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The International Energy Agency's “World Energy Outlook” predicts that global primary energy demand will increase by 1.7% per year from 2000 to 2030. It also predicts that 90% of this demand will be met by fossil fuels. Consequently, there will be a 1.8% per year increase in carbon dioxide from 2000 to 2030, reaching 38 billion tonnes in 2030. Cleaner, renewable energy sources, including solar cells, have long been heralded as counters to this increased pollution trend. While advanced silicon based solar cells are now widely commercially available, their uptake has been slow due to high production costs, a lack of robustness and associated visual pollution resulting from the large surface exposure requirements.
Dye Sensitised Solar Cells (DSSC) are an alternative to crystalline solar cells that are cheaper than crystalline solar cells to produce. However, DSSC's are less efficient than crystalline solar cells. Therefore, DSSC's require significant area coverage to be effective power generators.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,927,721 entitled “Photo-Electrochemical Cell”, by M Gratzel et al. discloses a typical DSSC. As illustrated in FIG. 1, the DSSC 10 comprises a first transparent insulating layer 1; a first transparent conductive oxide (TCO) electrode layer 2; a transparent metal oxide layer 3 of titanium dioxide (TiO2); a molecular monolayer of sensitiser (dye) 4; an electrolyte layer 5; a second transparent conductive oxide (TCO) electrode layer 6; and a second transparent insulating layer 7.
A DSSC generates charge by the direct absorption of visible light. Since most metal oxides absorb light predominantly in the ultra-violet region of the electromagnetic spectrum, a sensitiser (dye) 4 is absorbed onto the surface of metal oxide layer 3 to extend the light absorption range of the solar cell into the visible light region.
In order to increase the amount of light that the metal oxide layer 3 and the sensitiser (dye) layer 4 can absorb, at least some portion of the metal oxide layer 3 is made porous, increasing the surface area of the metal oxide layer 3. This increased surface area can support an increased quantity of sensitiser (dye) 4 resulting in increased light absorption and improving the energy conversion efficiency of the DSSC to more than 10%.
An electrochromic display (ECD) is a new type of display, which has a unique property of bi-stability.
An electrochromic display (ECD) is a relatively new electrochemical, bi-stable display. While the application is different to the DSSC, these devices share many physical attributes, illustrated in FIG. 1, exchanging the sensitiser (dye) layer 4 by an electrochromic material layer which undergoes a reversible colour change when an electric current or voltage is applied across the device; being transparent in the oxidised state and coloured in the reduced state.
When a sufficient negative potential is applied to the first transparent conductive oxide (TCO) electrode layer 2, whilst the second transparent conductive electrode oxide (TCO) layer 6 is held at ground potential, electrons are injected into the conduction band of the metal oxide semiconductor layer 3 and reduce the adsorbed molecules (the coloration process). The reverse process occurs when a positive potential is applied to the first transparent conductive oxide (TCO) electrode layer 2 and the molecules become bleached (transparent).
A single electrochromic molecular monolayer on a planar substrate would not absorb sufficient light to provide a strong colour contrast between the bleached and unbleached states. Therefore a highly porous, large surface area, nanocrystalline metal oxide layer 3 is used to promote light absorption in the unbleached state by providing a larger effective surface area for the electrochromophore to bind onto. As light passes through the thick metal oxide layer 3, it crosses several hundreds of monolayers of molecules coloured by the sensitiser (dye) 4, giving strong absorption.
Since the structure of both electrochemical devices is similar, we describe only the method of DSSC manufacture as an example. Equally, this process could be applied with little modification to the ECD manufacture.
In order to manufacture the DSSC 10 illustrated in FIG. 1, a metal oxide layer 3 of several microns thickness is deposited onto the first transparent conductive oxide (TCO) electrode layer 2, using any one of several techniques, such as screen printing, doctor blading, sputtering or spray coating a high viscosity paste. A typical paste commonly consists of water or organic solvent based metal oxide nanoparticle suspensions (5-500 nm diameter), typically titanium dioxide (TiO2), a viscosity modifying binder, such as polyethylene glycol (PEG), and a surfactant, such as TRITON-X. Following deposition the paste is dried, to remove the solvent, and then sintered at temperatures up to 450° C. This high temperature process modifies the metal oxide particle size and density, and ensures the removal of the organic binder constituents, such as polyethylene glycol (PEG) to provide a good conductive path throughout and a well defined material porosity. Sintering also provides good electrical contact between the metal oxide particles 3 and the first transparent conductive oxide (TCO) electrode layer 2.
After drying and cooling, the porous metal oxide layer 3 is coated with sensitiser (dye) 4 by immersion in a low concentration (≦1 mM) sensitiser (dye) solution for an extended period, typically 24 hours, to allow absorption of the sensitiser (dye) 4 onto the metal oxide layer 3 through a functional ligand structure that often comprises a carboxylic acid derivative. Typical solvents used in this process are acetonitrile or ethanol, since aqueous solutions would inhibit the absorption of the sensitiser (dye) 4 onto the surface of the metal oxide layer 3.
The first transparent conductive oxide (TCO) electrode layer 2, having the porous metal oxide layer 3 and sensitiser (dye) layer 4 formed thereon, is then assembled with the second transparent conductive oxide (TCO) electrode layer 6. Both electrode layers 2, 6 are sandwiched together with a perimeter spacer dielectric encapsulant to create an electrode-to-electrode gap of at least 10 μm, before filling with the electrolyte layer 5. The spacer material is most commonly a thermoplastic that provides an encapsulation seal. Once the electrolyte layer 5, which is most commonly an iodide/triiodide salt in organic solvent, is introduced, the DSSC is completed by sealing any remaining aperture with either a thermoplastic gasket, epoxy resin or a UV-curable resin to prevent the ingress of water and hence device degradation.
Most, if not all, of the materials used to fabricate the DSSC can be handled in air and also under atmospheric pressure conditions, removing the necessity for expensive vacuum processes associated with crystalline solar cell fabrication. As a result, a DSSC can be manufactured at a lower cost than a crystalline solar cell.
The ECD fabrication process is very similar to that for the DSSC, with several exceptions. The porous metal oxide layer 3 is often patterned by screen printing to provide a desired electrode image, allowing the device to convey information by colouring or bleaching selected regions. Additionally, the sensitiser (dye) layer 4 is replaced with an absorbed electrochromophore material layer. Furthermore, a permeable diffuse reflector layer, typically large particles of sintered metal oxide, can be positioned between the first and second electrode layers 2, 6 to increase the viewed image contrast.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,830,597, entitled “Method and Equipment for Producing a Photochemical Cell”, by H Hoffmann also discloses a DSSC 100. As illustrated in FIG. 2, the DSSC 100 comprises a first substrate 101 of glass or plastic; a first transparent conductive oxide (TCO) layer 102; a titanium dioxide (TiO2) layer 103, a dye layer 104; an electrolyte layer 105; a second transparent conductive oxide (TCO) layer 106; a second substrate 107 of glass or plastic; and insulating webs 108, 109. The insulating webs 108, 109 are used to form individual cells 110 in the DSSC 100.
An individual cell 110 formed between the insulating web 108 and the insulating web 109 is different from the adjoining individual cell 110 formed between the insulating web 109 and the insulating web 108. This is because the TiO2 layer 103 and the electrolyte layer 105 are interchanged in each adjoining individual cell. 110. Thus, the electrical polarity of the adjoining individual cells 110 is opposite. This alternate division of different layers results in the formation of conducting layers 111 from the electrically conductive layers 102 and 106, each conducting layer 111 connecting a positive (negative) pole of one individual cell 110 to the negative (positive) pole of an adjacent individual cell 110. The resultant structure provides a method of increasing the overall DSSC output voltage, without the necessity of incorporating a multi-layered structure.
In order to improve the incident photon to current conversion efficiency and control the stability/reproducibility of the DSSC performance, it is important to precisely control the physical-properties of the metal oxide layer, and hence the absorption of the sensitiser (dye) molecule. However, metal oxide layer fabrication using screen-printing often results in a ±5% film thickness variation caused by residual blocked or dirty screen cells, adhesion to the screen during separation from the substrate surface and trapped bubble expansion during drying, caused by the inability to completely outgas a viscous paste. Other methods, such as doctor-blading, also suffer from an inability to provide a well defined thick metal oxide layer without significant spatial deviations. Subsequent porosity and film quality deviations are therefore likely to occur throughout such metal oxide layers, resulting in a degradation of efficiency and image quality for the DSSC and ECD, respectively.
In the case of the ECD, screen-printing demands are further exacerbated by the requirement to create ever finer metal oxide layer features for higher quality images, i.e. increase the dots-per-inch (dpi) for a pixelated display. As the dpi increases, the smallest feature size becomes limited as the screen mesh size approaches the mesh partition width.
As a result, fabrication of an electrochemical device based on a functionally sensitised thick porous metal oxide layer, as for the DSSC and ECD, using the aforementioned fabrication techniques are inappropriate from the view points of device reproducibility and adaptability to large size device production. | {
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This application relates generally to photofabrication. More specifically, this application relates to diffraction unlimited photofabrication methods, systems, devices, and materials.
Photofabrication, and more specifically photolithography, can be limited by diffraction. In order to form smaller and smaller features, one generally can resort to using shorter wavelengths of light or increasing the numerical aperture of the lenses used in a photofabrication system. While these two approaches can reduce the diffraction limit, they also can come with increasing costs.
Alternative techniques have been developed to try to get beyond the diffraction limitations found in photofabrication. Two photon and threshold approaches can provide avenues to decreasing feature size. However, these too have problems. Techniques using two photon photoresists, for example, can be inefficient. Furthermore, two photon photoresists may not be conducive to projection-based photolithography techniques using masks. Threshold approaches also face problems because they can rely on being a function of a summation of patterns, which can put limits on decreasing feature size. | {
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The present invention relates to a magnetic ink character recognition system provided in an electrostatographic printer and to a method for controlling characters produced by magnetic ink character printing. Preferably, the invention relates to controlling the application of magnetic ink characters by electrostatographic printing and to a magnetic ink character recognition system.
The process of electrophotographic printing may include sensitizing the surface of an photoconductive member by charging to a substantially uniform potential. The charged portion of the photoconductive surface is exposed to a light image of an original document being reproduced. The light image selectively discharges portions of the surface thereby recording the image of the document. Alternatively, a modulated light beam, i.e., a laser beam, may be utilized to discharge the photoconductive surface to record the desired information. In this way, an electrophotographic latent image is recorded on the photoconductive surface. The image corresponds to the information desired to be reproduced. After the image is recorded on the photoconductive member, it may be developed by contact with developer material. The developer material may comprise toner particles adhering triboelectrically to carrier granules, or alternatively a single component development system may be employed. Both the carrier granules and toner particles may be magnetic, the toner particles having ferromagnetic parities encapsulated in a thermoplastic resin binder. The toner particles are transferred from the carrier granules to the latent image to form a toner powder image on the photoconductive member which is subsequently transferred to a copy sheet. The copy sheet is heated to permanently affix the powder image.
Electrostatographic printing is useful for producing checks or financial documents with magnetic characters for the banking industry and for other businesses producing financial instruments. The process involves fusing magnetic toner particles on the checks or documents to provide encoding in a magnetic ink character recognition (MICR) format. High speed processing of financial documents is simplified by imprinting magnetic ink characters and/or bar codes in a machine readable form. The magnetic character codes permit repeated processing of financial documents and their high speed sorting. Encoded information may be imprinted on financial documents with magnetic ink or toner. The resulting document copies may be subsequently read by an MICR reader and processed.
Ozaki et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,736,315, disclose an apparatus for evaluating density and evenness of printed patterns including a circuit for calculating density distribution of imaged data, a circuit for normalizing density distribution with an area of affective image data and a circuit for quantifying the density and evenness of patterns.
Will, U.S. Pat. No. 4,797,938, discloses a process of identifying MICR characters comprising generating an analog signal representative of the characters, digitizing and storing values representing the analog signals, locating positive and negative peaks of the analog signals, testing the peaks against a first plurality of repeating patterns to determine which of the patterns fit the peak stored for the character, using a pattern which best fits the peaks to select the stored digitized values and testing the stored digitized values against the second plurality of patterns representing a set of characters which can be identified in order to identify the read character.
Word et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,891,240, disclose printing MICR characters wherein the area in which the characters are to be printed is prelubricated.
Parker et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,901,114, disclose an electronic printer employing tri-level xerography to superimpose two images during a single pass in a printer. One part of the composite image is formed using MICR toner, while the other part of the image is printed with less expensive black or color toner.
Aoki, U.S. Pat. No. 4,980,726, relates to a toner density control device for an electrophotographic copier with two sensing circuits, a toner density sensing circuit and an image density sensing circuit. Toner is supplemented whenever one of the two sensing circuits fails.
Matsuhashi et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,984,281, relates to a magnetic ink character recognition system that includes a field unit for receiving digital signals from a storage unit and for sorting the digital signals from each field plus a decision unit for receiving the signals from the sort unit and for judging the thickness of ink characters and determining a representative thickness value for each character and a correction unit for correcting the digital signals from the storage unit based on decision data from the decision unit for each character and a recognition unit for determining whether or not the corrected signals are readable.
Smith et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,083,157, relates to an electrophotographic printing machine wherein a nonmagnetic toner image is transferred to a copy substrate and MICR readable images are formed out of the previously fused non-magnetic image. A film is utilized and includes a heat resistant backing member and, a magnetic media adhered to the backing member. The film is used to press magnetic media against predetermined portions of nonmagnetic images. The film is heated to cause magnetic media to fuse to the selective non-magnetic image areas.
Corona et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,083,159, discloses a method for providing initial optimized performance of an illumination and exposure system used to form a latent image at an exposure station of a document on a photosensitive medium, including the steps of introducing a linear photosensitive display consisting of a plurality of photodiodes to an exposure station, energizing an illuminator to produce a light output which is transmitted through the exposure station and is incident along the length of the array, converting the output of the photosensitive array into video signals representative of the average illumination output of the illuminator, providing a bar graph on a display screen of the average illumination error superimposed against a horizontal specification line on the display representing a maximum acceptable illumination level, and positioning the illuminator while observing the bar graph and selecting the alignment position at the lamp at which the bar graph is at a minimum value relative to the specification line.
Baus, U.S. Pat. No. 5,091,961, discloses a check reader which is operative with a variable check movement rate. The bank reader imposes a set of flux reversals over the magnetic ink characters to be read. The flux reversals permit a pulse count sequence to be generated which is unique to each magnetic ink character independent of the rate of check movement.
Kozlowski, U.S. Pat. No. 5,134,663, relates to a system and method for recognizing MICR characters including establishing a center line between first and last peaks of a scanned magnetic electrical readout, established in a location of major peaks, comparing the peak magnitudes and peak locations with parameters in a predetermined template. The magnitudes and locations are scored according to error deviation. The lowest scored template is then found to identify the character read.
Canu et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,151,952, discloses an apparatus for detecting the position of edges in scanned characters and comparing them to the edges of selective characters and utilizing the ratio between the distances determined and using the ratio to compare to a stored set of standard ratios to identify the character scanned.
Butler, U.S. Pat. No. 5,162,874, discloses an electrophotographic apparatus having a densitometer. The apparatus includes means for generating diffused signal representative of the diffused component of light reflected from material placed on a substrate; means for generating a compensation ratio; means, responsive to the compensation ratio, for generating a compensated specular; and means responsive to the diffused signal for determining density of the material; and a means responsive to the compensated spectral signal for calibrating the determining means.
Application of magnetic ink to a copy sheet is a delicate process. The objective is to have a correct amount of magnetic ink deposited on a continuous basis. Too much magnetic ink causes smearing and too little will not provide a readable signal. In either instance, the magnetic ink characters are not accurately recognized.
It is desirable to provide a system for monitoring printed magnetic ink characters to assure that a correct amount of ink is deposited on a continuous basis. In a system, the printed magnetic characters may be read and compared to standard printed magnetic characters. The electrophotographic printer may be adjusted to resolve variations between the characters that are being read and the standard characters.
However, it is difficult to provide an accurate monitoring system because of a number of "noise" sources, including variations in the orientation of paper (alignment of reader head with respect to image). Paper may skew as much as 5% and greater from the longitudinal axis of the paper path. Other noise sources affecting the monitoring include the speed of image transport across the head gap and calibration of output to a reference standard.
Knapp et al., U.S. Pat. No. 4,563,086, discloses an electrophotographic printing machine in which a magnetic toner image is transferred to a copy sheet. The image is magnetized and the intensity of the magnetic field generated by the toner image is detected to provide a continuous indication of the quality of image fused on the copy sheet. The magnetic field intensity is proportional to the ratio of the mass of toner particles to the area of toner particles on the copy sheet. The machine further includes means for comparing the intensity of the magnetic field detected by the detecting means. In response, a control signal is generated that regulates a processing station of the printing machine.
The present invention relates to a method and system for controlling the application of magnetic ink characters to a substrate. The method comprises generating an electrical signal representative of a test magnetic ink character display, comparing the integral representation with the integral representation of a predetermined magnetic ink display, and adjusting the application of magnetic ink characters to a substrate according to the comparing step. The generating step may comprise applying a test magnetic ink character display to a substrate, reading the magnetic ink character display as the substrate passes a read element, and generating the electrical signal representative of the display. The application of a magnetic ink character display to a substrate in, for example, an electrostatographic printing process, may be adjusted in response to the comparing step.
One embodiment of the invention comprises applying the predetermined magnetic ink character display to a substrate, reading the predetermined magnetic ink character display as the substrate passes a read element, generating an electrical signal representative of the predetermined magnetic ink character display, and converting the electrical signal of the predetermined magnetic ink character display to the integral representation.
The test magnetic ink character display and the predetermined magnetic ink character display may be applied side by side on a substrate. Each display may comprise a plurality of imaged lines. Each of the plurality of imaged lines of the test magnetic ink character display may be imaged alternately among each of the plurality of imaged lines of the predetermined magnetic ink character display with each of the plurality of test image lines adjacent one of each of the plurality of the standard imaged lines.
An electrical signal from each of the plurality of imaged lines of the predetermined magnetic ink character display may be compared to a reference integral representation. The comparing step may comprise separately adding the test and reference integral representations and comparing the sum of the test integral representations with the sum of the reference integral representations. The application of magnetic ink characters is adjusted according to the difference between the sums. The displays may alternate side by side and the signals are divided into test signals and into reference signals depending upon the order received.
Each of the integral representations from the test display may be compared to the integral representation from an adjacent reference display to give a compared value. The compared values may be added and the application of magnetic ink characters adjusted according to the sum of the compared values.
Further, the invention relates to a magnetic ink character recognition system, ,comprising a reader for detecting magnetic flux generated from a magnetic character and outputting an electrical signal representative of the magnetic flux and a comparator operatively connected to the reader for comparing an integral signal of the electrical signal of the magnetic character to the integral representation of a signal from the standard magnetic ink character. The system may be a self-contained magnetic ink character recognition device and may comprise a generator responsive to the comparator for generating a control signal to regulate a processing station of an electrostatographic printer. Or the system may be part of an electrostatographic printing system. | {
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The present invention relates to an optically compensated bend (OCB) liquid crystal display device used for the display of liquid crystal display televisions, liquid crystal display monitors, etc.
In regard to liquid crystal display devices, though the twisted nematic (TN) type liquid crystal display device has been generally used so far, the OCB type display device has been studied as a liquid crystal display device characterized in higher response (Refer to Bulletin ‘SHINGAKUGIHOU’ EDI98-144, page 199; Institute of Telecommunications Engineers, NIKKEI FLAT PANEL DISPLAY, Strategy Edition 2005, page 110).
The liquid crystal is interposed between two substrates in the OCB type crystal display device, and transparent electrodes are formed on these substrates as the voltage supplying means. On the condition before a power source is turned on, the alignment state of the liquid crystal is the state called ‘spray alignment’. When the power source is turned on, a relatively high voltage is applied to the voltage supplying means for a short time so as to transfer the alignment of the liquid crystal to the bend alignment state. It is a feature of the OCB type liquid crystal display mode that the display is carried out by means of the bend alignment state.
An aspect of the alignment of the liquid crystal will be explained by the aid of FIG. 6. As shown in FIG. 6A, liquid crystal molecules 53 of a liquid crystal layer are in the spray alignment state when the voltage V between a pixel electrode 51 and a counter electrode 52 supplied from a power source 50 is zero. Directions of orientation for upper and lower substrates 55 and 54 are the same, i.e. the parallel direction as shown by the arrows 56 and 57. Next, upon supplying a predetermined voltage, e.g. a high voltage of several ten volts between both the electrodes, the state of molecules shifts to the bend alignment state where liquid crystal molecules at the center of the liquid crystal layer stand up perpendicularly like FIG. 6B. When the voltage that can keep the liquid crystal molecules of FIG. 6B being in the bend alignment state is called ‘the counterbalanced voltage VC’, the spray alignment state is stabilized at any voltage not higher than this voltage VC. In the OCB operation, a voltage higher than the counterbalanced voltage VC (off-voltage) at which the bend alignment state is kept steady is applied to the liquid crystal molecules as shown in FIG. 6B. Upon changing the voltage between the off-voltage and an on-voltage VON higher than VC, the state of inclination of the liquid crystal molecules is changed between FIG. 6B and FIG. 6C so that the retardation value of the liquid crystal layer may be changed in order to control the transmittance in combination with polarization films 58 and 59. In addition, there is an example in which a voltage higher than VC is periodically supplied, i.e. the black insertion drive is carried out.
On the condition that the direction perpendicular to the paper surface is the horizontal surface viewed from the direction of the arrow 60 on the paper surface, observation indicates that alignment of the liquid crystal molecules is in a symmetrical relationship with respect to the horizontal direction, so that display thereof has relatively balanced visibility in the longitudinal direction. To this end, it is considered that the orientation directions 56 and 57 of both the substrates are conformed together in the vertical direction of the display surface in the case of the OCB type display.
