the gates of the first field effect transistor and the second field effect transistor is realized by passing the wire connection below a first potential supply line by using a material for the gate terminal of the transistor.
In this way, by using the gate material as a wiring, the portion below the potential supply line can effectively be utilized and accordingly, there can be resolved a problem in which wiring operation becomes difficult which is caused when wirings at vicinities of the first field effect transistor and the third field effect transistor of the output signal amplifier are crowded.
Other objects and novel characteristics of the present invention will become apparent by the following embodiments. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a production method of a sintered silicon nitride which has a high temperature strength and suitable for a material of so-called fine ceramic structural parts which are usable throughout a wide industrial field including automobiles, mechanical apparatuses, chemical apparatuses and aeronautical and astronautical apparatuses.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Sintered silicon nitrides whose main component is silicon nitride are chemically stable and high in mechanical strength at ordinary and high temperatures, and therefore are suitable for a material of sliding parts such as bearings and engine parts such as rotors of turbochargers. Since silicon nitride is difficult to be singly sintered, it is usually sintered upon adding a considerable amount of sintering assistants such as MgO, Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 and Y.sub.2 O.sub.3. Such sintering method is disclosed, for example, in Japanese Patent Provisional Publication Nos. 49-63710, 54-15916 and 60-137873.
However, in the conventional sintered silicon nitride produced by adding a considerable amount of the sintered assistants such as MgO, Al.sub.2 O.sub.3 and Y.sub.2 O.sub.3, there exists a considerable amount of oxides in grain boundary in the sintered silicon nitride. These oxides promote oxidation of silicon nitride at high temperatures. As a result, structual parts formed of such a sintered silicon nitride are unavoidably low in high temperature performance such as creep resistance, high temperature strength and oxidation resistance. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The ever-increasing demand for smaller sized mobile devices, such as cell phones, digital cameras, etc. has triggered a corresponding and growing need for smaller sized photography modules. Such modules may comprise elements such as an optical imaging lens, a module housing unit, and an image sensor, etc., contained therein. Size reductions may be contributed from various aspects of the mobile devices, which includes not only the charge coupled device (CCD) and the complementary metal-oxide semiconductor (CMOS), but also the optical imaging lens mounted therein. When reducing the size of the optical imaging lens, however, achieving good optical characteristics may present a challenging problem.
Therefore, there is a need to develop optical imaging lens which may be capable to be placed with six lens elements therein, may have a shorter length, while also maintaining good optical characteristics. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The present invention relates to sail boats and, more particularly, to a sailing frame that is adapted to be mounted on a floating, buoyant hull structure.
It has long been known that most boats can be converted to sail boats by the addition of an apppropriate mast structure to support a sail and by the addition of appropriate stabilizing fins or boards which extend below the water line to impart a certain fore and aft stability to the boat to provide some slight increase in the resistance of the boat to rotation about the longitudinal axis.
Conventionally, when one starts with a rigid hull, one finds ample structural support for the addition of the mast and the stabilizing fins. Mast can be supported by a keel or, where absent, by the relatively rigid sole of the boat, while the gunwales provide points of attachment for stays which can support the mast upright through tension.
Either center boards or dagger boards are readily mounted and find adequate points of attachment on the structure. Even canoes can be fitted with a kit that includes a pair of lee boards and a central member joining the lee boards which includes a mast mount for supporting a mast structure. A rudder assembly, when added, adapts the canoe for sailing.
Since the 1940's, inflatable boats have achieved more and more popularity. These inflatable boats, which during the war were utilized as life rafts or as dinghies have been improved and developed to the point where they are currently being sold, for example, by Avon Inflatables, Limited, of Great Britain. The Avon catalog includes dinghies in sizes from 8 feet to 12 feet in length; sport boats which are adapted to operate with outboard motors, as well as rigid inflatables, which include a fiber glass rigid hull. The sport boats range in length from 9 feet to 16 feet and the rigid hull versions range from 13 to almost 18 feet.
A common feature shared by the inflatables is the substantially planar sole or floor which is made of a fluid impermeable flexible sheet. In a better inflatables, a plastic impregnated fabric is used, while less sturdy versions utilize a heavy guage film such as P.V.C. A substantially cylindrical inflation tube provides buoyancy and also serves as the "hull" of the craft. The buoyancy tubes can be fitted with oar locks, outboard beckets and life lines. The buoyancy tubes can be subdivided or compartmentalized for safety so that a rupture need not cause the loss of all buoyancy.
Another feature of the inflatable boats in their substantial resistance to capsizing, resulting from rotation about a longitudinal axis. Further, due to the wide beam and low center of gravity, the boats are extremely stable.
The very flat bottom of the inflatable, while of great benefit in assuring stability and resistance to capsizing does subject the boat to "skidding" under the force of the winds or waves. This tends to make rowing slightly more difficult since the craft is very sensitive to unequal application of propelling forces by the oars.
Because the inflatable is not rigid and, on the contrary, is resilient and flexible, no serious efforts have been made to adapt the craft for sail. Therefore, sailing for pleasure creates an additional category of uses for inflatables.
Inflatable boats have also achieved widespread acceptance and distribution as life rafts for aircraft and marine vessels. In such cases, they are compact, easily stored, easily deployed and, using compressed gas cylinders, easily inflated. In recent years, inflatables used as life rafts have been modified to a circular or polygonal shape and have been fitted with all types of survival gear. However, as noted above, such a structure is not easily propelled or directed and, in use, would generally drift aimlessly at the mercy of the winds, waves, and prevailing currents.
Oars or paddles can be employed for limited, directed movement. Sea anchors can limit the drift due to wind, while sails can accentuate the effect of the wind and minimize the drift due to waves and current.
With a suitable sailing adaptation, the wind could be utilized to propel the craft on a reasonably predictable course and the crudest or navigational instruments would permit progress in a desired direction, without the physical exertion required by rowing.
Frequently, occupants of a life raft do have an idea of their location and the ability to navigate. Under such circumstances, it would be highly desirable to have the capability of directed progress toward a destination whether it be land, a well-travelled shipping lane, or an airline route. Accordingly, a sailing "kit" adapting the raft to be sailed would be an invaluable addition to the raft itself. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a memory circuit having a fuse for use in circuit trimming, one-time ROM (Read Only Memory).
2. Description of the Prior Arts
Conventionally, a memory circuit having a fuse of polysilicon or the like in the semiconductor circuit stores data having a 1/0 value depending upon the presence or absence of disconnection in the fuse. A memory circuit of this kind is one type of programmable PROM which allows a user to freely write data thereon after manufacture, and constitutes a read only memory.
FIG. 5 shows a circuit configuration of a first conventional memory circuit as stated above. In the figure, a fuse 1 forming part of a semiconductor circuit is formed of polysilicon. The fuse 1 has one end connected to an external power supply so that an external voltage Vpp (12V-20V) is applied thereto. The fuse 1 is blown out due to Joule heat produced when a certain current or greater flows through. The fuse 1 in a blown state stores data "0" while it in an unblown state stores data "1".
An N-channel MOS (Metal Oxide Semiconductor) transistor 2 serves as a switch element that decides whether to flow current though the fuse 1 or not. The N-channel MOS transistor 2 has a drain terminal connected through the fuse 1 to the external power supply (not shown) and a source terminal that is grounded. Also, the N-channel MOS transistor 2 is on/off-controlled by a disconnect (write) signal SW inputted to its gate terminal.
A sense line 3 connects between the other end of the fuse 1 (N-channel MOS transistor 2 drain terminal) and a read-out circuit 5. Another N-channel MOS transistor 4 is inserted on the sense line 3 to have its drain terminal connected to a side of the fuse 1 and its source terminal connected to a side of the read-out circuit 5. The N-channel MOS transistor 4 is to be on/off-controlled by a read signal SR inputted to the gate terminal.
The read-out circuit 5 compares a voltage on the sense line 3 with a reference voltage to read out a state of the fuse 1 (storage data) and output it as read-out data D. Specifically, the read-out circuit 5 outputs read-out data D "1" when the voltage on the sense line 3 is higher than the reference voltage. On the other hand, it outputs read-out data D "0" when the voltage on the sense line 3 is equal to or lower than the reference voltage.
In the above configuration, where storing data "0" on the memory circuit of FIG. 5, a not-shown control circuit outputs a disconnect signal SW to the gate terminal of the N-channel MOS transistor 2. This causes the N-channel MOS transistor 2 to turn on so that an external voltage Vpp supplied for each power voltage Vcc is applied to the fuse 1. If at this time the external voltage Vpp is raised to as high as 12V-20V, then a current flows through the fuse 1. As a result, the fuse 1 is blown out due to occurrence of Joule heat. Accordingly, the fuse 1 in this case serves as a memory element storing data "0".
to read out the data "0" stored by the fuse 1, the control circuit (not shown) outputs a read signal SR to the gate terminal of the N-channel MOS transistor 4. This turns on the N-channel MOS transistor 4. In this case, however, the fuse 1 is blown so that the external voltage Vpp is not being applied on the sense line 3. Due to this, in the read-out circuit 5 the voltage on the sense line 3 is not greater than the reference voltages. Thus, the read-out circuit 5 outputs dead-out data D "0".
On the other hand, in a state the fuse 1 is not blown or data "1" is stored on the fuse 1, when a read signal SR is inputted from the control circuit (not shown) to the gate terminal of the N-channel MOS transistor 4, the N-channel MOS transistor 4 tuns on. The fuse 1 in this case is not blown. Consequently, the voltage on the sense line 3 is pulled up so that in the read-out circuit 5 the voltage on the sense line 3 is higher than the reference voltage. Thus, the read-out circuit 5 outputs read-out data D "1". At this time the external voltage Vpp is nearly at the same as the power supply voltage Vcc so as not to flow an excessively great voltage through the fuse.
FIG. 6 shows a circuit configuration of a second conventional memory circuit. In this figure, the corresponding parts to those of FIG. 5 are denoted by the same reference numerals, and duplicative explanations thereof are omitted. In FIG. 6, there is not provided the N-channel MOS transistor 2 shown in FIG. 5, wherein a bias voltage Vcc, e.g. power supply voltage Vcc, in place of the external voltage Vpp is applied to the fuse 1. This bias voltage Vcc is a voltage to be applied to various parts of the memory circuit. Meanwhile, the fuse 1 is to be flown out due to the laser light L radiated from a not-shown laser oscillator.
In the above configuration, where storing data "0" in the memory circuit of FIG. 6, the not-shown laser oscillator radiates laser light L onto the fuse 1. This blows out the fuse 1 due to heat produced by the laser light L. Therefore, the fuse 1 in this case serves as a memory element to store data "0".
Where reading out data "0" stored on the fuse 1, if a read signal SR is outputted from the control circuit (not shown) to the gate terminal of the N-channel MOS transistor 4, the N-channel MOS transistor 4 turns on. In this case, however, because the fuse 1 is in blown, the sense line 3 is in a state that no bias voltage Vcc is applied thereto. Thus, read-out data D "0" is outputted from the read-out circuit 5.
On the other hand, if a read signal SR is inputted from the control circuit (not shown) to the gate terminal of the N-channel MOS transistor 4 in the state that the fuse 1 is not in a blown state, or in a state "1" data is stored on the fuse 1, then the N-channel MOS transistor 4 turns on. In this case, the voltage on the sense line 3 is pulled up because the fuse 1 is not in blown. Accordingly, read-out data D "1" is outputted from the read-out circuit 5.
The conventional memory circuit of FIG. 5, however, uses two systems of power supplies including a power supply for biasing and an external power supply for blowing the fuse 1 out. This results in a problem that the conventional memory circuit is complicated in circuit configuration because of using two power supply systems.
On the other hand, the conventional memory circuit of FIG. 6 radiates laser light L to the fuse 1 thereby performing data writing. However, such write operation is possible only before mounting the memory circuit in a package (not shown). That is, the conventional memory circuits have an disadvantage that data writing is impossible to perform after mounting the memory circuit in a package resulting in poor usability. | {
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Smart cards are plastic cards having an embedded Integrated Circuit (IC). That IC may be a logic circuit with its associated memories or a microcontroller with its associated memories and software, or a microcontroller with its associated memories and software coupled to a custom circuit block or interface.
When personal computers are utilized in a home environment or office environment, it is often desirable to impose some measure of security and/or parental control over use of the computer. As such smart cards may be used for secure logon to a desktop by inserting the card in a card reader coupled to the desktop when required. However, a user wishing to remotely access his desktop from another location may not be able to do so if the desktop is smart card protected. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to conference calling systems and methods, more particularly to a system and method for providing more specific information about the speakers in a conference call.
2. Background of the Invention
Most users are familiar with the use of calling number display (CND) used with such phone features such as Caller ID(trademark). In the situation where a person is calling from one single-line location, such as a house, to another single-line location, the caller""s name, phone number, or both may appear on a display on the receiving person""s phone. The receiving phone must have the capability of locating and translating the identification code in order to display it to the user.
In some situations, however, a more limited amount of information is made available to the receiving person. For example, a call from a multiple-line location such as a business may result in a display of the number and the business name. Similarly, when an outside call is received at a business the receiving phone may just register that it is an outside call. Typically, calls within a multiple line location use a private branch exchange (PBX) that can identify both the callers and their extension numbers for the receiving people.
Conference calls produce further complications to the identification of callers. Conference calls require a unit to make several individual connections between itself and the various participants in a call. These connections may be between people all within a company or other internal group, or a mix of inside and outside callers. The connecting device may be a PBX or a bridge, or any unit that can make the individual connections necessary to have a conference call. For ease of discussion, the connection unit will be referred to as a bridge when referring to public-switched-telephone-networks (PSTN) and integrated-services-data-networks (ISDN) and a multipoint control unit (MCU) when referring to Voice-over-Internet-Protocol (VoIP or Voice-over-Internet).
The complication arises because of the multiple connections that are made through the bridge or MCU. As an example, a current set up for a conference call of N users is shown in FIG. 1. Caller 110a, caller 210b and caller N 10c, are all connected to the central bridge to participate in the conference call. Each of the callers has a display 12a-c on their respective phones that display the calling party identification (ID). However, because the bridge 14 treats each connection as an individual call, it sends and the callers see the conference bridge name as the caller. This is less than optimal.
For example, during the course of the conference call, caller 1 speaks. Because the caller identification does not change, callers 2 and N may have to ask the caller to identify his or herself. When caller 2 then replies to caller 1, the same problem occurs. This leads to awkward and inefficient conference calls.
Therefore, there is a need for a system and method for conference calls allowing speaker identification.
One aspect of the invention is a method for providing speaker identification in a conference call. The method identifies the speaker and locates and extracts the caller identification of the speaker. The conference calling unit then assumes that caller identification and sends the associated identifier to the endpoints participating in the conference caller as a speaker ID. The method applies to PSTN, ISDN and VoIP calls.
Another aspect of the invention is a conference calling unit that locates and extracts the caller identifier of the speaker. The unit then sends that information to the endpoints participating in the conference call as a speaker identifier. The conference calling unit could be a communications card, an attachment to existing connection units, a software upgrade to present network processing equipment or new network processing equipment. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to orthopedic devices for the stabilization and control of a human knee joint which has been injured. More particularly, the invention relates to a knee brace which will permit the user a relatively high degree of freedom in the use of the bones while, at the same time, permitting control of the joint so as to optimize healing and stability.
2. Description of Related Art
A knee brace of the initially mentioned type is disclosed in one of the present inventor's U.S. Pat. No. 4,890,607. In this patent, a multiaxis controlled motion knee orthosis utilizes a joint mechanism (which is improved over one disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,723,539 of one of the present inventors (Townsend)) having two camming slots and cam pin followers, wherein one camming slot is disposed in a transverse plane and serves to provide the anterior motion of an upper joint piece, while the second camming slot is disposed in a longitudinal orientation and to provide a long arc segment for a unicentric phase of the joint arthrokinematics. During an initial range of motion, pivoting occurs through a short arc segment about an upper cam pin within the longitudinally extending arcuate slot. After the lower cam pin follower reaches the anterior end of the transverse slot, the lower cam pin follower serves as an axis of rotation or pivot point for movement of the upper cam pin follower along the long arc segment of the longitudinal slot.
Such an arrangement provides full control of the forceful action of the joints throughout the entire range of motion while providing a joint of high strength. Furthermore, in knee braces that are custom fit to a particular user, the orthosis of this earlier patent has proved very successful and has been free of significant problems. However, certain shortcomings have been encountered with regard to use of this dual pin and cam slot joint arrangement in less expensive knee braces intended for "off-the-shelf" use. In particular, a generic "off-the-shelf" unit must be fitted by the doctor to a particular user and often involves bending of the femoral and tibial links, such as by bending the femoral links outwardly and the tibial links inwardly to fit someone with larger than average thighs and smaller than average calves.
If such "doctoring" of an "off-the-shelf" unit results in the overlapping surfaces of the joint not being exactly square, these relatively large overlapping surfaces of the links are caused to bind against each other to an extent affecting the performance of the joint. More specifically, this binding produces excessive wearing of the joint, so that the critical tolerances necessary to proper control of the knee can soon be lost. Furthermore, since, during each phase of movement, the motion of the joint is occurring about a single pivot, the full effect of the binding force is concentrated at the single pivot, and is sufficiently great to cause the binding effect to be felt by the wearer to an undesirable degree.
At the other end of the spectrum, in top of the line knee braces, especially for use by professional athletes, the weight of the knee brace is an important consideration, as is high resistance to wear. One way to reduce the weight of the joint, while increasing wear-resistance would be to form the femoral and tibial links of a "space age" lightweight fiber and resin composite material. However, such materials are expensive to machine and are very notch sensitive. Thus, a link having slots as disclosed in the above-mentioned Townsend patents would be cost-prohibitive to produce of a composite material, and would be prone to break apart due to the low notch strength of the composite material.
Thus, it would be desirable and advantageous to produce a joint which would have the benefits of the earlier Townsend designs without their shortcomings. In particular, to have a knee brace with a joint that could be used in inexpensive "off-the-shelf" orthosis without resulting in the wearer feeling a significant binding effect or the joint experiencing excessive wear due to binding. At the same time, such an improved knee brace should possess the capability to be manufactured of lightweight, wear-resistant composite materials.
Four bar linkages are also known for use in knee braces, even for producing polycentric motion. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 3,901,223, discloses a knee joint for orthopedic supports and splints using a four bar linkage in which a pair of different length, swinging links pivotally interconnect with bearing points on head portions formed on the ends of femoral (thigh) and tibial (shin) struts. These swinging links and their respective pivot points are designed so that, during flexion of the femoral link relative to the tibial link from a fully extended position of the joint, the longer, forward, link first pivots forwardly through a given angle and then its motion reverses so that the forward link adopts an identical position relative to the tibial link in the fully flexed attitude of the joint (approximately 134.degree. degrees) as it held in the fully extended position. This movement is intended to simulate a movement of the knee in which the locus of the instantaneous centers of rotation approximates a downward and forward curving path, beginning about 3 inches up on the femur and ending at about the position of the femoral epicondyles.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,821,707 to Audette, a mechanical articulated joint for a knee brace is shown which also uses a four bar type linkage in an attempt to produce a joint which will duplicate the complex motion of the knee; however, at best, the linkage as disclosed in this patent can only do so in a most general way do to the approach taken therein. Furthermore, the design criteria outlined in this patent require that the shape of the condyle be known (which is difficult to do in practice), require use of an arbitrarily set reference line segment and the location of the point of tangency of this arbitrary line segment and the condyle at three positions. As a result, an "off the-shelf," generic knee brace is virtually impossible to produce in accordance with this patent's teachings, and even achieving of a custom design brace that forces the knee to follow a motion that correctly reproduces the proper complex motion of a healthy knee is problematic.
Thus, there is still a need for controlled motion multiaxis joint for a knee brace which will meet the needs for both "off-the-shelf" and custom top-end knee braces, to an even greater extent than the cam and slot knee orthosis, mentioned above, being less prone to binding problems and being able to be made of composite fiber and resin materials; yet, at the same time, still being able to constrain the tibia to slide rearwardly relative to the femur in an initial range of flexion of the knee from a straight leg position and then to rotate relative thereto along an arcuate path. | {
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There is a distinct relationship between comfort, safety, and productivity in the workplace. When workers are required to stand for long periods of time, worker discomfort and fatigue can impact productivity and absenteeism. In order to reduce this problem, anti-fatigue mats have been utilized when the worker stands for long periods of time at one location. These anti-fatigue mats lie on top of the floor covering and provide a resilient cushioned surface that alleviates pressure to stimulate blood and oxygen flow to the lower body which reduces muscle fatigue. The result is improved worker morale and productivity.
While these anti-fatigue mats can be effective at improving worker morale and productivity, they make it difficult to clean the floor such as sweeping and vacuuming, as well as creating tripping hazards. Accordingly, there is a need in the art for an improved anti-fatigue flooring system which provides the increased comfort, safety and productivity provided by the mats but without the inconveniences of the mats. | {
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Propene (C3H6), often also referred to as propylene, is one of the most important starting substances of the chemical industry. The demand for the base material propylene is increasing worldwide, wherein propylene just like ethylene mostly is produced from petroleum in a steam cracker in a ratio dependent on the process and the raw materials.
To obtain additional propylene, a number of processes exist, such as the PDH process which proceeds from propane as educt. What is known, however, above all is the so-called MTP process, in which olefins are produced from methanol (MeOH) or dimethyl ether (DME) by catalytic conversion on a zeolitic catalyst. By varying the catalyst under process conditions, the selectivity of the products obtained can be influenced and the product spectrum thus can be shifted towards short-chain olefins (then often also the process name Methanol-to-Olefin (MTO)), towards longer-chain products (then often also the process name Methanol-to-Gasoline (MTG)) or towards propylene.
The fundamentals of an MTP process are described for example in DE 10 2005 048 931 A1. From an educt mixture containing steam and oxygenates, such as methanol and/or dimethyl ether, C2 to C4 olefins are produced above all. By a heterogeneously catalyzed reaction in at least one reactor, the educt mixture is converted to a reaction mixture comprising low-molecular olefins and gasoline hydrocarbons. By a suitable separation concept, higher olefins, above all the C5+ fraction, can at least partly be recirculated into the reactor as recycling stream and in said reactor for the most part be converted to propylene, whereby the propylene yield is increased.
One problem when carrying out the MTP process consists in that very pure oxygenates must be used as starting substances. When e.g. methanol is used as educt of the MTP reaction, this methanol must have a degree of purity of the specification AA, which means that the impurities must be smaller than 0.2‰. This mostly requires that in the plant for the production of methanol upstream of the MTP plant a very expensive purification method must be integrated. Usually, three distillation columns are used for this purpose (Ullmann's Encyclopedia of Industrial Chemistry, Sixth Edition, 1998 Electronic Release, METHANOL—Process Technology (Eckhard Fiedler, Georg Grossmann, Burkhard Kersebohm, Gunther Weiss, Claus Witte, section 5.4 and Fig. 5). In particular, the high energy costs incurred during the distillation distinctly lower the economy of the process.
In this connection, it is known from U.S. Pat. No. 4,709,113 that the feed of the MTP reactor can directly be guided into the reactor without particular purification. However, there is obtained a high amount of higher olefins, so that both a C5-C8 fraction and a C9+ fraction is obtained and thus the yield of propylene in this process is distinctly lower and in addition the downstream purification method is very complex.
From US 2005/0101478 A1 it is known that when using molecular sieves as catalyst, oxygenates with a lower degree of purity can also be used. However, this method con-fines itself to describing the reaction control via the catalyst and does not discuss the purification of the product spectrum obtained or changes in its composition.
From US 2006/0135632 A1 finally an MTP process is known, in which methanol is pre-purified in a single purification stage and subsequently fed into the MTP reactor. After the conversion to olefins in the reactor, the entire product stream obtained is supplied to a quenching column From the same, a stream rich in olefins is withdrawn and the remaining aqueous stream is supplied to a second column. In this second separating column, the oxygenates are separated from the water contained in the stream, wherein the oxygenate-containing stream subsequently can be recirculated into the reactor. This concept has the disadvantage that directly subsequent to the reactor quenching is effected, i.e. the product stream coming from the reactor is cooled by adding water. The water content in the product stream is distinctly increased thereby. The high water contents which are present in both columns due to the proposed separation concept, however, lead to the fact that here as well very large amounts of energy are required for the purification, so that with an energy balance over the entire process the savings in the field of methanol purification hardly produce any effect or not at all. | {
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Multiple-Input Multiple-Output (MIMO) is one of the key elements of the air interface for high-speed wireless communications for many wireless communication technologies such as Long Term Evolution (LTE) and High Speed Packet Access (HSPA). MIMO can use the diversity in the channel to provide multiplexing gain by enabling the simultaneous transmission of multiple streams known as layers. Denoting the number of transmit antennas, receive antennas, and layers by NT, NR, and R, respectively, R is never greater than NT (and, often, smaller or equal to NR). One possible implementation of MIMO uses a precoder, often expressed mathematically as a left-multiplication of a layer signal vector (R×1) by a precoding matrix (NT×R), which is chosen from a pre-defined set of matrices, a so-called codebook exemplified in Table 1 and Table 2.
TABLE 1Codebook for LTE UL (2-TX)RIPMI010 1 2 [ 1 1 ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 1 ] 1 1 2 [ 1 - 1 ] — 2 1 2 [ 1 j ] — 3 1 2 [ 1 - j ] — 4 1 2 [ 1 0 ] — 5 1 2 [ 0 1 ] —
TABLE 2Codebook for LTE UL (4-TX)RIPMI01230 1 2 [ 1 1 1 - 1 ] 1 2 [ 1 0 1 0 0 1 0 - j ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 ] 1 1 2 [ 1 1 j j ] 1 2 [ 1 0 1 0 0 1 0 j ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 - 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 ] — 2 1 2 [ 1 1 - 1 1 ] 1 2 [ 1 0 - j 0 0 1 0 1 ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 ] — 3 1 2 [ 1 1 - j - j ] 1 2 [ 1 0 - j 0 0 1 0 - 1 ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 0 1 0 - 1 0 0 0 0 1 ] — 4 1 2 [ 1 j 1 j ] 1 2 [ 1 0 - 1 0 0 1 0 - j ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 ] — 5 1 2 [ 1 j j 1 ] 1 2 [ 1 0 - 1 0 0 1 0 j ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 1 - 1 0 0 ] — 6 1 2 [ 1 j - 1 - j ] 1 2 [ 1 0 j 0 0 1 0 1 ] 1 2 [ 0 1 0 1 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 ] — 7 1 2 [ 1 j - j - 1 ] 1 2 [ 1 0 j 0 0 1 0 - 1 ] 1 2 [ 0 1 0 1 0 0 - 1 0 0 0 0 1 ] — 8 1 2 [ 1 - 1 1 1 ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 ] 1 2 [ 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 ] — 9 1 2 [ 1 - 1 j - j ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 1 1 0 0 - 1 ] 1 2 [ 0 1 0 1 0 0 0 0 1 - 1 0 0 ] — 10 1 2 [ 1 - 1 - 1 - 1 ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 1 - 1 0 0 1 ] 1 2 [ 0 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 1 0 0 ] — 11 1 2 [ 1 - 1 - j j ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 1 - 1 0 0 - 1 ] 1 2 [ 0 1 0 0 0 1 1 0 0 - 1 0 0 ] — 12 1 2 [ 1 - j 1 - j ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 1 0 1 1 0 ] —— 13 1 2 [ 1 - j j - 1 ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 1 0 - 1 1 0 ] —— 14 1 2 [ 1 - j - 1 j ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 1 0 1 - 1 0 ] —— 15 1 2 [ 1 - j - j 1 ] 1 2 [ 1 0 0 1 0 - 1 - 1 0 ] —— 16 1 2 [ 1 0 1 0 ] ——— 17 1 2 [ 1 0 - 1 0 ] ——— 18 1 2 [ 1 0 j 0 ] ——— 19 1 2 [ 1 0 - j 0 ] ——— 20 1 2 [ 0 1 0 1 ] ——— 21 1 2 [ 0 1 0 - 1 ] ——— 22 1 2 [ 0 1 0 j ] ——— 23 1 2 [ 0 1 0 - j ] ———
Each precoding matrix is indexed by a rank indicator (RI) and a precoding matrix indicator (PMI). (Note that the r-th column vector of the precoding matrix represents the antenna spreading weight of the r-th layer.) The precoding matrix usually consists of linearly-independent columns, and thus R is referred to as the rank of codebook. One purpose of this kind of precoder is to match the precoding matrix with the channel state information (CSI) so as to increase the received signal power and also to some extent reduce inter-layer interference, thereby improving the signal-to-interference-plus-noise-ratio (SINR) of each layer. Consequently, the precoder selection requires the transmitter to know the channel properties and, generally speaking, the more accurate the CSI, the better the precoder matches.
In the case of 3GPP LTE UL, precoder selection is made by the receiver (NodeB) so that there is no need for feeding channel information back to the transmitter. The precoder selection includes not only rank selection, but also precoding matrix selection. It is also necessary for the receiver to obtain channel information, which can usually be facilitated by transmitting a known signal, in the case of LTE UL, the Demodulation Reference Signal (DM-RS) and the Sounding Reference Signal (SRS). Both DM-RS and SRS are defined in frequency domain and derived from a Zadoff-Chu sequence. However, since the DM-RS is precoded, while the SRS is not precoded, the channel information obtained from DM-RS is the equivalent channel that the R layers experience, not the physical channel that the NT antennas experience. Mathematically, letting the NR×NT physical channel matrix, the NT×R precoding matrix, and the NR×R equivalent channel be denoted by H, W and E, respectively, it follows thatE=HDW, (1)where D is the NT×NT diagonal matrix whose diagonal elements represent a phase shift introduced by the transmitter chains. As will be seen later, the phase shift is not uniform and does not need to be constant. In detail, the i-th diagonal element is given as di=exp(jφi). As will be described below, the phase shift may result in significant performance loss, when the relative phase between the transmitter chains changes from SRS to PUSCH.
Using the above notation, the equivalent channels for PUSCH, DM-RS and SRS denoted by EPUSCH, EDMRS and ESRS can be expressed asEPUSCH=HW EDMRS=HW HSRS=HD. (2)
Here it is assumed that there is no channel variation among PUSCH, DM-RS and SRS. Furthermore, D is set to the identity matrix for PUSCH and DM-RS without loss of generality due to the fact that we are only concerned with relative phase variations. Note that it is also assumed that PUSCH and DM-RS experience the same channel. In addition, note that HSRS in (2) is directly obtained from SRS, and based on HSRS the equivalent channel ESRS as a function of a hypothesized precoder W can be obtained as ESRS=HSRSW.
Precoder selection is preferably based on SRS, since precoder selection is more easily done with complete knowledge of the channel, i.e., the physical channel, HD in (2). Based on the physical channel estimated based on SRS, the best transmission mode is chosen by the receiver. The receiver then sends the chosen best channel to the transmitter. One of the criteria of selecting the transmission mode is to maximize the data throughput. For example, the effective SNR is calculated for each precoder, i.e., each selection of the rank and precoder matrix, the relevant throughput is calculated, and the precoder maximizing the throughput is selected. Consequently, it is easily understood that precoder selection is subject to inter-antenna imbalance variation between measurement period (SRS) and actual data transmission period (PUSCH).
Referring to FIG. 1, consider a generic User Equipment (UE) 100 with two transmit antennas 102, 104 for simplicity (although the following argument is equally applicable to a UE with more than two transmit antennas). Furthermore, throughout this document a UE 100 can be any one of a multitude of types of wireless or mobile communication devices. Furthermore, a UE as used herein, but not specifically shown in FIG. 1, may include a user interface for physical touch, sound and/or vision. Additionally, a UE inherently comprises one or more controller or microcontroller devices 112 and related circuitry adapted to perform, among other things, mode switching of the one or more transmitter (TX) branches 106, 108 within a transmitter architecture 110.
Denoting the absolute phases of transmitter branch #1 106 and #2 108 by φ1(t) and φ2(t), respectively, the relative phase (RP) is defined as δφ(t)=φ1(t)−φ2(t). Then the relative phase discontinuity (RPD) is defined as the difference of RP between two time instants t1 and t2, i.e., δφ(t1)−δφ(t2).
The RPD of a transmitter branch typically comprises a power-dependent term and a time-dependent term. The power-dependent term depends on the transmit power, whereas the time-dependent term varies with time. From the viewpoint of modelling, the power-dependent term can be given as a function of the current transmit power, whereas the time-dependent term can be given as an additive random process.
The power-dependent RPD mainly comes from the power/configuration mode switching by which each transmitter branch switches the gain/bias state. The potential sources of the power-dependent RPD can be summarized as follows:
Power mode switching: Many state-of-the-art Power Amplifiers (PAs) switch the power mode according to the transmit power, in order to improve the power efficiency. Without extra design effort (or additional circuitry), the two transmitter branches 106, 108 tend to respond to the power mode switching differently, thereby resulting in RPD across the switching points. Configuration mode switching: Depending on the transmit power, the RF/ABB switches the configuration modes characterized by gain switching, adaptive biasing, signal path switching etc. in order to reduce the power consumption. Without extra design effort (or additional circuitry), it is likely that the two transmitter branches experience different phase variation across the switching points. Therefore, the transmitter tends to experience non-negligible RPD in case of configuration mode switching. AM-to-PM distortion: Since PAs are typically operated around the compression point to maximize the power efficiency; they may experience non-negligible AM-to-PM distortion without additional circuitry (e.g., digital pre-distortion). It is likely that the two PA devices have slightly different compression points, operate at slightly different power and operate under different loading conditions. This causes different distortion in the transmitter branches and consequently the transmitter tends to experience non-negligible RPD.
When it comes to precoder selection, the RPD between the measurement and the relevant precoding are the most important considerations. Recalling that SRS is a natural choice for precoder selection, the importance of the RPD between the SRS transmission used for precoder selection and the subsequent PUSCH transmission applying the precoder is easily understood. The RPD may lead to non-optimal precoder selection, even when the wireless channel is perfectly known to the Node B. This may result in non-trivial performance loss, since the precoder selection typically relies on the phase information of the transmitter chains.
It follows that the time frame of interest is about a few (or a few tens of) subframes. It depends on the processing time (measurement and precoder selection) and the SRS periodicity. For example, if the processing time is 4 msec and the period of SRS transmission is 10 msec, a minimum of 8 msec and a maximum of 18 msec should be assumed as the time frame. Given such a time frame, the power-dependent term has a larger impact on RPD than the time-dependent term and thus there is a need to focus on the power-dependent term, i.e., how to cope with it, in some embodiments of this invention.
Denoting the current transmit power by P(t), the absolute phase is given asφ1(t)=f1(P(t))φ2(t)=f2(P(t)), (1)where f1(x) and f2(x) represent the power dependence of absolute phase for the two transmitter branches. This is exemplified in FIG. 2. Defining the power dependence of RP as f1,2(x)=f1(x)−f2(x), the corresponding RP is given asδφ(t)=f1,2(P(t)). (2).
This is further exemplified in FIG. 3. In other words, the Relative Phase (RP) is given as a function of the current transmit power. Similarly, the RPD between t1 and t2 is given asδφ(t1)−δφ(t2)=f1,2(P(t1)−f1,2(P(t2)) (2)
Therefore, the RPD is given as a function of the transmit powers of the two time instants. In other words, it is the transmit power change that gives rise to the RPD. For example, there exists no RPD, if the transmit power remains constant, i.e., P(t1)=P(t2). It is also found out that, given a certain level of transmit power change, the resulting RPD is determined by the power-dependence of the RP. For example, when the RP is independent of the transmit power, i.e., f1,2(P)=C (constant), there exists no RPD.
FIG. 4 shows an example of the relationship between transmit power and the RP. It is shown that RP changes abruptly across, for example, two transmit power levels of 0 dBm and 10 dBm—referred to as switching points (or switching point power levels) hereafter. In this example of FIG. 4, there are two switching points 402, 404 whose power levels are 0 dBm (a low default switching point power level) and 10 dBm (a high default switching point power level). There are three operation modes: the operation mode below 0 dBm is called Low-Power Mode (LPM) 406, the operation mode between 0 dBm and 10 dBm is called Mid-Power Mode (MPM) 408 and the operation mode above 10 dBm is called High-Power Mode (HPM) 410. Each mode has its own bias state and the phase of a bias state is not necessarily equal to those of other bias sates. This justifies the aforementioned RP change across the switching points. In other words, the transmit power change causes the UE or the controller 112 to mode switch the UE transmitter 110 and the mode switching in turn causes the RPD.