The orientation process of the liquid crystal display device is carried out upon executing a rubbing process to the orientation film. In the OCB type liquid crystal display device, color filters disposed on the counter substrate are stripe-like extending in the direction perpendicular to the display surface. Red, green and blue stripe filters constituting one unit are sequentially aligned in parallel with each other in the horizontal direction. The counter electrode and the orientation film are deposited on the filters.
However, there is a problem in operation of the display device that transition from the spray alignment to the bend alignment is not surely executed due to the orientation film of the counter substrate side, so that the spray alignment having remained as it is looks like a luminescent spot defect. | {
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Advances in telecommunications systems have provided more services to telecommunications users. For example, telecommunications device for the deaf (TDD) and text telephones (TTY), hereinafter both referred to as TTY devices, allow users to communicate with non-speech sound on a telephone network. Such users include those users who cannot hear and those who cannot speak. Another service, such as Prompted Automatic Callback (PAC), provides users with a voice message informing the user that the line they are calling is busy. For example, the PAC system may provide a message that states “the number you have dialed is busy.” The PAC system may also ask the user if the user wishes to invoke an automatic call back feature to automatically call back the number when the line becomes available.
Prior to the development of automatic callback services, TTY users could recognize a busy signal by observing a determined pattern of flashes of a signal strength light of the TTY device that are produced by the busy signal. When a telecommunications provider provides an automatic callback service such as the PAC service, however, the busy signal is replaced with the announcement stating that the line is busy. Absent the busy signal, TTY users may no longer be able to recognize a busy line. The announcement produces intermittent flashes of the TTY signal strength light indicating that words are being spoken and does not produce the patterned flashes of the busy signal. The intermittent flashing light conveys no specific information to the user, thus the TTY user would be unaware that the line is busy.
Thus, there is a need for an improved communications system that can aid a TTY user in identifying a busy condition even when the communications system uses an announcement service such as the PAC service instead of the busy signal. | {
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Mobile computing devices such as mobile telephones and tablet computers have continued to proliferate in recent years. These mobile devices may be equipped with processors, memory, and the capability to communicate through local and wide area networks, including the Internet. Current mobile devices are also capable of executing a wide range of computer programs and software applications. A user of a mobile device may have a personal computer, another mobile device, or multiple other mobile devices that each includes programs and applications. In many cases, the programs and applications on a mobile device should be updated or synchronized regularly by accessing a network or the internet to send or obtain application updates, messaging updates, or other application data updates for synchronization.
A user of multiple mobile devices may desire to update or synchronize application data on the user's devices in various device use scenarios. For example, a user of multiple mobile devices may have different service capabilities for the user's different devices. In particular situations, one of the user's devices may be able to access the internet through a cellular network or a particular Wi-Fi hotspot while the user's other devices may not have that access capability. For example, this could happen in a roaming scenario. Also, the user's multiple devices may each be intermittently switched between sleep mode and wake mode, or between on and off states, as the user switches use from one device to another device and moves about or roams while carrying one or more of the devices with them. In any of these situations, a user may desire to update or synchronize application data on the user's devices while also minimizing data usage and cost. The user may also desire to update or synchronize an application while minimizing battery power consumption on the user's mobile devices. | {
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This invention relates to a temperature data producing apparatus for noncontact measuring of the temperature of a high temperature moving object such as a naturally falling melted metal droplet.
When metal material, particularly, metals having a high melting point such as niobium, molybdenum and tungsten or active metals such as titanium and zircon are melted in the air, impurities such as oxides and nitrides are formed inside the metals, thus greatly degrading the various characteristics of each metal. This same phenomenon occurs in super alloys such as corrosion and heat resistant alloys. In order to produce high quality ingots, it is necessary to remelt these metals in a vacuum chamber, to eliminate the impurities such as hydrogen, oxygen, nitrogen, tin and lead by exposure to the vacuum. This remelted metal is dropped into a mold that does not react chemically with the remelted metal where it solidifies into an ingot. To make the metal drop into the mold, it is heated with an electric arc, plasma or electron beam to melt it. Copper molds with water cooled surfaces are often used.
It is known that the temperature of the remelted alloy droplets is an important factor in determining the surface quality such as the ingot surface smoothness and the internal quality, which represents the macro structure and the compositional segregation of the solidified alloy in the mold.
However, the naturally falling melted metal droplets are very small having a diameter of 5-15 mm, fall with the acceleration of gravity, and are in a vacuum chamber, making accurate measurement of the temperature an impossibility. It is consequently impossible to control the temperature of the droplets and very difficult to obtain ingots of high quality. This is the same for pure metals such as niobium, molybdenum and tungsten. | {
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FIG. 6 schematically shows the structure of the prior art mass spectrometer. This instrument has an ion source 23 producing ions. These ions are mass-analyzed by an electric field 24 and a magnetic field 25. The ions then pass through a slit 26 and reach a secondary electron multiplier 27, where they are detected. The output signal from the multiplier 27 is supplied via both an amplifier 17 and an A/D converter (ADC) 19 to a controller 22 incorporating a computer, where the signal is stored. The controller 22 controls a power supply 11 via a D/A converter (DAC) 12, the power supply 11 developing an accelerating voltage for the ion source 23 and an electric field voltage. The controller 22 also controls a magnetic field power supply 20 via a D/A converter (DAC) 21.
Where a mass analysis is made by magnetic field scanning, the controller 22 sends a scanning signal to the magnetic field power supply 20 via the DAC 21 while maintaining the accelerating voltage and the electric field voltage constant.
The controller 22 also controls a secondary electron multiplier power supply 15 via a D/A converter (DAC) 16. The controller sets the gain of the amplifier 17 via a gain controller 18. Furthermore, the controller reads the magnetic field strength from the output signal from a magnetic field strength detector circuit 13 via an A/D converter (ADC) 14. The magnetic field scanning is controlled according to the magnetic field strength read in this way.
As is well known in the art, in the mass spectrometer constructed as described above, the mass-to-charge ratio m/z, the magnetic field strength B in the magnetic field 25, and the ion-accelerating voltage V given by the ion source 23 generally satisfy the relation EQU m/z=K(B.sup.2 /V) (1)
where K is a constant. Accordingly, if the magnetic field is scanned at a fixed value of the accelerating voltage V, then we have EQU m/z=K.sub.1 B.sup.2 ( 2)
where K.sub.1 is a constant. Also, since the relation EQU B=K.sub.2 t (3)
holds (where t is time and K.sub.2 is a constant), we have EQU m/z=K.sub.3 t.sup.2 ( 4)
where K.sub.3 is a constant. It is common practice to determine the masses of the substances under investigation by creating a table of reference peaks (i.e., masses) and positions at which they appear (or magnetic field strengths or emergence times) and performing calculations, based on this table. In this case, therefore, the operator usually measures the mass numbers of individual peaks during the preparation of the table and enters the measured mass numbers into the controller 22.
In the above-described mass spectrometer, the peaks appearing on a mass spectrum obtained by the conventional ionization technique are mostly derived from ions having the elementary electric charge. However, on a mass spectrum obtained by electrospray ionization techniques which have become widespread in recent years, there exist many peaks derived from ions having electric charges that are integral multiples of the elementary electric charge. Ions of this kind are hereinafter referred to as polyvalent ions. The integers are hereinafter referred to as valence numbers.
FIG. 2 is a diagram schematically illustrating a mass spectrum of polyvalent ions. The horizontal axis of the mass spectrum is usually expressed in m/z (i.e., ion mass m divided by ion valence number). On this axis, polyvalent ions having valence number n derived from a substance having mass m appear at positions given by EQU x=(m+nH)/n=m/n+H (5)
where H is the mass of hydrogen, for example. In the case of electrospray technique, n hydrogen ions are attached to molecules with mass m, thus resulting in the aforementioned polyvalent ions. In this way, on a mass spectrum of polyvalent ions, many peaks attributed to ions having the same mass but different valence numbers arise, thus complicating the spectrum. | {
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} |
Ribonucleotide diphosphate reductase (RR) is a highly regulated enzyme in the deoxyribonucleotide synthesis pathway that is ubiquitously present in human, bacteria, yeast, and other organisms (Jordan 1998). RR is responsible for the de novo conversion of ribonucleotide diphosphate to 2′-deoxyribonucleotide diphosphate, a process that is essential for DNA synthesis and repair (Thelander 1986; Jordan 1998; Liu 2006). RR is directly involved in tumor growth, metastasis, and drug resistance (Yen 1994; Zhou 1995; Nocentini 1996; Fan 1998; Zhou 1998).
The proliferation of metastatic cancer cells requires excess dNTPs for DNA synthesis. Therefore, an increase in RR activity is necessary as it helps provide extra dNTPs for DNA replication in primary and metastatic cancer cells. Because of this critical role in DNA synthesis, RR represents an important target for cancer therapy. However, there has been little progress in the development of RR inhibitors for use in cancer treatment. The three RR inhibitors currently in clinical use (hydroxyurea, 3-aminopyridine-2-carboxaldehyde thiosemicarbazone (3-AP), and GTI2040) each have significant drawbacks. Therefore, there is a need in the art for more effective compositions and methods for targeting and treating RR-based cancers. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Gripper assembly designs for automated tape libraries have traditionally been lacking in one or more of the following areas: reliability, cost size, speed, simplicity, and flexibility. U.S. Pat. No. 5,253,911, assigned to the assignee of the present invention, provided an improvement over prior art gripper assemblies by providing a servomotor-driven belt which actuates a rotary can mechanism, which drives a pair of cam followers for pivoting a scissors-type mechanism for opening and closing the gripper jaws. The servomotor design is subject to improvement because it requires control logic and continuous power. If power is lost, the system does not know the position of the jaws when power is returned, which may cause further delay.
It is desirable to provide an improved gripper assembly in which operating speed is improved, size is reduced, the number of components is reduced, and the servomotor is eliminated. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to networked file servers and caching proxy servers and more particularly to systems and methods for implementing a takeover of a reliable network connection by a backup host machine, particularly file servers, caching proxy servers, database servers, streaming media servers, or database proxies.
2. Background Information
It is increasingly common for users having standalone computers, or computers interconnected by an institutional intranet or local area network, to gain access to various remote sites (such as those on the “World Wide Web”) via the well-known Internet communications network. Using resident web browser applications executing on the computers, these clients may navigate among services (“pages”) stored on various servers of a service provider (“web site”) and may further request these services as desired. In a basic network communication arrangement, clients are free to access any remote web site for which uniform resource locators (URLs) are available.
It is also increasingly common in network applications to provide the web site servers with associated proxy cache servers that link (“front-end”) the servers with the Internet. A proxy cache server (“proxy”) may be used to accelerate client access to the Internet (“forward proxy”), to accelerate Internet access to a web server (“reverse proxy”), or to accelerate Internet access transparently to either client access or web server access (“transparent proxy”). As for the latter reverse proxy environment, the proxy may access frequently requested services from the web servers and store (“host”) them locally to effectively speed-up access to future requests for the services. For instance, a proxy may host frequently requested web pages of a web site. In response to a request from a browser executing on a client, the proxy attempts to fulfill that request from its local storage. If it cannot, the proxy forwards the request to a web site server that can satisfy the request. The web server then responds by transferring a stream of information to the proxy, which stores and forwards the information over the Internet onto the client. The illustrative embodiment of the invention described herein is applicable to a proxy environment.
As Internet traffic to the web site increases, the network infrastructure of the service provider may become strained attempting to keep up with the increased traffic. In order to satisfy such demand, the service provider may provide additional web servers and/or associated proxies. The additional machines will have unique network addresses.
These network addresses are typically Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol (TCP/IP) addresses that are represented by filenames or URLs including wordtext (domain) names and that are published in a directory service, such as the well-known Domain Name System (DNS). Computers referred to as name servers implement DNS by mapping between the domain names and TCP/IP address(es).
In the case of a “reverse proxy,” the proxies “front-end” the web servers (and may, in fact, be resident on the web servers) and the network addresses of the proxies (rather than the actual web site) are generally mapped to the domain name of the service provider.
Applications running on a proxy generally use an application program interface (API) based on sockets for their access top transport protocols, such as TCP and UDP. A socket is essentially an interface between an application layer and transport layer of a protocol stack that enables the transport layer to identify which application it must communicate with in the application layer. For example, a socket interfaces to a TCP/IP protocol stack via a set of APIs consisting of a plurality of entry points into that stack.
Applications that require TCP/IP connectivity typically utilize the socket API to interface into the TCP/IP stack. For a connection-oriented protocol such as TCP, the socket may be considered a session. However, for a connectionless protocol such as IP datagram using the User Datagram Protocol (UDP), the socket is an entity/handle that the networking software (protocol stack) uses to uniquely identify an application layer end point, typically through the use of port numbers. The software entity within the server that manages the communication exchanges is a TCP/IP process, which is schematically illustrated as layers of a typical Internet communications protocol stack. Protocol stacks and the TCP/IP reference model are well-known and are, for example, described in Computer Networks by Andrew S. Tanenbaun, printed by Prentice Hall PTR, Upper Saddle River, N.J., 1996.
Where web and other network-based data content is provided in large volume from a particular source, and/or to a particular group of users, the use of a multiple-server proxy caching array is highly desirable. In other words, a plurality of interconnected servers all residing on a local network are used to cache and vend content to clients based upon the clients' requests. One known implementation of a “cluster” of proxy cache servers (e.g. a proxy cache cluster or PCC) is the Excelerator™ appliance and associated software available from Volera, Inc. of San Jose, Calif. As part of such a cluster, a gateway router and Layer 4 (L4) switch may be employed. The L4 switch (or similarly operable component), in particular performs “load balancing.” By load-balancing it is meant that the switch assigns requests to various caches based upon a mechanism that attempts to balance the usage of the caches so that no single cache is over-utilized while taking into account any connection context associated with the client requesting the content dataflow.
When a server in a cluster fails, the TCP-based (more-formally termed “TCP/IP”) connections it has established will generally terminate unless a “hot backup” server is available. Such a server is a machine running in tandem with the failed server, and carrying the same connections. Clearly, this is a significant drain on server resources that may only be practical for critical data connections. Where a hot-backup arrangement is not employed, an alternative backup mechanism involves the resumption of the lost TCP-based connection(s) on a different server, or the same server, once restarted/rebooted. This approach, while less demanding on resources, is more time-consuming due to the delays in restarting and reestablishing the connection(s). Further, the hot backup server must be configured as a backup for a particular server-it cannot share the backup responsibilities with other servers in the cluster. In other words, it is dedicated to the server for which it is a backup.
It is desirable to provide a technique for address-partitioning a proxy cache cluster and associated proxy partition cache (PPC) that enables address partitioning at the proxy cache at the cache situs without an external load-balancing mechanism, thereby freeing the L4 switch from any additional address partitioning responsibilities. The PPC architecture should thereby relieve congestion, and overfilling of the caches with duplicate copies of large files. The PPC architecture is just one example of an application of the present invention. The present invention is also applicable to other architectures that utilize L4 switches and other load-balancing and/or failover switching devices.
It is further desirable to provide a system and method for providing “transparent failover” for TCP-based connections that are served by a group of cooperating servers, such as a proxy cache cluster. That is, the connections should be maintained in a manner that does not significantly delay or inconvenience the client with whom the TCP-based connection is established. This system and method should not cause an undesirable increase in server resource usage. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Large financial institutions provide financing for countless numbers of customers, including individual customers and companies. In the case where a financial institution provides financing for companies, credit requests can be for amounts in the tens, if not hundreds of millions of dollars. Further, financial institutions can receive a great number of these requests in a short amount of time, and decisions on these requests are often needed rapidly. Conventionally, however, decisions on these credit requests are reserved for the top credit executives, which are few in number. Accordingly, a typical financial institution often has a small team of credit executives empowered to approve high exposure requests, i.e., requests for a large amount of credit that would expose the financial institution to a significant amount of risk. This combination of having a small number of credit executives in proportion to the number of incoming requests creates a bottleneck in the approval process.
Therefore, a need in the art exists for a way to decrease the response time for credit requests while maintaining the integrity of the process of evaluating these requests in order to ensure that proper decisions are being made. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a memory card having an erroneous erase preventing function and its control apparatus, and a data transmission/reception apparatus.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Conventionally, an external storage apparatus such as a magnetic tape, magnetic disc, optical disc, memory card and the like is used for storing a data from an electronic apparatus such as computer, digital still camera and the like. Especially, the memory card is widely used for its convenience for carrying and high transfer rate.
Similarly as a flexible disc, a memory card as an erroneous erase prevention switch for preventing an erroneous erase of a data stored. However, a conventional erroneous erase prevention switch is provided on a main plane of the card memory body and a user cannot operate the switch when the memory card is mounted on an electronic apparatus.
In this case, if the memory card is inserted into an electronic apparatus and the user find that the memory card is disabled for writing, the user cannot write a new data on a data already stored. The user should pull out the memory card from the electronic apparatus, set the erroneous erase prevention switch to a writable mode, and again mount the memory card into the electronic apparatus. It has been desired to improve the switching operationability of the erroneous erase prevention switch. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Concomitant with development trends in vehicles, the vehicles are recently provided with stability and various other conveniences, in addition to basic traveling performances, and a plurality of sensors are applied in and out of a vehicle body to enable detection of a scene and an environment of an area around the vehicle while sitting inside the vehicle.
Most of the drivers have difficulty in parking. That is, it is difficult to park due to stolidity to distance of adjacent objects during parking of a vehicle. Furthermore, the parking becomes more difficult due to gradually narrowing parking lots caused by increased number of vehicles. Especially, the difficulty in parking looms larger to novice drivers due to failure to measure an adequate distance to objects resultant from inexperience.
The problem is that even an experienced driver can hit another vehicle or a wall existing in front of or at rear of his or her vehicle due to failure to measure a distance to obstructive objects during parking in a narrow space, resulting in property damage. Particularly, in case of reversely driving a vehicle, a driver even cannot grasp a presence of an object let alone a distance measurement, which frequently happens to a novice driver and an experienced driver as well. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a fabrication method of a semiconductor device.
2. Description of the Related Art
A silicon oxide film has been used as a gate insulating film or the like in field effect transistors in a semiconductor integrated circuit (IC). Silicon oxide is an extremely excellent material for an insulating film because silicon oxide has a relatively high endurance voltage and a relatively low leakage current level. On the other hand, the silicon oxide film has a relatively low dielectric constant, which may be disadvantageous for recent further miniaturization and higher integration of ICs.
Along with a recent demand for higher integration of ICs, use of a high-k film having a higher dielectric constant than the silicon oxide film has been considered as the gate insulating film or the like.
Such a high-k film may be formed by a Chemical Vapor Deposition (CVD) method or an Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) method, and then a thermal treatment is carried out with respect to the deposited high-k film in order to reduce residual impurities therein.
However, the thermal treatment may have a problem that the high-k film becomes poly-crystalline, which leads to increased leakage current. Patent Document 1: Examined Patent Publication No. H03-067346 | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Traditional blenders are large, heavy kitchen appliances that are powered through a connection to an electrical power outlet. Because of these physical characteristics and electrical power requirements, traditional blenders are not easily transportable and have limited use outside of the kitchen environment. Furthermore, traditional blenders are not modular in nature. That is, they cannot be disassembled and reassembled into different configurations appropriate for different uses or users.
It would be desirable to have a compact, lightweight, easily transportable blender that is capable of operating independent of an electrical power outlet. It would also be desirable to have a compact, lightweight, easily transportable blender that is capable of being assembled into different configurations. Embodiments of such a portable blender are described herein. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The present invention relates to locksets, and more particularly to electronic-actuated locksets.
Locksets are generally known and typically include a latch or deadbolt engageable with a strike so as to “lock” or retain a door disposed within a doorframe. Certain known locksets include electronic components, such as key pad, card readers, etc., that are used to operate the mechanical components of the lockset so as to controllably displace the latch or deadbolt between locked and unlocked positions. Such mechanical components include one or more rotatable spindles which operate a mechanism or component, such as a latch bolt, directly attached to or connected with the latch. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The invention relates in general to motor vehicle equipment.
More specifically, the invention relates to a tire comprising an airtight rubber cover and a reinforcing structure essentially formed of a plurality of fibres individually embedded in the rubber and arranged in several layers.
Present-day tire performance, particularly in terms of longevity, airtightness and strength, is nowadays obtained at the expense of high complexity, both in terms of the material structure of these tires and in terms of the steps and operations that have to be implemented in order to manufacture them. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to searching for data and, more particularly, to analyzing a natural language message, determining a category in a knowledge base corresponding to the content of the message, and intelligently providing documents from the knowledge base category in response to the message.
2. Description of the Related Art
With the ubiquitous nature of the Internet, most people are familiar with searching for data using a search engine. On the Internet, a search engine is a coordinated set of programs that can include the following: A “spider” (also called a “crawler” or a “bot”) that goes to every page or representative pages on Web sites designated as searchable and reads those pages, using hypertext links on each page to discover and read a site's other pages; A program that creates an index (sometimes called a “catalog”) from the pages that have been read; and A program that receives a search request, compares the search request to the entries in the index, and returns results to the user.
The general concepts and problems encountered when searching for data are explained herein in the context of Internet searching by search engines, although the same concepts apply for searches performed on documents that are not web pages by other types of software, such as database searches by database management systems.
An alternative to using a search engine on the Internet is to explore a structured directory of topics. The Yahoo web site is a widely-used directory on the Web, although Yahoo also allows a user to use a search engine. A number of Web portal sites offer both the search engine and directory approaches to finding information.
Before a search engine can tell you where a file or document is, the file or document must be locatable. To find information on the hundreds of millions of Web pages that exist, a search engine employs spiders to build lists of the words found on Web sites. When a spider is building its lists, the process is called Web crawling. To build and maintain a useful list of words, a search engine's spider examines a very large number of web pages.
A spider typically begins with lists of heavily-used servers and very popular pages. The spider begins with a popular site, indexing the words on its pages and following every link found within the site. In this way, the spider quickly begins to travel, spreading out across the most widely used portions of the Web, to build an index.
Searching through an index involves a user building a query and submitting it through the search engine. The query can be quite simple, a single word at minimum. Building a more complex query requires the use of Boolean operators that allow the user to refine and extend the terms of the search.
The searches defined by Boolean operators, such as AND, OR, NOT, and so on, are literal searches—the search engine looks for the words or phrases exactly as they are entered. This characteristic can be a problem when the entered words have multiple meanings. “Bed,” for example, can be a place to sleep, a place where flowers are planted, the storage space of a truck, or a place where fish lay their eggs. If the user is interested in only one of these meanings, the user might not want to see pages featuring all of the others. The user can build a literal search that tries to eliminate unwanted meanings, but it is preferable that the search engine assist with the elimination.
One of the areas of search engine research is concept-based searching. Some of this research involves using statistical analysis on pages containing the words or phrases in the search, in order to find other pages in which the user might be interested. The information stored about each page is greater for a concept-based search engine than for a keyword searching engine, and far more processing is required for each search. Still, many groups are working to improve both results and performance of this type of search engine. Others have moved on to another area of research, called natural language queries.
The idea behind natural language queries is that the user can type a question in the same way the user would ask the question to a human being; there is no need to keep track of Boolean operators or complex query structures. A popular natural language query web site today is AskJeeves.com, which parses the query for keywords that it then applies to the index of sites it has built. AskJeeves.com only works with simple queries; but competition is heavy to develop a natural-language query engine that can accept a query of great complexity.
All three of these types of search engines search for words in the index matching the words used in the search query. As mentioned above, even concept-based searching typically involves analysis of actual words in the result document and matches those word combinations to words in the search text. The analysis and searching in a context-based search is typically much slower and more expensive than keyword searching.
What is needed is a way to combine the advantages and capabilities of these different searching techniques. Preferably, the user should be able to enter his or her query in natural language text, rather than as a Boolean expression. The search engine should provide intelligence to search based on concepts, rather than solely based on words appearing in both the search query and the search result. In addition, the search engine should find documents quickly and present the results in order of perceived relevance to the search query. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
In recent years, among radiation therapy systems for the purpose of cancer therapy, there have been advanced development and/or construction of a cancer therapy system that utilizes a particle beam of proton, heavy ion, etc. (called, in particular, as a particle beam therapy system) As is well known, according to a particle beam therapy utilizing the particle beam, a cancer diseased site can be irradiated in a concentrated manner as compared to the conventional radiation therapy using an X-ray, a γ-ray, etc., that is, the particle beam can be radiated in a pinpoint manner to be matched to a shape of the diseased site, and thus it is possible to perform the therapy without affecting normal tissues.
In the particle beam therapy, it is important to highly accurately radiate the particle beam to the diseased site such as a cancer. For that purpose, during the particle beam therapy, the patient is fastened using a fastener, etc. in order not to shift his/her position relative to a patient support table in a treatment room (irradiation room). In order to accurately position the diseased site such as a cancer within a radiation exposure region, there is made a setting including roughly emplacing the patient with the aid of a laser pointer, etc., and then, an accurate positioning of the diseased site of the patient is performed using an X-ray image, a CT (Computed Tomography) image or the like.
In Patent Document 1, there is described a treatment table system in which, after being precisely positioned using a three-dimensional diagnosis apparatus (CT apparatus) and while keeping this positioned state, the diseased site is highly accurately positioned at an isocenter of a particle beam therapy system by moving a placing board (top board). Using an isocenter of the three-dimensional diagnosis apparatus (CT apparatus) as a virtual isocenter of the particle beam therapy system, the treatment table system of Patent Document 1 makes positioning so that an image by the three-dimensional diagnosis apparatus is matched to a reference image for positioning. Such a positioning using images, is referred to as an image-matching positioning. After completion of the image-matching positioning at the virtual isocenter, the treatment table system moves the placing board (top board) on which the patient is laid by a movement mechanism of the patient support table, to thereby position the diseased site at the isocenter of the particle beam therapy system. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Liquid crystal per se cannot emit light. Therefore, in a liquid crystal display device, it is necessary to use a back light module to provide a light source having even and high brightness for a liquid crystal cell.
The back light module generally includes a light source, an optical film, a light guide plate and a back plate, for example. In particular, depending on distributed location of the light source in the back light module, the back light module can be classified into an edge-lit back light module and a direct-lit back light module, wherein the light source in the edge-lit back light module is located on a side of a display panel and usually suitable for a liquid crystal display device having relative small size; and the light source in the direct-lit back light module is located on a bottom of the display panel and usually suitable for a liquid crystal display device having relative large size. The light guide plate is an essential component in the back light module which can transform a point light source and/or linear light source into an area light source, to provide an area light source output having even brightness. The optical film is arranged on a light exiting surface of the light guide plate, to further process light output from the light guide plate, such that the light can be emitted evenly and perpendicularly to the light exiting surface of the light guide plate. The back plate is used to support and fix components such as the light source, the light guide plate and the optical film.
Usually, in order to position the light guide plate, a positioning slot is provided in a middle position of a non-light incident surface on the edge of the light guide plate, and a positioning pin is mounted in the positioning slot to position the light guide plate. In practice, since the light guide plate is fragile and has the thermal expansion and contraction characteristics. For this reason, it is necessary to leave an expansion gap (or an expansion size) in advance between the positioning slot and the positioning pin of the light guide plate and between the light guide plate and the light source. Also, machining errors in sizes of the positioning slot, the positioning pin and the light guide plate may further influence a gap between the light incident surface of the light guide plate and the light exiting surface of the light source. Therefore, it may be easy to cause that the gap between the light incident surface of the light guide plate and the light exiting surface of the light source has relatively large amplitude of variation. Not only may display images be uneven, but also the gap between the light guide plate and the light source may have significant differences for different display devices, such that the display quality is different according to the display devices. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
With the growth of the Internet, web-sites are increasingly providing content such as news, articles, and stories. There are an increasing number of sources for content on the Internet. With this growth, content distribution on the Internet has become disorganized. For example, popular news sites carry redundant news items, so users have little need to visit more than one news source. For a user to receive comprehensive news items of a given topic, such as their local area, the user may have to visit numerous sites and materials. At the same time, a user may find it difficult to find a news item about an obscure category, such as a disease or a hobby. In such cases, users often rely on search sites, such as provided by YAHOO! or GOOGLE to locate content items of interest.
There are web-sites that categorize content for users, but in most cases, the categories are fairly broad and non-specific. For example, the typical news site will provide aggregation of news stories under headings such as World News, U.S. News, Sports, Business etc. The aggregation and categorization of such stories is typically done through some manual intervention. A typical situation is that the story is categorized in a general category at its origin, and then distributed for consumption or display on multiple web-sites. Another situation is that editors provide keywords in a story, or associate the keywords with the stories, so that when someone types a search term at a search site that matches the key word, the story will be presented in the search result.
Some sites provide category-specific content by searching for content that matches a particular search term. Such sites typically rely on the use of search terms to ensure that a particular content item is sufficiently pertinent to a particular category. When content is identified, it is known to belong to a category of the search term. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field
Embodiments of the present invention relate to a propulsion apparatus for ships and a ship including the same.
2. Description of the Related Art
Contra-rotating propellers are an propulsion apparatus that may achieve high propeller efficiency by causing a rear propeller rotating in a direction opposite to the direction of rotation of a front propeller to receive rotational energy produced by the front propeller and convert the same into propulsion power (hereinafter, referred to as ‘a contra-rotating propulsion apparatus’).
In the case of conventional contra-rotating propulsion apparatuses, a rear propeller and a front propeller are respectively attached to a main shaft and a hollow shaft which are coaxially disposed and rotated in opposite directions by a planetary gear unit.
To effectively use such a contra-rotating propulsion apparatus, a very large planetary gear unit may be required. However, it may be very difficult to secure a space for installation of such a planetary gear unit of this size at the stern of a ship formed in a complex shape.
In addition, in the case that the planetary gear unit malfunctions, operation of the apparatus may be interrupted. Thereby, the propeller ceases to rotate and accordingly propulsion may be lost.
To secure the space for installation of the planetary gear unit, the planetary gear unit may be deployed in a forward position. In this case, the length of the hollow shaft increases by the distance that the planetary gear unit is moved. However, as the length of the hollow shaft increases, the area that needs to be lubricated to reduce friction between the hollow shaft and the main shaft may increase, and alignment work through installation of bearings in the shaft may become difficult. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The present inventor has recognized that typical electrical connectors using standard MIL-C-39029 contacts commonly use a retaining clip to hold them in the electrical connector. The present inventor has also recognized that retaining clips commonly require a removal tool to be used to remove such contacts from an electrical connector one at a time for repair or replacement. The present inventor has also recognized that retaining clips, which are commonly located with the contacts in the same bore of the connector body, increase the bore size needed to hold a contact and thus increase the required spacing, that is, the axis to axis distance, between such bore centers.
The present inventor has recognized that other common electrical connectors embed contacts in a plastic housing, which prevents wires from being crimped into such contacts. The present inventor has also recognized that soldering wires into such contacts consumes significant amounts of time and may cause the plastic housing to melt. Melting the plastic housing loosens the embedded contacts and results in an inferior electrical connector that may need to be rejected or re-worked. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates generally to optical modulators, specifically optical retarder and polarization modulator assemblies that are used in optical systems such as lasers or narrow-band quasi-monochromatic beams that exhibit a relatively long coherence length (many waves).
2. Description of the Related Art
The phenomenon of phase interference is well-known and is described in standard optical texts such as Born and Wolf, Principles of Optics or Hecht and Zejak, Optics. While these present a fuller and more accurate treatment of the topic, an exemplary situation is summarized here as follows. When light is incident upon a structure that exhibits reflection at two or more nearly-parallel surfaces, there is interference between beams which have reflected from the different surfaces involved, or which have experienced multiple reflections between the surfaces involved. If the light is quasi-monochromatic or monochromatic (such as a laser beam) and is phase-coherent over distances corresponding to the differential path lengths involved, interference will result in spatially resolved light and dark fringes corresponding to regions of constructive and destructive interference. The specific fringe pattern, arising as it does from the relative phase between the beams, varies with the wavelength of light. So the interference pattern may be seen as varying with location for light of a given wavelength, or varying with wavelength for a given location.
In some structures such as the well-known Fabry-Perot interferometer, Fizeau interferometer, and so on, the fringe pattern is desired as a means of selecting wavelength, measuring wavelength, or spectrally filtering an optical beam. However, in most imaging or modulation systems, such an interference pattern would be undesirable, and components are designed to minimize or eliminate such effects.
Known techniques for doing so include mounting the optical components at non-normal incidence, so that beams reflecting from the various surfaces can be spatially separated, which eliminates the interference; or use of highly-efficient anti-reflection coatings, so that the energy in the various reflections beams is minimized; or by incorporating lossy elements between the reflecting surfaces, so that multiple-pass reflections are damped. If the system is viewed as a resonator, the latter approach effectively reduces its Q factor.
Wedged substrates have been used to construct a liquid crystal variable retarder, to defeat interference arising from reflections at the exterior faces of the device. Similarly, devices have been built wherein the liquid crystal layer is bounded by high-reflection mirrors, to produce a liquid-crystal tunable etalon, and these have generally been constructed using wedged substrates to eliminate fringing from reflections at the outer face of the device. However, use of wedged substrates is incompatible with prevailing liquid crystal fabrication methods, which are designed to use flat, relatively thin sheet glass instead. In the normal process, one produces a large panel containing many liquid crystal cells, which are subsequently cut into individual pieces, filled, and sealed. In contrast, the use of wedged substrates forces one to assemble the cells singly, at greatly increased cost. Also, the process is considerably more labor-intensive, so the number of cells a given facility can produce is much lower than if the panelized approach is used. Further, several of the steps involved in liquid crystal cell fabricationxe2x80x94such as spin-coating, alignment-layer buffing, and adhesive deposition xe2x80x94cannot be performed as easily when wedged substrates are used, nor can comparably tight quality control be achieved. Thus, liquid crystal cells that use wedged substrates are inherently more expensive, require non-standard production equipment, have lesser quality, and are difficult to provide in volume.
It is common practice to provide a liquid crystal cells with anti-reflection coated faces, either by laminating it to polarizers or similar materials that have such a coating; or by cementing the cell to glass windows that have antireflection coatings on their outer faces. The quality of coating which can be produced on glass is superior to that produced on polarizers, but even under ideal conditions it is difficult to produce less than 0.25% reflection per surface reliably.
While this is a small amount, which one might expect would have a negligible effect on the overall assembly, this is not actually the case. The intensity of the fringes produced when two phase-coherent beams interfere is:
xe2x80x83Ifringe=4(IA*IB)xc2xdxe2x80x83xe2x80x83[1]
where IA and IB are the intensities of the two beams. In a liquid crystal cell that operates in reflection-mode, beam IA might be the primary beam, and beam IB might be an unwanted reflection from the anti-reflection coated outer face of the device. If the intensity of the beam incident upon the cell is termed I0, the two intensities are then
IA=0.9975 I0xe2x80x83xe2x80x83[2a]
IB=0.0025 I0xe2x80x83xe2x80x83[2b]
where we make the approximation that the cell is otherwise lossless. Thus, the fringe intensity is
Ifringe=4(0.0024938 I02)xc2xd=0.1998 I0xe2x80x83xe2x80x83[3]
or nearly 20 percent of the intensity of the primary beam. So even surfaces or interfaces that produce what one might expect to be negligible reflections, based on the reflection coefficients involved, yield quite significant interference patterns when they interfere with a bright beam. This is because, loosely speaking, such interference is proportional to the strength of the electric field of the weaker beam, while intensity is a measure of the square of the electric field. In the present example, the intensity of the beam reflected from the coated surface is {fraction (1/400)} as great as that of the incident beam, but the electric field is {fraction (1/20)}th as great. When the reflected beam interferes with the main beam, it alters the electric field up or down by 5 percent, which produces an intensity change of plus or minus 10 percent, for a total peak-to-valley fringe depth of 20 percent.
Interference effects arising from reflections at the opposite faces of the liquid crystal layer itself are in some sense unavoidable, since there is always a finite reflection, and one usually wishes the liquid crystal to have a uniform thickness, to yield a retardance that is the same for all points within the aperture. Thus, one inevitably forms a parallel resonant cavity structure. However, because the liquid crystal layer is relatively thin (typically 4-25 microns) and well-controlled, the effects of this fringe pattern are often acceptable.
One reason for this is that the spectral period between successive peaks is relatively wide. This is an interference of relatively low order, where order denotes the path difference between interfering beams, counted out in wavelengths of light in the intervening medium.
Low-order interference has a wide spectral separation, while high-order interference has a narrow spectral separation. This may be quantified and calculated if one desires. When interference occurs from reflection at opposite faces of a slab of material, the spectral separation between successive peaks in the fringe pattern is given by
xcex4xcex=xcex2/(2nd)xe2x80x83xe2x80x83[4]
where xcex is the wavelength of light involved, n is the refractive index of the material between reflective surfaces, and d is the thickness of the slab. For a liquid crystal layer 10 microns thick with an index of 1.50, operated at 1.5 microns, the spectral separation between successive fringes is 75 nm. When such cells are used to make tunable filters, attenuators, switches, or other components which control or transmit light over a bandwidth narrower than 75 mn, the fringes do not significantly distort the bandpass of the system. In contrast, interference arising from parallel surfaces that are more widely spaced, will have a narrower spectral period, and will introduce ripple or distortion within the passband of the system. Consequently, interference between such elements is more deleterious to the system than interference across the liquid crystal layer itself.
At the other extreme, reflection between elements that are separated by a distance which exceeds the coherence length of the beam involved, does not lead to interference since the beams are not phase-coherent. One can estimate the coherence distance of a polychromatic beam by the equation
L=xcex2/xcex4xcexxe2x80x83xe2x80x83[5]
In this case, the bandwidth of interest xcex4xcex is that of the limiting element in the system, whether that be the source, the liquid crystal assembly, or some other spectral filtering element. It is often impractical when working with relatively coherent sources (or in narrowband instruments) to construct a liquid crystal assembly using components that are so thick that all reflecting surfaces (or interfaces) are so far apart as to greatly exceed L. Even when possible, this approach results in excess bulk, weight, and cost.
It is common to combine an optical retarder with a liquid crystal cell, to effect an optical retardance that is variable by means of the electro-optic action of the cell; and which spans a range that is not readily available by use of the liquid crystal cell alone. Basically, an optical retarder is placed in series with the cell, and oriented with its slow axis either parallel to, or perpendicular to, the retarder axis of the liquid crystal cell. The retardances of the two elements are summed or differenced thereby. One common reason for using this arrangement is to compensate for the residual retardance of the cell (since some retardance remains, even at high applied voltages), and in this way to enable providing a retardance of zero. This is exhaustively described in the prior art as a way to obtain enhanced contrast or extinction ratio when such a system is placed between polarizers. Such assemblies of a cell and retarder are availably commercially from Meadowlark Optics (Longmont, Colo.).
Another situation where optical retarders are used in combination with liquid crystal cells is in the construction of tunable filters using Lyot and Solc design. In applications such as solar astronomy, telecommunications channel selection, and Raman imaging, such filters are used to produce narrow, tunable passbands. Complete filters of this type are available from Cambridge Research and Instrumentation, Inc. (Boston, Mass.).
In a retarder-compensated cell, it is impossible to match the index of the retarder to that of the other materials involved, if only because the retarder is made of birefringent material and thus has two distinct optical indices, no and nc. Even if one or the other index matches that of the other components involved, it is impossible to match both. Further, the optimum materials for retarder selection may not have indices that are well-matched to those of the other materials. Retarder choice is governed by factors such as aperture, thickness, cost, and amount of retardance needed.
Common retarder materials include calcite, lithium niobate, polyvinyl alcohol, polycarbonate, polyethylene terapthelate (Mylar), mica, and quartz. All of these mismatch the index of the standard liquid crystal cell glass such as Corning 7059 or 1737F by 0.05 or more. Among other retarder materials such as liquid crystal polymers, stressed glass, KDP (potassium dihidrogen phosphate) and its isomorphs, some have the potential to provide a better match but all suffer one or more of the following limitations: they are not readily available, are subject to hygroscopic attack, cannot be produced in large aperture, have limited retardance range, or are very costly.
As this indicates, it is not practical to eliminate reflection between a retarder and a liquid crystal cell by choice of component material.
The incorporation of a retarder into the overall assembly increases the number of reflective interfaces by at least one (and in most cases two or more), and thus increases the number of interfering beams. Consequently, all the problems recited earlier with regard to liquid crystal cells in coherent beams, apply with even greater force when constructing assemblies of liquid crystal cells with retarders.
Thus there is no device or method of construction at present which provides a liquid crystal cell, either alone or in series with a fixed retarder, that does not suffer from significant interference between two or more beams, in addition to the interference from the opposite faces of the liquid crystal layer itself.
It is an object of the present invention to provide a liquid crystal cell that can be used with essentially no optical interference other than that produced by the opposite faces of the liquid crystal layer. It is a further object to provide such an assembly in a manner that is compatible with conventional, low-cost manufacture of the liquid crystal element involved, and specifically to be compatible with the high-volume, panelized cell construction described above. This compatibility is achieved without adding significant cost anywhere else in the assembly process. Fixed retarders may be incorporated for purposes of compensation or of providing a desired range of retardance values.
It is yet another object of the invention to provide both reflective and transmissive embodiments that share the aforementioned benefits over the prior art. Finally, it is an object of this invention to attain this without restricting in any way the choice of materials that can be used as retarders, substrates, or liquid crystal materials. Thus it is possible to span the entire range of retardances, aperture, and the like which have heretofore been possible, while enjoying the novel benefit of eliminating high-order interference.
The invention consists, in the simplest embodiment, of a reflective or transmissive cell of ordinary manufacture to which a wedged glass spacer is attached on one or both faces of the cell by index-matching cement or epoxy. The spacer material and the epoxy are well-matched in optical index to the substrate glass used in the liquid crystal cell, since any mismatch at the interfaces will produce a reflected beam that will interfere with the primary beam. However, it is relatively straightforward to match the refractive index of the wedged spacer to the substrate within 0.005 over a wide spectral range, by simply using the same glass type as is employed in the substrate. For example, if Corning 1737F is used as the substrate, the spacers could be cut from sheets of the same material, then ground and polished to achieve a wedge of 0.5 degrees. Alternatively, one can use an optical glass that matches the index of Corning 1737F. Optical epoxies and gels are available which have an index in the proper range (n=1.49-1.54) and are thus an excellent match. In this way, reflections at the spacer/cell interface are kept to as little as 0.0003 percent or less.
Windows are then mounted to the wedged face of the spacer, and such a window typically will have its outer face anti-reflection coated so there is low reflection at the glass/air interface. In a reflective mode cell, there is only one set of spacers and windows; in a transmissive mode cell, two sets may be employed, one on each side of the cell.
A compensating retarder may be mounted to the wedged face of the spacer when this is required, and a window may then be mounted to the exterior face of the retarder, if desired. Or, the exterior face of the retarder may itself have an anti-reflection coating so it functions as the window. Or, the overall assembly may be joined with other optical elements using index-matching adhesives, eliminating the need for anti-reflection coatings on outermost faces. A retarder is normally planar, in order to produce uniform retardance across its aperture. Thus, reflections at the interface between the retarder and spacer, and retarder and window (if present), are canted at an angle to the plane of the liquid crystal material. This angle is chosen so that the divergence between the main beam and the unwanted reflections is great enough that they are spatially separated before encountering the detector, film, or measurement apparatus to which the light beam involved is ultimately presented.
The result is that interference is defeated, just as when one constructs the liquid crystal cell using wedged substrates. However, the construction is enormously simplified with the present invention, since the cell can be fabricated using high-quality, low cost methods including panelized assembly. The only additional cost of the present invention compared to a prior-art fringing assembly, is that of the wedged spacer element, which is readily made and attached using conventional optical device manufacturing methods, with special attention to matching the optical indices of the adhesive, spacer, and cell substrates.
Other objects and features of the present invention will become apparent from the following detailed description considered in conjunction with the accompanying drawings. It is to be understood, however, that the drawings are designed solely for purposes of illustration and not as a definition of the limits of the invention, for which reference should be made to the appended claims. It should be further understood that the drawings are not necessarily drawn to scale and that, unless otherwise indicated, they are merely intended to conceptually illustrate the structures and procedures described herein. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system and method for use in a telephone network, the system and method for providing automatic collect messaging for a calling party placing a collect call to a called party where a destination number associated with the called party has restricted access for collect telephone calls.