Every time a UE operates across a switching point 402, 404, the operation mode changes, thereby creating RPD. What is needed is a method of mode switching that can be used to alleviate or decrease the occurrence of RPD. Additionally, what is needed is a method of mode switching that eliminates unnecessary mode switches and thereby alleviates, decreases or reduces RPD. Furthermore, what is needed is a method of mode switching that can avoid unnecessary mode switching between SRS and PUSCH and thus mitigate the RPD between SRS and PUSCH. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Growth differentiation factor 15 (GDF15) is a divergent member of the TGFβ superfamily. It is also called macrophage inhibitory cytokine 1 (MIC1) (Bootcov M R, 1997, Proc Natl Acad Sci 94:11514-9), placental bone morphogenetic factor (PLAB) (Hromas R 1997, Biochim Biophys Acta. 1354:40-4), placental transforming growth factor beta (PTGFB) (Lawton L N 1997, Gene. 203:17-26), prostate derived factor (PDF) (Paralkar V M 1998, J Biol Chem. 273:13760-7), and nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drug-activated gene (NAG-1) (Baek S J 2001, J Biol Chem. 276: 33384-92).
Human GDF15 gene is located on chromosome 19p13.2-13.1; rat GDF15 gene is located on chromosome 16; and mouse GDF15 gene is located on chromosome 8. The GDF15 open reading frames span two exons (Bottner M 1999, Gene. 237:105-11 and NCBI). The mature GDF15 peptide shares low homology with other family members (Katoh M 2006, Int J Mol Med. 17:951-5.).
GDF15 is synthesized as a large precursor protein that is cleaved at the dibasic cleavage site to release the carboxyterminal mature peptide. The mouse and rat GDF15 prepro-peptides both contain 303 amino acids. Human full-length precursor contains 308 amino acids. The rodent mature peptides contain 115 amino acids after processing at the RGRR (SEQ ID NO:1) cleavage site. The human mature peptide contains 112 amino acids after processing at the RGRRRAR (SEQ ID NO:2) cleavage site. Human mature GDF15 peptide shares 66.1% and 68.1% sequence similarity with rat and mouse mature GDF15 peptides (Bottner M 1999, Gene. 237:105-11; Bauskin A R 2000, EMBO J. 19:2212-20; NCBI). There is no glycosylation site in the mature GDF15 peptide.
The mature GDF15 peptide contains the seven conserved cysteine residues required for the formation of the cysteine knot motif (having three intrachain disulfide bonds) and the single interchain disulfide bond that are typical for TGFβ superfamily members. The mature GDF15 peptide further contains two additional cysteine residues that form a fourth intrachain disulfide bond. Biologically active GDF15 is a 25 KD homodimer of the mature peptide covalently linked by one interchain disulfide bond.
GDF15 circulating levels have been reported to be elevated in multiple pathological and physiological conditions, most notably pregnancy (Moore A G 2000. J Clin Endocrinol Metab 85: 4781-4788), β-thalassemia (Tanno T 2007, Nat Med 13:1096-101; Zimmermann M B, 2008 Am J Clin Nutr 88:1026-31), and congenital dyserythropoietic anemia (Tamary H 2008, Blood. 112:5241-4). GDF15 has also been linked to multiple biological activities in literature reports. Studies of GDF15 knockout and transgenic mice suggested that GDF15 may be protective against ischemic/reperfusion- or overload-induced heart injury (Kempf T, 2006, Circ Res. 98:351-60; Xu J, 2006, Circ Res. 98:342-50), protective against aging-associated motor neuron and sensory neuron loss (Strelau J, 2009, J Neurosci. 29:13640-8), mildly protective against metabolic acidosis in kidney, and may cause cachexia in cancer patients (Johnen H 2007 Nat Med. 11:1333-40). Many groups also have studied the role of GDF15 in cell apoptosis and proliferation and reported controversial results using different cell culture and xenograft models. Studies on transgenic mice showed that GDF15 is protective against carcinogen or Apc mutation induced neoplasia in intestine and lung (Baek S J 2006, Gastroenterology. 131:1553-60; Cekanova M 2009, Cancer Prev Res 2:450-8). | {
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The present invention relates to display systems and, more particularly, to display systems incorporating magneto-optic chips employing Faraday rotation in conjunction with polarized light.
Magneto-optic displays are a phenomenon gaining rapid acceptance. Chips, such as that generally indicated as 10 in FIG. 1, comprise a substrate 12 having a film 14 of a material such as garnet (which will rotate polarized light by the so-called "Faraday effect") which film is divided into posts 16 to form a rectangular pattern of rows (labelled for convenience R1-R6) and columns (labelled for convenience C1-C6). Control wires 18 and 20, respectively, are placed between the columns (designated CC1-CC6) and between the rows (designated CR1-CR6). In this configuration, each post 16 can be addressed individually in the manner of a core memory at the intersection of a column control wire 18 and a row control wire 20. Each post 16 represents a pixel position in the overall display. The material of the film 14 has the effect of rotating polarized light in one direction by Faraday rotation when magnetized in one direction and of rotating polarized light in the opposite direction when magnetized in the opposite direction thus modulating the light passing therethrough. Such chips are discussed in greater detail in co-pending applications Ser. No. 375,329, filed May 5, 1982, by R. H. Anderson, titled IMPROVED MAGNETO-OPTIC IMAGE SCANNING DETECTOR and Ser. No. 375,321, filed May 5, 1982 by R. H. Anderson, W. E. Ross, and T. R. Maki, titled MAGNETO-OPTIC CHIP WITH GRAY-SCALE CAPABILITY, both of which are assigned to the common assignee of this application.
The chip 10 of FIG. 1 can be disposed in a light beam 22 from a source 24 between a polarizer 26 and a polarization analyzer 28 as shown in FIG. 2. The wires 18, 20 are contained in a cable 30 connected to a driver 32. The driver 32 drives the chip 10 to create display information within the posts 16. Light 22 passing through the polarizer 26 is polarized to the axis of polarization of the polarizer 26. This polarized light in passing through the chip 10 is rotated by the film 14 of each individual post 16 clockwise or counter-clockwise depending upon the magnetization thereof as set by the driver 32. The polarization analyzer 28 is positioned with respect to the expected emerging light orientation from the chip 10 so as to create a contrast between areas rotated in one direction and areas rotated in the opposite direction. This contrast can be seen by the observer 34. The specific effect will be discussed later hereinafter.
Such chips and display systems can be viewed directly as shown in FIG. 2 or can be projected through appropriate optics. Another display system to achieve particular effects is shown in my co-pending application Ser. No. 375,322, filed May 5, 1982 titled SWITCHABLE TANDEM MEMORY MAGNETO-OPTIC DISPLAY also assigned to the common assignee of this application.
Particularly in military use, displays having the capability of providing more than just simple messages are desired. Displays are used to impart a wealth of information. One particular feature which would be desirable and not possible by other display systems of the magneto-optic type heretofore is the conveying of depth-of-field information. Also, it is desirable to have a display which can selectively display only information where there is coincidence between two sources of data or, in the alternative, only where there is lack of coincidence between two sources of data. Such features can be used for image processing in military, space, transportation and computer uses, where either the similarities or differences between different images are detectable, such as in moving target indicators, updated inventory listings, extraction of stereo depth information, character recognition in machine-readable documents, and high reliability information processing.
Wherefore, it is the object of the present invention to provide a magneto-optic display generator which will accomplish the foregoing objectives. | {
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Blood clotting begins when platelets adhere to the cut wall of an injured blood vessel at a lesion site. Subsequently, in a cascade of enzymatically regulated reactions, soluble fibrinogen molecules are converted by the enzyme thrombin to insoluble strands of fibrin that hold the platelets together in a thrombus. At each step in the cascade greater than a protein precursor is converted to a protease that cleaves the next protein precursor in the series. Cofactors are required at most of the steps.
Factor VIII circulates as an inactive precursor in blood, bound tightly and non-covalently to von Willebrand factor. Factor VIII is proteolytically activated by thrombin or factor Xa, which dissociates it from von Willebrand factor and activates its procoagulant function in the cascade. In its active form, the protein factor VIIIa is a cofactor that increases the catalytic efficiency of factor IXa toward factor X activation by several orders of magnitude.
People with deficiencies in factor VIII or antibodies against factor VIII who are not treated with factor VIII suffer uncontrolled internal bleeding that may cause a range of serious symptoms, from inflammatory reactions in joints to early death. Severe hemophiliacs, who number about 10,000 in the United States, can be treated with infusion of human factor VIII, which will restore the blood""s normal clotting ability if administered with sufficient frequency and concentration. The classic definition of factor VIII, in fact, is that substance present in normal blood plasma that corrects the clotting defect in plasma derived from individuals with hemophilia A.
The development of antibodies (xe2x80x9cinhibitorsxe2x80x9d or xe2x80x9cinhibitory antibodiesxe2x80x9d) that inhibit the activity of factor VIII is a serious complication in the management of patients with hemophilia. Autoantibodies develop in approximately 20% of patients with hemophilia A in response to therapeutic infusions of factor VIII. In previously untreated patients with hemophilia A who develop inhibitors, the inhibitor usually develops within one year of treatment. Additionally, autoantibodies that inactivate factor VIII occasionally develop in individuals with previously normal factor VIII levels. If the inhibitor titer is low enough, patients can be managed by increasing the dose of factor VIII. However, often the inhibitor titer is so high that it cannot be overwhelmed by factor VIII. An alternative strategy is to bypass the need for factor VIII during normal hemostasis using factor IX complex preparations (for example, KONYNE(copyright), Proplex(copyright)) or recombinant human factor VIIa. Additionally, since porcine factor VIII usually has substantially less reactivity with inhibitors than human factor VIII, a partially purified porcine factor VIII preparation (HYATE:C(copyright)) has been used. Many patients who have developed inhibitory antibodies to human factor VIII have been successfully treated with porcine factor VIII and have tolerated such treatment for long periods of time. However, administration of porcine factor VIII is not a complete solution because inhibitors may develop to porcine factor VIII after one or more infusions in some patients.
Several preparations of human plasma-derived factor VIII of varying degrees of purity are available commercially for the treatment of hemophilia A. These include a partially-purified factor VIII derived from the pooled blood of many donors that is heat- and detergent-treated for viruses but contain a significant level of antigenic proteins; a monoclonal antibody-purified factor VIII that has lower levels of antigenic impurities and viral contamination; and recombinant human factor VIII, clinical trials for which are underway. Unfortunately, human factor VIII is unstable at physiologic concentrations and pH, is present in blood at an extremely low concentration (0.2 xcexcg/ml plasma), and has low specific clotting activity. Public health concerns regarding the risk of viruses or other blood-borne contaminants have limited the usefulness of porcine factor VIII purified from porcine blood.
Hemophiliacs require daily replacement of factor VIII to prevent bleeding and the resulting deforming hemophilic arthropathy. However, supplies have been inadequate and problems in therapeutic use occur due to difficulty in isolation and purification, immunogenicity, and the necessity of removing the AIDS and hepatitis infectivity risk. The use of recombinant human factor VIII or partially-purified porcine factor VIII will not resolve all the problems.
The problems associated with the commonly used, commercially available, plasma-derived factor VIII have stimulated significant interest in the development of a better factor VIII product. There is a need for a more potent factor VIII molecule so that more units of clotting activity can be delivered per molecule; a factor VIII molecule that is stable at a selected pH and physiologic concentration; a factor VIII molecule that is less apt to cause production of inhibitory antibodies; and a factor VIII molecule that evades immune detection in patients who have already acquired antibodies to human factor VIII.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a factor VIII that corrects hemophilia in a patient deficient in factor VIII or having inhibitors to human factor VIII.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide methods for treatment of hemophiliacs.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide a factor VIII that is stable at a selected pH and physiologic concentration.
It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a factor VIII that has greater coagulant activity than human factor VIII.
It is an additional object of the present invention to provide a factor VIII against which less antibody is produced.
It is a further object of the invention to provide a method for making recombinant porcine factor VIII and specifically modified porcine factor VIII.
The determination of the entire DNA sequence encoding porcine factor VIII set forth herein has enabled, for the first time, the synthesis of full-length porcine factor VIII by expressing the DNA encoding porcine factor VIII in a suitable host cell. Purified recombinant porcine factor VIII is therefore an aspect of the present invention. The DNA encoding each domain of porcine factor VIII as well as any specified fragment thereof, can be similarly expressed. Furthermore, porcine fVIII having all or part of the B domain deleted (B-domainless porcine fVIII) is made available as part of the present invention, by expression DNA encoding porcine fVIII having a deletion of one or more codons of the B-domain.
Also provided are pharmaceutical compositions and methods for treating patients having factor VIII deficiency comprising administering recombinant porcine factor VIII or a modified recombinant porcine factor VIII, in particular a B-domainless porcine factor VIII. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Some computer applications require the downloading of resources through a client-server connection over a network before the applications can start. The long startup time may deter some end users from using the applications. Therefore, improved techniques for downloading the resources for these applications would be desirable. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The histamine H3 receptor is relatively neuron specific and inhibits the release of a number of monoamines, including histamine. The histamine H3 receptor is a presynaptic autoreceptor and hetero-receptor located both in the central and the peripheral nervous system. The histamine H3 receptor regulates the release of histamine and other neurotransmitters, such as serotonin and acetylcholine. These are examples of histamine H3 receptor mediated responses. Recent evidence suggests that the H3 receptor shows intrinsic, constitutive activity, in vitro as well as in vivo (i.e. it is active in the absence of an agonist). Compounds acting as inverse agonists can inhibit this activity. A histamine H3 receptor antagonist or inverse agonist would therefore be expected to increase the release of H3 receptor-regulated neurotransmitters in the brain. A histamine H3 receptor agonist, on the contrary, leads to an inhibition of the biosynthesis of histamine and an inhibition of the release of histamine and also of other neurotransmitters such as serotonin and acetylcholine. These findings suggest that histamine H3 receptor agonists, inverse agonists, and antagonists could be important mediators of neuronal activity, and the activities of other cells that may express this receptor. Inverse agonism or selective antagonism of the histamine H3 receptor raises brain levels of histamine, and other monoamines, and inhibits activities such as food consumption while minimizing non-specific peripheral consequences. By this mechanism, they induce a prolonged wakefulness, improved cognitive function, reduction in food intake and normalization of vestibular reflexes. Accordingly, the histamine H13 receptor is an important target for new therapeutics in Alzheimer disease, mood and attention adjustments, cognitive deficiencies, obesity, dizziness, schizophrenia, epilepsy, sleeping disorders, narcolepsy and motion sickness.
Histamine mediates its activity via four receptor subtypes, H1R, H2R, H3R and a newly identified receptor designated GPRv53 [(Oda T., et al., J. Biol. Chem. 275 (47): 36781-6 (2000)], and alternative names for this receptor are PORT3 or H4R. Although relatively selective ligands have been developed for H1R, H2R and H3R, few specific ligands have been developed that can distinguish H3R from GPRv53. GPRv53 is a widely distributed receptor found at high levels in human leukocytes. Activation or inhibition of this receptor could result in undesirable side effects when targeting antagonism of the H3R receptor. The identification of the H4R receptor has fundamentally changed histamine biology and must be considered in the development of histamine H3 receptor antagonists.
Some histamine H3 receptor antagonists were created which resembled histamine in possessing an imidazole ring generally substituted in the 4(5) position (Ganellin et al., Ars Pharmaceutica, 1995, 36:3, 455-468). A variety of patents and patent applications directed to antagonists and agonists having such structures include EP 197840, EP 494010, WO 97/29092, WO 96/38141, and WO96/38142. These imidazole-containing compounds have the disadvantage of poor blood-brain barrier penetration, interaction with cytochrome P-450 proteins, and hepatic and ocular toxicities. Recently other imidazole and non-imidazole ligands of the histamine H3 receptor have been described. The compounds of the present invention differ in structure from the compounds described in the art.
There remains a need for improved treatments using alternative or improved pharmaceutical agents that act as histamine H3 receptor agonists, inverse agonists, or antagonists, to modulate H3 receptor activity, and treat the diseases that could benefit from H3 receptor modulation. The present invention provides such a contribution to the art based on the finding that a novel class of biaryl amine compounds has a high affinity, selective, and potent activity at the histamine H3 receptor. The subject invention is distinct in the particular structures and their activities. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Computer software is routinely used to create and/or modify graphic images on a computer display. Graphics software that is meant to run in conjunction with a graphical user interface-based operating system, such as Microsoft Windows NT, must be able to make use of the graphics capabilities of the operating system, i.e. the software must understand about brushes, pens, colors etc. Special graphics processors and higher speed general purpose processors used in conjunction with graphics software and large, high resolution monitors have improved the ability to display graphics and text images on a computer screen.
Graphics software packages are commercially available from a number of software vendors that run on various hardware configurations. The availability of reduced cost, more powerful processors has allowed paint and 3-D modelling systems to be made available for use on personal computers and high-speed workstations. A typical use of such software running on such a configuration of hardware is for video editing and computer animation.
Prior art graphics software is commercially available from SOFTIMAGE of Montreal, Canada. This software includes a paint capability wherein the user can define a brush that will be used in rendering images on the computer display. As with most computer graphics programs, existing graphics computer programs can also display text using a particular style of text where the style includes the font of the text as well as the size, color etc.
In the film, tension and multimedia industry, post production is normally carried out using several different editing and mixing equipment and facilities, including different computer-based animation and editing systems. Post production usually involves a wide range of processes on a wide range of data types, each of which can be affected or composed of a number of elements and/or properties. These data types, elements and properties vary greatly between toolsets. For example, audio data can receive audio effects, which deal with time and audio samples. In contrast, a body of text in a titling system can be assigned a font and channel mask, which ignores time and deals with a static image.
Simply describing the diversity of data types using a common language is a problem. As a result, graphics software such as prior art post production systems could not deal with such a variety of data types with a consistent user interface (UI). Separate systems and equipment were commonly used to handle the different data types.
Even if a suitable scheme (or taxonomy) for dealing with each of the various data types is developed, maintaining user interface consistency when dealing with these types remains a challenge. Ideally, the user interface should be consistent for all data and elements, efficient for use by very skilled "power" users, and extensible to handle new data types as the product and/or needs evolve.
These problems and needs apply to a wide variety of systems, including video post production systems and other complex environments and, as mentioned above, conventional user interfaces for such systems are often not fast enough for most power users. Specifically, a user often requires the ability to quickly select from a broad palette elements which include tools, properties and other settings. For instance if a user is animating a character, certain paint attributes which recreate objects such as hair, skin, etc., will be used repetitively. It is unacceptable to many users to be required to repeatedly make multiple selections, usually by multiple key presses mouse events, each time a tool or setting is to be accessed or employed.
Further, when using prior art graphics software and similar systems, it was not possible to easily save all the properties that are combined to define items such as brush strokes, text rendering or the like. For example, in order to produce a stroke or character with a particular or specific look, a paint or titling artist or other user can set up many individual parameters to achieve the desired result. For example, the user can define a specific brush shape, size, profile, specific color, opacity, tool shape etc. Once the properties for a parameter or tool have been set up, prior art software only allowed the user to save and retrieve some subsets of the discrete settings or parameters which were combined to achieve the desired result and thus the user would have to recreate the balance of the combination as best they could. Further, while some prior art graphics software does allow a user to save a brush by itself, or to create and save some combinations of parameters for very specific effects, none have allowed the user to save all the elements which uniquely define the appearance of each stroke, text element or other item. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system for cleansing, conditioning, and treating the skin. In particular, the present invention relates to a one-step system that delivers a combination of surfactants, humectants, emollients, antimicrobial agents, and other beneficial ingredients in a no-rinse, self-drying formulation that promotes effective absorption into the surface layers of the skin.
2. Discussion of Background
Many different types of products are used in cleansing and conditioning the skin: solid and liquid soaps, surfactants, humectants, moisturizers, emollients, astringents, deodorants, and antimicrobial agents, and other compositions which provide the desired beneficial effects. The normal method of cleansing the skin with soap and water originated in about 2000 BC with a soap invented by the Mesopotamians. Unfortunately, most soaps are alkali based and rely on consuming the natural skin oils to free up dried or dead skin, dirt, and soil. This strips the skin of natural oils and causes dry skin, flaking and even skin tears, especially in older persons. Liquid cleansers are becoming increasing popular; however, many liquid cleansers do not lather sufficiently well for thorough cleansing. Various cleansing aids such as wash cloths and sponges may impede lathering or even absorb liquid cleansers and moisturizers.
The primary function of human skin is to provide a barrier that contains the other organs of the body. The effectiveness of skin as a barrier depends on its physical integrity, thus, preserving the integrity of healthy skin and restoring the integrity of injured skin are important aspects of maintaining good health. Injuries (burns, cuts, abrasions, incisions) can lead to localized or systemic infection if contaminated; dry skin can lead to pruritis and hasten the formation of skin ulcers (including decubitus ulcers), an especial concern for bedridden patients and the elderly. The normal techniques used in skin cleansingxe2x80x94washing with soap and water, rubbing with sponges and wash clothsxe2x80x94can exacerbate these problems.
The technique of cleansing skin using a basin of water and soap commonly used for bed ridden patients today was popularized by Florence Nightingale over 100 years ago. This technique usually starts with a basin filled with hot water, and involves the use of soap and rough wash cloths to loosen dead skin. Patients are bathed by scrubbing their skin with a well-soaped wash cloth, followed by vigorous towel drying. This technique can easily result in some areas of a patient""s body becoming contaminated by bacteria carried from other parts via the washcloth or towel. Another concern is skin damage (abrasions, tears, etc.) due to friction from washcloths and towels, especially in elderly patients and others with fragile, easily-damaged skin.
Most skin cleansing formulations and techniques were developed primarily to remove dirt, soil, and germs carried on the surface of the skin or in the skin""s oil, and do little or nothing to protect or enhance the skin or its natural functions. In fact, many sacrifice skin health to achieve the primary objective of skin cleansing.
More recently, substrates pre-moistened with various cleansers, moisturizers, and other additives have been used to provide greater convenience and disposable cleansing systems. For example, Elmore (U.S. Pat. No. 4,220,244) describes a soft cloth pad saturated with salt water and enclosed in a moisture proof envelope having a mirrored surface. The pad can be taken out when needed to refresh and clean the user""s face. Toohey (U.S. Pat. No. 4,749,080) teaches a plurality of woven cloths pre-moistened with an aqueous moistening liquid such as pure water, contained in a resealable package. The package is sealed by application of heat and pressure, and sterilized by exposure to gamma radiation. Toohey states that the liquid can contain additives for skin freshening such as alcohol, iodine as an antiseptic, and a skin smoothing agent such as glycerin or lemon oil, altogether not exceeding 10% of the total weight of the aqueous solution.
Some products, such as the delivery system and treatment compositions described by Deckner (U.S. Pat. No. 4,563,346), are designed to air dry after application to the skin. Deckner uses a volatile silicone and a non-ionic lipophilic emulsifier that can be used to deposit a variety of active ingredients on the skin, including oils, humectants, emollients, sunscreens, antiperspirants, and topically active drugs. Other ingredients may include parabens, benzyl alcohol, and imidazolidinyl urea, emollients such as alcohol benzoate, and moisturizers such as panthenol, propylene glycol, or glycerol incorporated into the water phase of the delivery system. The system is said to produce a wash-resistant and sweat-resistant moisturizer film on the skin, which makes it unsuitable for use as a cleanser.
In addition to good cleaning action, cosmetic cleansers should be gentle, causing little or no irritation without drying the skin or leaving it taut. Wivell, et al. (U.S. Pat. No. 5,439,682) provides a personal cleansing and moisturizing composition that includes an anionic surfactant, a long chain C16-22 suspending agent, a dispersed, insoluble oil phase, an additional surfactant, an optional suspending agent, and water. Gordon, et al. (U.S. Pat. No. 5,650,384) combines a hydrophobic, diamond-mesh sponge with a liquid cleansing and moisturizing composition. The composition contains a moisturizing phase and an anionic surfactant in order to clean and moisturize the skin in a single step. Notably, most of the ingredients are rinsed away during use, leaving the relatively heavy, oily moisturizers behind.
Blieszner, et al. (U.S. Pat. No. 5,648,083) teach the addition of a cleansing composition to pre-moistened disposable wipes for personal cleansing of the perineal area. The composition includes water, a protective barrier agent that contains silicone oil, and an emulsifier; it may also include additional components such as pH-adjusting agents, antimicrobial agents, chelating agents, fragrances, skin soothing aids, moisteners, humectants, emollients, and powders. The composition is formulated for use in the normally moist perineal area; thus, repeated use in other, normally-drier areas would cause problems.
Additional compositions and methods are disclosed by Martin, et al. (U.S. Pat. No. 5,702,992), who add an anti-microbial agent to a patient care kit that includes a plurality of cleanser-impregnated cloths packaged in a sealed polyethylene bag. The cleanser is a nonionic, non-rinsing mixture of surfactants, emollients or humectants, vitamin E and deionized water. Williams, et al. (U.S. Pat. No. 4,761,402) describes a soluble, phophorylated glucan composition for treatment of viral and fungal infections; additional ingredients may include antimicrobial agents such as aminoglycoside and gentamicin. The composition is administered in vivo through injection, orally, topically, or by inhalation. Buchalter (U.S. Pat. No. 3,896,807) impregnates an article such as a glove with a therapeutic substance (a non-oily solid which is activated to form a cream upon addition of water or moisture). Murphy""s cosmetic product (U.S. Pat. No. 5,653,967) also includes beta glucan as a suspension agent. The beta glucan is non-toxic and non-irritating, but was not noted to demonstrate any stimulation of macrophages or curative effects.
Many of the substrates used with cleansing compositions are unsuitable for long-term use. For example, paper substrates are biodegradable but abrasive to the skin, and, like dense woven or nonwoven substrates, are ineffective at trapping and carrying away dirt. Unfortunately, most nonwoven substrates that are available to consumers are selected for softness and reduced friction without regard for their ability to trap and carry away dirt or soil.
Most known skin cleansing systems contain ingredients that are aimed at producing specific outcomes, but that may also have detrimental side effects. For example, alcohol is fast-drying and kills many varieties of microorganism, but also dries the skin. Iodine, widely used in antiseptic compositions such as Betadine(copyright), is harsh and discolors the skin. Propylene glycol (the main ingredient in antifreeze) is used as a soap, emollient, or preservative, but repeated use and exposure have been found to contribute to contact dermatitis, liver abnormalities, and kidney damage. Mineral oil and other oils may suffocate the skin by forming an oil film; any excess oily residue on the skin surface (including vitamin E) promotes excess sweating which can be detrimental to skin health and maintenance. Sodium lauryl sulfate (SLS) and sodium alureth sulfate (SLES) may cause formation of potentially carcinogenic nitrates and dioxins by reacting with commonly used ingredients found in many products. Glycerin and some other humectants attract and draw in moisture to keep the dead surface skin moist, but when used in quantity can dry out and damage the subsurface, living skin. Other humectants that trap water in solution can damage the skin by over-hydration.
Alcohol, glycerin, and other common ingredients used in cosmetics and skin cleansers are relatively inexpensive at least partly because they have been used in volume in so many different applications for many years. To reduce costs, these ingredients are normally a first choice for new product formulations. Many common ingredients, including propylene glycol and glycerin, are included to impart an impression of silkiness, slipperiness, and other tactile sensations deemed to be desirable to consumers. This poses no significant skin problems for normal usage, or when the product is rinsed off after use. However, many of these popular ingredients are simply inappropriate for repeated use in no-rinse, fast-drying cleansing and moisturizing systems.
Many cosmetic and skin cleansing compositions include antimicrobial agents and preservatives that extend the shelf life of the product (these constituents restrict the growth of microorganisms in the substrate, solution, and container). These constituents are typically selected for their effectiveness in protecting the product rather than their compatibility with human skin or even their effectiveness against microorganisms found on the skin. These constituents are selected for their ability to act relatively slowly during product storage; they are not designed to kill large amounts of microorganisms quickly during skin cleansing, nor are they suitable for leaving on the skin for extended periods of time: an agent that helps prevent the growth of undesired microorganisms during product storage cannot be assumed to be equally effective against bacteria in vivo.
An additional problem is that of cross reactions, which can result in the breakdown of various product constituents and the formation of new compounds that may be harmful to the skin. Many common preservatives are subject to cross reactions, for example, Diazolidinylurea (marketed, inter alia, under the trademarks Germall II or Germaben II) is a broad-spectrum preservative used in cosmetics and pharmaceutical preparations. Diazolidinylurea, which has become a popular constituent of cosmetics, creams and lotions since the early 1980s, is now known to change into formaldehyde if activated to kill microorganisms. When radiated at normal sterilization levels, cross-reactions may change diazolidinylurea into offensive-smelling ammonia or formaldehyde.
Very few products are sterilized as part of, or after the manufacturing process. Instead, manufacturers rely on less costly preservatives matched to known microbial loads on the product to restrict microbial growth during storage. Sterilization is desirable for all skin cleansing products, but especially so for products used in hospitals, nursing homes, extended care facilities, and the like. Contrary to many statements in the prior art literature, presently-available pre-moistened substrates used for skin cleansing typically cannot be adequately sterilized by ultraviolet light, and cannot be ETO-sterilized due to the resulting unallowable levels of ethylene glycol. Gamma or E-beam sterilization is usually unacceptable due to the difficulty in matching multiple ingredients with desired functions that are not significantly altered during required radiation levels. If sterilized by gamma radiation, diazolidinylurea and many other commonly-used ingredients deteriorate, resulting in foul odors or new compounds.
Known skin care compositions rely on pre-cleansing, rinsing, and manually drying the skin, or are intended for temporary skin coatings such as sunscreens and supplemental creams. These compositions are not effective as a one-step, no-rinse cleansing system; their effectiveness is hampered by the problems created during normal pre-cleansing. Furthermore, many presently-available compositions contain ingredients that have harmful side effects. Thus, known skin cleansing systems and compositions rely on a very careful selection of sometimes-incompatible ingredients to prevent unwanted interactions, during storage, during sterilization, and during use. This problem is so common that manyxe2x80x94perhaps mostxe2x80x94formulations include additional ingredients specifically to help offset the side effects caused by the other ingredients.
Despite the variety of skin cleansing and conditioning systems available to consumers, there is still a need for a practical, cost-effective system based on skin-friendly ingredients. An ideal system would include a non-irritating, lint-free substrate impregnated with a composition that simultaneously cleanses, detoxifies, restructures, and revitalizes the skin, and that air-dries rapidly, leaving a protective film on the skin surface.
According to its major aspects and broadly stated, the present invention consists of a skin care system that cleanses, therapeutically conditions, and provides additional beneficial treatment to the skin in a simple, one-step application that air dries quickly. (For purposes of this specification, the terms xe2x80x9cair dries quicklyxe2x80x9d and xe2x80x9cair dries rapidlyxe2x80x9d refer to a composition that air dries within approximately two minutes following application to the skin.) The system is implemented as a skin care kit: a container having a plurality of articles therein, each article consisting of a pre-moistened soft cloth. The cloths are impregnated with a treatment composition that contains ingredients selected from the following groups: (a) surfactants, (b) anti-inflammatory agents, (c) non-foaming agents, (d) cell-growth-promoting agents, (e) immune system-enhancing agents, (f) fast-acting antimicrobial agents, (g) absorption facilitating agents or ingredients, (h) humectants and emollients, (i) free radical-scavenging agents, and (j) healing promoting agents. (The terms xe2x80x9cagent,xe2x80x9d xe2x80x9cingredient,xe2x80x9d and xe2x80x9cconstituentxe2x80x9d are used interchangeably.) The ingredients are further selected to form a stable composition, that is, neither the ingredients nor the composition as a whole deteriorates or undergoes cross reactions when the composition is sterilized by gamma or electron-beam radiation.
In use, the cloths gently cleanse the skin, trap and carry away dirt and soil, and deposit a film of beneficial ingredients that coat and are absorbed into the skin. The system is portable, disposable, easily stored, and can be partially used and resealed for further use. Thus, it is both useful and convenient for medical-related and non-medical skin cleansing.
An important feature of the present invention is the synergistic effect of the selected ingredients. When combined according to the invention, surprisingly low concentrations of these ingredients are needed to provide effective cleansing and moisturizing of the skin, together with delivery of antimicrobial agents that act against local bacteria, viruses, fungi, etc. to help promote healthy skin. The combination of surfactants, humectants, emollients, and other ingredients promotes deeper and more effective absorption of multiple ingredients into the layers of the skin, in a disposable, one-step cleansing and moisturizing system that quickly air dries so that towel drying is not needed.
Another important feature of the present invention is the combination of ingredients used in formulating the composition. In a preferred embodiment, the composition is an aqueous solution that contains approximately 70-90 wt. % water and at least four additional ingredients: at least one ingredient selected from each of groups (a)-(c), and at least one ingredient selected from one of groups (d)-(j). More preferably, the composition contains at least five ingredients in addition to water: at least one ingredient from each of groups (a)-(c), and at least two different ingredients from one of groups (d)-(j). Most preferably, the composition contains at least two different ingredients from each of two different groups (d)-(j) in addition to the ingredients from groups (a)-(c). Additional ingredients such as preservatives and fragrances may be added if desired. The ingredients are selected so as to be compatible with each other, to be radiation-sterilizable, and to provide the desired beneficial treatment.
Another feature of the present invention is the cloths that carry the composition. The cloths are made of a soft, pliable fabric, preferably a fabric that contains at least 50% rayon or other suitable fibers. The structure of the fabric is sufficiently porous (i.e., with a sufficient number of air spaces) that it retains the composition therein during manufacture and storage, but easily releases the composition when wiped gently across the area of skin to be cleansed. The fabric also picks up and carries away dirt, dead skin flakes, and excess skin oils, while depositing a thin layer of the composition on the skin surface.
Other features and advantages of the present invention will be apparent to those skilled in the art from a careful reading of the Detailed Description of Preferred Embodiments presented below and accompanied by the drawings. | {
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Advancements in semiconductor manufacture have led to increases in the density and miniaturization of microelectronic circuits. As an example, the manufacture of 16 Mb DRAMs is now possible and 64 Mb and 256 Mb prototypes are currently being developed. A key requirement for achieving such high device packing density is the formation of suitable storage capacitors.
With the increased packing density of memory cells, however, the area available for storage capacitors (i.e storage nodes) has decreased. This has necessitated the development of storage capacitors having an increased capacitance. In general, storage capacitors can be formed as stacked structures or as trench structures. The present invention is concerned with stacked capacitors having a high storage capacity.
Typically a thin film stacked storage capacitor includes a lower electrode, an upper electrode, and a dielectric layer which is sandwiched between the electrodes. This capacitor structure is stacked on an insulating layer of a substrate. The insulating layer may be formed of insulating materials such as SiO.sub.2 and Si.sub.3 N.sub.4 that are compatible with a silicon process. The lower electrode of the capacitor is connected to an FET transistor formed on the substrate. In the past, a polycrystalline silicon layer has been used as the lower electrode of a capacitor. Such a polysilicon layer is sometimes referred to as a polysilicon (or silicon) electrode.
One way for increasing the capacity of this type capacitor is to use a dielectric layer formed with a high dielectric constant material. These high dielectric constant materials include inorganic non-metallic oxides in the paraelectric or ferroelectric phase such as BaSrTiO.sub.3 (BST), BaTiO.sub.3, SrTiO.sub.3, PbZrO.sub.3 and others. (Better insulating inorganic metal oxides are sometimes also used). Such high dielectric constant materials have a dielectric constant larger than 100. This is an order of magnitude larger than traditional dielectric materials, such as SiO.sub.2 and Si.sub.3 N.sub.4, which have dielectric constants of less than 10.
A problem with this type of high capacity capacitor is that in general, high dielectric constant films cannot be formed directly over a polysilicon electrode. This is because an interface layer of silicon dioxide forms between the dielectric film and the polysilicon electrode. Such an interface layer reduces the effective dielectric constant the dielectric material and defeats its purpose. For this reason the lower electrode structure is typically formed as a stack comprising a barrier layer formed on the polysilicon electrode and then the lower electrode formed on the barrier layer.
The barrier layer is typically formed of a conductive material such as tantalum (Ta) or titanium nitride (TiN). Such a barrier layer in addition to preventing oxidation of the polysilicon electrode also functions to prevent silicon diffusion into the lower electrode. Such silicon diffusion would increase the resistivity of the lower electrode and could lead to the formation of a thin SiO.sub.2 layer on top of the lower electrode.
Another problem associated with the use of high dielectric constant films is that these films must be deposited at relatively high temperature (i.e. 600.degree.-700.degree. C.). Because of the high process temperatures that are required, the lower electrode of such a capacitor is typically formed of a high melting point, non-oxidizing metal such as platinum, palladium or rhodium or of a conducting oxide such as ruthenuim oxide, iridium oxide, osmium oxide or rhodium oxide. A non-oxidizing material is required for the lower electrode because a traditional electrode material such as aluminum, titanium, nichrome or copper will oxidize at the high temperatures increasing the resistivity of the electrode.
One such improved high capacitance capacitor is described in the technical article entitled "A Stacked Capacitor With (Ba.sub.x Sr.sub.1-x)Tio.sub.3 For 256M DRAM") by Koyama et al. in IEDM 91-823 at pgs. 32.1-4. Such a stacked capacitor is shown in FIG. 1 and generally designated as 10. A memory array includes many of these capacitors arranged in a matrix.
With reference to FIG. 1, a semiconductor substrate 12 includes an FET transistor (not shown) formed with a pair of insulated gate electrodes 14, 16. An insulating layer 18 (i.e. SiO.sub.2) is formed over the FET transistor and gate electrodes 14, 16. The capacitor 10 is stacked on this insulating layer 18. A polysilicon plug 20 (or polysilicon electrode) is formed in a contact hole placed through the insulating layer 18 to the source or drain region 30 of the FET transistor.
The capacitor 10 includes a lower electrode 22, an upper electrode 24, and a dielectric film 26 formed between the lower electrode 22 and the upper electrode 24. The dielectric film 26 comprises a nigh dielectric constant material such as BaSrTiO.sub.3. The capacitor 10 also includes a barrier layer 28 formed between the lower electrode 22 and the polysilicon plug 20. The barrier layer 28 is preferably formed of a conducting material, such as Ta or TiN.
As previously explained, the barrier layer 28 is required to prevent the oxidation of the polysilicon plug 20 and the formation of an interfacial oxide. In addition, the barrier layer 28 prevents the reaction of the lower electrode 22 with the polysilicon plug 20.
Such a stacked capacitor represents the state of the art for high capacitance stacked capacitors. This capacitor structure, however, is subject to several limitations.
A first limitation is that the dielectric layer 26 must be formed over the stepped or non-planar surface contour provided by the stack formed by the lower electrode 22 and barrier layer 28. Poor step coverage of the dielectric material 26 over the lower electrode 22 promotes charge leakage at the corners 32, 33 of the dielectric material 26 in the completed capacitor structure. For this reason an insulating material such as SiO.sub.2 is sometimes deposited over the outside corners of the dielectric film 26.
Another limitation of this type of high capacity capacitor 10 is that the sidewalls 34, 36 of the barrier layer 28 are exposed to oxidation during deposition of the dielectric film 26. Accordingly, the high temperatures encountered during the dielectric deposition process will cause the sidewalls of the barrier layer 28 to oxidize. Such an oxide will increase the contact resistance of the barrier layer 28. In addition, with an oxide formed on the sidewalls 34, 36 of the barrier layer 28, the lower electrode 22 will not adhere as well to the barrier layer 28. This may cause the lower electrode 22 to lift off and separate from the barrier layer 28.
Finally, if the barrier layer 28 does not completely overlap the polysilicon plug 20, then the surface of the polysilicon plug 20 will oxidize during deposition of the dielectric material 26 . A critical alignment of the barrier layer 28 with the polysilicon plug 20 is thus required.
In view of these problems, there is a need in the art for a stacked capacitor structure which is not subject to these limitations. Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide an improved high dielectric constant capacitor and a method for manufacturing such a capacitor. It is a further object of the present invention to provide a high dielectric constant capacitor in which a dielectric layer is formed with a smooth geometry so that current leakage from the dielectric layer is minimized. It is a further object of the present invention to provide a high dielectric constant capacitor in which a barrier layer of the capacitor is protected from oxidation during manufacture. It is yet another object of the present in invention to provide a high dielectric constant capacitor which a polysilicon electrode for the capacitor is protected from oxidation during manufacture. Finally, it is an object of the present invention to provide a method for forming a high dielectric constant capacitor that is adaptable to large scale semiconductor manufacture. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a communication system and method, and a storage medium storing programs in communication system.
2. Related Background Art
A remote monitor system using a plurality of video cameras and a synthesizer for synthesizing in an analog manner images taken with the cameras has been used in a building of a relatively small scale or the like and such as system is called a local monitor system. In contrast to such a local monitor system, a remote monitor system has been proposed in which a plurality of cameras are connected by a digital network such as LAN (local area network) and public digital line ISDN so that the more cameras at remoter sites can be controlled more flexibly.
Of remote monitor systems, some systems control the image display and system operations through graphical user interface (GUI) by using personal computers or work stations as monitor terminals. Use of GUI at a monitor terminal enables a computer device to operate the system easily. The operability of the system can be improved by displaying a camera control panel together with an image taken with the camera.
However, conventional methods of displaying images with such a system include various methods such as a glance display of images taken with a plurality of cameras. A conventional display operation and discrimination between system operations are not always good heretofore. Personal computers and work stations are directly, or via a synthesizer for image synthesis and a switcher for switching between cameras, connected to the network. The image synthesizer can select one of cameras connected thereto to display its image, or can display a plurality of images side by side at the same time. By using the switcher, any desired camera can be selected to be controlled.
However, the operability of the system which inputs images via the switcher/synthesizer is not so much satisfactory and there is still a room to be improved. | {
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Consumers are demanding smaller and feature-rich wireless communication devices, such as cellular (cell) telephones. A smaller cell phone with more functions and features can be produced with two housing portions. One such multipart configuration is a flip phone. A flip phone opens up like a clamshell. Other configurations are sliding phones and swivel phones. In a sliding phone, one portion of the cell phone housing slides relative to the other portion. In a swivel phone, one portion of the cell phone swivels open, relative to the other portion. A sliding phone is shown in application Ser. No. 10/931,712, filed on Sep. 1, 2004, assigned to the assignee of the present application, the disclosure of which is hereby incorporated herein by reference. Generally, a wireless device case with multiple-part housing portions, including the examples described above, is referred to herein as a multipart case or multipart housing.
Typically, one arrangement of the two housing portions has an overall smaller form factor than the other arrangement. The smaller arrangement is often called the closed configuration, and the larger arrangement is called the open configuration. The cell phone user can keep the cell phone in the closed configuration when carrying the cell phone, or for storage. In use, the cell phone is put in the open configuration. Some phones can be used in both configurations.
In some configurable cell phones, both housing portions have a ground plane. Ground planes often act as the counterpoise for proximate antennas and almost always affect antenna performance. An antenna might perform optimally with the cell phone in one (i.e., open) configuration, but sub-optimally with the cell phone in the other (i.e., closed) configuration. The sub-optimal performance may be due to the positional change of one of the ground planes relative to the antenna. An antenna that depends heavily on the ground plane, such as a patch antenna, planar inverted-F antenna (PIFA), or folded monopole, may perform poorly when a grounded metal is near the antenna in some configurations.
One measure of poor antenna performance is the amount of current unintentionally generated through a transceiving device, typically as surface currents, as opposed to amount of energy radiated into the intended transmission medium (i.e., air). From the point of view of a transmitter, poor antenna performance can be measured as less radiated power, or less power in an intended direction. From the receiver perspective, poor antenna performance is associated with degraded sensitivity due to noisy grounds. From either point of view, poor performance can be associated with radio frequency (RF) ground currents.
The above-mentioned ground issues are compounded with the use of multipart type cell phone cases. Many cell phones use so-called flex films to carry signals between the two casing halves, for example, between a liquid crystal display (LCD) module and the main printed circuit board (PCB). These flex films are typically multi-layered planes of grounds and signal lines formed on, and separated by flexible sheets of dielectric insulator materials. These long thin signal wires may unintentionally act as antennas, interfering with the intended antennas and degrading the receiver performance. At the cost of connector flexibility, silver ink shielding (ground) layers can be used to cover the connector, or even added as internal layers. While this brute-force approach does shield the connector signal lines, other problems may be introduced. Since the shielded connector is located proximate to the antenna, the intended radiation patterns can be altered. Using a cell phone as an example, the shielded flex connector may cause a desired upward-pointing radiation pattern in the PCS band to point in an alternate, less desirable direction. | {
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This invention generally pertains to heterocyclic carbon compounds having drug and bio-affecting properties and to their preparation and use. In particular, the invention is concerned with various heterocyclic derivatives characterized by Formulas I and II, infra., which are inhibitors of blood platelet aggregation.
United States patents relating to the carboxylic acid and ester derivatives of the various heterocycles disclosed herein are as follows:
Thiazole compounds in Field of Search 514/365 and 548/203, 204.
Cavalla, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 3,506,679 discloses 2,5- and 4,5-diarylthiazolyl lower fatty acids having anti-inflammatory activity of formula (1) wherein R.sup.3 is a straight chain or branched aliphatic acid radical containing 2-6 carbon atoms. ##STR2##
Hepworth, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 3,538,107 discloses aryl-thiazolyl-acetic acid derivatives having anti-inflammatory, analgesic and antipyretic properties of formula (2) such as alpha-[2-(4-chlorophenyl) thiazol-4-yl]propionic acid. ##STR3##
Hepworth, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 3,661,920 discloses thiazole derivatives having anti-inflammatory, analgesis and antipyretic activity of formula (3). ##STR4##
Malen, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 3,821,237 discloses thiazolyl benzoic acid compounds having fibrinolytic, platelet stickiness decreasing and antiulcer properties of formula (4). ##STR5##
Malen, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 3,840,548 discloses thiazolylbenzoic acid compounds having thrombolytic properties of formula (5). ##STR6##
Rynbrandt, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,168,315 discloses dianisyl thiazole compounds having reduced platelet adhesiveness and inhibition of platelet aggregation properties of formula (6). ##STR7##
Yoshino, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,659,726 discloses 4,5-bis(4-methoxyphenyl)-2-(pyrrol-2-yl)thiazoles having platelet aggregation inhibiting properties of formula (7). ##STR8##
Lutomski, et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,791,124 discloses oxazole and thiazole compounds having insecticidal properties of formula (8). ##STR9## | {
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PCT International Application Publication Nos. WO 2014/083318 and WO 2013/175197 disclose a camera lens optical image stabilization (OIS) suspension system that has a moving assembly (to which a camera lens element can be mounted) supported by a flexure element or spring plate on a stationary support assembly. The moving assembly is supported for movement on the support assembly by plural balls. The flexure element, which is formed from metal such as phosphor bronze, has a moving plate and flexures. The flexures extend between the moving plate and the stationary support assembly and function as springs to enable the movement of the moving assembly with respect to the stationary support assembly. The balls allow the moving assembly to move with little resistance. The moving assembly and support assembly are coupled by shape memory alloy (SMA) wires extending between the assemblies. Each of the SMA wires has one end attached to the support assembly, and an opposite end attached to the moving assembly. The suspension is actuated by applying electrical drive signals to the SMA wires. The above-identified PCT publications are incorporated herein by reference for all purposes.
There remains a continuing need for improved lens suspensions. Suspension structures of these types that are highly functional, robust and efficient to manufacture would be particularly desirable. | {
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Osteoclasts are terminally differentiated cells which play a key role in bone resorption. Due to the low number of mammalian osteoclasts and the difficulty to isolate them from bone tissue, and from other cells, their characterization has been limited primarily to immunohistochemistry or anatomical and physiological measurements on single cells.
Several attempts have been made, with limited success, to identify, isolate and establish in culture, cells capable of differentiating into osteoclasts from either bone marrow (Billecocq et al., 1990 Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci. USA 87:6470-6474; Prallet et al., 1992, J. Bone Min. Res. 7:405-414; and Chambers et al., 1993, Proc. Nat. Acad. Sci. USA 90:5578-5582) or leukemic and promyelocytic cell lines (Yoneda et al., 1991, Endocrinology 129:683-689; Gattei et al., 1992 J. Cell Biol. 116:437-447). Recently, cells obtained from human giant cell tumors of bone were reported to form osteoclasts in culture (Grano et al., 1994 J. Bone Min. Res. 9:1013-1020; Grano, et al., 1994 Exp. Cell Res. 212:209-218).
To obtain enriched osteoclast preparations, Akatsu et al., 1992, J. Bone Miner. Res. 7:1297-1306; cultured the osteoblastic and bone marrow cells on collagen gel-coated dishes, and released the cells from the collagen matrix using collagenase. However, the yield of osteoclastic cells was quite low. Recently, Shioi et al., 1994, Calcif. Tissue Int. 55:387-394; using a similar co-culture system reported the enrichment of generated osteoclasts by treating the cultured cells with bacterial collagenase to remove the stromal supporting cells. By this procedure they obtained 60% pure tartrate resistant acid phosphate positive (TRAP.sup.+) cells, however the osteoclasts were not available except as attached cells to either dishes or bone slices.
Oursler et al., 1991, J. Bone Min. Res. 6:375-385 cultured avian osteoclasts and further purified the osteoclasts by density gradient centrifugation. This method yielded an enriched population of TRAP.sup.+ cells capable of bone resorption.
To date, however, the only mammalian osteoclasts obtained in high yields (300,000 per rabbit) and purity (98%) are rabbit osteoclasts (Tezuka et al., 1992, Biochem. Biophys. Res. Comm. 186: 911-917). These cells, however were attached to the plastic culture dishes and cannot be removed. | {
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Security systems are generally known. Such systems are typically used to protect secured areas from threats. Threats may include intruders that represent a threat to authorized persons within the secured area or environmental threats, such as fire or smoke.
Access to the secured areas is usually prevented via the use of a fence of walls that surround the secured area. One or more doors may be provided for access by authorized persons.
A centrally located control panel may be provided that monitors the secured area. One or more sensors and/or cameras may detect intruders or environmental threats within the secured area. The sensors may include limit switches on the doors to detect intruders entering the secured area. Card readers may be provided on the doors to detect entry by authorized persons.
While such systems work well, they are often difficult to set up and administer. In the case of large installations, the number of doors and sensors may number in the hundreds. Because of the large number of doors and sensors, such systems are difficult to configure. Accordingly, a need exits for expedited ways of setting up such security systems. | {
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In LTE, the user entity can be in three states: DETACHED, ECM-IDLE and ECM-CONNECTED. In ECM-IDLE state the position of the user entity is known to be within a so called traffic area corresponding to a plurality of cells. In ECM-CONNECTED state the position of the user entity is known to be within a given cell of an eNodeB in a given traffic area.
FIG. 1 shows key nodes of the evolved packet core (EPC) system. There is shown a packet data network (PDN) gateway node PGW, a serving gateway node, SGW, a mobility management entity, MME, a base station, eNodeB, and a user entity UE. The S11 interface between the MME and the SGW is shown. Moreover, the S5/S8 interface between PGW and SGW, the S1-U interface between SGW and eNodeB; and the S1-MME interface between the MME and eNodeB are shown. Key functionalities in the system involves control plane tunnels GTP-C between the PGW, the SGW and the MME and user plane tunnels between the PGW, SGW and the eNodeB. Payload data is transmitted via the user plane tunnel for a given user entity and control information for the user entity is transmitted via the control plane tunnels. There is moreover a S4 interface leading to a S4 interface capable SGSN.
ECM states are described in TS 23.401, section 4.6.3, which specifies that the UE and the MME shall enter the ECM-CONNECTED state when the signalling connection is established between the UE and the MME. Initial NAS messages that initiate a transition from ECM-IDLE to ECM-CONNECTED state are Attach Request and Service Request.
When the UE is in ECM-IDLE state, the UE and the network may be unsynchronized, i.e. the UE and the network may have different sets of established EPS bearers. When the UE and the MME enter the ECM-CONNECTED state, the set of EPS Bearers is synchronized between the UE and network. For a UE in the ECM-CONNECTED state, there exists a signalling connection between the UE and the MME. The signalling connection is made up of two parts: an RRC connection and an S1-MME connection.
The UE shall enter the ECM-IDLE state when its signalling connection to the MME has been released or broken. This release or failure is explicitly indicated by the eNodeB to the UE or detected by the UE. The S1 release procedure changes the state at both UE and MME from ECM-CONNECTED to ECM-IDLE. The SGW is always aware of the ECM state.
In ECM-CONNECTED, there is: One GTP-C tunnel (per UE) on S11 One GTP-C tunnel per PDN connection on S5/S8 One GTP-U tunnel per bearer on S5/S8 One GTP-U tunnel per bearer on S1-U
In ECM-IDLE there is: One GTP-C tunnel (per UE) on S11 One GTP-C tunnel per PDN connection on S5/S8 One GTP-U tunnel per bearer on S5/S8 No GTP-U tunnel(s) on S1-U. In FIG. 1, this tunnel is marked with dashed lines.
3GPP TS 23.401 describes procedures for a UE to attach to the network. Section 5.3.2.1 E-UTRAN Initial Attach Section 5.3.2.2 UTRAN/GERAN Initial Attach Section 5.5.1.2 S1-based handover (with SGW change) Section 5.5.2 Inter RAT handover (several cases) Section 5.10.2 UE requested PDN connectivity
All these scenarios are based on the same message sequence initiated by the MME: The MME first sends a Create Session Request message 102 to the SGW, then a Modify Bearer Request 107, as shown in the message sequence in FIG. 2.
For the Initial Attach procedure, the Create Session Request message 102 and the subsequent create session response message 115 are used for setting up a control-plane tunnel GTP-C on S11/S4 between the MME and the SGW, a control plane tunnel GTP-C on S5/S8 between the SGW and the PGW, and one user plane tunnel GTP-U on S5/S8 (between the SGW and the PGW).
The Modify Bearer Request message 107 and the subsequent Modify Bearer Response message 123 are then used for putting the UE in state ECM-CONNECTED, whereby a user plane GTP-U tunnel is set up between the SGN and the eNodeB. The message contains the S1-U eNodeB F-TEID that the SGW needs to forward downlink data to the eNodeB.
3GPP TS 23.401 version 9.3.0 deals among others with the so-called attach procedure which is shown in section 5.3.2 and most notably in FIG. 5.3.2.1-1. Key elements of this procedure, namely the create session request message 102, create session response 115, the modify bearer request message 107, the modify bearer response 123 and the ECM connected state 110 are shown in FIG. 2 of the present document.
The standard says nothing about the ECM state in the time between Create Session Request and Modify Bearer Request. Moreover, the standard gives no information on how the network nodes should handle the case in which the Modify Bearer Request never reaches the SGW.
One problem is that if no modify bearer request is received from the mobility management entity, resources are bound in the packet gateway node unnecessarily
One way of dealing with this problem as envisioned by the inventors could be as follows: If no Modify Bearer Request is received, there will be a “hanging” PDN connection in SGW and PGW. Next time the same UE attempts to attach, the MME will (probably) use the same EPS Bearer ID for the default bearer. When the SGW/PGW receives a new Create Session Request it checks (by IMSI) if it already has a PDN connection for that UE. The SGW/PGW checks if the EPS Bearer ID in the Create Session Request is already in use. If it is already in use, the node deletes the existing PDN connection locally (without signalling to other nodes) and handles the new Create Session Request message as usual.
A technical problem with such a solution is that the serving gateway node may still be prone to take up resources unnecessarily for the user entity connection. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Modern software programs include many instructions that are executed multiple times each time the program is executed. Typically, large programs have logical “region” of instructions, each of which may be executed many times. When a region is one that is executed more than once, and the results produced by the region are the same for more than one execution, the region is a candidate for “computation reuse.” The term “computation reuse” refers to the reusing of results from a previous execution of the region.
For example, a reuse region could be a region of software instructions that, when executed, read a first set of registers and modify a second set of registers. The identity of the first set of registers and the data values in the first set of registers are the “live-in states” to the reuse region, and the identity of the second set of registers and the data values deposited into the second set of registers are the “live-out states” of the reuse region. A hardware buffer holding live-in states and live-out states can be maintained for the region. Each entry in the buffer is termed a “reuse instance.” When the region is encountered during execution of the program, the buffer is consulted and if an instance with matching live-in states is found, the results, namely, data in the live-out states, can be used without having to execute the software instructions in the reuse region. When reusing the results is faster than executing the software instructions in the region, performance improves.
The identification of regions that are candidates for reuse has been the subject of much study. One mechanism for identifying candidate regions is discussed in: Daniel Connors & Wen-mei Hwu, “Compiler-Directed Dynamic Computation Reuse: Rationale and Initial Results,” Proceedings of the 32nd Annual International Symposium on Microarchitecture (MICRO), November 1999. Connors and Hwu use a compiler to identify candidate regions for computation reuse rather than identifying candidate reuse regions in already-compiled programs.
Another mechanism for identifying computation reuse potential involves using special purpose hardware during program execution to dynamically compare individual instruction instances with previously executed instruction instances. Such an approach is discussed in: Avinash Sodani and Gurindar S. Sohi, “Understanding the Differences Between Value Prediction and Instruction Reuse,” 31th International Symposium on Microarchitecture (MICRO-31), November-December 1998. This approach can operate on already-compiled programs, but is limited to the identification of individual instructions as candidates for computation reuse.
For the reasons stated above, and for other reasons stated below which will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon reading and understanding the present specification, there is a need in the art for an alternate method and apparatus for the identification of instructions and code regions that are candidates for computation reuse. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The rapid development of commercial image search engines allows users to easily retrieve a large number of images, simply by typing in a text query usually on a search engine. However, a problem with the existing search engines is the search results only use a relevance of surrounding text information of images associated with the text query. The existing search engines do not use image visual information in providing search results. As a result, there are ongoing efforts to improve image search results by leveraging the image content, which includes useful image visual information.
The growth of digital image content has made it more of a challenge to browse through the large amount of search results. To help with retrieving images, techniques have been tried for image search results refinement. Two conventional techniques commonly employed to assist with results refinement are content based reranking and IntentSearch.
Content based reranking may rely on image clustering and categorization to provide a high-level description of a set of images. While content based reranking uses visual information to reorder the search results, it does not take into consideration the intent of the user. On the other hand, IntentSearch provides an interface to allow users to indicate a few images of interests, and automatically attempts to guess the intent of the user to reorder image search results. However, guessing the intent of the user is somewhat difficult based on selected images. Thus, these conventional approaches do not really address the intent of the user for the images along with using image visual information.
Therefore, it is desirable to find ways to refine image search results through user interactions with the image visual information. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Technical Field
Embodiments of the present disclosure relates to wireless communication methods, and more particularly, to a wireless network probe system and method.
2. Description of Related Art
Stations are basic devices in wireless networks. An access point (AP) can let the stations access a wireless network to which the AP is directly connected. A service set identifier (SSID), which is often broadcast by APs connected to the wireless network, shows the name of the wireless network. It is necessary for a station to know the SSID in order to connect to the wireless network. If the wireless network closes its SSID, that is, data packets broadcast by the AP hide the SSID of the wireless network, the stations that do not know the SSID cannot be connected to the wireless network.
What is needed, therefore, is an improved method to overcome the aforementioned problem. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Many cytoplasmic plant proteins involved in plant resistance to pathogens, generally referred to as “R” proteins, possess both a nucleotide binding site (NBS) and a leucine rich repeat (LRR). R proteins are involved in both a rapid defense response (hypersensitive response) and more long-term nonspecific resistance (systemic acquired resistance). The hypersensitive response involves a form of programmed death localized to the site of infection and changes in gene expression that are thought to prevent further infection. The LRR of the R proteins is believed to recognize and bind to pathogen-derived proteins, triggering the defensive responses and resulting in a rapid and localized host cell death. Many R proteins have an amino terminal effector domain (e.g., a TIR domain or a leucine zipper domain) that is thought to play a role in downstream signaling of events triggered by infection and, possibly, other stresses.
The R proteins are structurally similar to APAF-1, a protein which mediates between Bcl-2, a negative regulator of apoptosis, and caspases, the proteases directly responsible for the degradation of cellular proteins that leads to the morphological changes seen in cells undergoing apoptosis. A domain, designated the NB-ARC domain (“nucleotide-binding adaptor shared by APAF-1, certain R gene products and CED-4”), contains a series of motifs and residues that are conserved among plant resistance proteins (e.g., R proteins) and regulators of cell death (e.g., APAF-1 and CED-4) (van der Bizen and Jones (1999) Current Biology 8:226-228). In addition to the NBS, APAF-1 has a CARD domain, functionally analogous to the effector domain of R proteins, and a WD-40 domain, functionally analogous to the LRR domain of R proteins.
The mechanisms that mediate apoptosis have been intensively studied. These mechanisms involve the activation of endogenous proteases, loss of mitochondrial function, and structural changes such as disruption of the cytoskeleton, cell shrinkage, membrane blebbing, and nuclear condensation due to degradation of DNA.
The various signals that trigger apoptosis are thought to bring about these events by converging on a common cell death pathway, the core components of which are highly conserved from worms, such as C. elegans, to humans. In fact, invertebrate model systems have been invaluable tools in identifying and characterizing the genes that control apoptosis. Despite this conservation of certain core components, apoptotic signaling in mammals is much more complex than in invertebrates. For example, in mammals there are multiple homologues of the core components in the cell death signaling pathway.
Caspases, a class of proteins central to the apoptotic program, are responsible for the degradation of cellular proteins that leads to the morphological changes seen in cells undergoing apoptosis. Caspases (cysteinyl aspartate-specific proteinases) are cysteine proteases having specificity for aspartate at the substrate cleavage site. Generally, caspases are classified as either initiator caspases or effector caspases, both of which are zymogens that are activated by proteolysis that generates an active species. An effector caspase is activated by an initiator caspase which cleaves the effector caspase. Initiator caspases are activated by an autoproteolytic mechanism that is often dependent upon oligomerization directed by association of the caspase with an adapter molecule.
Apoptotic signaling is dependent on protein-protein interactions. At least three different protein-protein interaction domains, the death domain, the death effector domain and the caspase recruitment domain (CARD), have been identified within proteins involved in apoptosis. A fourth protein-protein interaction domain, the death recruiting domain (DRD) was recently identified in murine FLASH (Imai et al. (1999) Nature 398:777-85).
Caspases comprise a multi-gene family having at least 12 distinct family members (Nicholson (1999) Cell Death and Differentiation 6:1028). A relatively small fraction of cellular polypeptides (less than 200) are thought to serve as targets for cleavage by caspases. Because many of these caspase targets perform key cellular functions, their proteolysis is thought to account for the cellular and morphological events that occur during apoptosis. Members of the caspase gene family can be divided by phylogenetic analysis into two major subfamilies, based upon their relatedness to ICE (interleukin-1β converting enzyme; caspase-1) and CED-3. Alternate groupings of caspases can be made based upon their substrate specificities.
Many caspases and proteins that interact with caspases possess a CARD domain. Hofmann et al. ((1997) TIBS 22:155) and others have postulated that certain apoptotic proteins bind to each other via their CARD domains and that different subtypes of CARD domains may confer binding specificity, regulating the activity of various caspases, for example.
CARD-4 is a member of the CED-4/Apaf-1 family that interacts with RICK, a serine threonine kinase, and induces NF-κB via the signaling protein TRAF-6 and NIK (Bertin et al. (1999) J. Biol. Chem. 274:12955). CARD-4 includes domains that are similar to the nucleotide binding site domain (NBS) and leucine rich repeat (LRR) domains found in plant R proteins that mediate resistance to pathogens. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to the bending of glass sheets, and in particular, to a pickup and shuttle system to transfer hot glass sheets directly from within a furnace to a shaping station with minimal conveyor roll marking.
2A. Technical Consideration
Shaped and tempered glass sheets are widely used as side or rear windows in vehicles, such as automobiles and the like. To be suitable for such applications, flat glass sheets must be shaped to precisely defined curvatures dictated by the shape and outline of the frames defining the window opening. It is also important that the windows meet strident optical requirements and that the windows be free of optical defects that would tend to interfere with the clear viewing therathrough.
During fabrication, glass sheets intended for use as shaped windows in vehicle are subject to thermal treatment, to temper the glass for strengthening and increase the resistance of the shaped window to damage resulting from impact. In addition to increasing the resistance of the glass sheets to breakage, tempering also causes the glass sheet to fracture in relatively small, smooth surfaced fragments that are less injurious than the relatively large jagged fragments that result from the breakage of untempered glass.
The commercial production of shaped glass sheets for such purposes commonly includes conveying a flat glass sheet along a substantially horizontal path that extends through a tunnel-type furnace to heat the sheet to its heat softening temperature, shaping the heated glass to a desired curvature, and cooling the bent sheets in a controlled manner to a temperature below the annealing range of the glass. In prior art apparatuses, the glass sheet is lifted off a conveying surface either by bottom segmented press surfaces situated between conveying rolls, by vertically reciprocating lifting fingers, by suction from a vacuum drawing arrangement, for example, an upper mold or a vacuum pickup, or some combination of these. The glass sheet is then either pressed directly against the complementing upper mold surface, dropped onto a forming ring to shape the sheet by gravity, or transferred to a shaping station where it is deposited between mold surfaces and pressed to shape.
In these arrangements, a common problem is the marking of the heat softened glass sheet due to the glass sheet slowing or stopping on the conveying rolls prior to it being lifted off the conveying rolls so as to ensure proper alignment between the glass and the lower mold or lifting ring or vacuum pickup. The resulting optical defects which may occur are commonly referred to as roll burn, which affects those portions of the glass sheet that are in extended contact with the hot conveying rolls, and roll ripple, wherein those portions between adjacent conveying rolls begin to sag prior to the shaping operation. In addition, if the glass sheet is engaged while still moving downstream, scuffing of the glass sheet surface may occur due to the engagement of the moving glass sheet with a stationery lifting and/or forming apparatus.
It would be advantageous to develop a system whereby heat softened glass sheets may be transferred directly from the furnace to a shaping station without stopping the glass sheet so as to reduce marking.
2B. Patents of Interest
U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,282,026; 4,361,432; 4,437,871; and 4,437,872 to McMaster et al. and 4,227,908; 4,229,199; 4,229,200; 4,233,049; and 4,280,828 to Seymour each teach a drop forming apparatus wherein a hot glass sheet is engaged by stationary upper vacuum pickup positioned above the conveying means and subsequently deposited onto a contoured shaping ring. The force generated by the impact of the glass sheet on the ring provides the bending force required to shape the sheet and conform it to the contours of the ring. The pickup may reciprocate vertically to engage the glass sheet or auxiliary lifters may be positioned between conveying rolls and beneath the hot glass sheet to lift the glass sheet for engagement with a vacuum pickup. Auxiliary shapers may be used to impart additional contours in the glass sheet. The ring subsequently shuttles from its pickup transfer station to a quench unit that rapidly cools the shaped glass. Throughout the operation, the vacuum pickup remains horizontally stationary within the furnace and the glass is transferred directly to a ring mold.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,607,187 to McMaster teaches a sheet shaping method and apparatus wherein flat glass sheets are removed from a conveyor by an upper vacuum mold. The mold draws the glass sheet thereagainst to shape it. The mold thereafter moves down stream to a cooling station where it deposit the sheet on a conveyor for movement through the cooling station.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,221,580; 4,285,715; and 4,433,993 to Frank and 4,430,110 to Frank et al. teach a horizontal press bending operation wherein heated glass sheets enter a shaping station and are lifted off the run-in conveyor rolls by a slotted lower mold. The glass sheet is pressed between the slotted lower mold and a shaped upper vacuum mold. After pressing, the lower mold is retracted to a position beneath the run-in rolls. A shuttling tempering ring is positioned below the vacuum mold and the vacuum is released so that the shaped glass sheet is deposited onto the tempering ring. The ring subsequently transfers the shaped glass sheet to a quenching station for tempering. The upper vacuum mold can reciprocate vertically but is horizontally stationary.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,297,118 to Kellar et al. teaches a shuttling, deformable vacuum mold that engages a heated glass sheet within a heating furnace. While still in the furnace, the mold deposits the shaped glass sheet on a shuttling tempering ring that is positioned beneath the mold. After depositing the glass sheet, the vacuum mold moves to a position outside of the furnace to cool prior to reentering the furnace to engage the next glass sheet. A tempering ring transfers the glass sheet from the furnace to a quenching station to temper the glass.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,517,001 to McMaster teaches the use of a travelling vacuum holder with a downwardly facing engaging surface to lift a heated glass sheet and transfer the glass sheet onto a carrier ring mold which moves into the heating furnace. The heated glass sheet is bent under the force of gravity on the mold as it is dropped thereon. The movement of the holder may be coordinated with the movement of the glass sheet so that there is no relative movement between the holder and glass sheet as the glass sheet is received by the holder. The bent glass sheet is subsequently removed from the furnace to a quench unit to temper the bent glass sheet.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,364,766 to Nitschke teaches a control system for monitoring and controlling pairs of hot glass sheets as they are conveyed through a heating, bending and tempering operation. The glass is conveyed through a heating furnace. As the glass pairs approach an overhead vacuum pickup in the furnace, a photoelectric sensor provides a glass sensing signal to a host computer that controls the rotational velocity of different sets of furnace conveyor rolls. By controlling the roll speeds, the distance between adjacent sheets of glass pairs can be established for engagement with the vacuum pickup.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,666,492 and 4,662,925 to Thimons et al. U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,666,493 to Frank et al. and 4,666,496 to Fecik et al. teach a horizontal press bending arrangement wherein heat softened glass sheets are engaged by a vacuum pickup within a heating furnace and transferred betwaen a pair of vertically aligned horizontally stationary upper and lower pressing molds. The glass sheet may be deposited onto an alignment device which positions the glass sheet between the upper and lower molds prior to the upper and lower molds sandwiching the glass sheet therebetween to shape it. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Heat treatment devices have been used to form diffusion layers or form silicon oxide or nitride films on semiconductor or glass substrates in the manufacture of electronic devices. These substrates are typically thin wafers made of silicon or other semiconductor materials. The description of the device hereinafter will be provided in reference to wafer substrates, it being understood that the apparatus is equally suitable for treating any thin glass or semiconductor sheets, and treatment of any or all of these materials are considered to be within the scope of this invention.
These devices provide the desired heat treatment by heating the wafers in a reactor or heating chamber while introducing inert or reactive gases into the chamber. These heating chambers are surrounded by heating elements enclosed within an insulated shell. In order to treat large numbers of wafers in a single heat treatment operation, it is conventional to support the wafers, one above the other in a parallel orientation, in a wafer boat. This combination is referred to hereinafter as a wafer stack.
Vertical furnaces generally have the furnace and coaxial wafer boat aligned along a vertical axis. The wafer boat loaded with wafers to be treated is raised into the furnace through a bottom opening before the treatment cycle and lowered from the furnace after treatment. A preferred vertical furnace designed to reduce particulate contaminants by eliminating gas eddy areas in the reaction chamber is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,320,680.
Commonly assigned, copending applications Ser. No. 08/565,177, filed Nov. 11, 1995, and Ser. No. 08/563,875, filed Nov. 28, 1995, describe wafer boat structures which protect wafers during rapid heating and cooling cycles and which are particularly effective with the furnace of this invention.
The prior art furnaces are limited by the ability of their heating systems to rapidly raise and lower furnace temperatures. Japanese patent application publication Hei 4-184923, to Nishimura et al. (Jul. 1, 1992), describes a heat treatment apparatus designed to reduce the heating time. The heating and cooling cycle times for the Nishimura et al. system are limited by the provision of additional heat sink materials to support the wafers, since they increase the power requirements and times for the heating and cooling phases. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The transfer of hydrocarbons from subsea wells to a collection point on the sea surface has been accomplished in a variety of different ways. For large deposits of hydrocarbons expensive subsea towers or floating platforms have been used. For smaller deposits whose production does not justify the expense of a subsea tower or floating platform, a surface collection vessel has been used. The surface collection vessel is specially moored to remain at a relatively constant location over the subsea wells. However because of waves, currents and wind, the surface collection vessel will rotate or weathervane around the surface terminus of the production risers. With such rotating or weathervaning motion of the surface collection vessel, it is often difficult to install a reliable system which can accommodate the rotation of the surface collection vessel and still maintain a fluid flow connection with the production risers extending from the subsea wells to the sea surface.
Various complex systems have been proposed to maintain fluid flow connections between a weathervaning vessel and the surface terminus of production risers. Such systems are described in U.K. Patent 2,270,132 and in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,915,416 and 5,113,778; however, because of the reliability and complexity of those prior art systems, none of these systems has been widely adopted by the industry.
There remains, therefore, a need in the art to provide a simple, reliable system which will allow rotation or weathervaning of the surface collection vessel with respect to the surface terminus of production risers. Such system should not put undue stress on the production risers or create the possibility of leakage of the hydrocarbons as they flow from the production riser into temporary storage on board the surface collection vessel. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Large binary programs (e.g., applications or shared libraries written in C++) often have many functions or read-only data members that are identical. Although the size of a binary program may be reduced by merging these identical functions or read-only data members into a single copy, this optimization could be risky because it may cause the binary program to behave incorrectly if the merged functions or read-only data members are involved in certain address-related operations (e.g., address-based comparison) during the execution of the binary program. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to mechanical structures for mounting a mcirowave device such as a diode in a microstrip line circuit.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The generation of high power microwave output signals by microwave devices such as diodes requires adequate dissipation of heat generated by such devices at, for instance, the diode junction. Thus, in order to increase the power handling capability of a diode, the diode is mounted in intimate thermal contact with a heat sink. Adequate dissipation of heat, achieved as indicated above by "heat sinking," is especially important in those applications where the diode is in high power, long pulse and high duty cycle operation.