2. Background
Various telephone service providers offer customers what may be referred to as a collect messaging service. Such a service may be provided for a calling party placing a collect telephone call to a destination number associated with a called party, where the called party is not available to receive the collect call at the time it is placed by the calling party.
More particularly, according to such a service, where a calling party places a collect telephone call to a destination number associated with a called party, and the called party is not then available to receive the collect call, the calling party may be offered the option of recording a message for the called party. According to collect messaging services, such a recorded message is delivered to the called party at a later time. Just as the called party would have been required to accept a charge to receive the collect call had the called party been available at the time the call was placed, with collect messaging, the called party must also accept a charge to receive the message.
However, a destination number may have restricted access for collect calls. That is, such a number or line may be designated as xe2x80x9ccollect restricted,xe2x80x9d such that collect calls to that number or line are blocked. As a result, a caller or calling party cannot complete a collect call to such xe2x80x9ccollect restrictedxe2x80x9d lines or numbers. xe2x80x9cCollect restrictedxe2x80x9d numbers or lines may include, but are not necessarily limited to, business or residential lines where a xe2x80x9ccollect calls blockedxe2x80x9d option has been selected and all mobile telephone lines or numbers.
For such xe2x80x9ccollect restrictedxe2x80x9d lines, when a caller or calling party attempts to place a collect call to such a number, the call is blocked. The calling party""s experience may be summarized as follows:
1. A caller places a collect call to a destination number.
2. The destination number has blocked collect calls (which may be the result of a request for collect call blocking by the business or residential customer associated with that destination number or line, or the fact that the destination number is a mobile number or line).
3. The calling party hears a recorded message that the collect call cannot be completed (for example: xe2x80x9cFor this call, collect billing is not allowedxe2x80x9d).
4. Call terminated.
Thus, the collect call is not completed. This is the result regardless of whether the called party was available at the time the collect call was placed. Collect messaging service is not available for the calling party to record a message for later delivery, as the destination number or line does not accept collect calls. That is, collect messaging only offers the ability to record a collect message for later delivery where the destination number or line is xe2x80x9ccollect eligible.xe2x80x9d Collect messaging is not supported on collect call restricted destination numbers or lines.
As a result, there exists a need for an improved system and method for providing collect messaging. Such a system and method would provide for automatic collect messaging for a calling party placing a collect call to a called party where a destination number associated with the called party has restricted access for collect telephone calls. Such a system and method would provide for recording a message from the calling party for later delivery to the called party. If the called party accepts a charge, the message would be delivered.
Accordingly, the present invention provides a system and method for providing automatic collect messaging for a calling party placing a collect call to a called party where a destination number associated with the called party has restricted access for collect telephone calls.
According to the present invention, then, in a telephone network for use in placing telephone calls to a destination number associated with a called party, the destination number having restricted access for collect telephone calls, a system is disclosed for providing a message to the called party for a collect telephone call from a calling party. The system comprises a messaging platform for use in recording a message from the calling party and a controller in communication with the messaging platform. The controller is for use in notifying the calling party of the restricted access of the destination number for collect telephone calls, providing the calling party with an option for recording a message for the called party, and, if the calling party accepts the option for recording a message, routing the collect telephone call to the messaging platform.
Also according to the present invention, in a telephone network for use in placing telephone calls to a destination number associated with a called party, the destination number having restricted access for collect telephone calls, a method is disclosed for providing a message to the called party of a collect telephone call from a calling party. The method comprises providing a controller, wherein the controller is for use in notifying the calling party of the restricted access of the destination number for collect telephone calls, providing the calling party with an option for recording a message for the called party, and, if the calling party accepts the option for recording a message, providing for recording the message.
Also according to the present invention, in a telephone network for use in placing telephone calls to a destination number associated with a called party, the destination number having restricted access for collect telephone calls, a method is disclosed for providing a message to the called party of a collect telephone call from a calling party. The method comprises notifying the calling party of the restricted access of the destination number for collect telephone calls and providing the calling party with an option for recording a message for the called party. The method further comprises recording a message for delivery to the called party if the calling party accepts the option for recording a message. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a nigrosine granulated colorant that is used to impart a color to thermoplastic resin and for other purposes and has good handlability and good dispersibility in resin, a method of producing the same, a high-concentration master batch using the granulated colorant, a method of producing the same, and a colored composition using the granulated colorant or high-concentration master batch.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Because thermoplastic resins have excellent mechanical and chemical properties, they are widely used in plastic molding products in the field of components for automobiles, electric/electronic products and the like, and the demands are increasing in the field of engineering plastics. Additionally, thermoplastic resins are fitted to a broad range of industrial applications by formulating fibrous reinforcing material in thermoplastic resins to improve the heat resistance and chemical resistance, and to confer mechanical properties matching with various applications. In particular, in the field of automobiles, bicycles and the like, there has been a remarkable trend toward replacement of conventional metal parts with fiber-reinforced thermoplastic resin parts, for the purpose of weight reduction, manufacturing process rationalization and corrosion prevention.
Thermoplastic resins are colored for decoration, color identification, improvement of light fastness of molded products, content protection and shading and for other purposes, with black coloring being the most important in the industry. Traditionally, various inorganic pigments and organic dyes/pigments, such as carbon black, black metal complex dyes, nigrosine dyes and perinone black, have been used to impart a black color to thermoplastic resins. Of these, nigrosine dyes enable imparting vividly black colors with excellent appearance and surface gloss, and hence have been widely used to impart a color to thermoplastic resins with various attempts.
Specifically, such attempts include a molded blend wherein a polyamide resin is colored with carbon black and nigrosine (Japanese Patent Examined Publication No. SHO-60-43379), a glass fiber-reinforced black polyamide resin composition comprising a polyamide resin, a surface-treated glass fiber and an azine dye (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. HEI-6-128479), a black polyamide resin composition wherein a polyamide resin is colored with a nigrosine dye, aniline black and carbon black (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. HEI-9-255869), a polyester resin composition wherein a polyester resin is colored with a dye having a phenazine ring (nigrosine dye) (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. HEI-10-292098), a colored thermoplastic resin composition wherein a crystalline resin (e.g., polyamide resin, polybutylene terephthalate resin, etc.) is colored with a modified nigrosine dye and related art (Domestic Re-publication of PCT International Publication No. WO00/26302).
Generally, in coloring a fiber-reinforced thermoplastic resin, a problem arises that the colorant (particularly black pigment) is difficult to sufficiently uniformly disperse in the resin even with a long time of kneading, because a fibrous reinforcing material is present in the resin. In particular, the spoilage of the gloss, appearance and the like of the colored molded product by the fibrous reinforcing material floating on the surface of the molded product during molding has been problematic. In this regard, there is room for improving colored resin compositions comprising a nigrosine dye.
Additionally, because nigrosine dyes are powders having small values of bulk density and average particle diameter, nigrosine dye dusting can occur during dye charge, blending with the resin, and the like, posing the problem with work environment deterioration, so that special measures have been required to prevent the dusting.
Furthermore, a master batch of nigrosine dye is produced by, for example, blending a resin and a dye in a mechanical mixer such as a Henschel mixer or blender, and extrusion-molding the blend using a single-screw extruder or twin-screw extruder into a resin pellet. In this manufacturing process, however, drawbacks, including phenomena such as bridging in the hopper and unsmooth feed of raw materials (resin, nigrosine dye, etc.) into the screw during extrusion kneading due to fluidity differences between nigrosine dye and resin, and a lack of fluidity due to dye wetting and adhesion as a result of dye exposure to the gas from the resin, additives and the like in the extrusion process, have been likely. As such, nigrosine dyes are extremely poorly handlable; it has been difficult to fill a nigrosine dye in a master batch at high concentrations.
The present invention has been developed in view of the aforementioned problems in the prior art, and is intended to provide a colorant that modifies the dusting of nigrosine dye, ensures good handlability in transportation, packaging, charge and the like, is unlikely to lose shape during the handling, and enables good and uniform dispersion of a nigrosine dye in a resin by blending or kneading with the resin in various forms of color imparting, including coloring a resin containing a fibrous reinforcing material and high-concentration resin coloring, a method of producing the same, a master batch that does not exhibit bridging or separation of a colorant from resin during blending or kneading said colorant with the resin during production and uniformly contains a high concentration of nigrosine dye, a method of producing the same, and a colored composition that uniformly contains a nigrosine dye, has a well controlled crystallization temperature with nigrosine dye, enables easier commercialization of products that must meet the rigorous demands for precision molding and dimensional accuracy, confers good appearance and surface gloss to molded products, has excellent light fastness, undergoes little color changes over time, and has good mechanical properties. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The invention concerns a unique and advantageous clamping mechanism for a hot-runner manifold system used for injection molding. A fastener connection is provided between the hot-runner manifold block and the mold plate of the product mold for the injection-molding system. A sprue bushing is situated in the mold plate in tight fluid communication with the hot-runner manifold. Clamping members located on both sides of the hot-runner manifold are screwed into the mold plate and secure the manifold to the mold plate.
Hot-runner manifold systems are well known and are used to convey the synthetic-material melt, plastified by heating, into a plurality of individual sprue bushings positioned in mold plates of the injection-molding system. The manifolds keep the plastic material in a fluid condition while the material flows from the injection machine nozzle through the sprue bushings and into the mold cavity. Hot-runner manifold systems provide for use of a plurality of sprue bushings and multi-cavity molds and thus allow increased manufacture of more products.
The sprue bushings are inserted into recesses or bores in the mold plate. The top or inlet ends of the sprue bushings are positioned and sealed against the lower surface of the hot-runner manifold block. (The lower surface is also called the "underside" of the manifold block. In addition, the "top side" of the hot-runner manifold means the external side of the hot-runner manifold block, which lies opposite the lower surface and the sprue bushings.)
Known hot-runner manifolds commonly contain pairs of lugs which protrude on opposite sides of the block and which accommodate clamping screws. In order to produce such hot-runner manifold blocks, the external contours, including the externally protruding lugs, are machined from a larger block of metal material. This requires considerable expenditure of labor and waste of material.
Since the hot-runner manifolds are heated, they undergo thermal expansion when in operation, while the sprue bushings inserted into the injection-molding mold plate typically maintain their position. Such thermal expansion, depending on the dimensions of the hot-runner manifold block, may be relatively large, for example on the order of 3 mm. This causes twisting and distortion of the clamping screws inserted in the lateral lugs. Furthermore, the thermal expansion causes an increase in the surface pressure between the hot-runner manifold and the sprue bushings. This may cause the bushing to be forced into the bottom surface (under side) of the hot-runner manifold and cause surface damage (erosion) on the sealing surface.
Consequently, it is an object of the present invention to provide a clamping mechanism for hot-runner manifold systems which is an improvement over known fastening mechanisms. It is another object of the present invention to provide a clamping mechanism for hot-runner manifold systems which permits thermal expansion of the manifolds without adverse effects on the clamping screws and/or the sprue bushings. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of Invention
This invention relates to a bumping process. More particularly, the present invention is related to a bumping process for ensuring the reliability of bumps and the integrity of the dielectric layer covering the redistributed layer of the bumped wafer.
2. Related Art
In this information explosion age, integrated circuits products are used almost everywhere in our daily life. As fabricating technique continue to improve, electronic products having powerful functions, personalized performance and a higher degree of complexity are produced. Nowadays, most electronic products are relatively light and have a compact body. Hence, in semiconductor production, various types of high-density semiconductor packages have been developed. Flip chip is one of the most commonly used techniques for forming an integrated circuits package. Moreover, compared with a wire-bonding package or a tape automated bonding (TAB) package, a flip-chip package uses a shorter electrical path on average and has a better overall electrical performance. In a flip-chip package, the bonding pads on a chip and the contacts on a substrate are connected together through a plurality of bumps formed by the method of bumping process. Accordingly, the technology of bumping process becomes more and more important in the advanced packaging fields.
As mentioned above, in a conventional bumping process, a stencil or a photosensitive film, such as a photo-resist layer, having a plurality of openings that exposes the bonding pads is formed over the active surface of the chip (or wafer) to serve as a mask. Thereafter, a plating process or a printing process is carried out to fill solder material into the openings over the bonding pads. The stencil or the photosensitive film is then removed to have the solder layer exposed over various bonding pads. After a reflow process, the solder layers solidify into a plurality of bumps and each bump has a spherical profile on the corresponding bonding pad.
Referring to FIG. 1A to FIG. 1G, which illustrate magnified cross-sectional views of the bump of a wafer showing the steps for producing a bump according to a conventional method. First, as shown in FIG. 1A, a wafer 100 having an active surface 101 with a plurality of bonding pads 102 (only one is shown) and a passivation layer 104 thereon is provided. The passivation layer 104 are positioned over the active surface 101 and exposes the bonding pads 102 through passivation openings 104a (only one is shown) formed in the passivation layer 104.
Next, as shown in FIG. 1B, a first dielectric layer 105 is formed over the passivation layer 104 and covers a portion of each bonding pad 102 to leave one of bonding pads 102 exposed out of the first dielectric layer 105 through a first opening 105a and have a portion of passivation layer 104 exposed out of the first dielectric layer 105 through a second opening 105b.
Next, a redistributed layer 106 is formed over the first dielectric layer 105, the bonding pad 102 and the passivation layer 104 exposed out of the first dielectric layer 105, wherein the portion of the redistributed layer 106 directly connecting the passivation layer 104 serves as a bump pad 106a. Generally, the redistributed layer 106 is formed by the following steps. Firstly, a first electrically conductive layer is formed over the first dielectric layer. Next, a photo-resist layer is formed on and partially covers the first electrically conductive layer. Then, a photolithographic process and an etching process are performed to remove the portion of the first electrically conductive layer not covered by the photo-resist layer to form a patterned first electrically conductive layer serving as the redistributed layer as mentioned above. Therein, the bump pad is electrically connected to the bonding pad through said patterned first electrically conductive layer.
Then, referring to FIG. 1D, a patterned second electrically conductive layer 107 is formed over the redistributed pad 106a by the steps of disposing photo-resist layer, performing a photolithographic process, and performing an etching process and serves as a transition layer or an under bump metallurgy layer located over the bump pad 106a.
Afterwards, referring to FIG. 1E, a second dielectric layer 108 is formed over the patterned first electrically conductive layer 106 with a third opening 108a exposing the portion of the patterned second electrically conductive layer 107, which is located over the bump pad 106a.
Next, referring to FIG. 1F, a photo-resist layer 109 is formed over the second dielectric layer 108 with a fourth opening 109a exposing the portion of the patterned second electrically conductive layer 107 located over the bump pad 106a. Then, a solder material is filled in the fourth opening 109a through a screen-printing method to form a bump 110.
Finally, the bump 110 is reflowed to be fixed on the patterned second electrically conductive layer 107 over the bump pad 106a securely and shaped into a solder ball 112; and the second dielectric layer 108 is removed in sequence.
However, in the aforementioned conventional bumping process, the solder material is a mixture of solder powder and flux, and the second dielectric layer 108 is usually made of a polymer material, such as polyimide (PI) and Benzocyclobutene (BCB). The flux within the solder material will react with the polymer material to produce water and carbon dioxide or some other gases, so the gases including water and carbon dioxide inside the bump 126 will form air bubbles and said bubbles will stay in the reflowed bump, after the reflow process is performed as shown in FIG. 1G. Hence, the mechanical strength of the bump will be lowered to reduce the reliability of the bump.
Furthermore, the photo-resist layer 109 is typically removed by etching with an etchant. The etchant not only etches away the photo-resist layer 109, but also attach the second dielectric layer 108 made of polymer material underneath the photo-resist layer 109 so that a portion of the second dielectric layer 108 will be removed or damaged. Any loss of integrity of the polymer layer 108 is likely to compromise the protective capacity on the wafer 100.
Therefore, providing another method for forming bumps to solve the mentioned-above disadvantages is the most important task in this invention. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The present invention, instead of for injection into the skin, is for transdermal delivery via a topical application. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
This invention pertains to the use of casters for moving heavy objects. More specifically, the invention relates to the provision of a flexible sheet material having casters distributed over its surface for attachment to objects of various sizes and shapes in order to enable them to be moved along the ground.
It is known in the art to employ casters in the form of wheels, balls, or other cylindrical or spherical rollers. Such casters or rollers are usually components of assemblies including rigid, and relatively heavy, platforms, with or with out handle assemblies, such as hand trucks and dollies. These devices are generally large, heavy, cumbersome, and expensive. Also, once purchased, their used is generally limited to objects within a narrow range of sizes.
It is desirable to be able to employ inexpensive casters on objects of virtually any size or shape, for permanent or temporary use.
It is known in the art to provide casters along rows and columns in a sheet of a rigid material that is scored to make the sheet frangible between the rows and columns. This enables portions of the material, each containing a caster, to be broken off for use, whereby one or more individual casters may be attached to an object for enabling it to be moved along a floor. Such a construction is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 3,559,802 to Eidus for a Caster Assembly.
The use of rigid sheets as disclosed by Eidus limits their usefulness on non-planar surfaces and makes the sheets difficult to store when suitably sized to support large objects. In addition, such sheets can be wasteful when only a portion of one sheet is to be used and the remainder is of a size too small to have immediate utility. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The present invention relates to sensors, and more particularly to sensors for measurements of electric potentials and electric fields.
With an electric field sensor it may be possible to measure the true quantitative electric potential and electrostatic field emanating from, passing through, and present around objects or in free space. A quasi-static measurement process for imaging electric potentials and electric fields has been developed using a quasi-static electric field generator. The quasi-static electric field generator allows for the simultaneous calibration and measurement of the electric field sensor responses in the presence of parasitic intrinsic and extrinsic leakage electrical currents that exist in electrical components. These leakage currents manifest themselves as parasitic capacitances, resistances, and inductances throughout solid state elements of electrical components and the supporting structures. The active constitutive electronic materials of the electronic component, as well as mounting structures, all have these manifestations to some degree. Additionally, the leakage currents are not only supported by solid structures. Leakage currents may also exist in surrounding gases, liquids, and plasmas. When measuring true static electric potentials and electric fields emanating from an object, the measurement process is made more complex by the leakage of charged carriers moving and polarization, due to the presence of the electric field, toward establishing an equilibrium state of the measurement system. This equilibrium process is time dependant and prohibits the measurement of the original true electrical potential and electric field in current systems. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Related art wireless multi-mode data communication methods include a method (for example, refer to JP,2002-369261,A) of switching between an autonomous mode in which data are transmitted and received autonomously, and a so-called scheduling mode in which data are transmitted and received according to requirements (i.e., scheduling) set for data transmission and reception, such as a communication timing permitted by a base station, according to a data rate and so on.
According to this communication method, when packet data is transmitted at a low data rate of about 9.6 kbps between a base station and a wireless device, for example, the transmission of the packet data is carried out with the transmission mode being switched to the autonomous mode. On the contrary, when packet data is transmitted at a high data rate between a base station and a wireless device, the transmission of the packet data is carried out with the transmission mode being switched to the scheduling mode.
In the scheduling mode, the base station transmits a signaling for notifying scheduling frequently to the wireless device. For this reason, if there is not a certain or more amount of data for each transmission, the efficiency of data transmission is reduced with respect to the number of times that the signaling is performed.
In the above-mentioned related art data communication method, the above-mentioned malfunction is removed by switching to the scheduling mode in the case of a high data rate at which the amount of data per unit time is large.
However, although the above-mentioned related art reference discloses application of a switching to either the autonomous mode or the scheduling mode based on the amount of data to the above-mentioned related art data communication method, it does not disclose any process of switching between the autonomous mode and the scheduling mode under other communication conditions.
As the communication conditions which should be used as the reference for switching between the communication modes, an amount of interference (referred to as a noise rise from here on), a delay time, or the like in the base station can be provided, for example, by taking into consideration a process of demodulating an encoded signal, and a process of handling data of which real-time nature is required.
According to the invention disclosed by the above-mentioned related art reference, no due consideration is given to flexible communication mode switching operations according to communication conditions, such as a communication mode switching operation of making a wireless device which carries out data communications in which any delay time cannot be permitted operate in the autonomous mode if possible, and making a device which carries out communications in which a delay time can be permitted operate in the schedule mode.
In uplink packet communications using a CDMA method, when interference caused by a transmission signal from a wireless device exceeds the limit of a noise rise in a base station, the base station cannot demodulate the transmission signal.
This noise rise varies dependently upon interference by other cells, transmission from other wireless devices in the same cell, etc. For this reason, it is necessary to sufficiently pay attention to the management of the noise rise in the packet communications using a CDMA method.
When a margin for the noise rise is sufficiently secured as noise rise management, it is possible to use the autonomous mode even if the amount of data to be transmitted is large. In this case, the number of times that the signaling is performed can be reduced compared with the case of the schedule mode, and there is an advantage of being able to reduce the delay time.
Thus, by appropriately dividing the margin for the noise rise resulting from various factors which vary according to the conditions of the communications traffic with respect to the noise rise margin of the base station, efficient communications dependent upon changes in the noise rise can be carried out.
The present invention is made in order to solve the above-mentioned problems, and it is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a communication mode controlling method of making it possible to carry out efficient data communications dependent upon changes in a noise rise caused by changes in the load of communications between a base station and a mobile communication terminal by switching between communication modes appropriately in consideration of factors other than the amount of data.
It is another object of the present invention to provide a communication mode controlling method of being able to divide a noise rise margin between an autonomous mode and a schedule mode according to QoS (Quality of Service) by independently setting a threshold for switching between transmission modes to each terminal in consideration of QoS parameters, such as a delay time.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a mobile communication system, an RNC, a base station, and a mobile communication terminal, which carry out efficient data communications dependent upon changes in a noise rise caused by a change in the load on communications using the above-mentioned method. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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This invention relates to a cyclable laminar flow battery having flow-through porous electrodes along with a non-ion-perm-selective element called a “dispersion blocker” to inhibit local convection.