A generally applied technique for heat dissipation consists of "flip-chip" bonding, in which one surface of a diode is brought in contact with a heat sink through a process known as "thermal compression." While such a technique is effective for diodes having very small diameters, surface finishing (smoothing) techniques for larger areas (500 micrometers) are generally so inadequate as to result in poor thermal contact, which consequently renders flip-chip bonding inadequate for larger (500 micrometers) diameter diodes such as power diodes. Such large diameter diodes utilize an integral copper heat spreader which is created by electroplating a heavy copper layer to a given surface of the diode. The electroplated diode side may typically serve also as an electrical terminal. A detailed description of the formation of the integral heat spreaders may be found in an RCA Laboratories Report PRRL-72-CR-37 entitled "S-Band avalanche Diode Amplifiers," by H. Kawamoto, H. J. Prager, et al. published July 31, 1972.
Microwave stripline (microstrip) circuits are typically constructed from commercially available laminates consisting of a sheet of insulation initially provided on both sides with layers of a suitable conductive material such as copper. Portions of one of the conductive layers are removed, suitably by etching, to form a stripline conductor. The second conductive layer, on the other side of the sheet of insulation, is suitably left intact and forms the ground plane (second conductor) of the microstrip circuit. The microstrip circuit is typically mounted on a metallic, conductive base or chassis, with the ground plane of the circuit in contiguous contact with the conductive base.
The use of integral heat spreaders, and the finite life of diodes require that the diodes by removably connected in the microstrip circuit. Typically, the diode is mounted in a conductive package fabricated separately from the conductive base, prior to insertion of the diode into the microstrip circuit, and the package subsequently mounted in the base. The diode is then electrically connected to the strip line circuit. The package is suitably formed of a material having good thermal and electrical conductivity such as copper. Generally, such mounting is achieved by machining in the base a recess of a given shape, typically a pyramid of two rectilinear parallelpipeds, diminishing in size, such that the smaller one is exposed to the ground plane of the microstrip circuit. An aperture in the microstrip circuit is made in alignment with the opening in the base facing the recess. The diode and integral heat spreader are mounted, suitably by soldering, on the package of conductive material, which serves, in conjunction with the base, as a heat sink. The package is of such a shape as to fit in, mate with, and extend through the recess in the baseplate. The diode is admitted through the aperture in the circuit board and is electrically connected to the microstrip line by a metallic, suitably gold, foil. Electrical connection between the diode and the ground plane is established by the contact of the package with the base.
The package may be flanged and fastened to the base by screws passing through the flange and into the base. Electrical and thermal contact between the base and package is enhanced by torqueing the screws, thereby creating a force on the package in a vertical direction. The horizontal surfaces of the package are thus pressed against the respectively adjacent surface portions of the base.
The above described mounting structures are generally unsatisfactory in that machine tolerances generally do not provide reliable mating of the package to the base, and, consequently gaps occur between the vertical sidewalls of the package an the base. Such gaps, at microwave frequencies often form resonant cavities and create parasitic capacitance and inductance, having the effect of detuning the circuit. The RF power output, DC to RF efficiency, and bandwidth of the circuit are thus adversely affected.
The present invention overcomes the disadvantages of the prior art by providing a microwave diode package and mounting structure which serves to provide reliable mating of the package to the recess whereby electrical and intimate thermal contact is established between the package and the base, substantially eliminating gaps, between adjacent vertical surfaces. Thus parasitic capacitance and inductance are substantially reduced, causing a substantial increase in bandwidth, and RF power output of the circuit. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to improvements in investment casting and in particular to new and improved alumina cores for employment therewith.
2. Description of the Prior Art
The production of directionally solidified (DS) metal eutectic alloys and superalloys for high pressure turbine (HPT) airfoils with intricate internal passageways for air cooling requires that the core and mold not only be dimensionally stable and sufficiently strong to contain and shape the casting but also be sufficiently weak to prevent mechanical rupture (hot cracking) of the casting during solidification and cooling. The DS process requirements of up to 1875.degree. C. for a 16 hour time period imposes severe constraints on materials which may serve as mold or core candidates.
The prior art appears to be mostly limited to the use of silica or silica-zircon core and mold materials. At temperatures greater than 1600.degree. C. the silica based materials fail from the standpoint of both mechanical integrity and chemical incompatibility with the advanced alloy compositions.
Dimensional control of the silica core is excellent since cristobalite exhibits very little densification. Microstructural examination reveals that, in some cases, commercial core compositions employ very large particles (>100 .mu.m). The addition of large particles serves to lower both shrinkage and mechanical strength.
Paul S. Svec in "Process for Making an Investment Mold for Casting and Solidification of Superalloys Therein", Ser. No. 590,970, now U.S. Pat. No. 4,024,300 teaches the use of alumina-silica compositions for making molds and cores. Charles C. Greskovich and Michael F. X. Gigliotti, Jr. in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,955,616 and 3,972,367 teach cores and molds of alumina-silica compositions which have a barrier layer of alumina formed at the mold/metal interface. One possible means for the formation of their alumina layer is by a chemical reaction wherein carbon of the susceptor chemically reduces the material composition of the mold or core. Charles D. Greskovich in U.S. Pat. No. 4,026,344 also teaches an alumina-silica composition wherein the material is of a predetermined size so as to favor, and therefore enable, the formation of metastable mullite for molds and cores which exhibit superior sag resistance at high temperature.
Aluminum oxide by itself, without a chemical or physical binder material, has been identified as a potential core and mold material based on both chemical compatibility and leachability considerations. There is, however, a considerable thermal expansion mismatch between the ceramic and the alloy which generates, around the ceramic core, hoop and longitudinal tensile stresses in the alloy on cooling from the DS temperature. The high elastic modulus and high resistance to deformation at elevated temperatures of dense alumina and its lower coefficient of thermal expansion than the alloy result in the mechanical rupture or hot tearing of the alloy.
A mechanism by which an alumina core body can deform under the stress induced by the cooling alloy has been developed to permit the production of sound castings. The microstructure of the ceramic core and mold as been tailored to permit deformation under isostatic compression at a stress low enough to prevent hot tearing or cracking of the alloy. The surface of the core and mold also serves as a barrier to metal penetration. The core has a central portion having continuous porosity therein and good crushability characteristics. A barrier layer having discontinuous porosity encompasses, and is integral with, the central portion of the core. The core is easily removed from the casting with minimum effort and little effect on the quality of the cast metal by autoclave aqueous caustic solution.
However, it has been discovered in cores having a complex geometry that the dimensional tolerances desired are difficult to attain. In fact, nonuniform shrinkage often occurs which results in minor but unacceptable distortions. The distortion results from the oxidation of carbon, a fugitive filler material, from the core in a nonuniform fashion. Regions of a core with a high surface area-to-volume ratio lose more carbon than regions with a low surface area-to-volume ratio. Greater densification occurs in the carbon depleted regions, thus giving rise to the differential shrinkage that causes distortion of the core.
The object of this invention is to provide a new and improved ceramic article, suitable for use as a core for casting directionally solidified eutectic superalloy material, and having superior porosity and crushability than prior art cores.
Another object of this invention is to provide a new and improved ceramic article, suitable for use as a core for directionally solidified eutectic and superalloy materials, wherein the ceramic article consists of a dense porous barrier layer of alumina, having a density gradient therein, which is integral with, and encompasses a core or central portion of porous alumina material having a continuous porosity therein.
Other objects of this invention will, in part, be obvious, and will, in part, appear hereinafter. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Children can play in various ways with toy vehicles. However, there is a need for a new way to play with toy vehicles. There are several factors that children want to have in their play, namely, challenges, novelty and variety, customization and identity, and social play. In addition, children have a desire to have complexity introduced into their play. One type of complexity is in collecting items.
It is desirable to provide a toy vehicle that can be identified by an electronic system. It is desirable to provide an experience for users in which each user can collect and interact with toy vehicles as part of the user experience. It is also desirable to create an online environment in which collecting items is an integral part of the play. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The present invention refers to a method for thermally coating the cylinder barrels of a cylinder block of a combustion engine as well as to an apparatus for thermally coating the cylinder barrels of a cylinder block of a combustion engine.
In manufacturing combustion engines, nowadays, more and more cylinder blocks made of a light-alloy material are used. In the past, cylinder sleeves made of cast iron have been inserted into those light alloy cylinder blocks for providing an adequate cylinder barrel for the pistons. However, recently, it becomes more and more usual to provide the cylinder barrels of light alloy cylinder blocks with an iron-containing coating material. For applying such a coating material, usually and preferably, rotary plasma guns are used.
Generally, problems may arise in the course of plasma spray coating of a substrate due to the fact that not all particles molten in the plasma jet reliably adhere to the surface of the substrate. Even if this problem is of no meaning at all in many applications, one has to take care that no loose coating particles are left in the cylinder block once the coating operation has been terminated. Up to know, this problem usually was solved by applying cover members to protect exposed locations of the cylinder block. A disadvantage in using such cover members may be seen in the fact that heat accumulations may occur, leading to a high thermal stress of the cylinder block. Moreover, thereby, undesired particle inclusions in the applied coating layer may be generated because environmental dust and not-molten or already cooled-down particles are entrained by the coating jet, causing the above mentioned undesired inclusions.
1. Prior Art
U.S. Pat. No. 5,573,814 discloses a method of masking one or more extremities of a cylinder bore from internal thermal spraying. For this purpose, an inflatable mask member is provided that is pressed against one end, usually the lower end, of the cylinder bore. The mask member comprises a suction conduit for extracting gases from the cylinder bore.
2. Objects of the Invention
Therefore, it is an object of the invention to provide an easily applicable method for thermally coating the cylinder barrels of a cylinder block of a combustion engine in which the quality of the coating applied to the cylinder barrel can be improved.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide an easily applicable method for thermally coating the cylinder barrels of a cylinder block of a combustion engine in which the cylinder block is protected from contamination during the coating operation.
It is a still further object of the present invention to provide an apparatus for thermally coating the cylinder barrels of a cylinder block of a combustion engine by means of which the method of the invention can be easily and quickly performed.
To meet these and other objects, according to a first aspect, the present invention provides a method for thermally coating the cylinder barrels of a cylinder block of a combustion engine in which a plasma spraying gun having a preferably rotary plasma spraying head is moved into the interior of the cylinder bore of the cylinder whose barrel is to be coated. Before the coating operation is initiated, a flow of air is created through said cylinder bore whose barrel is to be coated. The flow of air has a flow velocity of between 7 m/s and 12 m/s and is maintained during the entire coating operation.
According to a second aspect, the present invention provides an apparatus for thermally coating the cylinder barrels of a cylinder block of a combustion engine. The apparatus comprises a plasma spraying gun having at least one preferably rotary plasma spraying head and a mechanism for moving the plasma spraying head or heads into the interior of the cylinder bore of the cylinder whose barrel is to be coated. An air extraction member has a plurality of extraction collars and a plurality of at least partially flexible conduits for connecting the extraction collars with an extraction fan. Moreover, means are provided for varying the cross section of the conduits.
Surprisingly, using the method and the apparatus of the invention it was found that the quality of the applied coating is improved in different regards and that, simultaneously, the cylinder block is also protected from contamination. In particular, if the air is extracted from the interior of the cylinder bore whose barrel is to be coated with a flow velocity of between 7 m/s and 12 m/s, the coating particles not adhering to the barrel surface are reliably removed and the content of oxygen bound in the applied coating is kept in a region in which both the tribologic properties of the coating and the machining properties thereof are optimized. Moreover, due to the air flowing through the cylinder bores, the cylinder block is kept cooler than usual. Finally, using the method according the invention, the contamination of the plasma gun and its rotary head, respectively, is reduced. | {
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This invention relates to edible sugars. More particularly, it relates to fructose obtained by the isomerization of dextrose. Of specific relevance is a process for the concurrent production of anhydrous crystalline fructose and a syrup consisting essentially of fructose and dextrose.
Also of specific relevance are a process of crystallizing fructose by cooling a solution of fructose such that differing levels of supersaturation are produced during different periods of crystal growth and a process for producing a purified and concentrated fructose syrup.
2. Background of the Invention
LIQUID-PHASE FRUCTOSE PRODUCTS;
Fructose is a monosaccharide highly valued as a nutritive sweetener. The vast majority of fructose sold in this country is derived from corn starch with the principal form of the product being High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS). The syrups of commerce range from 42% to 90% by weight fructose on a dry solids basis, as used hereinafter, including the claims, "dsb" shall mean "by weight on a dry solids basis". The remainder is predominately dextrose. The HFCS commonly used as a sucrose replacement in soft drinks typically comprises 55% fructose, 41% dextrose, and 4% higher saccharides (all percentages dsb) . The solids content of such a syrup is usually about 77% by weight.
On an industrial scale, the production of HFCS commences with the enzymetic liquefaction of a purified starch slurry- The principal source of raw material in the United States is corn starch obtained by the wet milling process. However, starches of comparable purity from other sources can be employed.
In the first step of a typical process a starch slurry is gelatinized by cooking at high temperature. The gelatinized starch is then liquefied and dextrinized by thermostable alpha-amylase in a continuous two-stage reaction. The product of this reaction is a soluble dextrin hydrolysate with a dextrose equivalent (DE) of 6-15, suitable for the subsequent saccharification step.
Following liquefaction-dextrinization, the pH and temperature of the 10-15 DE hydrolysate is adjusted for the saccharification step. During saccharification the hydrolysate is further hydrolyzed to dextrose by the enzymatic action of glucoamylase. Although saccharification can be carried out as a batch reaction, a continuous saccharification is practiced in most modern plants. In the continuous saccharification reaction, glucoamylase is added to a 10-15 DE hydrolysate following pH and temperature adjustment. The carbohydrate composition of typical high-dextrose saccharification liquor is: 94-96% dextrose, 2-3% melrose; 0.3-0.5 maltotriose; and 1-2% higher saccharides (all percentages dsb) . The product will typically be 25 to 37% dry substance. This high-dextrose hydrolysate is then refined to produce dextrose feedstock for the isomerization reaction .
Preparation of very high-quality dextrose feedstock for isomerization is necessary because of the very low color and ash specifications of the finished HFCS. A high-purity feedstock is also required for efficient utilization of the immobilized isomerase enzyme column.
Immobilized isomerase enzyme columns are used continuously over a period of several months. During this period very large volumes of dextrose feedstock pass through the columns. Extremely low levels of impurities such as ash, metal ions, and/or protein in the feedstock can accumulate and lead to decreased productivity of the enzyme. For these reasons dextrose feedstock is refined to a color of 0.1 (CRA.times.100) and a conductivity of 5-10 micromhos.
Carbon-treated, filtered, and deionized, high-dextrose liquor is evaporated to the proper solids level for isomerization. In addition, the feedstock is chemically treated by the addition of magnesium ions, which not only activate the immobilized isomerase, but also competitively inhibit the action of any residual calciums ions, which are potent inhibitors of isomerase.
The isomerization reaction, which converts some of the dextrose to fructose, is commonly carried out on a stream comprising 94-96% (dsb) dextrose and 4-6% (dsb) higher saccharities, at 40-50% dry substance, The stream has a pH of 7.5-8.2 at 25.degree. C. and will be subjected to the action of the isomerase enzyme for 1/2 to 4 hours at 55.degree.-65.degree. C.
The conversion of glucose to fructose is a reversible reaction with an equilibrium constant of about 1.0 at 60.degree. C. Thus, one would expect to obtain a fructose level of about 47-48% at equilibrium, starting from a feedstock continuing 94-96% dextrose. However, the reaction rate of the isomerization near the equilibrium point is so slow that it is prudent to terminate the reaction at a conversion level of about 42% fructose to achieve practical reactor residence times.
In a given isocolumn (immobilized isomerase column), the rate of conversion of dextrose (glucose) to fructose is proportional to the enzyme activity of the immobilized isomerase. This activity decays over time in a nearly exponential fashion. When the column is new and the activity is high, the flow of feedstock through the column is relatively high, since a shorter residence time is required to achieve the 42% fructose level. As the usage life of the column increases, the flow through the column must be reduced proportionately to provide a longer residence time, compensating for the lowered activity in order to achieve a constant conversion level.
In practice, parallel operation of multiple isocolumns is used to minimize production fluctuations with respect to capacity and conversion level. In this arrangement each isocolumn can be operated essentially independently of the others. The variation in total flow of the isocolumns must be maintained within relatively narrow limits because of the requirements of evaporation and other finishing operations In practice, flow cannot be precisely controlled at all times so as to obtain a 42% fructose stream, but this can easily be achieved on an average basis.
One of the most critical operating variables in such a process is the internal isocolumn pH. The operating pH is usually a compromise between the pH of maximum activity (typically around pH 8) and the pH of maximum stability (typically pH 7.0-7.5). This is complicated by the fact that the dextrose feedstock is not pH stable at temperatures around 60.degree. C. Some decomposition occurs producing acidic by-products which results in a pH drop across the isocolumn during operation.
Following isomerization, the typical manufacturing process employs secondary refining or polishing of the 42% HFCS product. Some additional color is picked up du ring the chemical treatment and isomerization when the feedstock is held at a higher pH and temperature for a period of time. The product also contains some additional ash from the chemicals added for isomerization. This color and ash are removed by secondary carbon and ion exchange systems. The refined 42% HFCS is then typically evaporated to 71% solids for shipment.
The use of activated carbon to purify sugar syrups is generally known. U.S. Pat. No. 1,979,781 (van Sherpenberg) discloses mixing a raw sugar syrup (i.e., one not mixed with glucose syrup or with invert sugar syrup) at 60.degree. Brix (60% dry solids) with 1 to 2% by weight activated carbon and heating to 134.degree. C. for a short period of time. U.S. Pat. No. 2,763,580 (Zabor) broadly discloses treatment of sugar liquors (e.g., cane, beet or corn sugars) having solids contents of between 10 and 60%, especially 20 to 56%, by weight at 125 to 200.degree. F. with activated carbon. The patent discloses that partial treatment can be carried out at one concentration or condition, after which the treatment can be completed at a higher concentration (obtained by evaporation) or other condition.
Various patents directed to the production of corn syrups containing fructose incidentally disclose carbon-treatment and subsequent concentration of aqueous solutions having varying fructose concentrations (dsb) and varying levels of dry solids. U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,383,245 (Scallet et al. ) and 3,690,948 (Katz et al.) disclose carbon-treating fructose containing syrups having about 20% (dsb) fructose at about 40% dry solids and subsequently concentrating the syrups (e.g., by evaporation to 70-83% dry solids).
U.S. Pat. No. 3,684,574 (Katz et al.) discloses carbon-treatment of a syrup containing about 20% (dsb) fructose at a dry solids as low as 20% dry solids and subsequent concentration of the syrup. U.S. Pat. No. 4,395,292 (Katz et al.) discloses feeding a carbon-treated mixture of fructose and dextrose having from 10 to 70% dry solids, preferably 40%, to a fractionating column and concentrating the fructose containing extracts. The '292 patent discloses that extracts containing over 90% fructose can be obtained and discloses an example (Example No. 7) wherein a 40% dry solids feed was fractionated to produce a fraction having 100% (dsb) fructose at 9% dry solids.
The HFCS product from the isomerization reaction typically contains 42% fructose, 52% unconverted dextrose, and about 6% oligosaccharides. For reasons previously discussed, this product represents the practical maximum level of fructose attainable by isomerization. In order to obtain products with higher levels of fructose, it necessary to selectively concentrate the fructose. Many common separation techniques are not applicable for this purpose, since they do not readily discriminate between two isomers of essentially the same molecular size. However, fructose preferentially forms a complex with different cations, such as calcium. This difference has been exploited to develop commercial separation processes.
There are basically two different commercial processes currently available for the large-scale purification of fructose. In both instances, resins in the preferred cationic form are used in packed bed systems. One process employs an inorganic resin leading to a selective molecular absorption of fructose (see, R. J. Jensen, "The Sarex Process for the Fractionation of High Fructose Corn Syrup," Abstracts of the Institute of Chemical Engineers, 85th National Meeting, Philadelphia, Pa., 1978).
Chromatographic fractionation using organic resins is the basis for the second commercial separation process (see, K. Venkatasubramanian, "Integration of Large Scale Production and Purification of Biomolecules," Enzyme Engineering, 6:37-43, 1982). When an aqueous solution of dextrose and fructose (e.g. 42% HFCS) is fed to a fractionating column, fructose is retained by the resin to a greater degree than dextrose. Deionized and deoxygenated water is used as the eluent. Typically, the separation is achieved in a column packed with a bed of low crosslinked, fine-mesh, polystyrene sulfonate cation exchange resin using calcium as the preferred salt form. The enriched product which contains approximately 90% fructose is referred to as Very Enriched Fructose Corn Syrup (VEFCS) . This VEFCS fraction can be blended with the 42% HFCS feed material to obtain products having a fructose content between 42% and 90%. The most typical of these products is 55% Enriched Fructose Corn Syrup, which is sometimes referred to as EFCS or 55 EFCS. U.S. Pat. No. 4,395,292 (Katz et al.) discloses an example (Example No. 1 ) of fractionating a mixture of fructose and dextrose into various fractions and combining fructose-enriched fractions to produce a syrup containing 55.8% (dsb) fructose. This same example also discloses single fractions having high concentrations (dsb) of fructose (e.g., 75.1% (dsb)) and discloses combining fractions containing lesser concentrations of fructose (e.g., 64.5% (dsb) with 58.2% (dsb) fructose).
The treatment of other raffinate streams in the fractionation process is an important consideration. In general, the dextrose-rich raffinate stream is recycled to the dextrose feed of the isocolumn system for further conversion to 42% HFCS. A raffinate stream containing dextrose and fructose and having a fructose level higher than that of the feed stream can be recycled through a fractionator to maintain a high solids level and to reduce water usage. A raffinate stream rich in oligosaccharides can be recycled to the saccharification system.
Since water is used as the elution media, it has a great impact on the overall evaporation load on the system. Very low solids concentrations increase the risk of microbial contamination within the system. Thus, the most important design parameter dictating overall process economics is the maximization of solids yield at acceptable purity while minimizing the dilution effect of the eluant rinse. The efficiency of feed and water usage must be maximized for optimal yield. The yield is important to reduce the cost of reisomerization.
Procedures available for achieving these goals include recycling techniques, higher equalization of the resin phase with proper redistribution in a packed column, and the addition of multiple entry and exit points in the column. These approaches can be used to increase the purity and the yield.
In a batch fractionation system, a small apparent increase in the purity of feed to the fractionating column, that is, higher fructose levels, results in a much larger gain in production through increased yield at a given product purity. In practice, this translates into maximization of the ratio of the sugar volume fed per volume of resin per cycle, minimization of the ratio of the water column required per volume of resin per cycle, and careful fluid distribution to the columns. | {
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Over the past three decades interest in the reduction of air pollution, and in the development of domestic energy sources, has triggered research in many countries on the development of non-petroleum fuels for internal combustion engines. For compression ignition (diesel) engines, it has been shown that the simple alcohol esters of fatty acids (biodiesel) are acceptable alternative diesel fuels. Biodiesel has a higher oxygen content than petroleum diesel, and therefore reduces emissions of particulate matter, hydrocarbons, and carbon monoxide, while also reducing sulfur emissions due to a low sulfur content.
For spark ignition (gasoline) engines, ethanol, produced by fermentation of simple sugars generated from corn starch, can be blended with petroleum gasoline to substitute petroleum content with renewable content fuel, reduce dependence on foreign oil, reduce carbon dioxide emissions, and improve octane in the blended fuel. Since both ethanol and biodiesel are made from agricultural materials, which are produced via photosynthetic carbon fixation (e.g., by plants and by animals that consume plants), the combustion of biodiesel and ethanol does not contribute to net atmospheric carbon levels.
Initial efforts at the production, testing, and use of biodiesel employed refined edible vegetable oils (e.g. soybean oil, canola oil), used cooking oils (e.g. spent fryer oils) and animal fats (e.g., beef tallow) as feedstocks for fuel synthesis (Krawczyk, T., INFORM, 7: 800-815 (1996); Peterson, C. L., et al., Applied Engineering in Agriculture, 13: 71-79 (1997); Holmberg, W. C., and J. E. Peeples, Biodiesel: A Technology, Performance, and Regulatory Overview, National Soy Diesel Development Board, Jefferson City, Mo. (1994)).
Simple alkali-catalyzed transesterification technology (Freedman, B., et al., J. Am. Oil Chem. Soc., 61(10): 1638-1643 (1984)) is efficient at esterifying the acylglycerol-linked fatty acids of such feedstocks and is employed in making these fuels. More recently, methods have been developed to produce fatty acid methyl esters (FAME) from cheaper, less highly refined lipid feedstocks such as spent restaurant grease (Mittelbach, M., and P. Tritthart, J. Am. Oil Chem. Soc., 65(7):1185-1187 (1988); Graboski, M. S., et al., The Effect of Biodiesel Composition on Engine Emissions from a DDC Series 60 Diesel Engine, Final Report to USDOE/National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Contract No. ACG-8-17106-02 (2000); Haas, M. J., et al., Enzymatic Approaches to the Production of Biodiesel Fuels, in Kuo, T. M. and Gardner, H. W. (Eds.), Lipid Biotechnology, Marcel Dekker, Inc., New York, (2002), pp. 587-598).
In addition to acylglycerols, less highly refined lipid feedstocks can contain substantial levels of free fatty acids (FFA) and other nonglyceride materials. Biodiesel synthesis from these feedstocks can be accomplished by conventional alkaline catalysis, which then requires an excess of alkali since the FFA (which are not esterified by this method) are converted to their alkali salts. These alkali salts can cause difficulties during product washing due to their ready action as emulsifiers. Ultimately, the alkali salts are removed and discarded. This approach thus involves a loss of potential product, increases catalyst expenses, and can entail a disposal cost.
Further, with higher FFA levels, i.e. typically in excess of 2%, a general approach is to utilize an acid esterification step, since at higher FFA values the extent of soap formation with a single stage, transesterification process is excessive and renders the process uneconomical and potentially unworkable. To handle the higher FFA content, a two step process involving first acid-catalyzed esterification of the free fatty acids and then alkali-catalyzed transesterification of glyceride-linked fatty acids can be employed to achieve conversion of mixed, heterogeneous feedstocks (Canakci, M., and J. Van Gerpen, Biodiesel Production from Oils and Fats with High Free Fatty Acids, Abstracts of the 92.sup.nd American Oil Chemists' Society Annual Meeting & Expo, p. S74 (2001); U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,383,601; 2,494,366; 4,695,411; 4,698,186; 4,164,506). However, these methods can require multiple acid-catalyzed esterification steps to reduce the concentration of free fatty acids to acceptably low levels. In addition, high separation efficiency is required between the two stages to minimize the potential for acid catalyst transfer into the base catalyst section.
The feedstocks used for current biodiesel production are conventional commodity materials, thus they have other established markets which basically set the minimum commodity prices. As a result, the bulk of the biodiesel production cost relates to the feedstock cost. While there are a number of established process technologies in the biodiesel industry, as a result of the feedstock cost being such a high factor (i.e. 75% to 80%) there is a surprisingly small difference between the various processes in overall operational costs (due to this feedstock factor).
The production of ethanol for fuel use is well established and the growth in this industry over the past 2 decades has been significant. Fermentation is an (obviously) old process going back literally thousands of years to early wine and beer making. The basic techniques remain the same, however in the modern ethanol production process highly efficient enzymes and yeasts have been developed to provide for more efficient conversion of the fermentable materials. Further, the process technology associated with fuel grade ethanol production has also advanced over the years, e.g. energy recovery, so that current technology has a high degree of efficiency.
The primary feedstocks for current commercial ethanol production are corn (primarily in the United States) and sugar (especially in Brazil). As in the biodiesel case, these materials are “conventional” agricultural commodities and have historically had various markets associated with them, i.e. food sources and the like. It is also apparent that since these are commodity products, there are various non-fuel market pressures that dictate price. As such, for ethanol production, as in the case of biodiesel, the feedstock represents the vast majority of the operating cost (i.e. as much as 80%).
For both the biodiesel and ethanol fuel markets and for the large-scale expansion of the renewable fuels industries, it is apparent that development of a potentially large scale, lower cost feedstock source would be advantageous. Recently, significant advances have been made in carbon dioxide sequestering technology (aquatic species program reference, NREL, GFT, a U.S. company) using various species of algae to provide photosynthetic carbon fixation. This technology has tremendous value when applied to industrial sources of carbon dioxide such as; coal fired power generation, natural gas fired power generation, petroleum fired power generation, industrial gas generation, cement manufacturing, industrial fermentation, as well as various additional industries that are significant emitters of carbon dioxide. The algae resulting from the photosynthetic carbon fixation represents an opportunity for the production of transportation fuels as well as various value added chemical products. The volume of algae produced per acre, in a designed pond or “farming” system, is estimated at between 200,000 pounds to 600,000 pounds per year of algae on a dry basis; and is substantially greater, in terms of oil content and fermentable material content, than the volume of soybeans or corn produced per acre at 2,500 pounds to 10,000 lbs per year. The volume of algae produced using the above method allows for a far greater production density versus corn or soybeans with a relatively small geographic footprint. In addition, the algae selected comprise free fatty acids (FFA), triglycerides, polysaccharides, cellulose, hemicellulose and/or lignocellulose. However, the economical processing of the selected algae provides significant challenges for conventional biofuel processing techniques.
For the algae scenario, a significant degree of pretreatment of the sludge is required to prepare the material for the more traditional solvent extraction methods to recover the contained oil. This front-end pretreatment would then need to be combined with multi-stage esterification, (for free fatty acid esterification) and transesterification (for triglyceride conversion), and a completely separate process would be required for acid hydrolysis of the lipid depleted algae pulp to produce monosaccharides, disaccharides, trisaccharides or polysaccharides for production of ethanol by fermentation. This series of processing steps would add significant cost to the resulting materials to be produced from algae. Therefore, there is a need for further development of simplified processing routes for the production of fatty acid alkyl esters (i.e. FAME), monosaccharides, disaccharides, trisaccharides or polysaccharides in a simplified, direct process.
In addition, the current growth in biofuel production from food commodities is generating a substantial increase in co-products such as corn distillers grains, sorghum distillers grains, and rice bran meal. These co-products have underutilized value from the cellulosic content (45-55% by mass) and oil content (7-22% by mass) which represent an opportunity to increase the supply of biofuels to market by simply increasing the processing efficiency of current methods.
Again, the interest in cellulosic feeds for ethanol has increased considerably over the past several years, however some of the same issues apply to this source as to feeds such as algae. For example, with cellulosic feeds the typical approaches include enzyme treatment followed by yeasts which convert the cellulosic materials to sugars and subsequent alcohol, but has little effect on any contained oil content. For example distillers grains have both cellulosic content as well as contained oil values, both of which could be useful for conversion to biofuels.
Thus, there remains a significant need in the art to develop a simple and efficient method for the production of biofuels and ethanol from renewable energy sources. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
This invention generally relates to a display circuit, and more particularly to a display circuit and a display method.
2. Description of Related Art
The liquid crystal display (LCD) was applied to the electronic calculator and the electronic watch. Improvements in optoelectronics effect and driving technology have led the LCD to possess the advantages of low power consumption, light weight, and low voltage driving, and to be widely used in TV sets, mobile phones, laptop computers, personal digital assistants (PDAs), etc. The LCD display industry has been recognized to be one of the most thriving industries.
FIG. 1 shows the partial display mode of an LCD panel. Referring to FIG. 1, in the LCD, there is a display mode called the partial display mode. When the LCD works in the partial display mode, display area and non-display area are displayed on the screen. Only the display area will display the image; the non-display area will not display any image.
FIG. 2A is the internal circuit of a conventional LCD. Referring to FIG. 2A, a conventional LCD internal circuit includes a control circuit 210, a scanning driving circuit 220, a data driving circuit 230, and an LCD panel 240. A shift clock signal terminal 211 and a data signal terminal 212 of control circuit 210 are respectively coupled to data driving circuit 230. The n data lines (Y1-Yn) of the data driving circuit 230 and the m scan lines (X1-Xm) of the scanning driving circuit 220 are coupled to the LCD panel 240. The data driving circuit 230 includes the shift register set 231 and n transmission gates 232. Each transmission gate 232 has a first triggering terminal 21 and a second triggering terminal 23 coupled to the shift register set 231. A data signal input terminal 25 of each transmission gate 232 is coupled to the data signal terminal 212 and a data signal output terminal 27 of each transmission gate 232 is coupled to a data line, for example, data line Y3. The shift register set is coupled to the shift clock signal terminal 211 and turns on the transmission gates 232 based on the shift clock signal Vshift.
FIG. 2B is another data driving circuit of a conventional LCD. Referring to FIG. 2B, the data driving circuit 230 uses transistor switches 234 to replace the transmission gates 232 described with respect to FIG. 2A. In FIG. 2B, one source/drain of each transistor 234 is coupled to the shift register set 231, and the other source/drain of each transistor 234 is coupled to a data line, for example, data line Y3. Each transmission gate 232 is coupled to the data signal terminal 212.
The operation principles of the data driving circuit 230 in FIGS. 2A and 2B are the same. The following description is based on the data driving circuit in FIG. 2A. Referring to FIG. 2A, for simplicity, only one pixel circuit 250 is taken as an example for illustration. Pixel circuit 250 includes a thin film transistor (TFT) 251, a capacitor 252, and a pixel electrode 255. The traditional display circuit of the LCD operates in the same way regardless of full display mode or partial display mode. When displaying the image, scanning driving circuit 220 will turn on TFT 251. At the same time, control circuit 210 will send the shift clock signal Vshift and the data signal Vdata. Shift register set 231 decides when to turn on transmission gate 232 is on, the data signal Vdata will be sent to TFT 251. When TFT 251 is on, the data signal Vdata will charge capacitor 252 so that capacitor 252 can make pixel electrode 255 display on the screen.
In the partial display mode, although LCD panel 240 is black at the non-display area, shift register set 231 still has to send the data signal to LCD panel 240. That is, all circuits work in the same way whether they are for the display area or the non-display area. Such structure is simple, but would consume unnecessary power. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a catalyst for preparing a condensation polymerization resin for a toner which is used for developing electrostatic latent images formed in electrophotography, electrostatic recording method, electrostatic printing method, and the like, a condensation polymerization resin composition comprising the catalyst, and a toner comprising the condensation polymerization resin composition.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
Recently, the durability of a toner, especially suppression of toner adhesion which is a so-called toner spent, has become a serious problem, from the viewpoints of higher speeds and smaller scales of copy machines and printers. Therefore, various studies have been made such as a toner defining its melting properties (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. Hei 9-258471 and the like), a toner defining the composition of a resin binder (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. Hei 8-262796, 2000-147827, and the like), a toner defining its wax component (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No.2001-188387), a toner defining its dissolubility in tetrahydrofuran or the like (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2000-181119), a toner defining an external additive such as silica and a charge control agent (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2000-155443), and the like. Although effects are obtained to a certain extent, further improvements therefor have been desired.
The present inventor have conducted studies based on the thought that one of the causations of lowering the durability of the toner is in the generation of the lower molecular compounds due to unsatisfactory reaction activity and hydrolytic resistance of a catalyst conventionally used in the preparation of a condensation polymerization resin-based resin binder for a toner, such as a tin compound such as dibutyltin oxide, a titanium compound such as tetra-n-butyl titanate, a germanium compound such as germanium oxide, and a manganese compound such as manganese oxide (Japanese Patent Laid-Open Nos. 2000-56513 and Hei 3-41470). As a result, the present inventors have found a catalyst for a condensation polymerization resin for a toner, which is useful in improvement of durability of toner. The present invention has been accomplished thereby.
An object of the present invention is to provide a catalyst for preparing a condensation polymerization resin, which is effectively used in the preparation of a binder resin for a toner having excellent durability.
Another object of the present invention is to provide a condensation polymerization resin composition comprising the catalyst, the condensation polymerization resin composition being useful as a resin binder for a toner which has excellent durability, and a toner comprising the condensation polymerization resin composition, the toner having excellent durability.
These and other objects of the present invention will be apparent from the following description. | {
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In recent years, a vehicle-mounted camera referred to as a video recording type drive recorder has been mounted on an automobile. For example, the vehicle-mounted camera that captures an image of a road condition in front of a vehicle and records the image is mounted on the inner side of a front window in a case where the camera is not adaptable to outdoor use. In this manner, the vehicle-mounted camera mounted on the inner side of the front window captures an image in which a wiper blade intersects a screen in a case where a wiper device is operated.
For example, when the wiper blade is captured as a visual field obstacle that erases a white line to be captured in a case where the white line in the road is detected by image processing and traveling support enabling traveling along a traffic lane is performed, it may be difficult to detect the white line. In a case where an image captured by a guard or the like who goes round, a vehicle, a person, or the like to be noticed is obstructed due to the motion of the wiper blade, which leads to a concern for a reduction in concentration.
Even in a case of a monitoring camera installed outdoors, snow passing a screen during snowfall acts as a visual field obstacle that erases a portion of scenery to be captured, and thus there is a problem in that it is not possible to clearly show a necessary portion of an image. Regarding the snow during snowfall, image data equivalent to one frame is constructed by performing comparison between gray scales of respective pixels of images in a plurality of frames prior to a target frame by using the images of the plurality of frames traced back frontward in a time axis from the target frame to be processed, and collecting pixels ranging from a pixel having the highest grayscale to a pixel having a grayscale at a predetermined position in order (for example, see PTL 1).
According to PTL 1 described above, in an image obtained by capturing a visual field obstacle, a pixel having a grayscale at a predetermined position in order in pixels of a plurality of frames is used as a pixel constituting the visual field obstacle. Thereby, the pixel of the visual field obstacle is not used, and thus it is possible to remove the visual field obstacle. Accordingly, it is considered that image processing disclosed in PTL 1 described above is applied to the reflection of the wiper blade in the vehicle-mounted camera.
However, in a case of the vehicle-mounted camera, scenery, another vehicle, or the like which relatively moves by the traveling of the vehicle serves as a moving subject. The image processing disclosed in PTL 1 described above being performed on an image obtained by the vehicle-mounted camera also affects a moving subject such as scenery or another vehicle, and thus there is a problem of afterimage tear in the moving subject to be captured or partial disappearance.
When a monitoring camera or the like capturing an image of an outdoor subject performs image capture during snowfall, a captured image in which a subject to be monitored is unclear due to a visual field blocked by snow particles is obtained. Consequently, for example, there has been known a technique for removing snowfall noise by performing median filtering in a time-axis direction on a plurality of temporally continuous captured images to thereby sharpen the images (see PTL 2). This technique focuses on the fact that there is a low possibility of pixels having the same coordinates in the plurality of temporally continuous captured images being pixels representing snow particles, and pixel values representing snow particles are excluded by median filtering in which pixels values extracted from the plurality of temporally continuous captured images are sorted in descending order to thereby acquire the median value. Therefore, it is possible to remove the snowfall noise.
There is a technique for detecting an outdoor weather condition such as snowfall regardless of a person's determination, and there has been a known weather display system which is provided with a plurality of sensors for obtaining weather information such as snowfall, rainfall, or the velocity of wind, processes the weather information obtained by the sensors, and displays the obtained weather information on weather display means provided indoors (see PTL 3).
Incidentally, there are some weather conditions, other than the above-described snowfall, in which noise may be generated during image capture performed outdoors. However, for example, in a case of image capture during rainfall, a noise generation condition in a captured image is different from that during snowfall. Accordingly, even when the image processing for removing snowfall noise which is disclosed in PTL 1 described above is applied as it is, it may be difficult to obtain the same noise removal effect as in the case of snowfall. Therefore, in order to more appropriately remove noise caused by a weather condition different from the captured image, it is preferable to apply different image processing depending on a weather condition during image capture (for example, to change a parameter related to the image processing.
Consequently, it is considered that image processing (noise removal) which is suited to each weather condition is performed on the basis of, for example, detection results of a plurality of sensors for detecting weather conditions. However, in this case, it is necessary to provide various sensors for each location where a camera is installed, and thus there is a problem in that time and labor are required for the installation of the sensors and a facility cost is also increased.
Further, there has been known a video camera including an optical or electronic image blur correction mechanism in order to suppress the generation of an uncomfortable video in which a video shown on a screen of a monitor is blurred during watching, for example, in a case where a photographer captures a moving image by using a handheld video camera. In the electronic image blur correction mechanism, image blur is solved by canceling a deviation of a subject by comparing a plurality of captured images with each other.
In order to prevent an image having been subjected to image blur correction from deviating from the screen, an image capture range of a light receiving element may be set to be wider than a range of an image shown on the screen. However, there is a problem in that the cost of the camera is increased due to the use of the high-resolution light receiving element or the size of the camera is increased due to the mounting of the large-size light receiving element. On the other hand, a security guard may perform monitoring by mounting a camera on the security guard's shoulder or head. In this case, there is a demand for promoting a reduction in the size of the camera and suppressing a reduction in resolution. In this case, it is considered that the resolution of a light receiving element and the resolution of an image shown on a screen are made to be substantially the same as each other by using the light receiving element having a small size.
However, in a case where the resolution of the light receiving element and the resolution of the image shown on the screen are made to be substantially the same as each other, the generation of an image in which a deviation of a subject is canceled by image blur correction may result in the occurrence of a deviation of the image with respect to the screen and the generation of a blank region which is not shown on the screen. Thereby, when a boundary between the image and the blank region becomes clear, the contour of the image acts as an edge, and thus there is a problem in that the edge is blurred and flickers in association with image blur. On the other hand, there has been a technique for preventing the blur of an edge from being shown by hiding a blank region together with the edge by using a mask with fixed concentration (see, for example, PTL 4).
There has been a technique for extracting a parallel movement vector and a rotation angle vector that indicate the motion of a camera due to image blur, separating an intended motion component and an unintended motion component from each other, performing filtering on the components, confirming whether or not the amount of correction performed on the image blur exceeds an allowable threshold value, and performing image blur correction so that the amount of correction falls within an allowable range when the amount of correction does not exceed the threshold value (see, for example, PTL 5).
However, in a case where image blur correction is performed by the shift of a captured image such that a subject is positioned in the middle portion of a screen, the mask is displayed in a peripheral portion of the screen like a frame. Accordingly, a display region of the correction image (captured image shown on the screen without being subjected to masking) becomes smaller, and thus there is a problem in that image display efficiency is decreased with respect to a case where an image is displayed on the entire screen. Particularly, in a case where blur in a rotation direction of an image is corrected, a region of a mask for hiding an edge is enlarged, and display efficiency is further decreased.
A blank region including the edge is compensated for by an image of a former frame, and thus it is possible to suppress the enlargement of a non-display region due to the mask for hiding the edge. However, in this case, when a moving image corrected in this manner is reproduced, the image of the former frame which is shown in the blank region is shown in a hardened state due to the occurrence of a delay with respect to the correction image of the present frame, which may result in a feeling of strangeness at the time of viewing the entire screen.
It is possible to cope with a problem in that display efficiency is decreased due to an image region of the screen, by enlarging the image region in the entire screen. However, in a case where an image to be displayed is displayed on the entire screen in an enlarged manner, a basic image is only enlarged. Thus, there is a concern that the definition of pixels of a correction image having been subjected to image blur correction may be decreased. Particularly, for example, there is a scene captured during walking at the time of recording a video for monitoring, which is unsuitable for a case where the definition of an image is required in order to confirm details from the recorded moving image, and an image of a portion processed as a blank region is not kept as a record.
When the amount of hand shake correction (a parallel movement vector or a rotation angle vector) is restricted so as not to exceed an allowable threshold value, image blur correction becomes insufficient with respect to handshake exceeding the threshold value. In this case, a blurred image is shown, which results in an uncomfortable video.
An object of the present disclosure is to be capable of removing noise caused by disturbance during image capture and to suppress afterimage tear in a moving subject other than the noise shown in an image, or partial disappearance.
More specifically, an object of the present disclosure is to be capable of removing a visual field obstacle appearing as disturbance and to suppress afterimage tear in a moving subject other than the visual field obstacle shown in an image, or partial disappearance.
More specifically, an object of the present disclosure is to be capable of determining a weather condition by a simple configuration during image capture performed outdoors and to be capable of acquiring an image from which noise is appropriately removed by image processing based on the determined weather condition.
Further, more specifically, an object of the present disclosure is to hold the resolution of an image corrected by electronic image blur correction and to prevent a video shown on a screen of a monitor from becoming unnatural. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Network devices provide an important role in receiving and forwarding data packets on a network. Depending upon their role in the network, when in a connected state, devices may be operative to provide a network support function by receiving and forwarding data packets intended for other devices on the network.
In the event of a device failure, the network support function will no longer be operative. Depending upon the network topology employed, failure of a network device may disrupt network traffic for other still functioning devices on the network.
To overcome this limitation, network devices may be provided with a passive bypass mechanism that acts to transition from the connected state to a bypass state by physically disconnecting a failed network device from the network, and physically engaging a bypass circuit to allow network traffic to travel past the failed network device through the network.
Typically, these passive bypass mechanisms are operative to disconnect the failed network device when at least one of one or more pre-determined fault conditions affects operation of the device, such as a power failure to the device, or a fault in the device processing operations allows a bypass watchdog timer within the device to time out.
Depending upon the fault condition, it may be not be possible to re-connect the device without at least physically depowering and subsequently powering the device to initiate a system reboot. If the initial fault condition is attributable to something other than a simple loss of power to the device, it may result that the fault condition returns and the device continually triggers the bypass when the reboot is initiated. In such cases, the ability to troubleshoot the fault condition may be compromised as the device is physically disconnected from the network.
In some circumstances a particular fault or may render it expedient to enforce a bypass state on the network device, though the operational conditions of the network device do not meet the pre-determined fault conditions. Since the passive bypass mechanism only enables a bypass when the pre-determined fault condition affects operation of the device, it will not be possible to enforce the bypass state and the network device will remain physically connected to the network.
In applications where a network device may be physically difficult to reach, or is located in a physically hazardous or distant location, it would be particularly useful to be able to choose whether to engage or disengage a bypass state. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Technical Field
The present disclosure relates to provisioning resources in a compute environment and more specifically to a system and method of providing dynamic provisioning for operating systems, applications and/or other resources within the compute environment.
2. Introduction
The present disclosure relates to a system and method of managing resources in the context of a grid or cluster of computers. Grid computing can be defined as coordinated resource sharing and problem solving in dynamic, multi-institutional collaborations. Many computing projects require much more computational power and resources than a single computer can provide. Networked computers with peripheral resources such as printers, scanners, I/O devices, storage disks, scientific devices and instruments, etc. can be coordinated and utilized to complete a task.
Grid/cluster resource management generally describes the process of identifying requirements, matching resources to applications, allocating those resources, and scheduling and monitoring grid resources over time in order to run grid applications as efficiently as possible. Each project will utilize a different set of resources and thus is typically unique. In addition to the challenge of allocating resources for a particular job, grid administrators also have difficulty obtaining a clear understanding of the resources available, the current status of the grid and available resources, and real-time competing needs of various users.
Several general challenges exist when attempting to maximize resources in a grid. First, there are typically multiple layers of grid and cluster schedulers. FIG. 1 illustrates this point. A grid 100 generally comprises a group of clusters or a group of networked computers. The definition of a grid is very flexible and can mean a number of different configurations of computers. The introduction here is meant to be very general. The grid scheduler 102 communicates with a plurality of cluster schedulers 104A, 104B and 104C. Each of these cluster schedulers communication with a plurality of resource managers 106A, 106B and 106C. Each resource manager communicates with a series of compute resources shown as nodes 108A, 108B and 108C. These can be referred to as a cluster or compute environment 110.
Second, local schedulers (which can refer to either the cluster schedulers 104A, 104B, 104C or the resource managers 106A, 106B, 106C) are closer to the specific resources 108 and may not allow grid schedulers 102 direct access to the resources. The grid level scheduler 102 typically does not own or control the actual resources. Therefore, jobs are submitted from the high level grid-scheduler 102 to a local set of resources with no more permissions that the user would have. This reduces efficiencies.
Third, the heterogeneous nature of the shared resources causes a reduction in efficiency. Without dedicated access to a resource, the grid level scheduler 102 is challenged with the high degree of variance and unpredictability in the capacity of the resources available for use. Most resources are shared among users and projects and each project varies from the other.
Fourth, the performance goals for projects differ. Grid resources are used to improve performance of an application but the resource owners and users have different performance goals: from optimizing the performance for a single application to getting the best system throughput or minimizing response time. Local policies can also play a role in performance. Several publications provide introductory material regarding grid scheduling. See, e.g., Grid Resource Management, State of the Art and Future Trends, Jarek Nabrzyski, Jennifer M. Schopf, and Jan Weglarz, Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2004; and Beowulf Cluster Computing with Linux, edited by William Gropp, Ewing Lusk, and Thomas Sterling, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2003. The Beowulf Cluster Computing with Linux reference includes steps to creating a cluster.
Given the challenges associated with the compute environment, administrators have difficulty with regards to establishing operating systems and what operating systems are installed within a cluster. In many cases, clusters have a requirement for more than one operating system, such as the Macintosh, AIX, Microsoft NT, Linux, and so forth.
The majority of cases, an administrator or a group of administrators or managers will determine before the fact what particular mixture of these operating systems will be needed to be installed on the cluster nodes. In addition to operating systems, the same challenges exist for other resources within the cluster, such as software applications, memory requirements for each node, and other static or semi-static attributes.
These IT mangers and administrators must make a best estimate of the distribution of their workload and then they set up the cluster accordingly. Within a 64 node cluster, for instance, an administrator can assign 48 nodes to one operating system, 12 nodes to another operating system, and 4 more nodes to a third operating system. The administrator must anticipate what the workload will be. The problem with this approach is that as the system comes on line, users begin to submit jobs according to their needs and not necessarily what was configured by the operators and managers.
Load balancing issues can immediately exist between the various partitions which exist by virtue of the different operating systems. Partitions can relate to partitioning one of: operating systems, memory, disk space, a software application, a license or some other compute resource. One can find that the first operating system is under-utilized while the second and third operating systems are heavily over-utilized and there's nothing that can be done about it.
The cluster scheduler 104A, 104B, 104C simply does a matching policy to figure out if a job comes in and requires a particular operating system, and which node or set of nodes are best for running the job. If the scheduler 104A, 104B, 104C attempts but cannot establish matches between jobs and nodes, it queues the job until a match is available when some other job completes.
What is needed is a way to allow the compute environment to map more directly to the resources requested by in the incoming jobs. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to spotlights and other hand-held lighting devices and in particular to a spotlight having an attached handle which can be shifted between a lantern-style grip and a pistol-style grip.
Hand-held spotlights are generally available in either of two styles. In a first style, the spotlight includes a beam enclosure and a handle attached to the beam enclosure, where the handle is oriented in a direction parallel to the beam produced by the beam enclosure. This configuration, referred to as "lantern-style," allows the user to carry the spotlight with the beam enclosure below the handle in a manner similar to that of a traditional lantern. In a second style, the handle is oriented radially from the beam enclosure in a direction normal to the beam direction. Such a configuration, referred to as "pistol-style," allows the user to hold the spotlight upright in a manner similar to a pistol, facilitating aiming the beam in a desired direction.
It would be desirable to provide spotlight constructions which can assume either the lantern-style or the pistol-style configuration. One approach for achieving such a dual-configuration spotlight is described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,734,832, to Moriano et al. The spotlight is provided with a pair of interchangeable handles which are separately attached to a beam enclosure. Although quite workable, the use of interchangeable handles is disadvantageous in several respects. First, the need to manufacture separate handles increases the manufacturing cost of the spotlight. Second, and more important, it is difficult to keep track of the handle which is not attached to the beam enclosure. Thus, when the time comes for a user to interchange the handles, it is often difficult or impossible to locate the second handle. Third, interchanging of the handles can be problematic.
For these reasons, it is an object of the present invention to provide hand-held spotlights which can assume either a lantern-style or pistol-style configuration. A particular object of the present invention is that the transition between the two configurations can be achieved without the interchange of separate handles. Even more particularly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a spotlight construction having a single handle attached to the beam enclosure, where the handle can be shifted between a lantern-style orientation and a pistol-style orientation.
2. Description of the Background Art
U.S. Pat. No. 4,734,832 is discussed above. Hand-held spotlights having lantern-style grips are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,345,304; 4,339,788; and 3,794,825. Hand-held spotlights having pistol-style grips are described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,535,397; 4,233,655; and 3,398,271. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The present application claims priority to Japanese Applications Nos. P2000-121336 filed Apr. 21, 2000, P2000-260765 filed May 30, 2000, P2000-160766 filed May 30, 2000, P2000-206988 filed Jul. 7, 2000 and P2000-229605 filed Jul. 28, 2000, which applications are incorporated herein by reference to the extent permitted by law.
The present invention relates to a magneto-optical recording medium.
An optical recording medium is a recording medium in which a laser beam is applied to a signal-recording layer by a recording/reproducing apparatus to record and/or reproducing a record signal.
The following are known as optical recording media: a reproducing-dedicated digital audio disk (so called compact disk), an optical video disk (so called laser disk), a magneto-optical disk, and a phase-change-type optical disk.
As an example of the above optical recording media, a magneto-optical recording medium is used, having a multilayer structure in which a first dielectric layer a signal-recording layer, a second dielectric layer, and a metallic reflective layer are formed in order on a transparent substrate made of, for example, polycarbonate.
In the case of the above optical recording medium, a signal is recorded on or reproduced from a signal-recording layer along a recording track, and a groove is formed on a transparent substrate along the recording track, and it is requested to realize a recording medium having a larger capacity by improving the recording density.
For example, an MD (minidisk) which is one of standards of magneto-optical recording media has a configuration which has an easily-magnetized axis in the vertical direction to a substrate surface and in which a magnetic recording layer made of a magnetic film having a large magneto-optical effect is formed, the recording layer, a metallic reflective layer and a dielectric layer are laminated so that a recording section having a laminated structure on a transparent substrate is formed, and a protective layer made of, for example, an ultraviolet-curing resin is laminated on the recording section.
This minidisk is marketed as a re-writable magneto-optical recording medium and a magnetic-field-modulating magneto-optical recording medium in which a user can repeatedly record and erase information.
The following types are realized as the above minidisk (MD): a minidisk in which the pitch between recording tracks is set to 1.6 (xcexcm) to allow music signals to be recorded for 60 or 74 (min) and a minidisk in which the pitch between recording tracks is narrower to set to 1.5 (xcexcm) and thereby, the recording density is improved to allow music signals to be recorded for 80 (min).
Moreover, because a magneto-optical recording medium such as a (MD) minidisk can be used for various cases from home use to use by mounting the recording medium on a car because it is possible to easily record music in the recording medium serving as a household recording unit.
As described above, to accelerate general use of the above minidisk, it is indispensable to downsize an apparatus for recording or reproducing information in or from a magneto-optical recording medium and reduce the power consumption of the apparatus.
Particularly, in the case of a magneto-optical recording medium using a magnetic-field modulating system, it is necessary to modulate an applied magnetic field at a high speed. Therefore, it is necessary to make a magnetic head greatly approach a magneto-optical recording medium by decreasing the distance between the magnetic head and the corresponding face of the recording medium.
As recording systems for the above magnetic-field-modulating magneto-optical recording medium, it is proposed to use various types of fixed heads such as a sliding system and a flying head system.
However, as described above, when narrowing the pitch between recording tracks in order to increase a storage capacity, a problem occurs that a tolerance to a shift of the focus of a laser beam (hereafter referred to as defocus tolerance) to be irradiated for recording or reproducing data is decreased.
Thus, the decrease of the defocus tolerance causes the crosstalk for recording or reproducing data. Moreover, a difference occurs between optical characteristics of optical pickups due to the intrinsic performance of respective various types of recording and reproducing apparatuses. Thus, a problem occurs that a stable C/N characteristic cannot be obtained because a preferable reproduced signal is obtained from a recording/reproducing apparatus but a jitter value (time-axis fluctuation value) increases and an error rate deteriorates in another reproducing apparatus.
To solve the above problems, in the case of a magneto-optical recording medium such as a minidisk for repeatedly recording and reproducing information, a signal characteristic is improved by the so-called enhanced effect capable of enhancing an apparent Kerr rotational angle by adjusting the thickness of a dielectric film having a refractive index higher than that of a transparent substrate and obtaining effects of multiple reflection and interference so that a laser beam accurately traces a recording layer forming a magneto-optical medium.
However, also in the above description, it is difficult to obtain a signal characteristic enough for practical use in accordance with various types of reproducing apparatuses.
Therefore, as a result of earnestly repeating studies, the present inventor et al. provide an over-writable magneto-optical recording medium from which a superior signal characteristic and a high durability are obtained by sufficiently securing the defocus tolerance of a laser beam to be irradiated, improving the jitter characteristic, magnifying a power margin and thereby improving the C/N characteristic, and holding the surface strength of a disk even if a track pitch is narrowed.
An optical recording medium of the present invention has a configuration in which a recording section constituted of at least a first dielectric layer, a first recording layer, a second recording layer, and a second dielectric layer is sequentially formed, and a reflective layer and a protective layer are formed on the recording section.
In the case of an optical recording medium in which a groove is formed on the transparent substrate along a recording track and both sidewalls of the groove are respectively formed into an independent wobbling shape, the relation of 0.470xe2x89xa6W/Øxe2x89xa60.610 is effectuated when assuming the width of the groove as W and the relation of 0.120xe2x89xa6D/(xcex/n)xe2x89xa60.142 is effectuated when assuming the depth of the groove as D, and the angle xcex8 between the wall faces of the groove is kept at 150xc2x0 xc2x110xc2x0.
In this case, Ø denotes the spot diameter of a laser beam, xcex denotes the wavelength of a laser beam in a vacuum state, and n denotes the refractive index of a transparent substrate.
Then, a refractive index in the in-plane direction is made to range between 140 and 25 (nm) and a double-refractive index in the vertical direction is made to range between 200 and 300 (nm).
Then, the first recording layer is made of Gd, Fe, and Co and contains 28 to 30 (at %) of Gd and the thickness of the layer is selected in a range of 50 to 100 xc3x85, and the second recording layer is made of at least Tb, Fe, and Co, contains 22 to 24 (at %) of Tb and has a thickness of 180 to 250 xc3x85.
Moreover, the relation of 0.55xe2x89xa6(d2/d1)xe2x89xa60.9 is effectuated when assuming the thickness of a first dielectric layer as d1 and that of a reflective layer as d2, and the reflective layer is made of Al, Au, and Ti and contains 20 to 40 (wt %) of Au and 0.5 to 2.0 (wt %) of Ti.
According to the present invention, also when narrowing the track pitch of a magnetic-field-modulating over-writable magneto-optical recording medium, a superior signal characteristic and a high durability can be obtained by sufficiently securing the defocus tolerance of a laser beam for recording or reproducing a signal, improving the jitter characteristic, magnifying a power margin and thereby improving the C/N characteristic, and holding the surface strength of a disk.
A magneto-optical recording medium of a first aspect of the present invention has a configuration in which a groove is formed on a transparent substrate made of, for example, polycarbonate along a recording track and both sidewalls of the groove are respectively formed into an independent wobbling shape. The relation of 0.470xe2x89xa6W/Øxe2x89xa60.610 is effectuated when assuming the width of the groove as W, and the relation of 0.120xe2x89xa6D/(xcex/n)xe2x89xa60.142 is effectuated when assuming the depth of the groove as D and the angle xcex8 between the wall faces of the groove is kept at 150xc2x0 xc2x110xc2x0.
(In this case, Ø denotes the spot diameter of a laser beam to be irradiated, xcex denotes the wavelength of a laser beam in a vacuum state, and n denotes the refractive index of a transparent substrate.)
A magneto-optical recording medium is described below as an optical recording medium of the present invention by referring to the accompanying drawings. However, an optical recording medium of the present invention is not restricted to the example below.
That is, an optical recording medium of the present invention can be used as an optical recording medium for recording and/or reproducing data by using a laser beam as long as the recording medium has a configuration in which a groove is formed along a recording track and both sidewalls of the groove are respectively formed into a wobbling (zigzag) shape. For example, it can be used as an optical recording medium dedicated to reproducing in which a predetermined fine uneven pattern corresponding to a record signal is formed on a signal-recording layer, which can be used as one of various optical recording media such as a phase-change optical disk having a signal-recording layer made of a phase-change material.
FIG. 1 shows a schematic perspective view of an optical recording medium 10 of the present invention when a part of the medium 10 is cut out and FIG. 2 shows a schematic perspective view showing the layer structure of the optical recording medium 10.
The optical recording medium 10 of the present invention allows a record signal to be recorded or reproduced a plurality of times, which is accommodated in a disk cartridge (not illustrated) and removably used for a recording/reproducing apparatus (not illustrated).
As shown in FIG. 2, the magneto-optical recording medium 10 of the present invention has a configuration in which a first dielectric layer 3, a first recording layer 4, a second recording layer 5, a second dielectric layer 6, a reflective layer 7, and a protective layer 8 are sequentially laminated on a transparent substrate 2 made of a thermoplastic resin such as polycarbonate.
A signal is recorded in the optical recording medium 10 shown in FIGS. 1 and 2 by condensing a laser beam having a predetermined wavelength, e.g. 780 (nm) by an objective lens and applying the laser beam from the transparent-substrate-2-forming-face-2f side and applying a predetermined magnetic field by the recording magnetic head of a recording/reproducing apparatus.
In this case, the first recording layer 4 and second recording layer 5 of the optical recording medium 10 are raised in temperature by the laser beam and thereby decreased in coercive force. Therefore, a magnetic domain corresponding to a record signal is recorded in the second recording layer 5 by a magnetic field applied by a recording magnetic head.
Moreover, to reproduce the record signal recorded in the second recording layer 5, a laser beam is applied which has an output smaller than that of a laser beam for recording a signal. In this case, in the optical recording medium 10, return light of the laser beam reflected from the second recording layer 5 is polarized due to the magneto-optical effect such as the Kerr effect. The recording/reproducing apparatus detects the direction of a magnetic field of the magnetic domain recorded in the second recording layer 5 by detecting the polarized direction of the return light and thereby, reproduces a record signal.
The transparent substrate 2 is formed almost like a disk with a hard material capable of passing a laser beam. As the material for forming the transparent substrate 2, it is possible to use one of polycarbonate resin, acrylic resin, polyolefin resin, epoxy resin, and quartz glass.
Moreover, a groove 2b is spirally formed on the transparent substrate 2 in the circumferential direction. The optical recording medium 10 is constituted so that a signal is recorded or reproduced in or from the signal recording layer 4 along the groove 2b. That is, in the optical recording medium 10, a recording track is formed along the groove 2b.
Moreover, in the optical recording medium 10 of the present invention, a groove 2b is formed zigzag in the radius direction at a constant cycle and a small width as shown in FIG. 3. That is, both sidewalls 21 and 22 of a groove 2a are respectively formed into an independent wobbling (zigzag) shape.
The optical recording medium 10 is constituted so that the zigzag cycle of the groove 2b is read by a recording/reproducing apparatus when data is recorded or reproduced by a laser beam. Thereby, the recording/reproducing apparatus can always stably keep the rotational speed of the optical recording medium 10 in accordance with the groove 2b zigzagging at a constant cycle.
Moreover, the groove 2b is used as the criterion for positioning when recording or reproducing a record signal in or from the second recording layer 5 by a recording/reproducing apparatus and has a function for showing the recording position of a record signal, that is, the address of the signal in the optical recording medium 10. Thereby, the recording/reproducing apparatus can quickly perform accurate positioning when recording or reproducing data in or from the optical recording medium 10.
FIG. 4 shows a sectional view of a simplified layer structure of the optical recording medium 10 of the present invention. In this case, the first dielectric layer 3, second dielectric layer 6, and reflective layer 7 are omitted.
In the case of the optical recording medium 10 of the present invention, the relation of 0.470xe2x89xa6W/Øxe2x89xa60.610 is effectuated when assuming the width of the groove 2a as W, the relation of 0.120xe2x89xa6D/(xcex/n)xe2x89xa60.142 is effectuated when assuming the depth of the groove 2a as D, and the angle xcex8 between wall faces of the groove 2a is kept at 150xc2x0xc2x110xc2x0.
In this case, Ø denotes the spot diameter of a laser beam to be irradiated, xcex denotes the wavelength of a laser beam L in a vacuum state, and n denotes the refractive index of a transparent substrate.
Moreover, the track pitch TP between recording tracks of the optical recording medium 10 of the present invention is set to approx. 1.5 xcexcm.
Furthermore, the groove 2a is formed so that the relation of 0.200xe2x89xa6[{D/(xcex/n)}/(W/Ø)]xe2x89xa60.330 is effectuated when assuming the width of the groove 2a as W and the depth of the groove 2a as D.
In this case, Ø denotes the spot diameter of a laser beam to be irradiated, xcex denotes the wavelength of a laser beam in a vacuum state, and n denotes the refractive index of a transparent substrate.
The first dielectric layer 3 and second dielectric layer 6 improve the C/N characteristic and prevent the first recording layer 4 and second recording layer 5 from corroding.
That is, because components including chlorine ions or the like for corroding metals are frequently contained in the transparent substrate 2 and the protective layer 7, it is possible to avoid the first recording layer 4 and second recording layer 5 from being directly influenced by components for corroding metals by forming the first dielectric layer 3 and the second dielectric layer 6 so as to hold the first recording layer 4 and second recording layer 5 between the layers 3 and 6.
It is necessary to form the first dielectric layer 3 and second dielectric layer 6 with a material having a small absorbing power for an applied wavelength of the laser beam L for recording or reproducing data.
For example, the first dielectric layer 3 and second dielectric layer 6 are respectively formed on the transparent substrate 2 as a thin film by a thin-film forming art such as one of various sputtering methods by using one of such materials as Si3N4, SiN, AlN, Al2O3, AlSiNO, HfO2, ZnS, ZrO2, Y2O3, MgO, SiO2, MgF2, and LiF. However, it is preferable to use a material having a performance for passing the laser beam L incoming to record or reproduce a record signal but not passing oxygen or moisture, and not containing oxygen as the material for forming the first dielectric layer 3 and use SiN, Si3N4, or AlN as the material.
In the above case, the first recording layer 4 and second recording layer 5 constituting the optical recording medium 10 of the present invention respectively include a magneto-optical recording layer and the magneto-optical layer is formed as a thin film on the first dielectric layer 3.
The magneto-optical layer is made of a material in which the coercive force is decreased due to a temperature rise exceeding Curie temperature and which causes magnetic reversal in the direction of an external magnetic field and has a magneto-optical characteristic such as Kerr effect or Faraday effect. For example, the layer is made of a rare-earth and transition-metal alloy such as TbFeCo, TbFeCoCr, or GdFeCo.
It is permitted that a recording section 9 is formed with a single layer such as only a magneto-optical layer or with a multilayer structure obtained by further laminating a dielectric layer as proposed for a CAD (Center Aperture Detector) disk or MSR (Magnetically induced Super Resolution) disk.
Moreover, the uneven shape on the groove 2a of the transparent substrate 2 is transferred to the first recording layer 4 and second recording layer 5. In the case of the optical recording medium 10, recording tracks in or from which a record signal is recorded or reproduced are formed on the first recording layer 4 and second recording layer 5 along the groove 2a. Moreover, the optical recording medium 10 is constituted so that the pitch between recording tracks becomes 1.5 xcexcm or 1.5xc2x10.01 xcexcm by considering an error range. In the case of the optical recording medium 10, it is possible to improve the recording density compared to the case of a conventional optical recording medium having a track pitch of 1.6 xcexcm. Therefore, the optical recording medium 10 allows the capacity to be increased while keeping the outside diameter equal to that of a conventional optical recording medium.
Moreover, in the case of the optical recording medium of the present invention, because of numerically specifying the width and depth of the groove 2a and the spot diameter Ø and wavelength xcex of a laser beam for irradiating the angle between wall faces of the groove, it is possible to sufficiently secure the defocus tolerance of a laser beam for recording or reproducing a signal even if the track pitch is further narrowed than ever and keep a high reliability.
The reflective layer 7 constituting the optical recording medium 10 is formed on the second dielectric layer 5 as a thin film. The reflective layer 7 has a function for reflecting the laser beam L passing through the first recording layer 4, second recording layer 5 and second dielectric layer 6 as well as a function as a heat sink for preventing heat from being accumulated in the first recording layer 4 and second recording layer 5 due to a laser beam irradiated toward the first recording layer 4 and second recording layer 5.
The optical recording medium 10 makes it possible to improve the utilization efficiency of the laser beam L when recording or reproducing data because the reflective layer 7 has a function for reflecting a laser beam. As a material for forming the reflective layer 7, it is preferable to use a non-magnetic metal element serving as a thermally good conductor or its compound independently or compounding metal elements. The reflective layer 7 is made of, for example, Au, Al, and Ti.
The protective layer 8 is formed on the reflective layer 7 as a thin film by curing an ultraviolet-curing resin applied by a spin coater or the like.
The optical recording medium 10 makes it possible to avoid the first recording layer 4, second recording layer 5, and reflective layer 7 from being deteriorating due to oxidation or the like because of including the protective layer 8.
Moreover, the medium 10 makes it possible to prevent a crack from being produced on each layer formed on the transparent substrate 2.
The protective layer 8 may contain various lubricants or various lubricants may be applied to the surface of the layer 8.
Thereby, the optical recording medium 10 can avoid the recording head of a recording/reproducing apparatus or the protective layer 8 from abrading or producing heat when sliding the head on the protective-layer-8 forming surface. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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This application claims priority of European application EP99811164.5, filed Dec. 15, 1999, and whose contents are hereby incorporated by way of reference.
The present invention concerns an opto-electronic system for a dimension-measuring device, in particular an opto-electronic system for a portable device for measuring linear and/or angular displacement. The present invention concerns in particular an opto-electronic system for a displacement-measuring device of comparator type.
Optical systems for measuring dimensions and angles are described notably in DE19505176 (Baumer Electric AG). They comprise generally a light emitter emitting a light ray sent by means of appropriate optics in the direction of a photo-detector. A graduated rule or disc is placed in the optical path between the emitter and the photo-detector. The illumination of the sensor is interrupted when a graduation of the rule or of the disc is in the optical path. A counter counts the number of interruptions of the signal supplied by the sensor in order to deduce therefrom the displacement of the rule or of the disc and to display a representative value of this displacement. Such devices are used notably in apparatus for measuring and comparing dimensions of machine parts.
A device of this type is described in patent CH683798 (TESA SA), to which the reader can profitably refer. This document describes an opto-electronic system comprising several photo-emitters mounted on a printed circuit board on one side of a rule provided with a double graduated track and several photo-detectors mounted opposite on a second circuit on the other side of the rule.
This device has the inconvenience of necessitating two printed circuit boards, and thus of having relatively important space requirements, so that it is difficult to integrate it within a portable device. Furthermore, it is difficult to align accurately the optical components mounted on two different boards, notably when the two circuits are subjected to temperature variations and thus to dilatations that are different.
Patent application WO87/07944 (Renishaw) describes another electro-optical device for measuring dimensions, in which the light beam emitted by a photo-emitter is reflected in the direction of the photo-detector by reflecting surfaces on the rule. The described construction makes it possible to place the photo-emitter and the photo-detector on the same printed circuit board and to use a single lens. However, the portion of the beam that is reflected is weak, so that the contrast of the signal received on the photo-detector is weak. Furthermore, the manufacture and aligning of the single lens are subjected to rather strict constraints in order for the optical beam to be focused on the rule and reflected precisely in the direction of the photo-detector by means of a single lens.
The abstract of patent application JP-A-61-000712, published May 29, 1986, in volume 10, No 147 (P460) of less than less than Patent Abstracts of JAPAN greater than greater than , describes an optical reading device comprising a large number of individual optical elements that are difficult and costly to align correctly. Furthermore, it makes use of optical fibers between the photo-emitter and the printed circuit board that only increases the complexity, volume and cost of the device.
It is an aim of the present invention to propose an opto-electronic system for a dimension-measuring device that is improved over the prior art systems, notably a system that does not have the inconveniences mentioned.
Another aim of the present Invention is to propose an opto-electronic system for a dimension-measuring device of low cost, of high precision and having reduced space requirements, adapted for example to use in a comparator or in any other portable or small dimension-measuring device.
Another aim is to propose an opto-electronic system enabling to determine the position of a rule or of a disc read in transmission and comprising a succession of transparent and opaque zones.
According to the invention, these aims are achieved by means of an opto-electronic system having the characteristics of the independent claims, variants of preferred embodiments being moreover described in the dependent claims.