Laminar flow fuel cells are known in the prior art, which includes Ferrigno et al., J. Am. Chem. Soc., 2002, 124 (44), pp. 12930-12931; Choban et al., J. Power Sources 128, 54-60 (2004); Kjeang et al., US 2009/0092882; Peled et al., US 2012/0308907 and 2012/0308911; Braff, US/2012/0070766; and Cho et al., Journal of the Electrochemical Society, 2012. These cells are “membraneless” because laminar flow is used to keep reactants at one electrode from crossing over to the opposite electrode, without the use of a standard ion-perm-selective membrane barrier, as in most fuel cells and batteries.
These systems are mostly referred to as membraneless, laminar-flow “fuel cells” since they only support galvanic discharge operation and are not able to electrolytically recharge in closed-loop operation. Indeed, no prior flow battery system has been disclosed that can achieve stable closed-loop cycling with a membraneless laminar flow architecture. Most of the prior art also involves planar “flow-over” electrodes, although Cho discloses a flow-through cathode in a system with a solid ion exchange membrane. Most of the prior art also does not include attempts to control convection in the laminar flow channel, although Stroock et al., US 2008/0008911 and DaMota et al., Journal of the American Chemical Society 2012, disclose convection barriers in flow batteries that are not used with porous media or to inhibit dispersion. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a method and apparatus for isolating at least a portion of a tubular. In addition, this invention relates to a method for producing an apparatus for isolating at least a portion of a tubular.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the oil and gas industry, it is generally known that, in addition to hydrocarbons, an underground formation may include a relatively high percentage of water. Typically, where water is present this will underlie the hydrocarbons within the formation.
In reference to FIG. 1 of the drawings, a lower section 10 of a borehole 12 is shown extending from surface (not shown) towards an underground formation 14. The formation 14 comprises both a hydrocarbon reservoir 16 and a region containing water 18, the water 18 shown underlying the hydrocarbon reservoir 16. A well 20 may be completed to a level adjacent the hydrocarbon/water interface within the formation 14 by running a first tubular section, or casing (not shown), into the borehole 12 and supplying cement to the annulus around the tubing section to seal and secure the casing within the borehole 12. The borehole 12 is then extended and a second tubing section, or liner, is run into the borehole 12 and cemented in place, the liner supported by the casing above. The liner 15 adjacent the formation is then perforated to permit hydrocarbons from the reservoir 16 to be extracted to surface.
However, over time and due to the generally higher mobility of the water 18 within the formation 14, for example where relatively viscous hydrocarbons are present, water 18 is drawn towards the base 22 of the well 20 (as shown in FIG. 1 by the dotted lines 24, 26) until water is produced from the well 20. This phenomenon is known as “coning” and may be particularly prevalent in horizontal or deviated wells as water is drawn to the heel of the well, that is, where the well deviates from vertical.
It will be recognised that where water production occurs at the expense of production of hydrocarbons from the well, the recovery efficiency of the well will be adversely affected. The efficiency and utility of a well may be greatly reduced where a high percentage of water is produced from a well and, indeed, in some environments, it is known for a well to produce in excess of 50% water with water production approaching 100% in some areas of the well, while other areas may produce 100% hydrocarbons.
Typically, when water production is identified downhole, it is desired that the water producing zones are isolated in order to prevent this undesirable ingress of water.
For example, isolation may be achieved, for example, by setting mechanical packers across the water producing zone.
In U.S. Pat. No. 7,059,415, which is incorporated herein in its entirety by way of reference, when water production has been observed, a patch is run into the tubular and expanded into contact with the inner wall of the tubular to shut off water production from the respective zone. However, many current approaches may only be adopted after water production has been identified and typically require significant intervention into the well.
Alternatively, International Patent Application WO2004/0022911, which is incorporated herein in its entirety by way of reference, discloses a wellbore device comprising a tubular conduit comprising circular perforations. The device further comprises a swelling elastomer sleeve located about an exterior surface of the conduit. The generally perforations may be closed when the swelling elastomer encounters formation water to prevent inflow of water into the tubular.
As a further alternative, chemical agents may be pumped into the well to shut off unwanted water production. However, where chemical agents are used, it has been found that there are difficulties in targeting the chemicals to the desired location with a high degree of accuracy. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Porous inorganic solids have found great utility as catalysts and separation media for industrial applications. The openness of the microstructure allows molecules access to the surface area of the materials that enhance their catalytic and sorption activity. The porous materials in use today can be sorted into several categories based on their microstructure, molecular sieves being one of these.
Molecular sieves are structurally defined materials with a pore size distribution that is typically very narrow because of the crystalline nature of the material's microstructure. Examples of molecular sieves are zeolites and mesoporous materials. Zeolites are generally aluminosilicate materials with pore sizes in the microporous range which is between two to twenty Angstroms.
Zeolites have been demonstrated to exhibit catalytic properties. Zeolites are porous crystalline aluminosilicates which have a definite crystalline structure within which a large number of smaller cavities may be interconnected by a number of still smaller channels or pores. Relatively little advance has been achieved in fine chemical synthesis with zeolite-based catalysis due, at least in part, to the limitations of redox activity in currently available molecular sieves (B. Notari, Stud. Surf. Sci. Catal. 37 (1988) 413; P. Roftia, Stud. Surf. Sci. Catal. 55 (1990) 43; N. Herron, et al. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 109 (1987) 2837; R. F. Parton, et al. Nature 370 (1994) 541; P. T. Tanev, et al. Nature 368 (1994) 321; M. Iwamoto et al. Chem. Lett. (1989) 213; Y. Li et al. J. Phys. Chem. 94 (1990) 9971; and Y. Li et al. Appl. Catal. B. 1 (1992) L31). In most redox reactions, a catalyst with variable oxidation states is required to assist in charge or electron transfer between reactant molecules. To use inert aluminosilicate-based zeolites as redox catalysts, metal cations need to be introduced into the zeolitic matrices. This can be achieved only in very limited concentration in the form of dopants without affecting the crystallinity of the zeolitic structure. More commonly, metal cations are introduced into the zeolitic cage structure by cation exchange or metal salt impregnation. The metal cations introduced into zeolites have been found capable of catalyzing some redox reactions. The turnover frequency (TOF) of the catalyst is, however, very restricted by the number of catalytically active sites that can be introduced, which is in turn limited by the Si/Al ratio in the zeolite framework structure. Furthermore, the catalytic activity of the zeolite materials can be severely reduced due to aggregation of metal cations caused by hydration of the metal cations and/or dealumination of the zeolite framework in the presence of water vapor at temperatures of 500-800.degree. C.
Mesoporous materials, however, generally have larger pore sizes. Mesoporous materials have a pore size from about 10 to 500 Angstroms. Examples of conventional mesoporous solids include silicas and modified layered materials, but these are amorphous or 2-dimensional crystalline structures, with pores that are irregularly spaced and broadly distributed in size. Pore size has been controlled by intercalation of layered clays with a surfactant species, but the final products have typically retained the layered nature of the precursor material.
Porous transition metal oxides have been the subject of increasing interest as materials which can be utilized in partial oxidation, complete combustion, NO.sub.x decomposition, hydrodesulfurization, photocatalytic decomposition of organic compounds and solid acid catalysis. Most attempts, however, to prepare mesoporous materials suitable for such purposes have typically led to lamellar phases where surfactant and metal oxide phases are layered.
Efforts to synthesize hexagonally-packed mesoporous oxides have focused on an inverse-micelle template mechanism. Inorganic precursors, pH and surfactant head groups have been adjusted to achieve optimal electrostatic charge balance between the organic and inorganic phases during the self assembly process. This led to the synthesis of silica-based mesoporous materials as disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,098,684. Efforts to extend this approach to non-silica or alumina-based systems have mostly led to formation of layered phases. The few hexagonally-packed mesostructures derived by such approaches, composed of tungsten, antimony, lead and iron oxides, were not found to be thermally stable upon surfactant removal or thermal treatment (Huo et al. Chem. Mater. 6:1176 (1994)). High surface areas and well-defined porosities for transition metal products could not be achieved in these systems upon surfactant removal in contrast to alumina- and silicate-based systems mentioned above.
One reported example of a transition metal-containing hexagonally packed mesoporous material has only a small percentage of titanium dioxide incorporated into a silica structure. (Tanev et al. Nature 368:321 (1994)). The method used to form the hexagonal mesoporous materials utilized a primary, rather than a quaternary ammonium ion surfactant as the templating reagent. The titanium-doped silicate-based hexagonal mesoporous materials were found to be more active in the catalytic oxidation of arenes than the conventional microporous titanium silicate zeolites.
Therefore, a need exists for a thermally stable mesoporous transition metal material and a method for forming mesoporous transition metal materials which overcome or minimize the above mentioned problems. A need also exists for a crystalline microporous metal oxide having a dimensionally consistent pore structure and a method for forming crystalline microporous metal oxide materials which overcome or minimize the above mentioned problems. | {
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The invention relates to an improved collapsible or portable soccer goal that can be assembled and disassembled quickly on the field, and which is readily transportable by a person in a car or vehicle as the various components of such soccer goal xe2x80x9cbreak downxe2x80x9d into a plurality of smaller elements that can be packaged simply and/or easily handled, stored and transported or shipped.
The invention is achieved by a collapsible/portable soccer goal, comprising vertical side frame supports, each having a pair of adjacently disposed vertical sections, with an elongated top beam having a plurality of adjacently disposed horizontal sections including opposite end sections resting atop the pair of vertical sections. The vertical and horizontal sections are formed as hollow tubular elements with joints, including corner joints formed by said elongated top beam with said pair of vertical sections, and said adjacently disposed sections joined together by a plurality of bar means. Each vertical side frame support further includes at least a plurality of adjustable/extendible or telescoping struts, and the said plurality of adjustable/extendible or telescoping struts form a truss-like structure connectable to a vertical section for supporting said vertical and horizontal sections as a unitary soccer goal in a vertical upright position orthogonal to the ground.
The invention is also further achieved by a collapsible/portable soccer goal comprising vertical side frame supports, each having a pair of adjacently disposed vertical sections with an elongated top beam having a plurality of horizontal sections including opposite end sections resting atop said pair of vertical sections. The vertical and horizontal sections are formed as hollow tubular elements with joints, including corner joints formed by said elongated top beam with said pair of vertical sections, and said joints adjacently disposed sections joined together by a plurality of bar means. Each vertical side frame support further includes a plurality of fixed length struts and adjustable/extendible or telescoping struts, and each of said plurality of fixed length struts and adjustable/extendible or telescoping struts forms a truss-like structure connectable to a vertical section for supporting said vertical and horizontal sections as a unitary soccer goal in a vertical upright position orthogonal to the ground. | {
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Bonded joints are typically formed by applying a layer of adhesive to the mating surfaces of one or more parts to be joined. The parts are then brought together and held in position relative to one another while allowing the adhesive in the bondline to cure. For example, when bonding an end ring having a C-channel cross-section to an edge of a cylinder, the end ring may be oriented such that the C-channel is facing upwardly. A pool of adhesive may be installed within the C-channel and the cylinder edge may be lowered down into the C-channel. The adhesive may spill out of the C-channel until the cylinder edge contacts the bottom of the C-channel. The cylinder and the end ring may be held in position while the adhesive cures.
Unfortunately, the above-noted process may produce less-than-desirable results in the final bonded joint between the end ring and the cylinder. In this regard, the relatively long length of the bondline extending around the cylinder circumference may result in unpredictability with regard to the flow of adhesive in the C-channel as the cylinder is lowered into the end ring. For example, the long length bondline may affect the ability of the adhesive to flow from the bottom of the C-channel to the top edge of the C-channel at all locations around the cylinder circumference as the cylinder edge is lowered into the C-channel.
Such unpredictability with regard to adhesive flow may result in reworking the bonded joint to bring the bonded joint to within design tolerances. In cases where repair of the bonded joint is not possible, it may be necessary to scrap the bonded parts and assemble a replacement which may have a detrimental impact on cost and schedule. The unpredictability associated with adhesive flow may also require the installation of anti-peel fasteners along the bondline to prevent peeling of the bonded joint at the edges of the bondline. Unfortunately, the installation of anti-peel fasteners may add to the cost, complexity, and weight of the structural assembly.
As can be seen, there exists a need in the art for a system and method of forming a bonded joint that provides a means for controlling the flow of adhesive within the bondline during the bonding process. In this regard, there exists a need in the art for a system and method of forming a bonded joint that provides predictability with regard to the flow of adhesive in long length bondlines. | {
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Novel agriculturally acceptable formulations of the herbicide N-phosphonomethylglycine (glyphosate) comprising tertiary or quaternary etheramine or etheramine oxide surfactants are provided.
Glyphosate is well known as a highly effective and commercially important herbicide useful for combating the presence of a wide variety of unwanted vegetation, including a agricultural weeds. Glyphosate is conventionally applied as a formulated product dissolved in water to the foliage of annual and perennial grasses and broad leaf plants and the like, is taken up over a period of time into the leaves, and thereafter translocates throughout the plant.
Usually, glyphosate is formulated in commercial compositions in the form of a water-soluble salt. Salts in commercial use include the ammonium salt, alkylamine salts, such as the isopropylamine salt, alkali metal salts, such as the sodium salt, and the trimethylsulfonium salt. However, formulations of glyphosate in its acid form are also used. Typical glyphosate salt formulations include aqueous concentrates, requiring simple dilution and distributions in water for application by the end-user, and water-soluble or water-dispersible dry formulations, especially granules, requiring dissolution or dispersion in water prior to application.
Under most application conditions, the herbicidal efficacy of glyphosate can be significantly enhanced by including one or more surfactants in the composition to be applied. It is believed that such surfactants act partly by facilitating the penetration of glyphosate, a relatively hydrophilic compound, through the rather hydrophobic cuticle which normally covers the external above-ground surfaces of higher plants.
Wyrill and Burnside, Weed Science, Vol. 25 (1977), pp. 275-287, conducted a wide-ranging study of different classes of surfactants as agents for enhancing the herbicidal activity of glyphosate, applied as the isopropylamine salt. They demonstrated that the choice of surfactant has a pronounced effect on the herbicidal performance of a glyphosate formulation, but beyond showing a general tendency for surfactants having high values of hydrophile-lipophile balance (HLB) to be more efficacious than surfactants of the same class having low HLB values, they did not observe any predictive relationship between efficacy and surfactant chemical class. Some of the most effective surfactants identified in the Wyrill and Burnside study were ethoxylated tertiary and quaternary alkylamines.
Commercial formulations of glyphosate have frequently used ethoxylated tertiary alkylamine surfactants, for example an ethoxylated tallowamine having an average of about 15 moles of ethylene oxide (EO) per mole of tallowamine. Monsanto Company of St. Louis, Mo. has for many years sold, under the trademark Roundup(copyright) herbicide, glyphosate formulations containing various concentrations of such an ethoxylated tallowamine surfactant.
European Patent No. 0 290 416 to Forbes et al. discloses compositions of glyphosate salts comprising ethoxylated tertiary alkylamine surfactants having less than 15 moles of EO. For example a composition is disclosed comprising the isopropylamine salt of glyphosate and an ethoxylated cocoamine surfactant having an average of 5 moles of EO. It is taught by Forbes et al. that certain herbicidal efficacy advantages are obtainable with such compositions by comparison with compositions where the EO level in the surfactant is around 15 moles.
European Patent No. 0 274 369 to Sato et al. discloses glyphosate compositions comprising ethoxylated quaternary alkylamine surfactants. Several examples are shown wherein the surfactant is an ethoxylated N-methyl cocoammonium chloride surfactant having 2 moles of EO.
A drawback of ethoxylated tertiary alkylamine surfactants of prior art is that when included in concentrate formulations at levels consistent with good herbicidal performance, they tend to be irritant to eyes. In some, but not all, cases, eye irritancy can be reduced by converting the tertiary alkylamine to the corresponding quaternary (N-methyl) alkylamine. U.S. Pat. No. 5,317,003 to Kassebaum discloses that a glyphosate composition containing as the surfactant an ethoxylated N-methyl cocoammonium chloride surfactant having 15 moles of EO is less irritant to eyes than an otherwise identical composition wherein the surfactant is an ethoxylated tertiary cocoamine surfactant having 15 moles of EO.
An alternative solution to the eye irritancy problem is suggested in U.S. Pat. No. 5,118,444 to Nguyen, wherein ethoxylated tertiary alkylamine surfactants are converted to their N-oxides. Examples are shown of glyphosate compositions wherein the surfactant is an ethoxylated tallowamine oxide surfactant having 10, 15 or 20 moles of EO.
A further drawback of ethoxylated tertiary alkylamine surfactants of the prior art is that when water is added to them, they tend to form a stiff gel which adds to the complexity and expense of manufacturing formulations containing such surfactants, by making it difficult to clean vessels and pipes. In practice, this problem is ameliorated by adding an anti-gelling agent, such as polyethylene glycol, to the surfactant.
Never previously disclosed as components of concentrate glyphosate formulations are alkoxylated tertiary or quaternary etheramine or etheramine oxide surfactants. United Kingdom Patent No. 1,588,079 to Texaco Development Corporation discloses examples of ethoxylated alkyloxyisopropylamine and alkylpoly(isopropyl)amine surfactants and methods of preparing them, and suggests they are useful as detergents, dispersants, wetting agents and emulsifiers. Surfactants disclosed have the representative chemical structure
wherein R1 is C8-C18 alkyl, m is a number from 1 to 5, and x and y are average numbers such that x+y is in the range from 2 to 20.
Tomah Products, Inc. of Milton, Wis. in a brochure titled xe2x80x9cEthoxylated Aminesxe2x80x9d, dated Aug. 22, 1994, disclose, together with a series of ethoxylated tertiary alkylamines, a number of ethoxylated tertiary etheramine surfactants having the representative chemical structure
wherein R1 is C10-C26 alkyl and x and y are average numbers such that x+y is in the range from 2 to 15. Suggested uses of the Tomah ethoxylated amines include xe2x80x9cagricultural adjuvantsxe2x80x9d, a well-known application of the ethoxylated tertiary alkylamines listed. No suggestion is made that the ethoxylated tertiary etheramines included in the list would have advantages over the ethoxylated tertiary alkylamines as agricultural adjuvants, nor is there any teaching relevant to the making of concentrate glyphosate compositions with ethoxylated tertiary etheramines.
Another brochure from Tomah Products titled xe2x80x9cQuaternariesxe2x80x9d, dated Sep. 1, 1994, includes in a list of quaternary amine surfactants a number of ethoxylated quaternary etheramines having the representative chemical structure
wherein R1 is an aliphatic group exemplified by isodecyl or isotridecyl and x+y is 2. The list of suggested uses for Tomah""s quaternaries does not include agricultural adjuvants.
Another brochure from Tomah Products titled xe2x80x9cAO-14-2xe2x80x9d, dated Aug. 24, 1994, discloses an ethoxylated etheramine oxide which can be deduced to have the representative chemical structure
wherein R1 is an aliphatic group exemplified by isodecyl and x+y is 2. The list of suggested uses for AO-14-2 does not include agricultural adjuvants.
It is an object of the present invention to provide novel compositions of glyphosate herbicide containing an etheramine surfactant which imparts good herbicidal efficacy, yet having low irritancy to eyes.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide the commercial formulator of glyphosate with an alternative to ethoxylated alkylamine surfactants that (1) allows elimination or substantial reduction of the need for the use of an anti-gelling agent, (2) is soluble in aqueous formulations having higher glyphosate acid equivalent loadings than prior art formulations having comparable efficacy, and (3) provides herbicidal efficacy superior to that obtainable with comparable amounts of said ethoxylated alkylamine surfactants having similar degrees of ethoxylation.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide concentrate liquid and dry formulations of glyphosate with an etheramine surfactant having good storage stability.
These and other objectives are satisfied by the compositions disclosed herein. defined as an amine surfactant in which the hydrophobe is connected to the amine group via a series of up to about 10 oxyalkylene groups.
Specifically, the etheramine surfactant may be a tertiary amine having the representative chemical structure
wherein R1 is a straight or branched chain C6 to about C22 alkyl, aryl or alkylaryl group, m is an average number from 1 to about 10. R2 in each of the m (Oxe2x80x94R2) groups are independently C1-C4 alkylene, and x and y are average numbers such that x+y is in the range from 2 to about 60.
Alternatively, the etheramine surfactant may be a quaternary amine having the representative chemical structure
wherein R1 is a straight or branched chain C6 to about C22 alkyl, aryl or alkylaryl group, m is an average number from 1 to about 10, R2 in each of the m (Oxe2x80x94R2) groups is independently C1-C4 alkylene, R3 groups are independently C1-C4 alkylene, R4 is C1-C4 alkyl, x and y are average numbers such that x+y is in the range from 0 to about 60, and Axe2x88x92 is an agriculturally acceptable anion.
As a third possibility, the etheramine surfactant may be an amine oxide having the representative chemical structure
wherein R1 is a straight or branched chain C6 to about C22 alkyl, aryl or alkylaryl group, m is an average number from 1 to about 10, R2 in each of the m (Oxe2x80x94R2) groups is independently C1-C4 alkylene, R3 groups are independently C1-C4 alkylene, and x and y are average numbers such that x+y is in the range from 2 to about 60.
Compositions of the invention may be prepared on site by the end-user shortly before application to the foliage of vegetation to be killed or controlled, by mixing in aqueous solution a glyphosate containing composition and a composition comprising a surfactant having a chemical structure encompassed by those represented immediately above. Such compositions of the invention are referred to herein as xe2x80x9ctank-mixxe2x80x9d compositions.
Alternatively, compositions of the invention may be provided to the end-user already formulated, either at the desired dilution for application (xe2x80x9cready to usexe2x80x9d compositions) or requiring dilution, dispersion or dissolution in water by the end-user (xe2x80x9cconcentratexe2x80x9d compositions). Such preformulated compositions of the invention are storage-stable and may be liquid or dry.
A method of use of compositions of the invention to kill or control weeds or other unwanted vegetation is also provided.