According to the invention, these aims are achieved notably by means of an opto-electronic system comprising a transparent rule with at least one portion provided with a succession of opaque graduations, at least one photo-emitter, at least one photo-detector, an optical system capable of concentrating the light beam or beams generated by said at least one photo-emitter on said at least one portion, and of concentrating the light beam or beams having crossed rule on said at least one photo-detector, said rule and said optical system being able to be moved in relation to one another, and in which said photo-emitter and said photo-detector are on the same side of said rule. In a preferred embodiment, said photo-emitter and said photo-detector are mounted in the same plane, for example on a same printed circuit board.
This characteristic makes it possible to use the advantageous properties of a rule read in transmission, enabling an improved contrast, in a system in which the emitting and the receiving of light are made in approximately the same direction but in opposite sense. The system thus permits a rule read in transmission to be used with a photo-emitter and a photo-detector mounted on a same printed circuit board. This characteristic thus makes it possible to avoid the problems of mutual alignment and of positioning of the photo-emitter and photo-receiver.
According to the invention, these aims are further achieved by means of an optoelectronic system comprising a transparent rule with at least one portion having a succession of opaque graduations, at least one photo-emitter, at least one photo-detector, an optical system capable of concentrating the light beam or beams generated by said at least one photo-emitter on said at least one portion, and of concentrating the light beam or beams having crossed said rule on said at least one photo-detector, in which said optical system is constituted of an integrated optical bloc.
These characteristics thus allow the position of a transparent rule comprising opaque graduations to be determined with great accuracy, since all the optical surfaces are made in a same optical bloc. This characteristic has the advantage of avoiding the problems of mutual alignment of the optical components during assembly and the inaccuracies due to the different dilatations of the optical components. Furthermore, use of an ordinary transparent rule and of a single optical element manufactured for example by injection of synthetic material in a mould makes it possible to reduce the manufacturing cost of the system and to obtain an excellent contrast of the signal received on the photo-detector.
According to a preferred embodiment of the invention, the optical bloc, the photo-emitter and the photo-detector are mounted on the same printed board circuit, the rule moving for example in a plane perpendicular to that board. This arrangement makes it possible to reduce the system""s space requirements and to move the printed board closer to the rule without increasing the size of the optical bloc.
According to a preferred embodiment of the invention, the optical bloc comprises a first optical surface for collecting the light beam emitted by said photo-emitter, a second optical surface for reflecting this light beam and concentrating it on said portion, a third optical surface for concentrating and reflecting the light beam having crossed said rule, and a fourth optical surface for concentrating said beam on said photo-detector. Thanks to this advantageous arrangement, each optical surface of the optical bloc effects only simple optical operations of reflecting and/or collimation, which makes it possible to use relatively simple optical surfaces, for example only spherical or possibly elliptical surfaces. In a preferred embodiment, all the optical surfaces are spherical or cylindrical.
In a preferred embodiment of the invention, an additional diversion is provided in the optical path between the photo-emitter and the photo-detector, allowing the optical path to be lengthened without increasing the optical bloc""s space requirements, or, inversely, allowing these space requirements to be reduced without shortening the optical path. It is thus possible to use optical surfaces that are extremely easy to manufacture, for example spherical or even plane surfaces, even with devices of small size in which the focal distances are necessarily reduced. | {
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Italian patent 1311501 and WO95/34765 disclose transmission devices which comprises a first cylindrical sleeve which can be mechanically coupled or uncoupled with a second cylindrical sleeve by tightening or loosening, respectively, a helical spring arranged in a substantially coaxial manner astride these two cylindrical sleeves, wherein a control collar is mechanically coupled with a tubular member, so that the mutual translation of the control collar with respect to the tubular member also causes their mutual rotation, the ends of the helical springs being arranged into seats made in the control collar and in the tubular member so that their mutual rotation tightens or loosens the coils of the helical spring, thereby causing the coupling or the uncoupling, respectively, between the first cylindrical sleeve and the second cylindrical sleeve.
The torque which can be transmitted by this known device depends on the force exerted by the helical spring on the outer walls of the two cylindrical sleeves, i.e. depends substantially on the size of the spring, so that it is necessary to enlarge the whole device for transmitting high torques, with consequent size problems of the same device.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,986,400 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,825,988 disclose transmission devices with two pairs of cylindrical sleeves, two control collars and two helical springs, which however cannot transmit high torques, since the helical springs have the same coiling direction, so that they cannot be tightened at the same time on both pairs of sleeves. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The fabrication of ordered molecular assemblies on conducting silicon surfaces is of considerable interest owing to its potential applications in the microelectronic industry. One goal of semiconductor fabrication is to increase the density of active elements provided on an integrated circuit. In order to accomplish this, efforts have turned to the use of self-assembling molecular structures as an alternative to, or in conjunction with various lithographic processes to form the active elements used in integrated circuits.
In addition, interest has turned to the use of organic molecules to form such active elements (e.g., memory elements) (see, e.g., U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,272,038, 6,212,093, and 6,208,553, and PCT Publication WO 01/03126) and/or to form components of certain devices (e.g., field effect transistors, gates, sensors, transducers, etc.).
Organic molecules covalently attached to silicon are very stable due to the strength of Si—O and Si—C bonds. A number of approaches exist to form a covalent link between silicon and organic molecules (Buriak and Allen (1998) J. Am. Chem. Soc., 120: 1339–1340; Bansal and Lewis (1998) J. Phys. Chem. 102: 1067–1070; Zhu et al. (1999) Langmuir 15: 8147–8154; Coulter et al. (2000) J. Vac. Sci. Technol. A 18: 1965–1970; Bourkherroub and Wayner (1999) J. Am. Chem. Soc. 121: 11513–11515; Cleland et al. (1995) Faraday Commun., 91: 4001–4003; Bateman et al. (1998) Angew. Chem. Int. Ed., 37: 2683–2685). These approaches include chemical, electrochemical and vapor deposition on a hydrogen-terminated silicon surface.
Such approaches, however, have typically involved difficult reaction conditions, have been relatively inefficient, have degraded the organic molecule(s), and/or have resulted in the production of fairly toxic materials. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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A rotatably mountable track chain roller can have a roller body formed with axle journal stubs formed by casting and forging or machining which are fixed in position in a vehicle frame and which each engage rotatably in an end cap formed as or with a radial and axial bearing.
Moreover the track chain roller has a hollow chamber filled with lubricant material for the bearings which can be sealed from the exterior.
The end caps are fixed in position on the vehicle frame to rotatably support the roll body thereon.
A track chain roller of this type is described in German Utility Model DE-GM 85 23 108.8. There the end caps mounted on the axle journal stubs are attached to one another rigidly, e.g. by a rod which passes through the axle journal stubs and the roll body, so that the track chain roller can be assembled in a unit which can be mounted without disassembly. The desired axial play of the bearing is guaranteed by the rod so that among other things a considerable assembly simplification results, i.e. the difficulty of ensuring axial play is eliminated.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,594,846 describes the use of a wear degradable material to ensure axial play in a track pivot pin. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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This invention relates to ceramics and more particularly to aluminosilicate ceramics.
Ceramics based on monoclinic celsian (BaO.Al.sub.2 O.sub.3.2SiO.sub.2) can be considered for applications requiring materials with a combination of high melting point, low thermal expansion, high thermal shock resistance, high-frequency working capabilities, low and thermally stable dielectric constant and low loss tangent. For example, celsian is a promising candidate for use as thermally-stable dielectric and refractory materials. Celsian ceramics have been reported in the literature as having a thermal expansion of 2.5 x 10.sup.-6 /degree (at 20.degree.-1000.degree. C.), bending strength up to 110 MPa, dielectric constant and loss tangent of 6-7 and (1-2) x 10.sup.-4, respectively, at 20.degree. C. and 1 MHz, and dielectric constant stable up to 600.degree. C. These ceramics were prepared from natural (kaolin or clay) or technical grade purity starting materials containing significant amounts of impurities which can adversely affect all properties, particularly the dielectric behavior of ceramics especially at high temperatures.
Celsian with melting point of about 1760.degree. C. exists in two main crystalline modifications: monoclinic, stable up to 1590.degree. C., and hexagonal, stable from 1590.degree. C. to melting temperature. Although the hexagonal modification is stable at temperatures above 1590.degree. C., it tends to be the first product of solid phase reaction and has a strong tendency to persist metastably in the whole temperature range. Hexagonal celsian transforms reversibly into low temperature orthorhombic form at 300.degree. C. This transformation is accompanied by significant volume changes. Because of this fact, hexagonal celsian is of no practical use as ceramic materials for high-temperature, especially, thermal cycling applications. Properties of celsian ceramics mentioned above belong to monoclinic modification. Literature reveals that the transformation of hexagonal celsian into the monoclinic form is promoted by prolonged high-temperature (above 1450.degree. C.) heating, hydrothermal treatment at about 2 kbar pressure, formation of glass phase during firing, and by the presence of impurities or the addition of certain additives (such as B.sub.2 O.sub.3, LiF, Cr.sub.2 O.sub.3, CaF.sub.2, ZrSiO.sub.3). However, the preparation of monoclinic celsian from high-purity raw materials free of undesirable additives by conventional processes can be only accomplished by long term high temperature treatment.
It would be desirable to provide a method of making pure monoclinic celsian at lower temperatures for shorter heating times without the use of contaminating additives. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Up to date, there are many devices for putting a limb of an animal-shaped toy in motion. However, the mechanisms are very complicated. Traditional devices usually use gears or cams as an actuation source and are composed with rectangular slide plate sets or rack and pinion sets as an activity track to act upon the toy. Approximately, ninety-five percent of reciprocating type toys apply the rack and pinion set to form a track and the rest of them apply a rectangular slide plate set. Therefore, traditional devices have the following drawbacks:
1. The activity track is a simple straight line whose motion is monotonous.
2. The manufacturing cost is high and assembly is relatively difficult.
3. The type of motion cannot be changed. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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In the electronics industry, components having at least one planar surface are often handled by a vacuum pickup tool. The typical vacuum pickup tool comprises a shaft whose tip is provided with an orifice surrounded by a sealing surface. The sealing surface about the orifice, when brought into contact with the planar surface on the component, forms a substantially airtight seal therewith. When a partial vacuum is drawn through the orifice, a vacuum will be drawn over a portion of the area on the surface of the component. In this way, a force, referred to as a "vacuum" force, caused by a difference between the air pressure and partial vacuum, is exerted against the component which allows the component to be engaged by the vacuum pickup tool at a storage site. Once engaged, the component can then be transported for placement on a circuit board. By interrupting the vacuum drawn through the orifice, the component can be released from the vacuum pickup tool and the component can be thereafter bonded to the circuit board.
The magnitude of the vacuum force on the component varies with the size of the area (referred to as the vacuum area) on the planar surface of the component over which the vacuum is drawn. The size of the vacuum area varies directly with the size of the orifice, so that the larger the orifice, the heavier the component that can be engaged by the vacuum pickup tool. However, making the orifice larger than the area of the planar surface on the component prevents the formation of an airtight seal between the tool tip and the component which reduces magnitude of the force exerted on the component.
Presently, the range in the size and weight of the components to be handled is so wide as to preclude the use of a vacuum pickup tool having a single diameter orifice in its tip. In the past, this problem has been overcome by making the tip at the end of the vacuum pickup tool detachable. In this way, the tip can be interchanged with one having a different size orifice so as to permit components of a different size and weight to be engaged by the vacuum pickup tool. However, the interchange of tips requires either manual intervention or the addition of complex mechanical equipment to automatically change the tips, both alternatives being undesirable.
Thus, there is a need for a vacuum pickup tool which may be automatically adjusted in a convenient, simple manner to handle components of different size and weight. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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This invention relates to an improved soil product and methods of making the same.
Various types of soil mixtures are used commercially and for retail such as for potted plants, nursery beds, etc. These mixtures include a minimum of actual soil since good natural soil is difficult to obtain and has other disadvantages such as for example it is heavy to handle, it has poor moisture retention qualities, etc. One mixture that is popularly used as a soil additive or conditioner is barkdust since it has good moisture retention qualities and it decomposes at a slow rate. However, barkdust is now being used extensively in other products, such as structural board, adhesive, etc., and the demand thereof has made it too expensive for mass usage as a soil conditioner. Straw has been used as a soil conditioner and has some attractive features, namely, it is abundant and inexpensive and also makes a good mulch when decomposed. Straw, however, has the disadvantage that it decomposes at a fast rate and thus is not feasible for commercial use. Artificial soil mixtures have also been used but such mixtures are too expensive at least for commercial use. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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(1) Field of the Invention
The invention relates to an apparatus for automatically placing large plastic lids atop pail receptacles and a method for placing large plastic lids atop pail receptacles.
(2) Description of the Prior Art
Despensing and capping devices for a variety of containers are well known. For example, the milk industry has long utilized such devices for affixing bottle caps to bottles by equipment which dispenses one lid at a time and then affixes the lid over the bottle opening. Other areas of the food industry similarly have become proficient in capping a wide array of containers for perishable commodities. Different industries, such as the paint industry, have also developed methods for affixing lids to metal cans for paint, adhesives, petroleum products, joint compounds, and various materials.
In general, the lidding of conainers utilizes a magazine storage with means for advancing selective numbers of lids. Many forms of advancement are extant, and vertical, inclined, and horizonal magazine sections are utilized. Generally, however, such dispensing and capping equipment envisions smaller type lids such as those for necked-down bottles, medicine vials, wide-mouth jars for comestible contents, metal pails for petroleum and paint products, and various other typically circular containers. The food vending machine industry has solved problems of dispensing individually pre-packaged goods but has not had to deal with capping large receptacles. With the use of lids less than about six to eight inches in diameter, problems with non-uniformity and deformation are not encountered since the size tolerances and behavior of the material used is less variable. When large size receptacles, such as multiple-gallon pails, are lidded, magazine dispensation becomes difficult and the capping or placing onto the receptacle is manually performed.
Particularly large receptacles generally are covered with metal, or high density plastic, lids. One example of large metal lids would be in sealing large containers of asphalt emulsion, or tar, used in paving, roofing, and other construction-type industries. The inventor has particular concern for the utilization of high density plastic lids, specifically high density polyethylene. The prior art does not disclose a sufficiently adequate method or apparatus for both dispensing and placing such types of circular lids. A characteristic of high density polyethylene is that it tends to bow up in hot weather, which hinders automatic lidding operations. Additionally, the polyethylene type lid has been found to be supplied in non-uniform diameters, irregular rim sealing lips, and non-unifrom skirt lip dimensions. Such vagaries of dimension hamper lidding operations and implementation of an automatic method and apparatus for lidding large pail-type receptacles.
It has been discovered that additional problems relate to the sequence of filling and registering pail-type containers for subsequent lidding. This is problematic in that the spacing for larger containers, such as five gallon pails, may become random after proceeding along conventional conveyor belts, or the like, rather than neatly organized space-apart intervals as could be attained for example with small jars or cans. The problem is compounded when attempting to sequentially dispense one large lid at a time for affixation to the upper rims of the pails. The two steps of filling and lidding are desirably coordinated so that continuous operation is afforded.
(3) Objects of the Invention
It is accordingly a primary goal of this invention to provide a method and apparatus for automatically dispensing and lidding large pail-type receptacles with large diameter plastic lids.
It is moreover a critical object of the invention to provide such automatic placing when non-uniform plastic lids are used.
It is an allied goal of the invention to lid pail-type receptacles, having upper circular rim portions, with high density polyethylene lids having a peripheral skirt or lip portion.
It is an important goal of this invention to provide a method and apparatus which allows for dispensing and lidding pail-type receptacles one at a time wherein filled pail containers may be advanced after a filling operation through a lid placing operation without regard to spacing and without sacrificing a continuous operation. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The invention is concerned with obtaining generally reproducible growth rates for individual micro-organisms upon the surfaces of agar-based gels. More particularly, the invention is concerned with micro-organism growth upon agar-based gels which have a very smooth surface so that surface imperfections do not lead to apparent differences in growth rates of particular micro-organisms grown thereon.
2. Prior Art
The preparation of agar gels for the growth of micro-organisms so as to allow identification of the micro-organisms, identification of particularly effective anti-micro-organism agents thereagainst, and the like is of course very well known. Such agar-based gels must contain therein the essential nutrients for the growth of the particular micro-organism being grown thereon and as is well recognized must be grown in sterilized cells of one nature or another. For example, growth may take place in tubes or very often in petri dishes or the like.
A serious problem which has existed with prior art growth cells, such cells being defined as a container having an agar-based gel therein, has been that the rate of growth of a particular micro-organism on the surface of the gel has often been effected by small or large bubbles which are formed during the mixing of the materials from which the gel is formed and which do not escape fully therefrom during the gelling process. A uniform or more properly a generally reproducible growth rate is necessary for each particular micro-organism if it is to be properly identified and/or the effects of various anti-micro-organism chemicals are to be properly evaluated upon it. Heretofore, in order to obtain such a uniform rate it has been customary in the art when, for example petri dishes, are used and a gel is formed therein which does not have a completely smooth surface, to open the dishes and then quickly flame them to melt slightly the top surface thereof so that any and all depressions and/or hills therein will be smoothed out and the resulting top surface of the gel will be sufficiently smooth so that generally reproducible growth rates will be observed for each micro-organism.
This flaming solution has not proven completely satisfactory for a number of reasons. First, the flaming itself requires reopening of the petri dish or the like thus drastically increasing the chances of contamination from foreign micro-organisms. Second, the flaming is not fully effective if truly large depressions and/or hills have been introduced into the agar-based gel by the bubbles formed therein during mixing of the gel ingredients. Third, the flaming technique even when successful takes up a good deal of valuable time. Fourth, the flaming may lead to a selective destruction or removal of certain essential nutrients from the area of the gel which is directly exposed to the flame. The present invention provides a complete solution to the problem of having uneven surfaces on the top of agar-based gels while completely eliminating the necessity for flaming. This solution also removes the necessity for ever opening the petri dishes or the like which contain the gel therein except for innoculation thereof so that chances of contamination are drastically reduced. Further, the solution of the present invention to the above problems completes the formation of an agar-based gel medium on which micro-organisms will grow at precisely the same rate within experimental error as the same micro-organisms will grow upon prior art agar-based gels having smooth top surfaces as produced for example by bubble free formation of the gels. Further, by use of the technique of the present invention, much more active mixing techniques can be used to form the agar-based solution which is to be gelled thus reducing the time needed to perform such mixing. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
Embodiments relate to an apparatus and method for hiding data in an audio signal and extracting the data from the audio signal, and more particularly, to an apparatus and method for hiding data in an audio signal and extracting the data from the audio signal based on a pilot code sequence.
2. Description of the Related Art
An audio watermark technology includes a technology of carrying required additional information in an audio signal by adding arbitrary distortion or a arbitrary signal and of extracting the additional information. The additional information carried on the audio signal may be used to guarantee a quality of the audio signal at a minimum loss and to discriminate a copyright of the original audio signal.
Recently, due to a wide use of portable smart terminal equipment, the audio watermark technology is showing a possibility to be used as a scheme of transmitting additional information utilized in a portable terminal in addition to copyright discrimination. In addition to existing constraints, additional information may need to be extracted robustly against acoustic channel distortion until the audio signal is spread in the air and received to a microphone. Also, to perform an additional service desired by a user, a high quantity of data associated with transmitted additional information may be required. For example, the additional information may include, for example, channel information, time information or uniform resource locator (URL) information. A portable terminal may extract text information from a received signal only when tens of bytes of text information is transmitted within a set period of time.
However, in most cases, a large number of bit errors may occur in data associated with extracted additional information due to reverberation or noise occurring in an acoustic channel, in comparison to the original data. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The embodiments discussed herein relate to a liquid-jet head and a liquid-jet device.
2. Description of the Related Art
A typical image forming apparatus includes an ink-jet recording device such as a printer, a facsimile machine, a copier, a plotter or a multifunctional peripheral having a combination of these functions. The ink-jet recording device includes a liquid-jet head configured to form an image on a medium such as a sheet by discharging ink drops on the sheet while transferring the sheet. The aforementioned “medium” or the “sheet” indicates any medium or sheet formed of any materials and hence is not limited to a medium or sheet of any particular material. Likewise, and a recording medium including a transitory recording medium and a non-transitory recording medium, a transfer material and a recording sheet may be used synonymously with the aforementioned medium or sheet that is formed of any materials. Further, the image forming apparatus may be any apparatuses that form an image by discharging a liquid on a medium such as paper, thread, fiber, cloth, hide, metal, plastic, glass, wood, ceramics and the like. The aforementioned “forming an image” not only indicates providing an image having meaning of a character or graphics on a medium but also indicates an image having no meaning such as a pattern on a medium by simply discharging a liquid. In addition, “ink” is not limited to those so-called “ink”, but may be any liquid that is in a form of liquid when being discharged. The aforementioned “ink” is used as a generic name of liquids including DNA specimens, resist and a patterning material.
An ink-jet recording head in the ink-jet recording device (an example of the image forming apparatus) includes nozzles to discharge ink drops, a pressurized liquid chamber communicating with the nozzles, an actuator unit to generate energy to increase pressure in the pressurized liquid chamber and a common liquid chamber to supply ink from an ink tank such as an ink cartridge communicating with the pressurized liquid chamber. Hence, pressure in the pressurized liquid chamber is increased by driving the actuator unit to discharge the ink drops from the nozzles while an amount of ink equivalent to a discharged amount of ink drops is supplied from the common liquid chamber to the pressurized liquid chamber. In the ink-jet recording device, air bubbles or foreign particles may sometimes intrude into an ink flow path. When the air bubbles or foreign particles enter the pressurized liquid chamber, the nozzles may be clogged with the air bubbles or foreign particles to cause ink discharge malfunction. Japanese Patent No. 3885226 (Patent Document 1), for example, proposes a technique to prevent such ink discharge malfunction by providing a filter in the ink flow paths between the ink cartridges and the common liquid chamber. In the liquid-jet head disclosed in Patent Document 1, a filter is provided in each of communicating paths communicating between the common liquid chamber and the corresponding pressurized liquid chamber. The filter includes plural openings configured to block the air bubbles or foreign particles while maintaining the communication between the common liquid chamber and the corresponding pressurized liquid chamber. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Gas turbine engines typically have stators to direct the compressed high temperature gas against the turbine blades. Stators are comprised of an annular array of airfoils or vanes interposed between inner and outer shroud rings. Usually, the three components are cast from the same material making the vane integral with the shroud rings at the top and bottom edges of the vanes. During transient conditions, such as start up and shut down of the engine, the gas temperature rapidly changes. Because a larger portion of the vane relative to the shrouds is exposed to the gas, it respond more quickly to the changes in gas temperature. Thus, when heated faster then the shrouds, the vanes become susceptible to large thermal compressive stress because the vanes want to expand but are constrained by the shroud rings. Similarly, when cooled, a large tensile stress is created across the vane which wants to contract.
The thermal stresses are particularly high in the thin, trailing and leading edges. The cyclic nature of the thermal stresses make the vanes highly susceptible to low cycle fatigue cracking. Therefore, it is desirable to have vanes with good low cycle fatigue properties which tend to be expensive.
Bicasting is another method of forming a turbine stator. This method includes casting shroud rings around the tip and root edges of prefabricated vanes. The advantage to bicasting is that the vanes and shroud rings can be formed from materials having different compositions and crystallographic structure. This permits the use of single crystal or columnar grained crystallographic vanes which have low elastic modulus and good low cycle fatigue properties in the direction of primary stress.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,728,258 discloses a bicast turbine stator having a vane configured for mounting with a slip joint between the vane and the shroud ring to accommodate the thermal expansion of the vanes. The slip joint is produced by printing or stamping through the shroud ring which reduces its strength. Also, with slip joints, the hoop stress in the shroud ring must be carried by the portions of the ring surrounding the slip joint and adjacent the leading and trailing edges of the vanes. Not only does this reduce the amount of material available for carrying the hoop stress but compounds the problem by producing large stress concentrations at the leading and trailing edges.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,069,265 discloses a bicast turbine stator in which the shroud ring is strengthened by the addition of a rail which carries a portion of the hoop stress. A space is maintained between the rail and the shroud ring to accommodate the thermal expansion of the vanes. However, the rail adds weight to the shroud ring, increases the thermal mismatch between the vanes and the shroud ring, and increases the thermal stress in the shroud ring.
Thus disadvantages to slip joints are reduced material available in the shroud ring for carrying hoop stress, stress concentrations adjacent the vanes leading and trailing edges, radial space taken by the shroud rings and rails, increased weight, increased thermal mismatch between the vanes and shroud rings, and increased thermal stress in the shroud rings.
Accordingly, there is a need for a stator vane that when bicast to shroud rings increases the stator's structural integrity, and reduces thermal stresses. | {
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1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a modular sofa assembly and, more particularly, to a sofa assembly having a pair of rocking-reclining chair sections removably secured to a low-profile center console section by a mounting apparatus in a side-by-side configuration.
2. Discussion
Present day sofas often incorporate one or more seating sections which function as recliners to provide a significant degree of added comfort when compared with conventional sofas which incorporate a single fixed seating arrangement. Such sofa assemblies incorporating one or more reclining seating sections enable the owner to "customize" a sofa assembly to fit his/her specific needs and lifestyle.
In this regard, U.S. Pat. No. 5,326,153 to Muffi discloses a sectional sofa arrangement that includes a glider/rocker recliner. However, certain comfort features of the rocker recliner are given up when utilized in this configuration. For example, the inboard arm rest of the rocker recliner is removed to enable the end unit chair to be assembled in the sofa assembly. Additionally, it would be advantageous to provide table top and storage areas proximate to the seating units.
With sofa assemblies as described above, it has heretofore been necessary to secure the various independent sections together via use of a permanent frame, usually constructed integrally with the various seating sections at the factory. Accordingly, the sofa assembly must be shipped as a single, relatively large structure.
While the permanent frame has proved to provide adequate structural strength to the sofa assembly, it would be desirable to provide means for securing the various sections of a modular sofa assembly together after the assembly has reached its destination. This would significantly ease the shipping and handling of such sofa assemblies as the various components thereof could be shipped and handled independently. At the destination, the ability to individually position the components of the assembly would contribute to its transportation, for example, within hallways and through doorways of rooms in a home, apartment or office. This ability would also allow a sofa assembly to be placed in rooms which previously were inaccessible for the unitary, large and cumbersome assemblies. The overall weight of these unitary assemblies would make a typical sofa difficult to handle and transport, whereas the individual components are easily handled and transported when detached from the sofa assembly.
It would further be desirable if such a frame-like mounting apparatus as described above incorporated some means of enabling the modular sections of the sofa assembly to be laterally adjusted to compensate for variations in thicknesses of fabric and padding of individual components, as well as design differences between dissimilar components. The need for allowing some adjustability in a frame-like mounting apparatus as described above is particularly acute when one or more rocker recliner chair sections are included in the modular sofa assembly. The rocker recliner sections must be able to rock and recline freely with a minimum amount of friction from adjacent modular components, and yet the clearance between the rocker recliner sections in other components must not be so great as to create unsightly gaps between adjacent sections of the sofa assembly.
An advantage of such a frame-like mounting apparatus would be the flexibility in changing the configuration of the sofa assembly as the needs of the owner change. For example, if the sofa assembly was originally purchased with three sitting sections, the center seat section could, at a later time, be replaced with a center console section, or vice versa. Accordingly, there would be no need for the owner to order an entire new sofa assembly if the owner desired to utilize the sofa in a different configuration than originally purchased.
Still additional advantages would be derived from a mounting apparatus which is secured to the individual frame components associated with each individual section. The mounting apparatus of each individual component could be used to easily and rigidly interconnect the frame members of each seating section. The mounting apparatus should be small and lightweight such that the average homeowner would easily be able to assemble the modular unit.
It is therefore a principal object of the present invention to provide a sofa assembly which includes a pair of rocking reclining chairs positioned on either side of a center console section.
A further object of the present invention provides an arm rest which may be fixedly or movably positioned in a use position on the inboard side of the chair.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a low-profile center console section which facilitates rocking reclining motion of a seated occupant.
It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a mounting apparatus for a modular sofa assembly which allows various sections of a modular sofa assembly to be removeably secured together at the factory or at the destination where the sofa assembly is to be installed.
It is still a further object of the present invention to provide a mounting apparatus which may be secured to various sections of a modular sofa assembly, quickly, easily and without requiring special tools.
It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a mounting apparatus which enables independent seating sections to be easily and conveniently shipped and handled and subsequently secured together to form a modular assembly.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide a mounting apparatus which is very inexpensive to produce and which does not add appreciably to the overall complexity of the modular sofa or its assembly. | {
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In high-speed wireless transmission, it is important to improve efficiency of signal transmission using flexible transmission control that can accommodate various traffic. Traffic control techniques include time scheduling and frequency scheduling, and, for example, frequency scheduling in MC-CDMA (multi-carrier CDMA) is being studied.
In MC-CDMA, a base station selects subcarriers that have good channels based on channel quality information such as SINR (signal-to-interference plus noise ratio) which is reported from a plurality of communication terminal apparatuses and transmits data. Users use the subcarriers that have good channel states, and therefore communication at a low PER (packet error rate) is possible.
Methods for controlling resources taking into consideration a requirement for delay have also been proposed (for example, Patent Document 1). In such control methods, circuit-switching connections that accompany bandwidths capable of dynamic control are allocated to connections having strict requirements for a transmission delay. After resources are allocated to circuit-switching connections, resources are allocated from the unassigned resource pool to connections that have a high degree of allowance for a transmission delay.
Patent Document 1: Japanese Patent Publication Laid-Open No. 2001-512939 | {
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The semiconductor industry currently uses different types of semiconductor-based imagers, such as charge coupled devices (CCDs), photodiode arrays, charge injection devices and hybrid focal plane arrays, among others.
Because of the inherent limitations and expense of CCD technology, CMOS imagers have been increasingly used as low cost imaging devices. A CMOS imager circuit includes a focal plane array of pixel cells, each one of the cells including either a photodiode, a photogate or a photoconductor overlying a doped region of a substrate for accumulating photo-generated charge in the underlying portion of the substrate. A readout circuit is connected to each pixel cell and includes a charge transfer section formed on the substrate adjacent the photodiode, photogate or photoconductor having a charge sensing node, typically a floating diffusion node, connected to the gate of a source follower output transistor. The imager may include at least one transistor for transferring charge from the charge accumulation region of the substrate to the floating diffusion node and also has a transistor for resetting the diffusion node to a predetermined charge level prior to charge transfer.
In a conventional CMOS imager, the active elements of a pixel cell typically perform the necessary functions of: (1) photon to charge conversion; (2) accumulation of image charge; (3) transfer of charge to the floating diffusion node; (4) resetting the floating diffusion node to a known state before the transfer of charge to it; (5) selection of a pixel for readout; and (6) output and amplification of a signal representing pixel charge. The charge at the floating diffusion node is converted to a pixel output voltage by the source follower output transistor. The photosensitive element of a CMOS imager pixel is typically either a depleted p-n junction photodiode or a field induced depletion region beneath a photogate.
CMOS imaging circuits of the type discussed above are generally known and discussed in, for example, Nixon et al., “256.times.256 CMOS Active Pixel Sensor Camera-on-a-Chip,” IEEE Journal of Solid-State Circuits, Vol. 31(12), pp. 2046-2050 (1996); and Mendis et al., “CMOS Active Pixel Image Sensors,” IEEE Transactions on Electron Devices, Vol. 41(3), pp. 452-453 (1994), the disclosures of which are incorporated by reference herein.
A schematic top view of a semiconductor wafer fragment of one exemplary CMOS sensor pixel four-transistor (4T) cell 10 is illustrated in FIG. 1. As it will be described below, the CMOS sensor pixel cell 10 includes a photo-generated charge accumulating area 21 in an underlying portion of the substrate. This area 21 is formed as a pinned photodiode 11, shown in FIG. 2, formed as part of a p-n-p structure within a substrate 20. The pinned photodiode is termed “pinned” because the potential in the photodiode is pinned to a constant value when the photodiode is fully depleted. It should be understood, however, that the CMOS sensor pixel cell 10 may include a photogate, photoconductor or other image to charge converting device, in lieu of a pinned photodiode, as the initial accumulating area 21 for photo-generated charge.
The CMOS image sensor 10 of FIG. 1 has a transfer gate 30 for transferring photoelectric charges generated in the charge accumulating region 21 to a floating diffusion region (sensing node) 25. The floating diffusion region 25 is further connected to a gate 50 of a source follower transistor. The source follower transistor provides an output signal to a row select access transistor having gate 60 for selectively gating the output signal to terminal 32. A reset transistor having gate 40 resets the floating diffusion region 25 to a specified charge level before each charge transfer from the charge accumulating region 21.
As noted, the charge accumulating region 21 may be formed as a pinned p-n-p photodiode 11 which has a p-type layer 24, an n-type region 26 and the p-type substrate 20. The pinned photodiode 11 includes two p-type regions 20, 24 and the n-type photodiode region 26 which is fully depleted at a pinning voltage. Impurity doped source/drain regions 22 (FIG. 1), preferably having n-type conductivity, are provided on either side of the transistor gates 40, 50, 60. The floating diffusion region 25 adjacent the transfer gate 30 is also preferable n-type.
FIG. 2 also illustrates a portion of trench isolation regions 15 formed adjacent the charge accumulating region 21. The trench isolation regions 15 are typically formed using a conventional STI process or by using a Local Oxidation of Silicon (LOCOS) process and serve to isolate pixels one from another. A translucent or transparent insulating layer 55 formed over the CMOS image sensor 10 is also illustrated in FIG. 2. Conventional processing methods are used to form, for example, contacts 32 (FIG. 1) in the insulating layer 55 to provide an electrical connection to the source/drain regions 22, the floating diffusion region 25, and other wiring to connect to gates and other connections in the CMOS image sensor 10.
PNP buried photodiodes, such as the pinned photodiode 11 of FIG. 2, are becoming increasingly popular for high efficiency image sensors, particularly for image sensors operating at smaller wavelengths of the visible spectrum, for example, at the blue wavelength. The pinned buried photodiode presents an advantage to a conventional CMOS imager in that it increases the efficiency of charge transfer, improves color response for blue light and decreases dark current (generation of thermally-created electrons that raise potential without any illumination), as described in detail in U.S. Pat. No. 5,181,093 and U.S. Pat. No. 6,297,070, for example.
CMOS imagers with pinned buried photodiodes have a drawback, however, in that the charge is not completely transferred from the photodiode charge collection region 26 to the floating diffusion node 25 due to the formation of various potential barriers at the transfer gate 30. One potential barrier is formed when charge depletes to the pinned (or maximum) potential, at which point the electrostatic potential at the buried charge collection region 26 is higher than the potential at the end of the transfer gate channel adjacent to the buried photodiode. When this occurs, the pinned buried photodiode potential is high enough for some of the electrons to stay back in the photodiode charge collection region 26 rather than to move into the transfer gate 30 and then onto the floating diffusion node 25.
Another potential barrier occurs between the transfer gate 30 and the floating diffusion node 25. After some electrons have been transferred to the floating diffusion node 25, the electrostatic potential of the floating diffusion decreases. This causes a lower potential level at the floating diffusion node end of the transfer gate, such that some of the electrons stay back in the transfer gate channel rather than moving into the floating diffusion node 25. The closing of the potential difference between the floating diffusion node 25 and the channel region under the transfer gate 30 causes backspilling of electrons from the floating diffusion node 25 to the transfer gate channel. This charge stored in the transfer gate channel will be spilled equally into the floating diffusion and the photodiode when the transfer gate is being turned off. However, if channel impurity gradient is present, this charge will be preferably directed into the floating diffusion node when the transfer gate is turned off.
Accordingly, an improved charge transfer between the buried photodiode and the transfer gate, and a subsequent charge transfer between the transfer gate and the floating diffusion node are desirable. An improved charge transfer would improve voltage swing on the floating diffusion made and confer a lower voltage operation. A device that is less likely to form potential barriers would also be more easily manufactured because it would be less sensitive to process variations. By suppressing potential barrier formation in the transfer gate region, backspilling of electrons from the floating diffusion node to the transfer gate channel could be reduced.
A method of fabricating an active pixel photosensor exhibiting these improvements is also needed. | {
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The Arabic script is written from right to left and is essentially and obligatorily cursive: letters are horizontally linked to one another without the intervening blank spaces customary in the printing of European languages. The writing of Arabic in a simplified form involving the intrusion of such spaces has been implemented in order to facilitate the use of equipment and procedures originally designed for Western languages, but the results are invariably unacceptable from an esthetic point of view. To achieve a tolerable compliance with the ordinary calligraphic style, a variety of shapes must be provided for most letters of the alphabet. This is done, for instance, on the usual Arabic typewriter keyboard. Of course the selection of the appropriate form of each letter devolves upon the typist, even though this choice is completely determined by the orthographic context, specifically, by the immediately preceding and the immediately following character. This implementation necessitates a multiplication of the number of keys and so results in a reduction of typing speed, especially since many of the variant shapes are on shifted keys. (The Arabic script does not have the upper-case vs. lower-case distinction of Western typography). In any case, Arabic typewriters must reduce the inventory of variant forms to limit the size of the keyboard, and this results in a definite degradation of the quality of the Arabic script produced, as judged by the standards of either traditional manual calligraphy or full-scale typographic composition.