Compositions of the invention may contain glyphosate in its acid form. However, because of the relatively low solubility of glyphosate acid in water, more soluble salts of glyphosate are generally preferred. As in commercial compositions of prior art, an especially preferred salt for aqueous compositions of the invention is the isopropylamine salt of glyphosate, while an especially preferred salt for dry compositions of the invention is the ammonium salt. Many other salts may be used either in aqueous or in dry formulations, including but not restricted to alkylamine, such as dimethylamine and n-propylamine, alkanolamine, such as monoethanolamine, alkylsulfonium, such as trimethylsulfonium, and alkali metal, such as sodium and potassium, salts of glyphosate. Regardless of whether acid or a salt is used, it is generally preferred to refer to the amount of glyphosate applied or contained in a formulation in terms of glyphosate acid equivalent, conventionally abbreviated as xe2x80x9ca.e.xe2x80x9d.
Tank-mix and ready to use compositions of the invention are aqueous solutions comprising from about 1 to about 50 g glyphosate a.e./l, occasionally more. A preferred range for tank-mix and ready to use compositions is from about 5 to about 20 g a.e./l.
Concentrate compositions of the invention may be aqueous solutions comprising from about 50 to about 500 g glyphosate a.e./l or more, preferably from about 200 to about 500 g a.e./l and most preferably from about 350 to about 500 g a.e./l. An example of an especially preferred aqueous concentrate composition of the invention contains the isopropylamine salt of glyphosate at about 360 g a.e./l, the same level as is present in commercial compositions being sold as Roundup(copyright) herbicide by Monsanto Company.
A surprising advantage of aqueous compositions of the invention over prior art compositions is that the glyphosate concentration can be increased to very high levels, for example from about 450 to about 500 g a.e./l, yet the surfactant concentration is still adequate to give excellent herbicidal performance without the end-user requiring to add more surfactant in the spray tank. Many such highly concentrated compositions have remarkably good storage stability under a wide range of temperature conditions.
Alternatively, concentrate compositions of the invention may be dry formulations, presented for example in the form of powders, pellets, tablets or, preferably, granules, to be dispersed or dissolved in water prior to use. Typically no water-insoluble ingredients are present at substantial levels in such compositions and the formulations are therefore fully water-soluble. Dry water-soluble or water-dispersible compositions of the invention comprise from about 20% to about 80% weight/weight glyphosate a.e., preferably from about 50% to about 76%, and most preferably from about 60% to about 72%. An example of an especially preferred water-soluble granular composition of the invention contains the ammonium salt of glyphosate at about 72% weight/weight, the same level as is present in commercial compositions being sold as Scout(copyright) herbicide by Monsanto Company.
In dry compositions of the invention glyphosate may itself provide the support for other formulation ingredients, or there may additionally be present one or more inert ingredients providing such support. An example of an inert support that may be used is ammonium sulfate. The term xe2x80x9cdryxe2x80x9d as used herein does not imply that dry compositions are totally free of water; typically dry compositions of the invention comprise from about 0.5 to about 5 percent by weight, preferably less than about 1 percent by weight water.
Dry water-soluble or water-dispersible granular formulations of the invention can be made by any process known in the art, including but not restricted to spray drying, fluid-bed agglomeration, pan granulation, or extrusion. In dry formulations, glyphosate may be present as a salt, for example the sodium or ammonium salt, or as the acid. Formulations containing glyphosate acid may optionally contain an acid acceptor such as an ammonium or alkali metal carbonate or bicarbonate, ammonium dihydrogen phosphate or the like, so that upon dissolution or dispersion in water by the end user a water soluble salt of glyphosate is produced.
What distinguishes compositions of the invention from all previously described glyphosate compositions is the presence therein of an alkoxylated tertiary or an alkoxylated or non-alkoxylated quaternary etheramine or an alkoxylated etheramine oxide surfactant having the representative chemical structure (a)
wherein R1 is a straight or branched chain C6 to about C22 alkyl, aryl or alkylaryl group, m is an average number from 1 to about 10, R2 in each of the m (Oxe2x80x94R2) groups is independently C1-C4 alkylene, R3 groups are independently C1-C4 alkylene, and x and y are average numbers such that x+y is in the range from 2 to about 60; or (b)
wherein R1 is a straight or branched chain C6 to about C22 alkyl, aryl or alkylaryl group, m is an average number from 1 to about 10, R2 in each of the m (Oxe2x80x94R2) groups is independently C1-C4 alkylene, R3 groups are independently C1-C4 alkylene, R4 is C1-C4 alkyl, x and y are average numbers such that x+y is in the range from 0 to about 60, and Axe2x88x92 is an agriculturally acceptable anion; or (c)
wherein R1 is a straight or branched chain C6 to about C22 alkyl, aryl or alkylaryl group, m is an average number from 1 to about 10, R2 in each of the m (Oxe2x80x94R2) groups is independently C1-C4 alkylene, R3 groups are independently C1-C4 alkylene, and x and y are average numbers such that x+y is in the range from 2 to about 60.
Alkylamine or alkylamine oxide surfactants in glyphosate compositions of prior art have no (Oxe2x80x94R2) groups, in other words m=0. We have found that surprisingly improved properties can be imparted to glyphosate compositions when from 1 to about 10 (Oxe2x80x94R2) groups are inserted in the surfactant structure between the R1 group and the nitrogen atom.
Aryl groups, if present in R1, have 5-7, preferably 6, carbon atoms and may or may not be substituted with moieties. The alkyl portion in any alkylaryl group comprising R1 has 1-16 carbon atoms. An example of such an alkylaryl group is alkylphenyl, for example nonylphenyl.
However, in preferred surfactants of the invention R1 is a straight or branched chain alkyl group having about 8 to about 18, for example about 10-15, carbon atoms, and are derived from the corresponding alcohol. For example, the alkyl group may be of natural derivation, such as from coconut or tallow, or may be derived from a synthetic alcohol such as isodecyl, isotridecyl, linear C12-C14 or octadecyl alcohols.
The R2 substituent closest to the nitrogen atom (the proximal R2 group) is in preferred examples a linear propylene (xe2x80x94CH2CH2CH2xe2x80x94), isopropylene (xe2x80x94CH2CH(CH3)xe2x80x94) or ethylene (xe2x80x94CH2CH2xe2x80x94) group. Preferred examples where the proximal R2 group is linear propylene have m=1. Where the proximal R2 group is isopropylene or ethylene, m is preferably in the range from 1 to 5, most preferably from 2 to 3, and all R2 groups are preferably the same.
R3 substituents in preferred examples are independently selected from isopropylene and ethylene. In especially preferred examples all R3 groups are ethylene. In tertiary etheramines and etheramine oxides of the invention it is preferred that x+y is in the range from 2 to about 20. In quaternary etheramines of the invention it is preferred that x+y is in the range from 0 to about 20. A particularly preferred range for x+y in tertiary and quaternary etheramines and etheramine oxides of the invention is from 2 to about 10, more particularly from 2 to about 5.
In quaternary etheramines of the invention R4 is preferably methyl and Axe2x88x92 is preferably a halide, for example chloride or bromide, a phosphate or a sulfate ion, or alternatively may be a glyphosate ion or may be contributed by an anionic surfactant included with the etheramine in the formulation. It will be recognized by those skilled in the art that a low pH, such as may well exist in a glyphosate formulation, tertiary etheramines will most likely be protonated at the nitrogen atom and may be associated with a counterion; in such cases the tertiary etheramine can be represented by the chemical structure shown above for a quaternary etheramine, except that R4 is hydrogen. The counterion Axe2x88x92 in a low pH glyphosate formulation comprising a tertiary etheramine is most likely glyphosate itself.
One especially preferred surfactant useful in compositions of the invention is a tertiary etheramine having R1=C12-C14 alkyl, R2=isopropylene, m=2, R3=ethylene and x+y=5.
Another especially preferred surfactant useful in compositions of the invention is a tertiary etheramine having R1=C12-C14 alkyl, R2=ethylene, m=3, R3=ethylene and x+y=5.
Two other especially preferred surfactants useful in compositions of the invention are tertiary etheramines having R1=isodecyl, R2=linear propylene, m=1, R3 ethylene and x+y=2 or 5 respectively..
Another series of especially preferred surfactants useful in compositions of the invention is a tertiary etheramine having R1=coco alkyl, R2=linear propylene, m=1, R3=ethylene and x+y=a number in the range from 2 to 10.
Two other especially preferred surfactants useful in compositions of the invention are tertiary etheramines having R1=isotridecyl, R2=linear propylene, m=1, R3=ethylene and x+y=2 or 5 respectively.
Two other especially preferred surfactants useful in compositions of the invention are quaternary etheramines having R1=isodecyl or isotridecyl respectively, R2=linear propylene, R3=ethylene, R4=methyl, m=1 and x+y=2.
Any convenient and effective herbicidal activity enhancing amount of the etheramine surfactant can be used in compositions of the invention. In tank-mix and ready to use formulations very high levels of surfactant are achievable. for example up to 5% weight/volume or even higher, but for reasons of economy it will be more normal to use a concentration in the range from about 0.125% to about 2% weight/volume. One of ordinary skill in the art will be able to determine from tests on different plant species an appropriate level of etheramine surfactant to include for any particular glyphosate application.
In concentrate liquid or dry compositions of the invention, the etheramine surfactant is preferably included at a weight/weight ratio to glyphosate a.e. in the range from about 1:20 to about 1:1, most preferably from about 1:10 to about 1:2, for example about 1:6.
Long-term storage stability is an important commercial attribute of concentrate formulations. In the case of aqueous concentrate formulations of glyphosate salts, it is particularly important that surfactants in the formulation do not separate concentrates made with surfactants of prior art show a tendency for phase separation at high temperatures. It is a feature of the etheramine surfactants herein disclosed that they show good compatibility with glyphosate salts, particularly the isopropylamine salt, as evidenced by relatively high cloud points even in aqueous solutions having high glyphosate concentrations. In general for most applications, a cloud point higher than about 50xc2x0 C. is desirable.
In addition to glyphosate or a salt thereof and the etheramine surfactant, any of a variety of further ingredients or adjuvants may be included in formulations of the present invention, as long as such added materials are not significantly antagonistic to the glyphosate herbicidal activity. Examples of such added materials illustratively include anti-gelling agents, antifreezes, thickeners, dyes, antimicrobial preservatives or additives to further enhance herbicidal activity, such as ammonium sulfate or fatty acids.
A second surfactant of a class other than etheramines, for example a primary or secondary alcohol ethoxylate, an alkyl ester of sucrose or sorbitan, or an alkyl polyglucoside, may also be included. When such a second surfactant is present, it is preferable that the weight/weight ratio of etheramine to the second surfactant is greater than about 1:1, most preferably greater than about 2:1, for example around 4:1.
Preferably when a second surfactant is included in a highly concentrated glyphosate formulation of the invention, for example one containing about 450 to about 500 g a.e./l, the etheramine surfactant comprises at least about 75% by weight of the total surfactant present.
Mixtures of glyphosate with other herbicides are also within the scope of the present invention if an etheramine surfactant is included in the formulation. Examples of such other herbicides include bialaphos, glufosinate, 2,4-D, MCPA, dicamba, diphenylethers, imidazolinones and sulfonylureas.
Methods of use of glyphosate formulations are well known to those of skill in the art. Aqueous concentrate formulations of the invention are diluted in an appropriate volume of water and applied, for example by spraying, to the weeds or other unwanted vegetation to be killed or controlled. Dry concentrate formulations of the invention are dissolved or dispersed in an appropriate volume of water and applied in the same way. For most purposes, compositions of the invention are applied at glyphosate a.e. rates in the range from about 0.1 to about 5 kg/ha, occasionally more. Typical glyphosate a.e. rates for control of annual and perennial grasses and broadleaves are in the range from about 0.3 to about 1.5 kg/ha. Compositions of the invention may be applied in any convenient volume of water, most typically in the range from about 50 to about 1000 l/ha.
The present invention is illustrated by but not limited to the following Examples. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Various organizations make use of enterprise resource planning (ERP) software architectures to provide an integrated, computer-based system for management of internal and external resources, such as for example tangible assets, financial resources, materials, customer relationships, and human resources. In general, an ERP software architecture is designed to facilitate the flow of information between business functions inside the boundaries of the organization and manage the connections to outside service providers, stakeholders, and the like. Such architectures often include one or more centralized databases accessible by a core software platform that consolidates business operations, including but not limited to those provided by third party vendors, into a uniform and organization-wide system environment. The core software platform can reside on a centralized server or alternatively be distributed across modular hardware and software units that provide “services” and communicate on a local area network or over a network, such as for example the Internet, a wide area network, or the like.
As part of the installation process of the core software platform on computing hardware owned or operated by the organization, one or more customized features, configurations, business processes, or the like may be added to the default, preprogrammed features such that the core software platform is configured for maximum compatibility with the organization's business processes, data, and the like.
The core software platform of an ERP software architecture can be provided as a standalone, customized software installation that runs on one or more processors that are under the control of the organization. This arrangement can be very effective for a large-scale organization that has very sophisticated in-house information technology (IT) staff and for whom a sizable capital investment in computing hardware and consulting services required to customize a commercially available ERP solution to work with organization-specific business processes and functions is feasible. Smaller organizations can also benefit from use of ERP functionality. However, such an organization may lack the necessary hardware resources, IT support, and/or consulting budget necessary to make use of a standalone ERP software architecture product and can in some cases be more effectively served by a software as a service (SaaS) arrangement in which the ERP system architecture is hosted on computing hardware such as servers and data repositories that are maintained remotely from the organization's location and accessed by authorized users at the organization via a thin client, such as for example a web browser, over a network. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a semiconductor memory and a driving method of a semiconductor memory. More particularly, the invention relates to a semiconductor memory having a ferroelectric capacitor and a driving method of such a memory.
2. Related Background Art
In recent years, an interest in a memory using a ferroelectric substance as a capacitor dielectric film (hereinafter, such a memory is referred to as a “ferroelectric memory”) is increasing more and more. The ferroelectric memory stores information by using a spontaneous polarization of a ferroelectric substance. When a polarizing direction is oriented to one direction by once applying a voltage to the ferroelectric capacitor, the polarization remains (referred to as a “residual polarization”) even if no electric power is supplied after that, and the stored information is held. The ferroelectric memory having such a feature can be used as a non-volatile memory.
Further, in case of a general volatile memory such as a DRAM or the like, a voltage of 10V or more is necessary for writing data. According to the ferroelectric memory, a polarizing direction of the ferroelectric capacitor is reversed by a voltage of a few volts and data can be written. A data writing time of the general non-volatile memory is on the order of microseconds. A polarization reversing time of the ferroelectric memory is on the order of nanoseconds. As mentioned above, the ferroelectric memory is largely expected as a non-volatile memory of the next generation in which the operation of a low voltage and a high speed can be executed.
At present, a ferroelectric memory having a plurality of memory cells comprising MOS transistors (selective transistors) each of which functions as a switching device and ferroelectric capacitors mainly becomes a target of study and development. A construction and the operation of the memory cells of the ferroelectric memory will now be described with reference to FIG. 5.
In case of writing data into a memory cell MC, a word line WL is asserted and a selective transistor Tr is turned on. 0 v is applied to a bit line BL and a positive voltage is applied to a plate line PL. Thus, a polarization of a ferroelectric capacitor C is directed to one direction (↑ direction) shown in FIG. 5 and it is stored as information of, for example, “1” into the memory cell MC. On the contrary, when a positive voltage is applied to the bit line BL and 0V is applied to the plate line PL, the polarization of the ferroelectric capacitor C is directed to the direction (↓ direction) opposite to the above one direction and it is stored as information of, for example, “0” into the memory cell MC.
In case of reading out the information from the memory cell MC, the bit line BL is precharged to 0V and a positive voltage is applied to the plate line PL. If the ferroelectric capacitor C has already been polarized in the opposite direction (↓ direction) (the information “0” has been held), the polarizing direction is reversed. On the other hand, if the ferroelectric capacitor C has already been polarized in one direction (↑ direction) (the information “1” has been held), the polarizing direction is not reversed. An electric potential of the bit line BL changes in accordance with the polarizing state of the ferroelectric capacitor C. Therefore, by detecting and amplifying a change amount of the electric potential of the bit line BL by a sense amplifier SA connected to the bit line BL, the information stored in the memory cell MC is read out.
The sense amplifier SA amplifies the electric potential of the bit line BL to either the L (low) level (for example, 0V) or the H (high) level (for example, a power potential Vcc) by using a reference potential Vref as a reference.
Generally, a dummy memory cell (not shown) in which information opposite to that in the memory cell MC is stored is provided for the ferroelectric memory. The reference potential Vref is inputted from the dummy memory cell to the sense amplifier SA. In this case, one information is stored by two memory cells in which complementary data is stored, respectively. Such a memory configuration is called a 2-transistor/2-capacitor (2T/2C) type.
As a memory configuration of the DRAM, a 1-transistor/1-capacitor (1T/1C) type in which one information is stored by one memory cell is used. According to the memory of the 1T/1C type, as compared with the 2T/2C type, since a layout area of a memory cell array is reduced, a large capacity of the memory can be easily realized.
The conventional ferroelectric memory having the memory array of the 1T/1C type has been disclosed in, for example, JP-A-7-93978. FIGS. 18(a) and 21 of this Official Gazette show circuit constructions of the conventional ferroelectric memory, and FIGS. 18(b) and 22 show the data reading operations thereof.
Although the 1T/1C type has a structural advantage as mentioned above, the use of it to the ferroelectric memory is not progressed due to the following reasons.
In case of the memory of the 1T/1C type, a circuit for generating the reference potential Vref is additionally necessary. In the ferroelectric memory, its circuit construction is more complicated than that of the DRAM.
In case of the DRAM, the bit line is set to ½ of the power voltage Vcc, the plate line is set to the power voltage Vcc or 0V, and data is written into the memory cell. After that, in order to read out the data, it is sufficient to precharge the bit line to ½ Vcc and activate the word line. An electric potential which is induced to the bit line is set to a voltage which is either higher or lower than ½ Vcc in accordance with the data stored in the memory cell. That is, in case of the DRAM, if ½ Vcc is used as a reference potential Vref, the stored data can be accurately read out.
Also in case of the ferroelectric memory as a target of the present invention, in a manner similar to the DRAM, an electric potential of the bit line during the data reading operation differs in dependence on contents of the data which is read out. Since an absolute value of the bit line potential differs in dependence on a variation of characteristics of the ferroelectric capacitor, it is not easy to decide such a value at the stage of design. Therefore, it is extremely difficult to generate the reference potential Vref adjusted to an intermediate value of two electric potentials which show a binary value and are induced on the bit line during the data reading operation, that is, an average value of the bit line potential in case of reading out the information “0” and the bit line potential in case of reading out the information “1”. Unless the reference potential Vref is accurately adjusted to the intermediate value of the two electric potentials induced on the bit line, there is also a possibility that the stored information is erroneously read out.
As mentioned above, hitherto, in case of using the memory array construction of the 1T/1C type for the ferroelectric memory, since the reliability of the data which is read out deteriorates, the memory construction of the 2T/2C type which is disadvantageous to realize a large capacity has to be used. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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A. Field of the Invention
The present invention is related to brake beams for railway cars, and more particularly to a brake beam which allows a quick installation thereof and a quick replacement of its brake head if required.
B. Description of the Related Art
There are well known brake heads assemblies for railway cars by which a brake shoe is pressed against a wheel in order to decrease or stop the rotational speed of the wheel and railway car.
Generally, the brake head assembly is held by a structure called “brake beam” mounted transversely in the bogie of a railway car and is linked to a lever, which applies a force in order to press the brake shoe against a wheel.
The brake beam generally comprises, a generally “V” shaped tension member a compression member having its ends coupled to the ends of the tension member, a brake head subassembly linked to the each end of the compression member, two end extensions each coupled to an end of the compression member by which the brake beam is coupled to the bogie of a railway car and a fulcrum coupled to the compression member and tension member, so that the fulcrum remains between the tension and compression members. The end extensions of the brake beam are coupled to both pocket guides of the trucks
The main reasons for replacing a Brake Beam out of a freight car are the following:
A worn out condition.
A broken brake beam
A bent brake beam
A missing brake beam
When it is necessary to install a new brake beam, the damaged car must be decupled from the train, and taken to a repairing facility which could be many miles away.
Once in the facility, the car must be jacked up, then the truck must be disconnected and retired from under the car, proceeding to the dismantling of side frames and corresponding wheel set, in order to decuple the brake beam end extensions from the pocket guides and then remove the damaged brake beam, for reapplication of the new brake beam, proceeding then to reinsert wheel set and side frames, push truck under the car, reconnect and lower the car body on top.
The above referred operation is a main cause for car repair personnel injuries, it's very complex, it's costly and time consuming since it may take from 3 to 7 days to replace a brake beam. And worst, the owner of the car and the transport company, looses money for each minute the car is inactive, besides angry customers since usually the car that is cut from the train is completely loaded, facing penalties or damaged perishable goods.
Furthermore, normally, the brake heads are fixedly or pivotally linked to the brake beam by means of bolts passing through perforations located at the ends of the brake beam and through perforations located at the brake heads. Also, the brake heads may be linked to a brake beam by welding the brake head directly to the ends of the brake beam, or are integral to the beam ends as is the case of the cast beams.
When it is necessary to replace a brake head welded to the brake beam, normally the whole brake beam is replaced since it is extremely difficult to detach a welded brake head from the brake beam.
For brake beams having brake heads linked by bolts, when it is necessary to replace a brake head due to a worn out condition, it is very difficult to just decouple the damaged brake head since the bolts are usually not designed to be retired from the brake beam. Furthermore, since the bolts that join the brake head to the brake beam normally link the tension member, compression member and brake head together, if said bolts are retired the whole brake beam would become disassembled.
In view of the above referred problems, it is better opted to have the whole brake beam replaced. The process for replacing a brake beam begins with decoupling the car having the damaged brake head from the train, and taking it to a repairing facility which could be many miles away.
In order to reduce the time and effort necessary to replace a brake beam, or a brake head only, applicant developed a brake beam including means for avoiding the dismantling thereof, which can be quickly and easily installed in a train car without the necessity of cutting the car from the train nor dismantling the car nor the truck and/or which its brake head can be quickly and easily installed in a train car without the necessity of replacing the whole brake beam and consequently without cutting the car from the train nor dismantling the car nor the truck.
Thanks to applicant's brake beam it is not necessary to dismantle the car for replacing the brake beam and therefore the operation can be carried out without cutting the car from the train thus saving money on labor and materials.
Furthermore, the brake beam replacement operation can be completed in matter of minutes, saving time on all type of freight cars using a standard Brake beam, being particularly beneficial on intermodal or premium service trains and avoiding penalties and costs related with previous mounting systems.
Thanks to the brake beam of the present invention, it is possible to replace any kind of brake beam which is found at a damaged condemnable condition under a car in service, by a simple torch cut off process of the damaged beam under the car, pulling then the damaged component from the car bottom, which activity is simple and familiar to must skilled in the car repair art, and be then able to install the brake beam of the present invention, as an spare brake beam, right there and then, without the dismantling of the train, car nor truck, with simple common tools and skills.
Since it is no longer necessary to dismantle the car for changing a brake beam, there are avoided the related and common accidents and personal injuries to the maintenance staff.
Last but not least (when) the brake beam of the present invention is adapted to receive a replaceable brake head, it is possible, when installed in the car, to replace the brake head which is found at a damaged condemnable condition under a car in service, by a simple torch cut off process of the bolt holding the damaged brake head of the beam under the car, pulling then the damaged component from the car bottom, which activity is simple and familiar to must skilled in the car repair art, and be then able to install the replaceable brake head of the present invention, as an spare brake head, right there and then, without the dismantling of the train, car nor truck, with simple common tools and skills.
Finally, thanks to the DTI included in the replaceable brake head and or on one end of the coupling section of the spare beam, when it is necessary to replace the brake head, the bolt that joins the brake head to the brake beam can be adjusted at the correct tension without the need of checking it with a feeler gauge or to loosing and tightening the bolt repeatedly until the correct tension is achieved. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The present invention relates to a sheet storing device that stores a large number of sheets, a post-processing apparatus equipped with the sheet storing device and an image forming system equipped therewith, and in particular, to a sheet storing device that stores folded sheets.
A folded sheet takes a condition that plural sheets are superposed by folding operations to take an irregular shape by swelling.
Conventionally, in the post-processing apparatus connected to an image forming apparatus, sheets folded and ejected have been stored in a box-shaped storing device under the irregular condition.
Therefore, there have been problems including that a capacity of the storing device runs short and that the ejected sheets scatter.
In Patent Document 1, there is disclosed a sheet storing device that aligns folded sheets to store them.
In the sheet storing device disclosed by Patent Document 1, sheets fed into the sheet storing device continuously are stopped temporarily by a stopping roller to avoid a lift of the sheet, and then the sheet is conveyed to a sheet storing section.
Patent Document 1 discloses two types of sheet storing devices, and in the first one of them, a succeeding sheet is inserted to be under a preceding sheet, whereby, a sheet is inserted into the bottom of sheets in the sheet storing section, thus, the sheets are stacked vertically in the lying situation in the sheet storing section. In the second one of them, a succeeding sheet is supplied to the upper side of a preceding sheet, and sheets are stacked to be inclined at the storing section.
Width H of the folded sheet which is a length of the sheet in the direction perpendicular to sheet edge E formed by a fold as shown in FIG. 1 varies depending on a sheet size and on a type of folding processing.
The folded sheet is usually conveyed with its sheet edge E formed by a fold being perpendicular to the sheet conveyance direction. The conveyance method of this kind is also employed even in Patent Document 1, and in the Patent Document 1, the succeeding sheet is superposed under or over the preceding sheet, so that a large number of sheets are superposed in the prescribed order to be stored.
When width H of the folded sheet is changed as stated above, there is a problem that sheets are not superposed under the correct order and they are not aligned, when superposing preceding sheet and succeeding sheet one after another.
[Patent Document 1] Unexamined Japanese Patent Application Publication No. 11-35211 | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Conventionally, the formation of passive components, e.g. resistors and capacitors, in the back end employs one or more photolithographic masks to define the deposition of a high-resistance material in the case of resistors and the deposition of a pair of planar electrodes with a dielectric between in the case of a capacitor.
In the case of resistors, the material has a high resistivity compared with the Al or Cu of the interconnect material and therefore requires a separate deposition step and a special mask different from the mask of the nth wiring level. In the case of capacitors, there will be separate deposition steps for horizontal planar electrodes and for the dielectric between the electrodes.
Structures like these perform well enough, but the requirement of one or more additional masks means that the use of such structures incurs additional costs to have the masks made, plus yield detractors associated with the additional handling and processing steps.
The art could benefit from a method of forming passive components that does not require additional masks and/or processing steps. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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As semiconductor technology has advanced, the amount and speed of logic available on an IC, such as an FPGA, has increased more rapidly than the number and performance of I/O connections. As a result, IC die stacking techniques have received renewed interest to address the interconnection bottleneck of high-performance systems. In stacked IC applications, two or more ICs are stacked vertically and interconnections are made between them. Such a stacked arrangement is referred to as a system-in-package (SIP).
Through die vias (TDVs) can be employed to establish interconnections between stacked ICs. A TDV is a metal via that extends through a die of one IC for coupling to interconnect of another IC. In the design of stacking-friendly ICs, regions in the device layout are dedicated to TDVs. Typically, the dedicated TDV regions in a layout do not allow any metal or active layers within a predefined distance of the TDVs. As a result, there can be low metal pattern density around the TDVs of a stacking-friendly IC. Such a low metal pattern density can result in low chemical metal polishing (CMP) efficiency and variation in interconnect height among the metal layers of the interconnect. In particular, the metal height variation can accumulate over several metal layers, which can cause port depth of focus around TDVs during optical lithography.
Accordingly, there exists a need in the art for a method and apparatus for customizing metal pattern density in ICs configured for use in die stacking applications. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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This section provides background information related to the present disclosure which is not necessarily prior art.
Composite packages having plastic receptacles positioned within paperboard boxes have been used in the food and restaurant industry to package various types of liquids, including cooking oils. In such packages, the receptacles (for receiving the liquids) typically have pouring spouts located toward front walls of the receptacles and elongated handles extending from the pouring spouts to rear walls of the receptacles. And, the paperboard containers typically have single or double layer top assemblies with movable flaps to define first cutout portions for accommodating the receptacle spouts and second cutout portions for accommodating the receptacle handles. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image processing method and apparatus for receiving a color image original in the form of R, G, and B color-separated signals, performing predetermined arithmetic processing, such as matrix conversion, for the input image signals, and outputting the result of the processing.
2. Related Background Art
Generally, a color copying machine desirably reproduces colors, gradation, and the like as faithful as possible in a hard copy output image with respect to those of an original image. In effect, however, problems are pointed out in the following three points because there is the difference between the color separation of an original image and the color reproduction range of a hard copy output device, and countermeasures against these problems have been proposed.
(1) In an original having a background portion (which is normally white), called a surface, in addition to an original image, it is desirable that this surface be reproduced in a color as white as possible (i.e., be not printed out). Additionally, even if the surface color is removed, color reproduction is desirably performed without degrading the color reproducibility of other colors. As a countermeasure against this, a method has been proposed by which the surface color is removed by detecting the surface level and performing nonlinear conversion for R, G, and B signals, as in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 5-63968.
(2) In an original in which the color distribution of an original image falls outside the color reproduction range of a hard copy output device, the gradation of that portion is degraded. In such an original, it is desirable to map the color distribution of an original image within the color reproduction range of a hard copy output device. In this connection, U.S. Ser. No. 38,898 (filing date: Mar. 29, 1993) proposes a method in which the color distribution of an original image is detected, and matrix conversion is performed in accordance with the detected color distribution to map the color distribution within the color reproduction range.
(3) A color copying machine compresses the expected dynamic range of an input image by converting the dynamic range in gradation. However, if an original image has a range wider than the expected dynamic range, the gradation is degraded in a dark portion. As a countermeasure against this, there is a method by which the compression ratio of the dynamic range is adjusted by modifying conversion expressions by using a logarithm conversion circuit in luminance-density conversion processing for an image signal.
A color copying machine includes an operation unit in addition to the above arrangement, so an operator can perform various color adjusting operations he or she desires by using this operation unit. For example, when an operator wishes to obtain a more reddish output image, he or she increases the M (magenta) density and decreases the C (cyan) density by operating an operation unit of a color copying machine as illustrated in FIG. 17. That is, in accordance with the setting in this operation unit, a color gradation modification circuit performs gamma conversion as in FIGS. 18A and 18B (in each of which a chain double-dashed line indicates a standard value, .gamma.=1). Consequently, the gamma curve of magenta rises to increase the magenta density as a whole, and the gamma curve of cyan falls to decrease the cyan density, thereby increasing reddishness in total.
The above countermeasures for effecting faithful color reproduction, however, have been separately proposed against the different problems. Therefore, if the above problems appear at the same time in practical situations (e.g., if the outlying color space of an original image and the batter of a dark level exist simultaneously), the signal conversion for a countermeasure against one problem produces an influence on the signal conversion for a countermeasure against the other, making it impossible to sufficiently achieve the respective effects of these countermeasures.
In addition, there are other problems in respect of the configuration of hardware. That is, the locations of the individual countermeasures are scattered at a plurality of points in an image processing signal system, resulting in increases in size, manufacturing cost, and difficulty in design of the circuit.
Generally, color adjustment is performed on the basis of a color sample image by using lightness, saturation, and hue as variables in many instances. As an example, the adjustment is to "increase the vividness (saturation) at a constant brightness (lightness) without changing the hue (at a constant hue)".
In any color adjusting method of the above conventional examples, however, the adjustment amounts of the lightness, the saturation, and the hue must be replaced with the combination of the color density adjustment amounts of Y, M, C, and Bk, as in FIG. 17. This makes desired color adjustment very difficult.
In addition, some image processing apparatuses employ a color adjusting method by which R, G, and B signals are converted in coordinates in a CIE-L*a*b* uniform color space to perform color conversion in the L*a*b* space, and then returned to the R, G, and B signals. However, the conversion from the RGB signal to the L*a*b* signal involves processing containing nonlinear arithmetic operations. Therefore, in an apparatus, such as a color copying machine, in which an enormous quantity of data (pixels) is processed at a high speed in real time, the load on the apparatus is increased to result in an increased size of hardware.
Furthermore, in the method of adjusting the color densities of Y, M, C, and Bk as in the above conventional examples, if the magenta density is increased and the cyan density is decreased in the adjustment for increasing reddishness, a red portion of an image becomes more reddish. However, green as a mixed color of cyan and yellow is rendered yellowish if the cyan density is decreased; that is, an undesirable color change takes place as a side effect. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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In recent years, a digitalized radiographic image detecting device has been employed as a method for acquiring a radiographic image, including the processes of irradiating radial rays onto a subject and detecting radial rays penetrated through the subject. For this purpose, so-called FPD (Flat Panel Detector) can be employed for the radiographic image detecting device above-mentioned.
For instance, a certain FPD is so constituted that a plurality of detecting elements are two-dimensionally aligned on a substrate, and radial rays penetrated through the subject are irradiated onto a phosphor member (scintillator), and then, each of the plurality of detecting elements converts the intensity of visible light, generated corresponding to the amount of radial rays irradiated, to an amount of electric charge to be stored in a capacitor, so as to acquire the radiographic image by reading out the electric charges stored in the capacitors. The abovementioned FPD has such immediacy that the concerned radiographic image can be obtained just after the radiographic image capturing operation is completed.
Further, the recent advancement of the semiconductor manufacturing technology makes the dimensions of the FPD minimized and thinned. Still further, Tokkai 2004-180931 (Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open Publication) sets forth an X-ray image capturing apparatus that is provided with such the thin-type FPD and a communication device having a wireless communication capability.
On the other hand, from the viewpoints of making the information utility convenient and speeding up various kinds of processing, the HIS (Hospital Information System) serving as such a system that totally controls patient diagnosis information and accounting information, the RIS (Radiology Information System) serving as such a system that controls the image capturing orders to be conducted in the department of radiology, etc., have been introduced into the hospital. In such the system, various kinds of radiographic image capturing apparatuses and terminal devices for controlling the capturing apparatuses, etc., are coupled to the RIS or the HIS through a network installed in the hospital, such as LAN (Local Area Network), etc.
Further, International Publication 06/109551 sets forth a radiographic image capturing system in which both a plurality of consoles (each serving as a controlling terminal device) and a plurality of FPDs (each being provided with a communication function) are coupled to the above-mentioned network installed in the hospital. According to the radiographic image capturing system set forth in International Publication 06/109551, in order to improve an efficiency of image confirming operations to be conducted by various kinds of operators, such as a radiologist, a doctor, etc., the plurality of consoles and the plurality of FPDs are correlated with each other in advance, so as to transmit the radiographic image, acquired by a specific FPD, to the console correlated to the specific FPD in advance.
Still further, International Publication 05/096944 sets forth another radiographic image capturing system in which a plurality of consoles and a plurality of FPDs, each of which is a portable cassette-type FPD (hereinafter, also referred to as a portable-type FPD) provided with a wireless communication section, are coupled to each other by using a radio repeater installed in the image capturing room. According to the radiographic image capturing system set forth in International Publication 05/096944, when the radiographing operation is implemented by employing the FPD, an ID (Identification) of the operator who conducts the radiographing operation concerned is correlated to the captured image data. Then, when operating the console that displays the radiographic image acquired by implementing the radiographing operation concerned thereon, the concerned radiographer registers the operator's ID, while the FPD transmits the image data, correlated with an operator's ID coinciding with that registered by the concerned radiographer, to the console concerned. By employing the above-mentioned method, even when the radiographer repeats the radiographing operations while moving from one to another console among the plurality of consoles, it becomes possible for the radiographer to confirm the radiographic images, represented by the image data acquired by the radiographing operations, at a specific console which is currently used by the radiographer concerned, resulting in improvement of the efficiency of the radiographing operations.
As for the radiographic image capturing system set forth in Patent Document 2 or Patent Document 3, it is necessary to correlate the FPD with the console installed in the radiographing room in advance when the radiographing operation is actually implemented.
Other than the purpose of improving the efficiency of image confirming operation, the reason why the FPD is correlated with the console lays on such purposes that, by storing radiographing sensitivity information in advance into the console correlated, the image correcting operation is speedily performed and the operation in regard to the timing of image capturing operation is synchronized with the X-ray generating apparatus to be used for the radiographing operation concerned.
However, sometimes, the portable-type FPD provided with the wireless communication section is used by moving it between plural radiographing rooms. For instance, in case that a FPD, singly installed in a certain radiographing room, has malfunctioned and another FPD is moved to the concerned radiographing room from another radiographing room so as to backup the malfunctioned FPD, due to such the emergency reason, it would be requested that the portable-type FPD is employed for the radiographing operation in the concerned radiographing room in which the portable-type FPD is not equipped in the normal situation, or the like. In that case, unless the correlating relationship between the portable-type FPD and the radiographing room is made to be changed, since the portable-type FPD is still correlated with the console installed in the radiographing room serving as the departure site, instead of the concerned radiographing room serving as the destination site, the radiographing subject (patient) resides in the wrong radiographing room, which is different from the correct radiographing room correlated to the console to be used for radiographing the subject. Accordingly, if the radiographing operation is conducted in the abovementioned state, the operation for acquiring the radiographing image cannot be actually achieved, and merely a wasted X-ray exposure would occur in vain.
In order to change the correlating relationship from that with the console installed in the radiographing room serving as the departure site to that with the other console installed in the other radiographing room serving as the destination site, the following method could be employed.
(1) The console information in both the console of the departure site and the other console of the destination site are established by using one of the both consoles through the wireless communication path.
(2) The portable-type FPD is equipped with a separate setting section for the setting change use, so as to use the separate setting section for the above purpose. For instance, a device for connecting the portable-type FPD with the console through wire communication, a wireless communication device other than that to be used for controlling operations, etc. can be cited as the abovementioned separate setting section. In addition, it is necessary for the operator to manually move the radiographing sensitivity information to be utilized for the image correction processing to the other console of the destination site through the network or by using a certain kind of recording medium. However, even in any one of the abovementioned methods, the operator should once conduct establishing operations by employing a certain kind of method through manual operations, and accordingly, there has been a problem that such the establishing operations are cumbersome for the operator. | {
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With the advent of front wheel drive vehicles and disc brakes, the assembly which is driven by the drive shaft comprises a hub presenting a disc flange supporting a rotor having opposed braking surfaces and with a bearing assembly surrounding the hub with an outer race presenting a support flange for attachment to a king pin of a vehicle. When fully assembled on the vehicle, the braking surfaces of the disc rotor are disposed adjacent the brake pads of the brake disc assembly and separated from engaging the braking surfaces by a brake running clearance when the brake piston is not actuated. When the brake piston is actuated, the brake pads take up the clearance and engage the braking surfaces.
In order to provide this uniform running clearance, the disc rotor must be manufactured to close tolerances with the braking surfaces oriented radially or perpendicularly to the axis of rotation of the rotor when installed. A method of machining to close tolerances on a disc which is mounted through a bearing on a fixed stub shaft is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,430,926 issued Jul. 11, 1995 to D. J. Hartford. Normally, however, in a front drive or driven wheel, a bearing assembly is disposed about the hub, rather than in the hub as in the aforementioned patent, and after the braking surfaces have been machined. As the bearing assembly is mounted to the vehicle the bearing assembly is loaded to finalize the relationship or orientation between the braking surfaces and the axis of rotation and can result in misalignment of the braking surfaces. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention is directed in general to the field of computer storage networks. In one aspect, the present invention relates to a standalone cache memory device which is connected between one or more host machines and a storage device.
2. Description of the Related Art
Data storage technology over the years has evolved from a direct attached storage model (DAS) to using remote computer storage models, such as Network Attached Storage (NAS) and a Storage Area Network (SAN). With the direct storage model, the storage is directly attached to the workstations and application servers, but this creates numerous difficulties with the administration, backup, compliance and maintenance of the directly stored data. These difficulties are alleviated at least in part by separating the application server/workstations from the storage medium. For example, FIG. 1 depicts a typical NAS system 100 in which a number of PCs, workstations and application servers (clients) use a network 10 to access storage resources on a number of remote network attached storage and file servers (or filers). In the depicted system 100, each of the networked PC or workstation devices 12-14 and application servers 16-18 may act as a storage client that is connected to the network 10 by the appropriate routers 11 and switches 15 to remotely store and retrieve data with one or more NAS filers 1-6, which in turn are connected to the network 10 by the appropriate routers 9 and switches 7-8. Typically, the storage clients (e.g., 14) use an IP-based network protocol, such as CIFS and NFS, to communicate store, retrieve and modify files on an NAS filer (e.g., 5).
Conventional NAS devices are designed with data storage hardware components (including a plurality of hard disk drives, one or more processors for controlling access to the disk drives, I/O controller and high speed cache memory) and operating system and other software that provides data storage and access functions. Even with a high speed internal cache memory, the access response time for NAS devices continues to be outpaced by the faster processor speeds in the client devices 12-14, 16-18, especially where any one NAS device may be connected to a plurality of client storage devices. In part, this performance problem is caused by the lower cache hit rates that result from a combination of increased disk capacity and high-density mounting on the NAS storage device.
While a number of solutions have been proposed to address these problems, they are, for a variety of reasons, not entirely satisfactory. For example, increases in the size and speed of the cache memory result in increased costs. And while faster disk drives have been developed, the increased disk drive access speeds are not enough to overcome the performance gap. Other solutions have proposed using performance-oriented data placement, but these have provided only limited performance gains. Attempts to increase response speed by using disk striping across multiple RAID disks have not proven to be scalable or have otherwise suffered from proprietary limitations. And while parallel file systems with virtualization have been able to provide short-term performance gains, they are massively complex and difficult to implement. Accordingly, there is a need for a system and method for improving the disk storage access time to overcome the problems in the art, such as outlined above. Further limitations and disadvantages of conventional solutions will become apparent to one of skill in the art after reviewing the remainder of the present application with reference to the drawings and detailed description which follow. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a brushless DC motor of the type in which a magnetic field of a rotor is generated by a rotor permanent magnet and a magnetic field of a stator is generated by a field magnetic coil. In particular, the present invention relates to a brushless DC motor in which the efficiency thereof is improved by providing a permanent magnetic core within a stator field magnetic coil core and by providing a boosting permanent magnet external this permanent magnetic core within the stator. The stator magnetic field is enhanced by the combination of the magnetic force of the field magnetic coil and the magnetic force of the boosting permanent magnet when the field magnetic coil is excited.
2. Description of the Related Art
In the conventional DC motor of the type in which the magnetic field of the rotor is generated by the rotor permanent magnet and the magnetic field of the stator is generated by the field magnetic coil, the efficiency is low relative the power consumption of the electric current supplied to excite the field magnetic coil to generate the magnetic field of the stator. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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I. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to vehicle frames and, more particularly, to an improved vehicle frame construction.
II. Description of the Prior Art
Many vehicles, such as truck or automotive vehicles, utilize a ladder frame to provide the structural support needed to support all of the loads during the operation of the vehicle. An exemplary model of such a prior art vehicle frame 10 is illustrated in FIG. 1.
With reference then to FIG. 1, the prior art vehicle frame 10 includes longitudinally extending and elongated framing members 12 and 14 which extend along opposite sides of the vehicle. The frame 10 also includes a number of cross members 16 which extend laterally between and connect to the framing members 12 and 14. Any conventional method, such as welding, may be used to secure the cross members 16 to the framing members 12 and 14.
In many types of vehicles, the frame 10 must be sufficiently strong to support vehicle loads and the ability to withstand the vertical loads is known as “beaming strength” because the entire frame acts as a beam and is designed to absorb vertical loads. Traditionally, designers have increased the beaming strength by increasing the size and/or number of the cross members 16 and framing members 12 and 14.