A further problem is that the shape assumed by most letters depends on the following character, which cannot be known in advance. Usually one must know what character follows the present one before one can draw it correctly. Hence a lag in response to the user is introduced in those few proposed systems where an effort is made to relieve the typist of the task of selecting the particular form of each letter as well as the letter itself.
In summary, existing devices suffer from one or more of the following drawbacks:
(1) calligraphically poor output due to over-simplification of the cursive script;
(2) imposition on the user of the (unnecessary) task of selecting the particular context-determined form of each letter;
(3) delay in response to user input when subsequent context is unknown. | {
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An individual with normal vision fixates an object or stimulus binocularly and visually responds to it as a single entity. Early in the history of visual science, it was assumed that the visual axes of a person intersect precisely at the point of regard of the viewed object or stimulus to result in a classic stimulation of corresponding retinal elements. For some time, however, investigators have known that the visual axes may be over or under converged and experimentation and observation has been carried out from as early as 1900 to detect the presence of this fixation disparity. In connection with these investigations, reference is made to the following publication:
I. Ogle, K. N., Researches in Binocular Vision, Hafner, New York, 1972. PA1 II. Mallett, R. F. J., A Fixation Disparity Test for Distance Use. The Optician, 1523927,1, July 8, 1966. PA1 III. Mallett, R. F. J., The Investigation of Heterphoria at Near and a New Fixation Disparity Technique, The Optician, 148, 3844-3845, December 1963. PA1 IV. Ogle, K. N., T. G. Martens, and J. A. Dyer, Oculomotor Imbalance in Binocular Vision and Fixation Disparity, Philadelphia, Lea and Febiger, 1967. PA1 V. Hebbard, F., Foveal fixation disparity measurements and their use in determining the relationship between accommadative convergence and accommodation, Am. J. Optom. Arch. Am. Acad. Optom., 37(1): 3-26, 1960.
Within certain small limits of such variations or misalignments, a sensory fusion of the monocular images as preceived by each eye still will occur. This small amount of misalignment which is physiologicallly allowed is due to the existence of Panum's fusional area and the angular subtense of the misalignment generally is described as a fixation disparity. Under the phenomenon, the image of the fixation point stimulates disparate retinal elements without diplopia resulting.
Past experimental techniques investigating fixation disparity have looked to an evaluation under both distance and near vision conditions, inasmuch as the oculomotor balance changes for stimuli situated at varying distances from the eye. Distant-vision measurments, for example at about 2.5 meters from a subject's eyes, involved the utilization of a lantern projected central fusable square of about 1.5.degree. visual angle within which short vertical bright lines were located. These lines or arrows were polarized, vertically displaced with respect to each other and movable horizontally at the square to define a variable mutual horizontal displacement. The subject being tested, perceiving the target through a phorometer to which had been attached a pair of Polaroid filters of mutually opposed polarization, observed the arrows at the target which were projected with complementary polarization, so that when viewed by the subject, one line would be seen by one eye and the other with the other eye. By mechanically adjusting the lantern, the displacement of the two arrows was read at that location at which the test subject indicated that the lines appeared to be vertically aligned. The actual physical separation of the lines represented the value of fixation disparity. Test instrumentation for near vision evaluation involved a similar geometry, however a mechanical device provided the two vertical lines, one movable with respect to the other by a mechanical adjustment. For further data concerning such prior test arrangements, reference is made to Publication I above.
Devices generally available in the marketplace for evaluating fixation disparity similarly utilize a polarization technique for effecting the visual isolation of each eye with respect to aligned targets. However, the test mechanisms do not provide an indication of fixation disparity, the test results only indicating the presence or absence of the phenomenon. For a more detailed discourse concerning such instrumentation, reference is made to the following publications:
Where an effective and precise evaluation of the amount of disparity is made available, the resultant data can be much more useful to the clinician in a diagnosis of binocular imbalance in the oculomotor system than an indication merely representing the presence or absence of the phenomenon. For fully effective diagnosis, the fixation disparity data must be of sufficient detail with respect to the precise angular extent of misalignment so as to be capable of combination with other clinical indicators or variables of binocular oculomotor balance. For example, an important such combination provides for the development of forced-vergence-fixation-disparity curves. See in this regard:
As indicated above, presently available devices for analyzing fixation disparity do not develop data suited for full clinical diagnosis, the subject being tested merely observing whether line images perceived in isolation by each eye appear aligned or not. Should the lines appear misaligned to the patient, then ophthalmic prisms are interposed in front of the eyes until the fixation disparity is eliminated. The measurement recorded by this current test is the amount of prism necessary to eliminate the fixation disparity.
Among the additional of the above-mentioned clinical indicators evaluated in the diagnosis of oculomoter balance are heterophoria and vergence. Heterophoria may be evaluated by the Von Graefe method of vertical disassociation. With this method, a target is viewed through a phorometer. With the arrangement, the eyes are disassociated vertically utilizing ophthalmic prisms whereupon double vision is observed. Following this initial procedure, lateral ophthalmic prisms are interposed in the phorometer in incremental amounts until the vertically displaced images appear to be vertically aligned. The resultant evaluation provides data concerning the position of the eyes when there is no stimulus for fusion. Vergence testing is carried out in similar fashion, however, no vertical disassociation is provided, convergent and divergent eye movements elicited by horizontal ophthalmic prisms in small increments to the points of image blur and image break or diplopia, the amount of prism inserted at each point being recorded. Vertical heterophorias and vergences can be similarly measured by changing the prism orientations by 90 degrees.
While the information made available from tests for phoria and vergence remain as valuable diagnostic inputs, considerable value would be promised with a provision of accurate fixation disparity data, in the analysis of oculomotor imbalances. The test instrumentation for carrying out the earlier experimentation required very fine movements of the target lines through the use of micrometers and the like, and, thus, has not found practical introduction into the clinical market as a practical testing procedure.
From the foregoing it may be observed that a need exists for a test method and apparatus which achieves an accurate measurement of the degree of misalignment evoked by a patient's fixation disparity. However, before such apparatus can be made available on a somewhat universal clinical basis, it must be fabricable as well as operable at relatively low cost. | {
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1. Field
Aspects of the present invention relate to a thin film deposition apparatus and a method of manufacturing an organic light-emitting display device by using the same, and more particularly, to a thin film deposition apparatus that can be easily used to manufacture large-sized display devices on a mass scale and that improves manufacturing yield and improves thickness uniformity of deposited thin films, and a method of manufacturing an organic light-emitting display device by using the thin film deposition apparatus.
2. Description of the Related Art
Organic light-emitting display devices have a larger viewing angle, better contrast characteristics, and a faster response rate than other display devices, and thus have drawn attention as a next-generation display device.
Organic light-emitting display devices generally have a stacked structure including an anode, a cathode, and an emission layer interposed between the anode and the cathode. The devices display images in color when holes and electrons, injected respectively from the anode and the cathode, recombine in the emission layer and thus emit light. However, it is difficult to achieve high light-emission efficiency with such a structure, and thus intermediate layers, including an electron injection layer, an electron transport layer, a hole transport layer, a hole injection layer, etc., are optionally additionally interposed between the emission layer and each of the electrodes.
Also, it is practically very difficult to form fine patterns in organic thin films such as the emission layer and the intermediate layers, and red, green, and blue light-emission efficiency varies according to the organic thin films. For these reasons, it is not easy to form an organic thin film pattern on a large substrate, such as a mother glass having a size of 5G or more, by using a conventional thin film deposition apparatus. Therefore, it is difficult to manufacture large organic light-emitting display devices having satisfactory driving voltage, current density, brightness, color purity, light-emission efficiency, life-span characteristics. Thus, there is a demand for improvement in this regard.
An organic light-emitting display device includes intermediate layers, including an emission layer disposed between a first electrode and a second electrode that are arranged opposite to each other. The interlayer and the first and second electrodes may be formed using a variety of methods one of which is a deposition method. When an organic light-emitting display device is manufactured using the deposition method, a fine metal mask (FMM) having the same pattern as a thin film to be formed is disposed to closely contact a substrate, and a thin film material is deposited over the FMM in order to form the thin film having the desired pattern. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to high frequency switches to be mounted on boards and methods of testing high frequency apparatus by means of such h-f switches.
2. Description of the Related Art
A conventional method of testing the performance of each of h-f circuits mounted on the same board includes the steps of cutting off signal conductor between the respective h-f circuits, picking up signals from the cut off portions for testing, and, after testing, filling the cut off portions with conductor for soldering. Another method includes putting earphone jack coaxial connectors in transmission lines to take signals for testing h-f circuits connected to the transmission lines. H-f switches are used to switch between built-in speakers and earphones or outside and inside antennas in the RF (coaxial) circuits of RF apparatus such as portable phones and BS or ordinary TV sets.
Such h-f switches includes a pair of parallel ground conductive plates and an non-ground conductive plate disposed between and at right angles with the parallel ground conductive plates to provide an impedance match. The switches are used to switch between two circuits A and B mounted in an apparatus without disturbing the impedance match. Consequently, it is necessary to mount two circuits (if one of them is open, then an open circuit) in the apparatus.
In addition, the outputs of the two circuits are made parallel to the board on which the h-f switch is mounted so that it is necessary to make a signal pick-up circuit to take a signal from one of the outputs or to mount the switch on an edge of the board thereby providing a large space around the output.
The above method in which the cut-off conductor portions are soldered after testing requires a large number of steps of operation. In the testing method in which an earphone jack coaxial connector is disposed on the transmission line, the coaxial connector lowers the impedance of a portion of the transmission line, causing an impedance mismatch and reflection at the connector. The connector is disposed on the transmission line without cutting the line so that it is impossible to pick up all of the signals because part of the signals still flow the transmission line.
Such problems with the above methods will be described more specifically with reference to FIGS. 1-3. In FIG. 1, an non-ground conductive plate 11a is disposed between and at right angles with parallel ground conductive plates 12a to provide an impedance match. It is known that even if the non-ground conductive plate 11a is bent as shown by broken lines, the impedance match is maintained. However, as shown in FIG. 2, when the ground conductive plates 21a are disposed in parallel to the board 23a or, as shown in FIG. 3, when the ground conductive plates 31a are disposed in perpendicular to the board, the output directions of circuits A and B are parallel to the board 23a or 33a.
That is, as shown in FIG. 4, when such a h-f switch 41a is mounted on a board 42a, the output directions of circuits A and B are parallel to the board 42a. Where the output of circuit A is a transmission line for supplying signals and signals are taken out from the output of circuit B, it is necessary to provide either a signal pick-up circuit matched to the output of the circuit B or a large space around the circuit B at the expense of other components. In addition, it is very hard to take out a signal in the direction of B or parallel to the board 42a.
In order to avoid such a problem, as shown in FIG. 5, an h-f switch 51a is mounted on an edge of a board 52a. However, this puts limits to the location of an h-f switch and makes it impossible to test all of the h-f circuits.
As shown in FIG. 6, where a coaxial connector 61a is put on a h-f transmission line 62a an impedance mismatch occurs at the location of the coaxial connector 61a, causing reflection at the location of the coaxial connector 61a. The value of transmitted signals N is equal to the value of (transmitting signals L--reflected signals R) so that the value of N decreases as the frequency or power increases.
Where signals are taken out from the coaxial connector 61a in the direction perpendicular to the board 62a, most of the transmitting signals L are transmitted as the transmitted signals N so that the value of picked-up signals M is very low. The value of the picked-up signals M also decreases as the frequency or power increases. | {
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A network-accessible system commonly implements a web application using a plurality of application instances, provided by a plurality of computing devices. A load balancer directs an end user's request to one of the application instances based on any selection strategy, such as a round-robin selection strategy.
An administrator will typically conduct one or more tests on the system to ensure that it is providing acceptable service to its end users. Known tests, however, are labor intensive and sometimes inconclusive. | {
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Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image forming apparatus.
Description of the Related Art
In an electrophotographic image forming apparatus, charging of a surface of a photosensitive drum is performed uniformly by a charger, and the charged surface of the photosensitive drum is exposed by a laser beam which is modulated in accordance with image data and irradiated by an exposure unit, thereby forming an electrostatic latent image. Then, by a developer (hereinafter referred to as a toner) supplied from a developing unit, the electrostatic latent image is developed and a toner image is thereby formed.
For photosensitive drum surface charge processing, an AC charging scheme that charges by causing a charging roller to abut the surface of the photosensitive drum, for example, applying a voltage that overlaps a direct current voltage and an alternating voltage to the charging roller, and discharging to the surface of the photosensitive drum is employed. In this AC charging scheme, the surface of the photosensitive drum can be charged uniformly because discharge to the positive side and to the negative side occurs alternatingly because voltage that overlaps an alternating voltage on a direct current voltage is applied.
A class-D amplifier is used for an alternating voltage generation circuit for generating an alternating voltage applied to this charging roller. This class-D amplifier converts an input signal into a pulse width modulation signal (a PWM signal), and drives a bridge circuit by the PWM signal. With this, compared to a conventional analog amplification scheme, the amplification signal can be obtained with high efficiency. With such an alternating voltage generation circuit, a high-voltage alternating voltage is caused to occur on a secondary side of a transformer by driving a primary side of the transformer by a class-D amplifier output (refer to Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2013-65932, Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. H7-241083, for example).
However, because the class-D amplifier performs switching driving of a bridge circuit at a high frequency, a radiation noise occurs, and because a ferrite bead or a filter is used as a noise counter-measure, this leads to a cost increase. Also, if the class-D amplifier is used by a charging high-voltage circuit of a color image forming apparatus having 4 image forming units for yellow, magenta, cyan, and black, it is necessary to charge each photosensitive drum for the four colors. For this reason, there is the problem that the frequencies of the PWM signals of the class-D amplifiers used corresponding to respective color photosensitive drums overlap, and radiation noise worsens. | {
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1. Field
The present invention relates to a blade with a turbine operating in water, such as a device driven by tidal or river flow. It is particularly designed for a turbine arranged to rotate about a horizontal axis. However, the blade is suitable for use in any orientation.
2. Description of the Related Art
For a turbine arranged to rotate about a horizontal axis in water, the blades are conventionally hollow. However, this leads to a problem in that as the blade rotates about the horizontal axis, its depth changes. At the tip of the blade, there is a variation in depth in a single rotation equal to the diameter of the blade. This subjects the blade to significant variations in static pressure, which, on a hollow blade translates to repeat expansive and compressive forces giving rise to potentially severe cyclical stress problems.
One attempt to solve this problem is disclosed in WO 2004/029448.
This raises the possibility of filling the void with a light-weight material such as foamed plastic, but observes that the cyclic loading will cause the filler material to become detached from the outer shell thereby creating a void. WO 2004/029448 rejects this approach in favour of filling the blade with liquid. The pressure of this liquid is then allowed to fluctuate either by allowing liquid into and out of the blade, or by providing a pressure compensating device such as a diaphragm or piston to equalise the internal and external pressures.
With a liquid filled device, the centrifugal forces which are experienced in use will cause an increase in pressure at the tip of the blade. If this is vented, the internal space of the blade is not sealed and can be subject to fouling. On the other hand, if the space is sealed then stress at the tip can cause damage. Also, the variations in internal pressure caused by the centrifugal forces are unpredictable and can damage the internal structure. | {
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Field
Exemplary embodiments relate to a touch screen panel and method of manufacturing the touch screen panel. More particularly, exemplary embodiments relate to a touch screen panel improving a display quality and a method of manufacturing the touch screen panel.
Discussion of the Background
As demands on various type of display devices have recently increased with the development of an information society, studies on display devices, such as a liquid crystal display device (LCD), a plasma display panel (PDP), a field emission display device (FED), an electrophoretic display device (EPD), and an organic light emitting display device (OLED), have been actively conducted.
Recently, studies have been conducted to apply a touch screen panel function to such display devices. A touch screen panel is an input device which enables a command to be inputted by touching a screen of a display device using an object, such as a finger or pen. Since such a touch screen panel can be substituted for a separate input device connected to a display device, such as a keyboard or mouse, its application fields have been gradually extended.
Touch screen panels are divided into a resistive overlay touch screen panel, a photosensitive touch screen panel, a capacitive touch screen panel, and the like. Among these touch screen panels, the capacitive touch screen panel converts information of a contact position into an electrical signal by sensing a change in the capacitance formed between a conductive sensing pattern and an adjacent sensing pattern, ground electrode or the like whenever an object, such as a user's hand or pen, comes in contact with the touch screen panel.
Generally, a touch screen panel includes a touch electrode formed of indium tin oxide (ITO). However, since indium is expensive, manufacturing costs may be increased.
Accordingly, a touch electrode using an opaque metal mesh pattern has been developed. The opaque metal mesh pattern has high conductivity and is less expensive than indium.
When a metal mesh pattern is used for a touch electrode, a dry-etching process may be used. However, when a metal mesh pattern is formed by the dry-etching process, defects of aluminum wiring, such as under-cut, may occur.
The above information disclosed in this Background section is only for enhancement of understanding of the background of the inventive concept, and, therefore, it may contain information that does not form the prior art that is already known in this country to a person of ordinary skill in the art. | {
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The natural intervertebral disc contains a jelly-like nucleus pulposus surrounded by a fibrous annulus fibrosus. Under an axial load, the nucleus pulposus compresses and radially transfers that load to the annulus fibrosus. The laminated nature of the annulus fibrosus provides it with a high tensile strength and so allows it to expand radially in response to this transferred load.
In a healthy intervertebral disc, cells within the nucleus pulposus produce an extracellular matrix (ECM) containing a high percentage of proteoglycans. These proteoglycans contain sulfated functional groups that retain water, thereby providing the nucleus pulposus with its cushioning qualities. These nucleus pulposus cells may also secrete small amounts of cytokines as well as matrix metalloproteinases (MMPs). These cytokines and MMPs help regulate the metabolism of the nucleus pulposus cells.
In some instances of degenerative disc disease (DDD), gradual degeneration of the intervertebral disc is caused by mechanical instabilities in other portions of the spine. In these instances, increased loads and pressures on the nucleus pulposus cause the cells within the disc (or invading macrophages) to emit larger than normal amounts of the above-mentioned cytokines. In other instances of DDD, genetic factors or apoptosis can also cause the cells within the nucleus pulposus to emit toxic amounts of these cytokines and MMPs. In some instances, the pumping action of the disc may malfunction (due to, for example, a decrease in the proteoglycan concentration within the nucleus pulposus), thereby retarding the flow of nutrients into the disc as well as the flow of waste products out of the disc. This reduced capacity to eliminate waste may result in the accumulation of high levels of proinflammatory cytokines and/or MMPs that may cause nerve irritation and pain.
As DDD progresses, toxic levels of the cytokines and MMPs present in the nucleus pulposus begin to degrade the extracellular matrix. In particular, the MMPs (as mediated by the cytokines) begin cleaving the water-retaining portions of the proteoglycans, thereby reducing their water-retaining capabilities. This degradation leads to a less flexible nucleus pulposus, and so changes the loading pattern within the disc, thereby possibly causing delamination of the annulus fibrosus. These changes cause more mechanical instability, thereby causing the cells to emit even more cytokines, typically thereby upregulating MMPs. As this destructive cascade continues and DDD further progresses, the disc begins to bulge (“a herniated disc”), and then ultimately ruptures, causing the nucleus pulposus to contact the spinal cord and produce pain.
One proposed method of managing these problems is to remove the problematic disc and replace it with a porous device that restores disc height and allows for bone growth therethrough for the fusion of the adjacent vertebrae. These devices are commonly called “fusion devices”.
Designs of intervertebral fusion devices are generally either box-like (i.e., Smith-Robinson style) or threaded cylinders (i.e., Cloward style). Smith-Robinson style implants have the advantage of possessing better contact area to the vertebral endplates, but rely on a coarse surface texture (such as teeth) to prevent their migration once implanted. Insertion then requires over distraction of the disc space to slide the implant in or to provide a smoother implant, which can migrate post-op.
One such box-like design is the Brantigan cage, which is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,743,256 (“Brantigan”). Brantigan discloses an improved surgical method for eliminating spinal back pain caused by ruptured or degenerated vertebral discs by spanning the disc space between adjacent vertebrae with rigid fusion devices, or “cages”, having surfaces facilitating bone ingrowth and bottomed on prepared sites of the vertebrae to integrate the implant with the vertebrae and to provide a permanent weight supporting strut maintaining the disc space.
One commercial box-like design is the injection-molded carbon fiber reinforced PEEK (CFRP) cage made by DePuy Spine. However, these cages are difficult to insert because of the interference fit that is required for intervertebral space distraction. In addition, the reinforced PEEK material that makes up the teeth is brittle and so is susceptible to breakage when applying impact or torque loads to the implant.
Current interbody devices are made from single materials (e.g., machined titanium, or molded and/or machined PEEK). Titanium has the disadvantage of being radiopaque (which can interfere with fusion assessment on x-ray) while also having a high modulus of elasticity (which can stress shield the bone graft). Injection molded CFRP is very brittle and susceptible to fracture during insertion. Unreinforced PEEK is much less brittle but also weaker than carbon-filled PEEK, requiring thicker-walled designs (diminishing space for bone graft). In addition, the teeth of an unreinforced PEEK cage are softer and so may allow more migration. Both PEEK and carbon-filled PEEK are radiolucent.
U.S. Pat. No. 6,824,565 (“Muhana”) discloses implant and instrument designs wherein some of the implant embodiments have planked designs and a mating inserter instrument. However, the disclosed inserter wraps around the exterior of the implant and partially into grooves on the implant. Moreover, the disclosed implant is derived from bone and is not hollow. The insertion technique disclosed by Muhana requires a cutting tool to prepare a channel for the implant.
US Patent Publication 2008-0154377 (Voellmicke) discloses a cage adapted to contain an inserter within its inner volume during insertion.
US Patent Publication 2009-0198339 (Kleiner) discloses an implantable intervertebral fusion cage including a removable means for retaining material inside of the cage during implantation. Embodiments are directed toward an implantable intervertebral fusion cage that includes at least one removable shield or veneer that is capable of retaining a surgically useful material, such as a spinal fusion-inducing material, inside of the fusion cage during implantation and/or until the shield or veneer is removed. None of the Kleiner shields cover the teeth of the cages.
U.S. Pat. No. 7,569,054 (Michelson) discloses disc space docking and distraction means. In particular, Michelson discloses an apparatus for use in human surgery has a tubular member with a passage for providing protected access to a surgical site. The passage has a minimum width transverse to the mid-longitudinal axis of the tubular member. Two opposed extensions extend from the distal end of the tubular member. The extensions each have a length and a maximum height perpendicular to the length. The maximum height of the extensions are less than the length of each extension and greater than one-half the minimum width of the passage. Each extension has an interior surface at least in part facing the mid-longitudinal axis of the tubular member. The interior surfaces of the extensions are spaced apart from one another along the length of each extension a distance no less than the minimum width of the passage. Each extension has opposed bone contacting surfaces configured to contact portions of bone.
Other relevant instruments include those disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 7,008,431 (“Simonson”); U.S. Pat. No. 5,797,909 (“Michelson II”); U.S. Pat. No. 6,080,155 (“Michelson III”); U.S. Pat. No. 6,096,038 (“Michelson IV”); U.S. Pat. No. 7,300,440 (“Zdeblick”); and US Patent Publication 2009-0198339 (“Kleiner”).
In summary, the insertion of both smooth and toothed intervertebral cages has proven to be problematic due to high resistance forces (friction) and interference fit of the cage and intervertebral space. Whereas toothed cages are difficult to insert, cages with smooth upper and lower surfaces have demonstrated undesirable migration.
Current injection-molded PEEK or carbon fiber reinforced PEEK (CFRP) cages are difficult to insert because of the interference fit between the textured/spiked surfaces of the implant and the bony endplates.
The difficulty of direct, unshielded cage insertion and final positioning in the disc space also increases the likelihood of bony endplate damage, as the disc space preparation, FSU distraction forces and insertion trajectory are variable.
Consistent and accurate placement of the posteriorly inserted spinal fusion cages is difficult because light tamping and impaction are employed for final positioning. Cages have been over inserted via pushing or impaction through the annulus and into the adjacent body cavities and/or structures.
Most cages are filled with graft and/or bone inducing substances including BMP and collagen sponge. It has been found that the graft and/or BMP frequently drips or falls out of the graft retaining pockets. The uncontrolled delivery of the BMP/graft can irritate adjacent tissues and prompt bone formation in undesired locations including heterotopic bone.
Many spinal fusion procedures require either pre and or post packing of the disc space, thereby increasing patient risk and operative time. | {
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Many vehicles are used over a wide range of vehicle speeds, including both forward and reverse movement. Some types of engines, however, are capable of operating efficiently only within a narrow range of speeds. Consequently, transmissions capable of efficiently transmitting power at a variety of speed ratios are frequently employed. When the vehicle is at low speed, the transmission is usually operated at a high speed ratio such that it multiplies the engine torque for improved acceleration. At high vehicle speed, operating the transmission at a low speed ratio permits an engine speed associated with quiet, fuel efficient cruising. Typically, a transmission has a housing mounted to the vehicle structure, an input shaft driven by an engine crankshaft, and an output shaft driving the vehicle wheels, often via a differential assembly which permits the left and right wheel to rotate at slightly different speeds as the vehicle turns. | {
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1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a method and system for generating a schema mapping that composes two given schema mappings.
2. Related Art
Compositional mappings between schemas may be expressed as constraints in logic-based languages. However, there is no known compositional mapping that applies to Extensible Markup Language (XML) schemas. Accordingly, there is a need for a compositional mapping that applies to XML schemas. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The prior art shows a number of different types of footwear, for various purposes, having weight sensors—typically in the form of strain gages—adapted to provide a measurement of a person's weight or the distribution of weight over a footprint area or portion thereof. U.S. Pat. No. 7,174,277 to Vock et al. shows in FIGS. 57-62 a personal weighing system including a strain gage mounted in the tread or sole portion of a shoe and connected to a telemetry system for sending weight information to a remote receiver. (It should be noted re Vock et al. that the disclosures relative to the determination of an individual's weight are highly conceptual and some doubt obtains as to the ability of the systems and devices shown to accurately make the determination claimed. Specifically, determining the true weight of all object depends on the entire weight of the object being borne—supported—by the scale or scales alone. No portion of the object's weight may be borne or supported by anything other than the scale or scales. In the present invention, projecting the scale or scales beneath the shoe's sole insures that all of the subject's weight is borne and supported by the scale or scales alone.) Further prior art is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 6,122,846 to Grey et al., in which strain gages are mounted in a sensing unit in the sole of a shoe-type foot plate apparatus. This system is designed to communicate information to a remote display similar to that of Vock et al. A still further system is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 5,253,654 to Thomas et al. and includes a weight sensor disposed inside the shoe with a strain gage pad connected by a wire to a readout on the wearer's waist. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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For example, Japanese unexamined patent application publication No. 2010-26299 describes an image-forming device having a drawer that can be pulled out from the body of the device, and a plurality of developer cartridges that are detachably mounted in the drawer. Each developer cartridge is provided with a grip part by which a user can hold the developer cartridge. The grip part can be displaced between a stored position in which the grip part is retracted into the drawer, and a grippable position in which the grip part sticks out enough for the user to grasp. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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With the increasing of the size and the high definition of the Liquid Crystal Display, LCD the thin film transistor, TFT with a larger electron mobility has been emerging and show great market prospect. Currently, the Indium Gallium Zinc Oxide, IGZO has been adapted to form amorphous oxide semiconductor, AOS layer of the TFT, also known as IGZO semiconductor pattern layer or channel. Since IGZO is a material extremely sensitive to water and oxygen, the water molecules and oxygen molecules in the LCD working environment can easily affect its electrical properties, so in order to improve the electrical stability of the TFT channel, a protective layer is needed to form on the channel.
The conventional material of the protective layer is typically of silicon oxide SiO2, silicon nitride Si3N4, and usually formed by plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD), atomic layer epitaxy (ALD and magnetron sputtering, etc. in the system. However, the chemical vapor deposition method is easy to incorporate impurity hydrogen atom into the channel, the channel will not only be damaged, but also affect the electrical properties of the channel; the quality of the protective layer prepared by magnetron sputtering is poor and the stability of the channel protection is poor; the process of the atomic layer epitaxy is complex, time-consuming, and therefore not conducive to industrialization. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to wireless, computer controlled transaction processing within merchandising operations, and, more particularly, it relates to a communication network wherein much of such transaction processing is distributed between a centralized station and a plurality of portable data terminals
2. Description of the Related Art
Computer terminals and peripherals have become dramatically smaller and more portable. Many types of peripheral devices exist such as printers, modems, graphics scanners, text scanners, code readers, magnetic card readers, external monitors, voice command interfaces, external storage devices, and so on. Despite the reductions in size, computer terminals still must physically interface with the peripheral devices. This typically involves either the running of a cable from one of the computer terminal to each device (hereinafter “hard-wiring”) or the computer terminal must be docked with the device while the information transfer is to take place.
Hard-wiring poses several problems. If there are many peripheral devices, there must be as many cables attached to the computer terminal. This place a strain on the input/output capabilities of many computer devices. In addition, the wired mass of cabling often creates an eyesore and safety hazard. In addition, attempts to hide cabling behind walls often proves very costly, and such hidden wires are always more difficult to relocate.
Another problem exists when several computer terminals share a peripheral device. Not only must each computer be connected, often via hard-wiring, to the peripheral device, but it must utilize a communication protocol for sharing the communication channel to the peripheral device with the other connected computer terminals. This poses significant problems with different types of computers that do not share a common hard-wired interface or communication protocol.
In smaller computer terminal settings, hand-held or portable terminals, the cabling and connection problem become more severe. For example, excess cabling can transform an otherwise light, portable device into either a stationary device or a heavy, luggable device having dangerous trip cords for cabling.
Physical connections created by hard-wiring often proves to be relatively expensive because cables break and must be replaced. Cable replacement is even more common in portable environments where cables are subject to frequent handling, temperature extremes, dropping and other physical trauma.
An operator who is using, holding or carrying several devices and feels all tied up is not just inconvenienced, he may be severely limited in his mobility and flexibility as he moves about the work area. This loss of mobility and flexibility directly undercuts the entire reason for having small and portable computers and peripheral devices, and greatly increases the likelihood of operator injury.
Attempts to alleviate or eliminate these problems have been made but have not been greatly successful. One solution is to incorporate a computer terminal and all of the peripherals into one unit. However, this solution proves unsatisfactory for several reasons. For example, the incorporation of many devices into one unit greatly increases the size and weight, thus jeopardizing the portability of the unit. Furthermore, incorporating all of the functions into one unit greatly reduces and, in most cases eliminates, the flexibility of the overall system. A user may only wish to use a hand-held computer terminal at times, but at other times may also need to use a printer or occasionally a code reader. An all-incorporated unit thus becomes either overly large because it must include everything, or very limiting because it does not include everything.
Another solution has been to set up Local Area Networks (LAN's) utilizing various forms of RF (Radio Frequency) communication. The LAN's to date, however, have been designed for large scale wireless communications between several portable computer terminals and a host computer. Therein, the host computer, itself generally a stationary device, manages a series of stationary peripherals that, upon requests to the host, may be utilized by the portable terminals.
Other large scale wireless communications have also been developed which for RF communication between several computer terminals and peripheral devices, but all proving to be ineffective as a solution. For example, these systems require the peripheral devices to remain active at all times to listen for an occasional communication. Although this requirement may be acceptable for stationary peripheral devices receiving virtually unlimited power (i.e., when plugged into an AC outlet), it detrimental to portable peripherals by unnecessarily draining battery power. Similarly, in such systems, the computer terminals are also required to remain active to receive an occasional communication not only from the other terminals or the host but also from the peripherals. Again, often unnecessarily, battery power is wasted.
Moreover, in merchandising operations, conventional, stationary merchandizing terminals (e.g., electronic cash registers) which are typically hard-wired to a power source, local communication network, and/or telephone lines provide customer checkout service at a fixed location. Once such terminals are installed, they cannot be easily moved without significant effort in not only moving the terminals themselves but also in the relocation of the power source (typically an AC outlet), communication network and telephone line connections.
Also in merchandising operations, a common problem is found in handling light and heavy checkout loading. To manage heavy customer checkout traffic, each merchandiser, guessing what the peak checkout traffic will be, installs a plurality of stationary merchandizing terminals within a store's premises. If the guess proves too low, additional stationary terminals (each requiring power source, network and telephone connection, i.e., cabling installations) must be added, often causing floor layout problems and very expensive cabling installations which require the store to be temporarily closed. Alternately, if the guess proves too high, a merchandiser must either rip out the station and repair the facilities or suffer the costs of lost space and station upkeep. Furthermore, increases or decreases in customer traffic over time may covert a guess for good to bad, resulting in the need to modify a store's terminal installations.
In addition, in periods of light checkout traffic (i.e., very few customers checking out in relation to the number of stationary merchandizing terminals), most of the stationary merchandising terminals will not be used. In such situations, the space taken up by the stationary terminals is not justified. In periods of heavy checkout traffic (i.e., where numbers of customers wait in lines for access to each available stationary merchandising terminal), merchandisers fear that their customers will see the lines and forego their purchases, or, worse, will become so dissatisfied with the checkout wait that they will vow never to return.
Thus, it may be appreciated that it is often very difficult to predict the number of stationary merchandizing terminal installations that are or will be needed. Moreover, it is even more difficult and costly to change a store's stationary merchandizing terminal installations to conform to such needs.
Attempts have been made to minimize the cost of removing or adding merchandizing terminal installations by replacing the network cabling with an RF communication channel. In such installations, each terminal is fitted with an RF transceiver for communicating, for example, with a centralized host computer located some distance away. However, even with such changes, the aforementioned problems have not been solved. For example, the merchandising terminals still require hard-wiring to a power source, telephone lines (if used) and peripherals. In addition, the RF transmissions used to communicate with the centralized host need relatively high transmission power, requiring access to a virtually unlimited power source (such as is available through an AC outlet).
Thus, there is a need for a communication network that supports the changing need for merchandizing terminals and their peripherals without requiring conventional removal, installation or relocation costs. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Consistent and optimized sensitivity and energy density of energetic materials are essential to their performance and safety in applications such as explosives and propellants. These factors heavily rely on the microscopic morphology of energetic materials including crystalline size, shape, uniformity and purity. See M. Ghosh et al., Cryst. Growth Des. 14, 5053 (2014). Triaminotrinitrobenzene (TATB) is a powerful energetic material which displays superior insensitivity to elements such as shock, impact, vibration or fire over any other known energetic material. See S. F. Rice and R. L. Simpson, The Unusual Stability of TATB: A Review of the Scientific Literature, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore, Calif. (1990). This insensitivity makes TATB the best choice where absolute safety is required. See B. M. Dobratz, The Insensitive High Explosive Triaminotrinitrobenzene (TATB): Development and Characterization, Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory, Los Alamos, N M (1995); W. E. Voreck et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,597,974 A (28 Jan. 1997); and R. Thorpe and W. R. Feairheller, Development of Processes for Reliable Detonator Grade Very Fine Secondary Explosive Powders, Monsanto Research Corporation, Miamisburg, Ohio (1988). However, TATB particles prepared by existing methods typically lack uniformity in crystalline morphology. Such irregularity limits the potential to produce TATB with reproducible and predictable performance. Further, the sharp edges of existing energetic material particles result in detonation hot spots which are responsible for reducing energetic material stability. See M. Ghosh et al., Cryst. Growth Des. 14, 5053 (2014).
Therefore, a need remains for TATB microparticles with uniform particle size and spherical shape. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to modified and improved layered lubricants, such as molybdenum disulfide and graphite.
2. Description of Related Art
Layered substances such as molybdenum disulfide, tungsten disulfide and graphite have been used in the past, both as dry lubricants and as additives dispersed in liquid lubricants to reduce the friction and wear between moving surfaces. These materials initially improve the anti-wear properties and lower the friction when used as a solid lubricant. However, as the two surfaces continue to move against each other, the lubricating particles tend to spread away from the asperity contact points. This results in an increase in the friction.
An example is the case of a drill bit rotating against a metal surface while drilling a hole. Within seconds of drilling, the rotating action makes a solid lubricant move away from the tip of the drill and thus increases the friction between the surfaces in contact. It would be desirable to provide some means for maintaining solid lubricants in position between the moving surfaces where they help to reduce the friction instead of being dispersed away from this area. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a press-fit pin connection checking method and system.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent communications equipment, high-density packaging has proceeded in response to the demands for high performance and multi-functionality to devices to be packaged, so that an increase in number of printed wiring boards layered and a decrease in bonding area and conductor spacing are remarkably proceeding. A component mounting method is also changing from an insert mount technology (IMT) such that a lead is inserted into a through hole and is bonded by flow soldering to a surface mount technology (SMT) such that a component is mounted on a surface pattern and is bonded by reflow soldering, and the SMT is becoming mainstream. At present, the component mounting method is in the shift from the IMT to the SMT, and a printed circuit board (plug-in unit) using both the technologies as mixed is most dominating.
In such a recent trend, a connector component for connecting the printed circuit board to a back wiring board has also changed, and the shift from an insert mount device (IMD) to a surface mount device (SMD) as the connector component has been examined. However, a bonding force for each pin is reduced by adopting the SMT, and the connector component cannot endure a total pressure applied in connecting the printed circuit board and the back wiring board. To cope with this problem, a press-fit connector bonding technique (gastight bonding technique) of press-fitting a press-fit pin into a through hole has risen.
The press-fit connector bonding technique has such merits that the bonding force for each pin is high to ensure a strong holding force of the connector as a whole, that the flow soldering step as a main bonding method in the IMT can be omitted, that the shift to the SMT can be made smoothly, and that the connector is repairable. As seen from the connection between a plug-in unit and a back wiring board, it is considered that the press-fit connector bonding technique will become a dominating technique in the future connector bonding for communications equipment. However, although the IMT is being currently shifted to the SMT, there exist many IMDs that cannot support the SMT, and it is therefore difficult to completely shift the IMT to the SMT in the near future.
In recent communications equipment, not only the high-density packaging has proceeded, but also a signal transmission speed has been increased year by year. Accordingly, increasing a signal transmission speed between a plug-in unit (PIU) and a back wiring board (BWB) is also proceeding. The technique required for high-speed signal transmission includes the suppression of transmission loss, the suppression of reflected waves, and the unification of propagation delay. Accordingly, a connector structure supporting high-speed signal transmission includes a shielding structure, shortening the length of a press-fit pin, and equalizing the lengths of differential signal pair lines. A characteristic impedance is controlled by the shielding structure to suppress the transmission loss. The length of a press-fit pin is shortened to suppress the reflected waves. The lengths of differential signal pair lines are equalized to unify the propagation delay.
While a plug-in unit and a back wiring board are connected by a press-fit connector in general as described above, a plurality of press-fit pins are press-fitted into a plurality of through holes to thereby mount the press-fit connector on the back wiring board or the plug-in unit. Accordingly, it is necessary to check that the press-fit pins are completely press-fitted in the through holes. At present, whether or not the connection of the press-fit pins and the through holes after press-fitting the press-fit pins is acceptable is checked by only visual check for the plug-in unit and by visual check and electrical check in combination for the back wiring board.
FIG. 1 is a schematic sectional view for illustrating a plug-in unit checking method in the prior art. Reference numeral 2 denotes a plug-in unit having a plurality of through holes 4, and reference numeral 6 denotes a press-fit connector having a plurality of press-fit pins 8. The press-fit pins 8 of the press-fit connector 6 are press-fitted into the through holes 4 of the plug-in unit 2 to thereby mount the press-fit connector 6 on the plug-in unit 2. In the conventional visual checking method, whether or not the connection of the press-fit pins 8 and the through holes 4 is acceptable is checked by seeing the through holes 4 from one side (back side) of the plug-in unit 2 opposite to the press-fit connector 6 after press-fitting the press-fit pins 8 into the through holes 4 and by determining whether or not the front ends of the press-fit pins 8 project from the back side of the plug-in unit 2.
Referring to FIG. 2, there is shown a schematic sectional view for illustrating a back wiring board checking method in the prior art. Reference numeral 10 denotes a back wiring board having a plurality of through holes 12, and reference numeral 14 denotes a press-fit connector having a plurality of press-fit pins 16. The press-fit pins 16 of the press-fit connector 14 are press-fitted into the through holes 12 of the back wiring board 10 to thereby mount the press-fit connector 14 on the back wiring board 10. The press-fit connector 6 on the PIU side is preliminarily mounted on a checking printed circuit board 18. The press-fit connector 6 on the PIU side is engaged into the press-fit connector 14 on the BWB side to thereby electrically connect the checking printed circuit board 18 to the back wiring board 10. The checking printed circuit board 18 has a plurality of conductor patterns respectively corresponding to the press-fit pins of the press-fit connector 6 and a plurality of output lands respectively formed at the front ends of the conductor patterns.
In the conventional electrical checking method for the press-fit pins 16 on the BWB side as shown in FIG. 2, two checking printed circuit boards 18 are electrically connected to the back wiring board 10, and the output lands of the two checking printed circuit boards 18 are selectively connected to check the electrical continuity, thereby determining whether or not the press-fitted condition of the press-fit pins 16 is acceptable. The wiring in the back wiring board 10 is complicatedly connected to a plurality of plug-in units 2. Accordingly, to check the connection of all the press-fit pins 16 without omission, a continuity check program is prepared for each design of the back wiring board 10 and the plug-in units 2 in combination, and the continuity check is performed in accordance with this program. The visual check for the back wiring board 10 is similar to that for the plug-in unit 2 as mentioned above with reference to FIG. 1. That is, whether or not the connection of the press-fit pins 16 and the through holes 12 is acceptable is checked by determining whether or not the front ends of the press-fit pins 16 project from the back side of the back wiring board 10.
FIGS. 3A to 3C are sectional views showing an acceptable mode and a defective mode. More specifically, FIG. 3A shows an acceptable mode, and FIGS. 3B and 3C show defective modes. The defective modes shown in FIGS. 3B and 3C can be detected by the visual check. However, the defective mode shown in FIG. 3C cannot be detected by the electrical check, because the press-fit pin 16 is in electrical continuity to the through hole 12.
Although the visual check is low in efficiency and detection power to defective connection, all kinds of buckling of the press-fit pin 16 as shown in FIGS. 3B and 3C can be detected as detectable defective modes by the visual check. on the other hand, although the electrical check is high in efficiency, only the complete buckling of the press-fit pin 16 as shown in FIG. 3B such that:the press-fit pin 16 is not in contact with the through hole 12 can be detected as a detectable defective mode by the electrical check, and another kind of buckling of the press-fit pin 16 as shown in FIG. 3C such that the press-fit pin 16 is in contact with the through hole 12 cannot be detected as a defective mode by the electrical check.
In the conventional press-fit pin connection checking method, only the visual check is performed for the plug-in unit, so that the omission of detection of defectives is prone to occur. Also in the connection check for the press-fit pins on the BWB side, the defective mode shown in FIG. 3C can be detected only by the visual check, so that there is a possibility of omission of detection of defectives. In the case that the omission of detection of defectives occurs, the defectives omitted may be detected in subsequent function check or the like. However, a large number of man-hours are needed to seek real defectives.
Further, the conventional connection checking method requires a dedicated jig (including a checking printed circuit board on the PIU side, testing device, and program) for the electrical check for the back wiring board in each product, so that a cost and time for preparation of the connection check are required. Moreover, the visual check for detection of defectives is important in the conventional connection checking method, so that the length of each press-fit pin must be larger than the thickness of a substrate, so as to ensure the detection power. However, a reduction in length of each press-fit pin of a press-fit connector supporting high-speed signal transmission is now being pursued, and it is becoming general that the length of each press-fit pin is smaller than the thickness of the substrate. In this case, the front end of each press-fit pin does not project from the back surface of the substrate, and the visual check cannot therefore be performed.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a press-fit pin connection checking method and system which can detect defective press-fit of all the press-fit pins by only electrical check.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a press-fit pin connection checking method and system which can detect defective press-fit of each press-fit pin even in the case that the length of each press-fit pin is smaller than the thickness of the substrate.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a printed circuit board structure required for realization of such a press-fit pin connection checking method.
In accordance with an aspect of the present invention, there is provided a printed circuit board suitable for mounting of a press-fit connector having a plurality of press-fit pins, comprising a substrate; a plurality of through holes formed through said substrate in which said press-fit pins are adapted to be respectively press-fitted; and a checking conductor pattern formed on an upper surface of said substrate so as to be electrically insulated from all of said through holes and to surround all of said through holes for engagement with said press-fit connector; said checking conductor pattern being exposed without being covered with a resist.
Preferably, the upper surface of said substrate is exposed at a portion having a predetermined width between each of said through holes and said checking conductor pattern. Alternatively, the upper surface of said substrate may be covered with a resist at a portion having a predetermined width between each of said through holes and said checking conductor pattern. Preferably, the printed circuit board further comprises a checking output land electrically connected to said checking conductor pattern.
In accordance with another aspect of the present invention, there is provided a press-fit pin connection checking system comprising a first press-fit connector having a plurality of first press-fit pins; a first printed circuit board having a first substrate, a plurality of first through holes formed through said first substrate in which said first press-fit pins are adapted to be respectively press-fitted, and a first conductor pattern formed on an upper surface of said first substrate so as to be electrically insulated from all of said first through holes and to surround all of said first through holes for engagement with said first press-fit connector; a second press-fit connector having a plurality of second press-fit pins and adapted to engage with said first press-fit connector; a second printed circuit board having a second substrate, a plurality of second through holes formed through said second substrate in which said second press-fit pins are adapted to be respectively press-fitted, a plurality of second conductor patterns formed on said second substrate so as to be respectively connected to said second through holes, and a plurality of output lands respectively connected to said second conductor patterns; and means for selectively connecting said first conductor pattern to said output lands.
In accordance with a further aspect of the present invention, there is provided a press-fit pin connection checking method comprising the steps of providing a first printed circuit board having a plurality of first through holes in which a plurality of first press-fit pins of a first press-fit connector are adapted to be respectively press-fitted, and a first conductor pattern formed so as to be electrically insulated from all of said first through holes and to surround all of said first through holes for engagement with said first press-fit connector; press-fitting said plurality of first press-fit pins of said first press-fit connector into said plurality of first through holes of said first printed circuit board to thereby mount said first press-fit connector on said first printed circuit board; providing a checking jig including a second printed circuit board and a second press-fit connector mounted on said second printed circuit board, said second printed circuit board having a plurality of second through holes, a plurality of second conductor patterns respectively connected to said second through holes, and a plurality of output lands respectively connected to said second conductor patterns, said second press-fit connector having a plurality of second press-fit pins press-fitted in said plurality of second through holes of said second printed circuit board; engaging said second press-fit connector of said checking jig with said first press-fit connector mounted on said first printed circuit board; and selectively connecting said first conductor pattern of said first printed circuit board to said output lands of said second printed circuit board; wherein when there is no electrical continuity between said first conductor pattern and each of said output lands, it is determined that the connection of said first press-fit pins and said first through holes is acceptable, whereas when there is electrical continuity between said first conductor pattern and each of said output lands, it is determined that the connection of said first press-fit pins and said first through holes is defective.
Preferably, said first printed circuit board further has a checking output land electrically connected to said first conductor pattern; and the selective connection of said first conductor pattern and said output lands is provided by connecting a probe pin to said checking output land and selectively bringing said probe pin into contact with said output lands. The detection of no electrical continuity indicates an acceptable mode, and the detection of electrical continuity indicates a defective mode.
The above and other objects, features and advantages of the present invention and the manner of realizing them will become more apparent, and the invention itself will best be understood from a study of the following description and appended claims with reference to the attached drawings showing some preferred embodiments of the invention. | {
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Epigenetics includes DNA methylation in which a genome is physiologically modified and posttranslational modification of chromatin which is a complex of DNA and proteins and a large number of proteins constituting chromatin, which integrally control the gene expression.
Regarding modification of histones in chromatin, structural alteration of chromatin by histone modification plays an important role in the induction of transcription. For example, acetylation by a histone acetylation enzyme triggers the induction of remodeling of chromatin, so that transcription is started by general transcription factors and a RNA polymerase. In addition, methylation or phosphorylation of histones controls the transcription and causes silencing, chromatin condensation, and the like.
In addition, in the genomes of many eukaryotes, 60 to 90% of CpG dinucleotides are methylated at the 5-carbon atom position of cytosine. The methylated CpG is found in heterochromatins and transposons containing many repeated sequences, and thought to suppress the activation of viruses and transposons. In addition, the CpG methylation and the histone modification coordinate with each other.
An exception is that CG-rich regions (CpG islands) present in promoter regions of many genes are not methylated. In addition, an exception to the exception is that CpG islands are methylated in genes to be imprinted and in the inactive X chromosome of females. In addition, CpG islands are methylated also in the promoter regions of tumor suppressor gene in cancer cells. Hence, methylation of cytosine can be used as a marker of development, recurrence, and metastasis of cancer. In this respect, a simple method for detecting whether or not cytosine in a gene is methylated has been sought.
As described above, 5-methylcytosine, which is a methylated cytosine (C), has been reported to be present in the DNA, and has been known to play an important role in the developmental genetics, so far. Recently, a new base (5-hydroxymethylcytosine) has been discovered in a study of Purkinje cells (Non Patent Literature 1). It is pointed out that 5-hydroxymethylcytosine is a key for elucidating the mechanism of DNA demethylation (reprogramming). Hence, specifying the presence and the position of 5-hydroxymethylcytosine in a DNA is important and essential as a core technology for investigating the reprogramming of a gene function in all the fields associated with epigenetics technologies, such as the fields of cancer, aging, and regenerative medicine.
Various methods have been proposed for chemically and easily detecting methylcytosine in a DNA. Patent Document 1 describes a method for distinguishing cytosine from methylcytosine. In addition, Patent Document 2 describes a method in which a target DNA is selectively cleaved at the position of 5-methylcytosine to obtain a 5′-fragment, an enzymatic reaction is carried out by using a FRET probe capable of hybridizing with the 5′-fragment and a flap endonuclease, and then the fluorescence is detected.
However, none of these methods can be applied directly to the detection of 5-hydroxymethylcytosine.
Known methods for detecting 5-hydroxymethylcytosine in a DNA include a method in which 5-hydroxymethylcytosine in a fragmented DNA sample is detected by applying the conventional immunoprecipitation method using an anti-5-hydroxymethylcytosine antibody (Non Patent Literatures 2 and 3), a method in which 5-hydroxymethylcytosine is modified with a sugar by using an enzyme capable of the sugar modification, and the modified 5-hydroxymethylcytosine is isolated (Non Patent Literature 4), and the like.
However, each of the method requires that a DNA sample be fragmented in advance, and has a problem that even when a fragment containing 5-hydroxymethylcytosine is isolated, the position of the 5-hydroxymethylcytosine in the fragment cannot be specified.
Hence, there is a demand for a method for chemically and easily detecting 5-hydroxymethylcytosine in a nucleic acid such as a DNA. | {
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The prior art includes beacon positioning systems which use sonic or electromagnetic signals, but these system only make use of either time of flight or angular information. If one of the beacons in these systems becomes unreachable they can no longer function. A system and method for positioning is needed which will provide increased precision and robustness compared to the prior art positioning systems. Also the systems in the prior art do not take full advantage of encoding useful information into the signals, calculating the impact of changes in terrain, nor do they adequately compensate for varying environmental conditions and their effect upon a calculated position. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method of manufacturing an organic light emitting display device, and more particularly, to a method of manufacturing an organic light emitting display device including a filler.
2. Description of the Related Art
Because the organic light emitting display devices have superior characteristics such as wider viewing angles, higher contrast ratios, shorter response time, and lower amounts of power consumption, applications of organic light emitting display devices range from personal portable devices such as MP3 players and mobile phones to television sets. | {
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Systems for monitoring pupil size and pupil responsiveness characteristics are well known in the art and are generally referred to as pupilometry systems or, simply, pupilometers. One early pupilometer is described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,533,683, which issued to Stark et al. on Oct. 13, 1970 and is entitled “Dynamic Pupilometers Using Television Camera System” (incorporated herein by reference). The Stark et al. system employed a television camera system, a digital computer system, an infrared light source, and a visual light stimulator for determining the instantaneous size of a pupil as an eye (or neurologic pupilary control system) of a patient was exposed to various stimuli. Like the early Stark et al. system, conventional pupilometers measure, for example, the diameter of a pupil before and after the pupil is exposed to a light stimulus pulse and also measure the rates at which the pupil may constrict and dilate in response to the initiation and termination of the light stimulus pulse. Pupilometers may comprise hand-held units or, alternatively, may comprise desk or table-mounted, stand-alone units. Pupilometers also generally include some mechanism for ensuring that an imager within the pupilometer is properly positioned in relation to a pupil to be imaged. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,646,709 (incorporated herein by reference), issued to Elbert P. Carter, describes an electronic centering system for ensuring that a pupilometer is properly positioned in relation to a pupil to be imaged. Similarly, U.S. Pat. No. 5,187,506 (incorporated herein by reference), issued to Elbert P. Carter, describes an eye orbit housing for ensuring proper positioning between a pupilometer and an eye of a subject prior to the initiation of a pupilary scanning procedure.
Those skilled in the art will appreciate, however, that for a pupilometer to have maximum utility maximum flexibility should be provided for positioning the imager. For example, in the case of a hand-held system few, if any, restrictions should be placed upon the orientation of the imager prior to enabling an imaging function. The reason for this is that medical personnel at, for example, an accident site may have difficulty in positioning an imager in a prescribed position for acquiring pupilary response data. Thus, it is believed that, for hand-held units in particular, a need exists within the pupilometer field for improved data acquisition and processing systems and methods, as such systems and methods may substantially reduce system dependence on imager orientation and may allow pupilometers to become more user friendly.
Similarly, those skilled in the art will appreciate that a need exists for pupilometers that are capable of evaluating more than a mere pupilary response to light stimulus pulses. For example, it is believed that a substantial need exists for a pupilometer that is capable not only of measuring changes in pupilary diameter in response to one or more light stimulus pulses, but also of evaluating pupil shape and/or segmental responses to a visual stimulus. Stated somewhat differently, it is believed that a substantial need exists for a pupilometer having a pupilary shape irregularity or non-uniformity detection capability.
Finally, it is believed that a substantial need exists for pupilometer-based diagnostics systems, as such systems may provide medical practitioners with a cost effective, non-invasive means for gathering and assessing numerous physiologic parameters.
For example, the present invention can be used to screen for Glaucoma, which is the second leading cause of blindness in the world. Visual field perimetry is presently used for diagnosing Glaucoma. In visual field perimetry, a white background and multiple green flicker sources are used. The green sources are randomly turned on for approximately one second durations and the subject patient is asked to press a button if he/she sees a green light. The procedure is repeated until the entire visual field is mapped for each eye. Loss of visual field sensitivity is indicative of Glaucoma.
The current standard of care for Glaucoma detection, however, suffers form inaccuracy and human/patient error. The current standard of care relies on the patient to respond to his or her visual detection of green light by pressing a button. The patient has a limited window of time in which to respond to the green light. Thus, if the patient is not concentrating or responds too quickly or too slowly, the perimetry device will not register the patient's response, and the accuracy of the diagnosis is compromised. Furthermore, current perimetry devices are large machines that are immobile. They are for use in doctors' offices only. Thus, a need exists for improved systems and methods for Glaucoma detection, and the present invention meets these needs and solves the problems associated with standard techniques.
Another area of diagnostic need relates to assessing the level of brain function to diagnose disorders such as autism, age-related disorders, and drug impairment or intoxication. Neurological exams today do not typically include pupilometry beyond the use of a pin-light. Currently, expensive and/or time-consuming tests are required to diagnose impairment of brain function. And, the pin-light test is subjective, non-quantifiable, and inaccurate. The present invention solves these by providing a method and system to closely track the pupil while presenting the eye with a moving visual stimuli to determine the level of coordination. The present invention is capable of quantifying tracking errors, which might occur in the course of a neurological exam, and reduces the subjectivity and increases the repeatability of exams to assess brain function.
Another area of diagnostic need is diagnosis of neurological disease or trauma. Dermatome mapping of patients is commonly done with a pin-prick to determine the level of dorsal root or spinal cord injury. This test, however, is subjective and usually requires cognitive response from a patient. There exists a need for noninvasive diagnosis of neural damage or trauma. The present invention fills that need by providing a means of quantitatively measuring pupilary response to noxious stimulation. Furthermore, this invention is useful in diagnosing dorsal root and spinal cord injuries in unconscious patients with no cognitive response capabilities. It is further useful in diagnosing and monitoring the progression of demyelinating diseases such as multiple sclerosis, which affects conduction velocity through nerve fibers. In addition, testing the level of epidural anesthetic block may be accomplished using pupilometry with this automated stimulus control.
Finally, an area of diagnostic need relates to testing the functional integrity of auditory pathways, i.e., hearing screening. Particularly with infants, hearing has been subjectively screened using stimuli such as in a clap test while observing the startle response. Other tests, such as EEG-type brain stem audible evoked potential (AEP) monitoring systems have been used, but require attachment of electrodes to the scalp and are cumbersome to use. Middle ear tone-feedback monitoring is also used, but is not capable of measuring latency information. The present invention solves these and other problems associated with the prior art by providing hearing screening using objective pupilometer-based testing systems and methods. The pupilometer-based systems are not cumbersome, are easy to use and provide latency information for diagnosing and monitoring the progression of demyelinating diseases. | {
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A general object of the present disclosure is to provide a molded plastic container having a security feature, preferably a layered security feature, molded into a wall of the container, to provide a method of making such a container, and to provide a security feature insert suitable for molding into a wall of a container.
The present disclosure embodies a number of aspects that can be implemented separately from or in combination with each other.
A molded plastic container, in accordance with one aspect of the present disclosure, includes an insert molded into an exterior surface of a wall of the container. The insert is of plastic construction that includes a UV brightener that is visible under UV light to verify authenticity of the container. The container wall and the insert preferably have identical colors under visible light. The insert preferably is of two-piece construction with an outer portion of the insert being exposed at the exterior surface of the container and an inner portion underlying the outer portion. The inner and outer portions preferably include respective UV brighteners that are visible as different colors under UV light. The outer portion of the insert preferably is removable to expose the inner portion and thereby to provide layered security for which the outer portion is first visible under UV light and, when removed, exposes the inner portion of the insert for illumination under UV light and radiating a different color from the outer portion.
A method of verifying authenticity of a molded plastic container, in accordance with another aspect of the present disclosure, includes providing an insert of plastic construction that includes a UV brightener such that the insert has a first color under visible light and a second color under UV light. The insert is molded into an exterior surface of a plastic container wall. The container wall is then exposed to UV light to energize the UV brightener and thereby verify authenticity of the container. The container wall and the insert preferably have the same first color under visible light. The insert most preferably is of two-piece construction, having an inner portion and an outer portion overlying the inner portion. The outer portion is exposed at the exterior surface of the container and is removable from the inner portion. The inner and outer portions have UV brighteners that are visible as different colors under UV light. The outer portion of the insert is exposed to UV light and the resulting color of the outer portion is noted. The outer portion then is removed, and the inner portion is exposed to UV light and the resulting color is noted, providing two layers of security for verifying authenticity of the container.
A molded plastic container, in accordance with a further aspect of the present disclosure, includes an insert molded into an exterior surface of a wall of the container. The insert is of two-piece molded plastic construction, with an outer portion of the insert being exposed at the exterior surface of the container and an inner portion of the insert underlying the outer portion. The outer portion is removable to expose the inner portion. The inner and outer portions of the insert have different security features embedded in or on surfaces of the portions such that the security feature embedded in or on the outer portion is observable and, when the outer portion is removed, the security feature embedded in or on the inner portion becomes observable. This aspect of the disclosure provides layered security with an overt portion associated with the outer portion of the insert and a covert portion associated with the inner portion of the insert. The security features preferably are selected from the group consisting of UV brighteners, microtaggents, chemical tracers, fluorescent agents, and combinations thereof. | {
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It is known that there are various biometric authentication techniques such as a face authentication technique, a fingerprint authentication technique, an iris authentication technique, a blood vessel authentication technique and the like.
In the face authentication technique, light is irradiated from a light source to obtain a face image, and a face image of an authentication target is obtained within a light irradiation region by a camera. Then, a face authentication process is performed on the obtained face image.
In this face authentication technique, a surrounding environment such as an environment illuminance or the like is an important factor to be considered in obtaining a face image used for face authentication.
In a conventional face authentication apparatus, an environment light illuminance is measured by an illuminance sensor, and light is irradiated by a light irradiation apparatus in a state where an illuminance is determined to be low when the environment light illuminance is low and to be high when the environment light illuminance is high.
However, power consumption is limited in an actual driving environment of the light source that irradiates light to obtain the face image. Therefore, even when the surrounding environment light illuminance is high, the increase in the illumination illuminance is limited, which results in a problem that a face image for face authentication may not be obtained.
Patent Document 1: Korean Patent Application Publication No. 10-2009-0012330. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Micro RNAs (miRNAs) are noncoding, single-stranded RNA molecules about 21-33 nucleotides in length (Curr Biol 2002; 12:735-739.2.; Nature 2004; 431:350-355). In some species, a mature miRNA is complementary to the 3′ untranslated region (UTR) of one or more messenger RNAs (mRNAs). The annealing of a micro RNA to its target messenger RNA causes an inhibition of protein translation, and/or cleavage of the messenger RNA. Micro RNAs are capable of regulating cell growth, differentiation, and apoptosis (Nature 2004; 431:350-355; Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 2006; 103:7024-7029; British journal of cancer 2006; 94:776-780; Science 2005; 310:1817-1821). Therefore, dysregulation of miRNAs may lead to human diseases. In this respect, several exciting researches have been focused on the role of miRNAs in cancers.
The PAX6 gene belongs to a highly conserved family of transcription factors containing the paired and homeobox DNA-binding domains. PAX6 gene is involved in the development of the central nervous system and eye development. It plays a significant role during the induction of the lens and retina differentiation, and has been considered the master gene for eye development (Exp Eye Res 2006; 83:233-234; Brain Res Bull 2008; 75:335-339). The inventors previously reported the 3′ untranslated region single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) rs662702 of the PAX6 gene is associated with extreme myopia (Invest Ophthalmol Vis Sci 2011; 52:35000-35005). In the subsequent report, the inventors proved that the preceding single nucleotide polymorphism is located in the microRNA-328 (miR-328) binding site on the PAX6 gene (Invest Ophthalmol Vis Sci. 2012 May 31; 53(6):2732-9). The functional assay suggested that the C allele of the single nucleotide polymorphism can reduce PAX6 protein levels and that significantly increases risk of myopia.
Signals which originate from the retina can be conveyed to the sclera (Vis Neurosci 2005; 22:251-261), especially those from the photoreceptors and the retinal pigment epithelium (RPE). Therefore, investigating the interaction between retinal pigment epithelium cells and scleral cells may provide more insight to the development of myopia.
However, in the past, there have been no reports about the role of micro RNA on the development of myopia, and at present, there are no reports of research related to using RNA interference as a medicament for treating and/or preventing myopia. | {
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This invention relates to the field of electrochemical power cells, and in particular to zinc anodes in such cells.
In today""s world of portable electronics and electric power tools, batteries are more important to our daily lives than ever before. Along with the growth of the portable consumer electronics market, the demand for inexpensive, long-lasting, powerful batteries has increased dramatically. Battery manufacturers continue to look for new ways to pull more power, for a longer duration, and more efficiently from their products. In addition to the drive for more powerful and longer lasting batteries, manufacturers are aware of the need to be environmentally conscious and the need to eliminate or minimize the use of harmful additives, such as mercury (Hg), from their products.
Many of the batteries marketed today are alkaline cells. A typical alkaline cell includes a cathode, an anode, an alkaline electrolyte, and a container. Generally speaking, the cathode is usually composed of manganese dioxide (MnO2), and the anode is typically made of zinc or a mixture of zinc and other compounds. The electrolyte usually consists of mainly potassium hydroxide (KOH), but often contains other additives. These components are usually encapsulated in a container. There are currently several shapes of containers, but two of the most common are cylinder shapes in varying sizes such as in the well known xe2x80x9cAAxe2x80x9d, xe2x80x9cCxe2x80x9d, and xe2x80x9cDxe2x80x9d cells, and smaller flat button cell batteries that are used in such devices as cameras and hearing aids.
Like all batteries in general, alkaline cells produce power through chemical reactions known as oxidation-reduction (redox) reactions. In zinc alkaline batteries this reaction consumes the zinc anode material and converts it to zinc oxide/hydroxide. As the redox reaction proceeds the zinc oxide/hydroxide deposits and accumulates within the electrolyte domain between and around the zinc anode particles. As it accumulates, it blocks the reaction site pathways by forming a barrier between the electrolyte solution and the zinc anode. The accumulation of these deposits decreases the power capacity of the battery significantly, particularly on high rate drains.
A decrease of reactivity, known as passivation, of the zinc is caused by this build-up of zinc oxide on the surface of the zinc anode. The problem is increased when the surface area of the zinc anode is low. With a small surface area and high discharge rates, surface current densities are high. This causes the anode to become highly polarized and leads to passivation of the zinc until the current density is reduced. The problems of polarization and passivation are especially of concern at low temperatures because at lower temperatures the solubility of zinc oxide in the electrolyte decreases. Lower solubility of the zinc oxide leads to a faster accumulation of zinc oxide, quickly blocking reaction site pathways. However, this problem can be reduced by presenting a higher surface area of zinc. An increase in the surface area of zinc lowers the surface current density and helps to delay the onset of passivation. Thus, with all other factors being equal the higher the surface area of the zinc anode the better the overall performance of the alkaline cell.
The problem of passivation is of particular concern under high rate drain conditions. For example, in a cell utilizing an electrolyte of potassium hydroxide, high rate drains drive electrolyte concentrations to extremes creating low potassium hydroxide concentrations in the anode cavity and very high concentrations around and within the pores of the cathode. While zinc oxide solubility dramatically increases within the pores of the cathode and within the cathode/separator/anode cavity interface, zinc oxide solubility falls off dramatically in dominantly electrochemically active areas of the anode cavity. As the interdiffusion of electrolyte species occurs in the attempt to sustain equilibrium, electrolyte of high potassium hydroxide strength and high zinc oxide solubility diffuses toward electrolyte domains low in potassium hydroxide and zinc oxide content. The result is a localized precipitation of zinc oxide close to the separator but within the anode cavity. A zinc oxide compaction zone results which eventually inhibits electrolyte diffusion at the rate necessary to support the high rate drain.
The current art typically uses zinc powder in order to achieve a maximum surface area and to delay the onset of passivation. This zinc powder provides a very large surface area. However, the use of zinc powder has a number of drawbacks. First, if zinc powder is used alone there is a tendency for it to be mobile and sensitive to shock allowing particle to particle contact to be intermittently disrupted. Anodes of powdered zinc require intimate particle to particle contact as well as intimate current collector contact. To prevent unwanted movement of particles, a suspension agent or gelling agent is usually added to the electrolyte solution of the battery. The suspension agent inhibits the zinc powder mobility and helps maintain particle contact throughout the cell container. It would be more efficient if a suspension agent were not needed since it also interferes with ion transport. By decreasing the amount of suspension agent or gelling agent required, the battery design is simplified and costs are reduced. Another drawback to using zinc powder is its relative cost. The world is undergoing a battery-grade zinc powder shortage that drives the relative cost of zinc powder up. Thus, zinc powder is more expensive when compared with non-powdered zinc such as zinc mesh, zinc strip, or other solid zinc products.
Still another problem with the use of zinc powder as the anode in alkaline cells is the increased cost and loss of performance due to waste. When an alkaline battery having a zinc powder anode is completely discharged at high discharge rates and is xe2x80x9cautopsiedxe2x80x9d, it is observed that only approximately 50% of the zinc powder has been consumed. The reaction of the balance of the zinc powder has been inhibited by disruption of interparticle electrical contact by the deposits of zinc oxide/hydroxide. This leaves a significant amount of zinc powder in the battery which was not utilized to produce power. This decreases the amount of time before the onset of cell failure due to a decrease in the available surface. This wasted zinc drives up the costs of alkaline batteries in two ways. First, larger amounts of zinc powder are required to achieve the same amount of battery output. Second, the volume wasted by this excess zinc could be used for extra electrolyte. Increasing the amount of electrolyte would allow the manufacturers to increase the battery""s capacity.
Zinc powder negative electrodes are much less efficient at high discharge rates than at low discharge rates. Currently, to improve efficiency some zinc anodes are amalgamated with mercury. Mercury dramatically improves interparticle contact inhibiting the onset of low interparticle contact. Since mercury is environmentally dangerous, use of mercury is highly undesirable. However, due to its ability to improve interparticle contact, the removal of mercury from cell designs without causing cell quality problems has been difficult. Thus, an alternative to zinc powder which is more efficient at high discharge rates without the use of mercury is needed. This alternative needs to retain the high surface area of powdered zinc but avoid the problems associated with powdered zinc.
One alternative that has been explored by the industry to the use of zinc powder while still yielding more surface area than solid zinc is the use of perforated zinc as an anode. This material is readily available in spite of the world shortage of battery-grade zinc powder. However, the use of perforated zinc has its own problems. First, perforated zinc is manufactured by punching holes in solid sheets of zinc. This creates two problems. First, the material punched from the zinc is wasted. Second, there is manufacturing difficulty in making precise perforations. While these problems are significant, the largest problem that makes the use of perforated zinc undesirable is that the perforation does not substantially increase the surface area of the electrode. While some new surface area is generated, there is also a loss of surface area associated with the material punched out of the zinc. Thus, when compared to powdered zinc, perforated zinc has a relatively low surface area.
Another alternative to zinc powder is the use of expanded zinc mesh. The use of expanded zinc mesh is desirable because it provides a large surface area and is currently more available and cheaper than zinc powder. However, previously disclosed methods of using zinc mesh have had their own problems. For example, a method of using expanded zinc mesh as an anode was disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 4,175,168. The expanded zinc mesh was folded to create an anode. Zinc spacers were used to separate the folded layers of the zinc mesh anode in the cell. U.S. Pat. No. 4,226,920 discloses another expanded zinc mesh anode. This anode was formed by winding the zinc mesh to create a coil. Spacers were again used to provide a substantially uniform space between adjacent layers of the coil. The space between the electrode layers in these two anode designs was necessary to allow adequate electrolyte flow between the layers and to maintain adequate battery performance. However, this use of spacers to separate the layers of the anode is undesirable because it requires the use of additional materials and adds additional manufacturing costs. A zinc anode design that does not require the use of spacers to maintain battery performance is needed.
Alkaline batteries are used in hearing aids, flashlights, power hand tools, and electronic toys and games. Many new electronics require batteries that are efficient at high discharge rates. Therefore, there is a need for a battery that delivers more power capacity, is more efficient at high discharge rates, avoids the manufacturing expense of using suspension gels or spacers, minimizes the use of environmentally damaging compounds such as mercury, and uses a more available and inexpensive material than battery-grade zinc powder. In short, it is desirable to develop an alkaline battery anode comprised of expanded zinc mesh which reduces or eliminates the shortcomings of prior art anodes.
The present invention presents a solution to the above problems by providing zinc anodes having improved performance without the use of zinc powder. More specifically, the present invention provides for the use of expanded zinc mesh to increase battery performance at high discharge rates and to improve the efficiency of the anode design to decrease the amount of unreacted zinc in the oxidation-reduction reaction. The present invention also provides for electrochemical cells incorporating the improved zinc anode designs.
The present invention improves battery performance through the use of expanded zinc mesh to construct an anode of increased surface area with one of three basic designs. A xe2x80x9ccoiledxe2x80x9d zinc anode of the present invention comprises a single sheet of zinc mesh wrapped into a coil. A xe2x80x9clayeredxe2x80x9d zinc anode of the present invention comprises two or more sheets of zinc mesh layered together so that each layer is in electrical contact with adjacent layers. A xe2x80x9cfoldedxe2x80x9d zinc anode of the present invention comprises a single sheet of zinc mesh folded upon itself to form two or more layers that are in electrical contact with their adjacent layers.
In all three instances, the use of spacers between the layers of the mesh as taught by the prior art is avoided to lower material and manufacturing costs. Instead of maintaining a uniform space between the layers of the zinc mesh, the present invention utilizes anode configurations in which the layers of expanded zinc mesh are in direct physical contact. The direct contact of these layers creates electrical contact points between the zinc mesh layers of the anode. These electrical contacts work with the mesh to form a continuous lattice network that allows for better connectivity of the zinc to increase performance at high discharge rates.
The present invention also encompasses electrochemical cells employing each of the three disclosed types of zinc mesh anodes. These electrochemical cells are generally comprised of a casing, one of the described anodes, a cathode, an insulating separator between the anode and cathode, and electrolyte solution. These and other features, aspects, and advantages of the present invention will become better understood with reference to the following description and claims. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
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