Although the previously known vehicle frames have proven adequate in absorbing vertical loads, the ladder frames in such vehicles are inadequate at absorbing torsional loads. Furthermore, many vehicles require torsional stiffness in order to provide the required structure for a solid ride and better handling while the vehicle is in use.
In addition, even though the use of stronger or heavier frame members 12 and 14 and cross members 16 does provide the required strength to carry heavier loads, such a frame design also adds to the overall weight of the frame. Increasing the weight of the frame undesirably decreases the gas economy and vehicle acceleration and increases the costs. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a sheet-like medium alignment apparatus, sheet-like medium post-treatment apparatus and image forming apparatus.
2. Description of the Prior Art
A sheet-formed medium alignment apparatus provided with a returning means consisting of a rotating body is known in the prior art, wherein a sheet-formed medium is ejected onto a loading means by an ejecting means and the end of the aforementioned sheet-formed medium on the upstream side in the direction of ejection is pressed against the vertical wall (end fence) provided at the alignment position, whereby the sheet-formed medium is aligned and loaded. External force is applied to the sheet-formed medium ejected onto the aforementioned loading means (tray), and the medium is fed to the aforementioned vertical wall so as to be aligned.
The sheet-like medium handled in the present specification includes duplicating paper, transfer paper, recording paper, cover sheet, offset paper (divider), computer sheets, special paper, OHP sheet and others. In the following description, they will be genetically called sheets.
In an image forming apparatus, a punching unit for punching filing holes on the imaged sheets ejected from the image forming apparatus, staple means, and a sheet-like medium post-treatment apparatus for post-treatment such as stamping, the sheets ejected from the ejecting means are loaded on a tray as a loading means called an ejection tray or loading tray. The sheets loaded on the loading means are automatically aligned for subsequent use. In this case, the major point is the degree of sheet alignment, namely, accuracy of alignment.
In FIG. 77 illustrating an example of the prior art sheet treatment apparatus, for example, sheets S1 with an image created thereon by an image forming apparatus (not illustrated) are fed to the sheet processing apparatus, and are led to a pair of ejection rollers 3 as an ejecting means comprising a lower roller 3a and an upper roller 3b through the ejection sensor for detecting the passage of this sheet. Then sheets are ejected in the direction of ejection “a” (orthogonal to the axial direction of the lower roller 3a within the common tangential plane between a lower roller 3a and an upper roller 3b) on a direct extension of the aforementioned feed direction.
A vertical wall (end fence) 131 is provided below the ejection roller 3, and a tray 12 is located in such a way that it crosses this end fence 131. A tray 12 has a slope which is higher on the downstream side of ejection direction than the fence 131, and sheets are loaded on this slope. Further, tray 12 is movable in the vertical direction, and a sheet surface feeler (not illustrated) detects the top surface of the tray 12 (the top surfaces of the sheets when the sheets are loaded). As sheets are stacked on the tray 12, the tray 12 is lowered, and control is made to ensure that the distance from the nip of an ejection roller to the top surface of the sheet on the tray 12 will be kept constant.
Depending on the ejection speed, the intermediate position of the sheets S1 ejected from the ejection roller 3 to the tray 3 may be bent in the process of ejection while the rear ends of the sheets S1 are still gripped by the ejection roller 3 as shown in FIG. 77, and the sheets S1 may be fed out with the leading edge thereof kept in contact with the loaded sheets S″ which are already loaded on the tray 12.
Under this condition, the leading edges of sheets S1 moves the sheets S2 located on the top surfaces of the loaded sheets S″ toward the downstream side in direction of ejection a; therefore, the trailing edges of the sheets S2 aligned after having been pressed against the end fence 131 by the inclination of the tray 12 are separated from the end fence 131 and is misaligned toward the downstream side in the direction of ejection, with the result that the trailing edge is misaligned.
In the paper copying industry, a bundle of loaded sheets may be fed to the next process to be processed by a punching machine, for example, and this requires excellent alignment accuracy. If a bundle of sheets has a poor alignment accuracy, the bundle taken out of the tray has to be aligned again by human hand before it is fed to the punching machine, with the result that work efficiency is reduced. To solve this problem, the upstream segment, e.g., copying industry requires very severe alignment accuracy of the loaded sheets. Improvement of alignment accuracy is urgently required at present.
To solve this problem of misalignment resulting from the loaded sheet being moved by the leading edge of the ejected paper according to the prior art, a retaining roller 121′ as a retaining means is provided at a central position along the width of the sheet between the ejection roller 3 and the upper surface of the tray 12 in such a way that it can be rotated and drive, as shown in FIG. 78.
The retaining roller 121′ is fixed at a specified position on the immovable member, and is kept in a light contact with the upper surface of the tray 12 (the top surface of the sheet when the sheet is loaded). When paper is loaded on the tray 12, even if the leading edge of the paper ejected on the tray 12 attempts to move the loaded paper, the loaded paper is exposed to the force opposite to the direction of ejection “a” while being pressed by the retaining roller 121′, and is kept pressed against the end fence 131.
The sheet S1 ejected from the ejection roller 3 onto the tray 12 in the manner mentioned above is held by the retaining roller 121′, and is pressed against the end fence 131. This eliminates the so-called vertical misalignment on the trailing edge in the direction of ejection a.
When the retaining roller 121′ is rotating in the arrow-marked direction as shown in FIG. 78, the retaining roller 121′ has also a function of returning the sheet to the side of the end fence 131. The roller in this case is referred to as a returning roller. As shown in FIG. 79, the returning roller 121′ is kept in a light contact with the top surface on the tray 12 and is driven in such a way as to move the contact surface toward the upstream side in the direction of ejection a, so the sheets fed onto the tray 12 whose trailing edges are gripped by the returning roller 121′ are returned opposite to the direction of ejection “a” and are pressed against the end fence 131.
The sheets S1 ejected by the ejection roller 3 and loaded on the tray 12 in the manner mentioned above are gripped by the returning roller 121′. Or those sheets which have been ejected slightly farther in the direction of ejection “a” than the returning roller 121′ are slid under its own weight along the inclination of the tray 12, and their trailing edges are gripped by the returning roller 121′ to be pressed against the end fence 131, whereby the trailing edge is aligned.
These sheets fall under free conditions without any restriction on the distance from the ejection roller 3 to the tray 12, namely, on the distance of free fall of the sheet until they are loaded on the tray 12 by free falling after their trailing edges are released from the ejection roller 3. So a slight displacement will be formed between sheets under the influence of air, and alignment accuracy will be adversely affected. However, these sheets are correctly pressed against the end fence 131 due to the inclination of the tray 12 and the action of the returning roller 121, with the result that basically excellent alignment accuracy is ensured.
Another known art is a sheet-like medium alignment apparatus provided with a sorting means for sorting the sheet-like media fed upward one after another from the image forming apparatus. Such a sheet-like medium alignment apparatus is characterized by operation by an aligning means for aligning the sheet trailing edge, operation by a returning means for returning the sheet to the end fence and sorting operation by the aforementioned sorting means. These operations are performed by using the aforementioned time intervals of sheet-like media being fed one after another.
For example, when the sheet-like medium has been ejected and loaded onto the tray, the following operations are required before the next sheet is ejected; (1) a returning operation for ensuring alignment in the direction of ejection by returning the sheet-like medium with the returning roller until it is pressed against the end fence in order to ensure alignment between the sheet-like medium immediately after ejection and the edge of the already ejected sheet-like medium in the direction of ejection; (2) an alignment operation of gripping the end face in the direction of shift by the aligning means together with the sheet-like medium of the same portion already ejected in order to improve the alignment of the edge of the sheet-like medium in the direction of shift; and (3) a sorting operation by shifting the tray (or an aligning member) by a specified distance only during the time between ejection of the sheet-like medium at the end of this portion and ejection of the first sheet-like medium of the next portion. | {
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It is customary in irrigation systems to use a series of sprinklers arranged for instance adjacent to a row of trees and to couple these by means of a hose or a flexible tube, hereafter referred to as a tube, to a source of supply and to periodically energise the sprinklers by feeding liquid such as water, or water with fertilizer or other chemicals added thereto. Such an assembly requires in-line junctions.
In devices of this type it is necessary to position a sprinkler at each locality where watering is to occur and generally the method of supplying the water or other liquid to the sprinkler is somewhat intricate because of the large number of sprinklers that need to be connected, and the problem of fitting the feed tube to the sprinklers.
Such sprinklers may be positioned at spaced intervals along the main tube, or can be fed by laterals joined to the main tube, and it will be known that it is difficult to effectively join laterals to a main tube where the main tube is of considerable length and where it is not possible to thread the tube through or over the tube junction. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Typically linear actuators are electromechanical devices that provide linear mechanical motion in response to receiving electrical energy. Linear actuators may be utilized in many high-force and high-precision applications. One configuration of a linear actuator consists of a cylindrical core that is free to move axially. An air gap is formed between the cylindrical core and a cylindrical shell that surrounds the core. Both the cylindrical shell and coil are made of soft iron. A pair of magnets made of permanent magnet material are affixed to opposite ends of the core. The magnets are radially magnetized and orientated on the core such that the magnets are opposite in polarity. A coil assembly is positioned circumferentially about the core. The coil assembly consists of two coils connected together in series, each coil being wound in opposite directions. Current applied to the coil generates a magnetic field, which is aided by the static magnetic field produced by the magnet pair, moving the core axially. The core moves bi-directionally in response to the orientation of the current applied to the coil.
The coil assembly described above adds unnecessary manufacturing complexity to the actuator design. For example, such an assembly requires one coil to be wound in one direction (clockwise) and while the other coil is wound in the opposite direction (counterclockwise). The process of winding two separate coils and connecting the coils adds additional manufacturing steps, adding to the overall cost of the actuator. Moreover, the inherent resistance associated with this type of coil construction is somewhat high due to the series connection of the two coils. The high resistance of the coil requires a relatively high voltage power supply to achieve a desirable power density (force output per unit volume) for the actuator. Consequently, a heavier wire is typically utilized with this type of coil assembly to lower the total resistance. However the heavier wire is more difficult to wind; yielding complex manufacturing techniques with the associated high costs.
The present invention is directed to overcoming one or more of the problems as set forth above. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The present invention pertains to homogeneous immunoassay systems involving complement-mediated lysis of liposomes containing markers.
Liposomes are micron-sized spherical shells of amphipatic molecules which isolate an interior aqueous space from the bulk exterior aqueous environment. They can be made to contain hydrophobic molecules within their membrane, or hydrophilic markers within their internal aqueous space, or both. Because of this versatility, liposomes are of interest both as potential vehicles for the delivery of drugs in vivo and as the basis for immunoassay systems in vitro.
Various formats for liposome immunoassay systems have been developed including heterogeneous and homogeneous systems. Heterogeneous systems, which typically require an initial separation of bound and unbound forms of tracer, are described in O'Connell, et al., Clin. Chem., 31:1424-1426 (1985) and MacCrindle, et al , Clin. Chem., 31:1487-1490 (1985). Homogeneous methods, such as those based on (i) complement-mediated lysis, (ii) melittin-mediated lysis, (iii) color changes induced by cation-responsive dyes in perturbed membranes, and (iv) enhanced agglutination, have also been described. Some of these methods rely on liposomes to generally amplify immunological reactions whereas others rely on the utility of liposomes to encapsulate marker substances within the liposome and to subsequently release them in proportion to the amount of analyte present in a sample.
An immunoassay system of particular interest to the background of the invention is the Liposome Immuno-Lytic Assay (LILA) which involves the antibody-triggered complement-mediated lysis of liposomes. In an exemplary assay format, a liposome encapsulating a marker is first made immunoreactive by association of a first immunological binding pair member (e.g., an antigen) with its surface. The liposome is then incubated with a fluid sample to be analyzed for the presence of the corresponding binding pair member (e.g., an antibody). Typically, the binding of antibody to antigen (pre-bound to the liposome surface) generates a liposome immune complex and, upon the addition of serum, complement activation is initiated leading to lysis of the liposome and release of the internal marker substance. The amount of analyte present in the sample is proportional to the amount of marker substance released.
Liposome lysis can be detected in a variety of ways and depends upon the nature of the marker initially encapsulated within the liposome. Kataoka, et al., Eur. J. Biochem., 24:123 (1971), for example, describe Lipid A sensitized liposomes which release a spectrophotometrically detectable glucose marker when incubated with an anti-Lipid A anti-serum and complement source. Yet another means for detecting lysis involves initially encapsulating within the liposome a fluorophore at self-quenching concentrations. Upon liposome lysis, an extreme dilution of the fluorophore occurs and this dilution re-establishes fluorescence. The increase in fluorescence is proportional to the amount of analyte present in the sample. Ishimori, et al., J. Immuno. Methods, 75:351-360 (1984) describe an immunoassay technique using immunolysis of liposomes to measure antibody against protein antigens such as human IgG. The marker used was carboxyfluorescein and the technique was reported to be effective at detecting 10.sup.-15 mole of anti-human IgG antibody or human IgG. Similarly, Yasuda et al., J. Immun. Methods, 44:153-158 (1981), describe the utilization of complement-mediated immune lysis of liposomes entrapping carboxyfluorescein at self-quenching concentrations to measure anti-glycolipid antibody.
The use of antibody sensitized liposomes in Liposome Immuno-Lytic Assays presents a number of system design problems not present in assays employing antigen coupled liposomes. Of interest to the background of the present invention are references describing developments in the art relating to procedures for coupling antibodies to liposome surfaces (Heath, T. D. and Martin, F. J., Chemistry & Physics of Lipids, 40:347-358 (1986); Martin, F. J. and Kung, V. T., Annals New York Academy of Sciences, 446:443-456 (1985)) which describe binding characteristics of antibody-bearing liposomes; and especially those references which relate to avoidance of liposome aggregation--a phenomenon which can seriously limit the sensitivity of LILA's. As one example, Jou, et al., Fed. Proc., Fed. Am. Soc. E. Biol., 43:1971 (1984) disclose coupling procedures designed for avoidance of aggregation of antibody-sensitized liposomes through a series of steps including: (1) limiting the average number of reactive functional groups per antibody molecule to less than one; (2) providing for early "quenching" during the coupling reaction; and, (3) employing dialysis to remove uncoupled antibodies. In this reference however, only liposome aggregation as a result of antibody-liposome coupling was addressed and no information was provided regarding the use of antibody-coupled liposomes for immunoassays.
Umeda, et al., J. Immun. Meth., 95:15-21 (1986) (and Umeda, et al., Jap. patent appln. No. Sho 59 [1984-261806]) describe a series of studies regarding a complement-mediated liposome immune lysis assay using carboxyfluorescein-entrapped liposomes sensitized with antibody to C-reactive protein (CRP) antigen. Whole antibodies, derived from different animal sources, were modified and coupled to liposomes utilizing a heterobifunctional cross-linking reagent, N-succinimidyl-3-(2 pyridyldithio)-propionate (SPDP) and dithiothreitol (DTT), a reducing agent. However, upon coupling certain antibodies, e.g., rabbit antibodies, to dithiopyridyl-substituted dipalmitoylphosphatidylethanolamine (DTP-DPPE) liposomes, complement activation and liposome lysis occurred even in the absence of sample containing analyte. The low level of complement reagent required to minimize this non-specific lysis necessarily lowered the overall sensitivity of the assay. In addition, only certain animal sources of complement, i.e., guinea pig serum, proved to be effective reagents and this effectiveness also depended upon the animal source of the antibody coupled to the liposome. For example, goat antibody was suitable as the antibody bound to the liposome, but was not suitable as the secondary antibody. Although the assay sensitivity was in proportion to the amount of antibody bound to the liposome, when more than 400 .mu.g of IgG/.mu.mol of lipid was bound to the liposomes, liposomes became fragile and their spontaneous release of carboxyfluorescein increased irrespective of the liposome lipid composition. The sensitivity of the assay was improved by purification of whole antibody (by passage through an affinity chromatography column) prior to binding to liposomes. However, sensitivity was not increased when Fab' antibody fragments (which were expected to be coupled to liposomes more efficiently than IgG) were bound to liposomes. The Fab' antibody fragments of the reference were prepared by reducing F(ab').sub.2 antibody fragments with mercaptoethylamine and were then coupled via thiol residues to derivatized liposomes containing DTP-DPPE. In the attempt to explain the lack of improved sensitivity over that obtained using liposomes bearing whole goat antibody, it was speculated that the affinity of Fab' antibody fragments for antigen may be reduced during the drastic pepsin digestion at pH 4.5. It was thus suggested that the use of "high affinity" Fab' fragments would result in a much higher sensitivity than use of whole IgG.
The coupling of Fab' antibody fragments to liposomes via a disulfide exchange reaction requires either a sulfhydryl reactive derivative on the liposome or a derivatization of the sulfhydryl group on the Fab' antibody fragment. For example, Martin, et al., Biochemistry, 20:4229 (1981), describes the use of N-[3-2-pyridyldithio)propionyl]phosphatidylethanolamine (PDP-PE) liposomes, in a disulfide exchange reaction. The sulfhydryl reactive derivative is a pyridyldithio derivative. Martin, et al., J. Biol. Chem. 257:286 (1982), describes the use of N-[4-(p-maleimidophenyl)butryl]phosphatidylethanolamine (MPB-PE) liposomes having reactive maleimide moieties for forming an essentially irreversible antibody-vesicle linkage which did not involve the usual disulfide linkage but rather involved the more stable thioether linkage. The liposomes of the two Martin references did not contain an encapsulated fluorophore as those liposomes were intended for "targetting" use rather than for use in an immunoassay. Bredehorst, et al., Biochemistry, 25:5693-5698 (1986) describes the coupling of Fab' fragments to MPB-PE liposomes. These liposomes did contain encapsulated fluorophore but the liposomes were noted to release up to 95% of the entrapped fluorophore. To overcome this leakage problem, a decrease in the molar concentration of the MPB-PE anchor in the liposomes was required which caused a corresponding decrease in the number of Fab' molecules bound per liposome. No evidence was given as to whether such coupled liposomes would be functional in an immunoassay.
A number of references have described derivatization of Fab' antibody fragments for use in the preparation of bispecific antibodies--hybrid immunoglobulins provided with two different antigen-binding sites through a chemical re-association of monovalent fragments derived. See, e.g., Brennan, et al., Science, 229:81 (1985) and Paulus, H.P., PCT patent application WO 85/04811. Both references show the preparation of Fab' thionitrobenzoate derivatives in which arsenite is used as a complexing agent to stabilize vicinal dithiols and to impede intramolecular disulfide formation.
In sum, several immunoassay systems involving complement mediated lysis of marker-encapsulating, antibody bound liposomes have been described. However, none of these are homogeneous systems totally responsive to the need in the art for highly sensitive assays for antigens in fluid samples.
BRIEF SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
The present invention provides for novel homogeneous immunoassay systems involving complement-mediated lysis of marker-encapsulating lipid vesicles (liposomes) for detection of analyte in a fluid sample. These systems do not require the separation of unbound antigens and/or antibody conjugates yet provide highly sensitive procedures for analyte detection.
Liposomes containing a marker, e.g., a fluorescent marker, are coupled to antibody fragments (variously referred to as liposome-antibody conjugates or antibody sensitized liposomes). The antibody fragments of the invention confer the liposomes with immunological specificity yet avoid sensitizing the liposomes to complement mediated lysis in the absence of analyte. Antibody sensitized liposomes (the first reagent) are sequentially incubated with an analyte-containing sample, a second antibody (the second reagent), and finally with a complement source such as plasma. Complement is activated by the liposome-antibody-antigen-second antibody complex, and causes liposome lysis, a concomitant release of fluorophore and an increase in observable fluorescence.
Antibody of the first reagent may be an anti-analyte F(ab').sub.2 antibody fragment, or an anti-analyte Fab' antibody fragment. Antibody of the second reagent may be provided in either soluble form, or in insoluble form e.g., bound onto carboxylated polystyrene particles or coupled to a third antibody in the form of a "double antibody" immune precipitate. Where the antibody of the second reagent is provided in an insoluble form, the analyte-containing sample is preferably incubated with the second reagent, to form an analyte-second antibody complex, prior to incubation with the first reagent. Where the second reagent consists of soluble antibodies, the first reagent is incubated with the analyte containing sample prior to incubation with the second reagent.
In a presently preferred system, designed for detection of human chorionic gonadotropin (HCG) in a fluid sample, liposomes containing a fluorophore marker, such as calcein, are coupled to Fab'antibody fragments, e.g., goat anti-HCG Fab' antibody fragments, and incubated with an HCG-containing sample in the presence of dummy liposomes. This is followed by incubation with a second soluble antibody, e.g., goat anti-HCG IgG, and finally with complement, e.g., goat serum, leading to liposome lysis and an increase in observable fluorescence.
In another presently preferred system liposomes containing a fluorescent marker, e.g., calcein, are coupled to F(ab').sub.2 antibody fragments, e.g., goat anti-HCG F(ab').sub.2 antibody fragments, and the antibody sensitized liposomes are sequentially incubated with an HCG-containing sample and then with a second antibody, e.g., goat anti-HCG antibody, in solution form to form liposome-antibody-HCG-second antibody complexes, which are then lysed with complement, e.g., either human plasma or rabbit serum. In another preferred system, the second antibody, e.g., goat anti-HCG antibody, is coated onto carboxylated polystyrene particles or coupled to a third antibody, e.g., rabbit anti-goat IgG antibody, as a double antibody precipitate.
In another aspect of the invention designed to obtain improved sensitivity of the liposome immunolytic assay, antibody sensitized liposomes are mixed with "dummy" lipid vesicles, liposomes which do not contain encapsulated marker, prior to incubation with the analyte containing sample and with a second antibody.
In another of its aspects, the present invention provides methods for preparing antibody sensitized liposomes in a manner which minimizes liposome aggregation both during preparation and storage. In a preferred method for reducing lipid vesicle aggregation during antibody lipid vesicle conjugation, lipid vesicles having thiol groups are conjugated with modified antibody, i.e., Fab' and F(ab').sub.2 antibody fragments with thiol-reactive groups, in the presence of a polysaccharide capable of forming a reversible gel. The gel reaction mixture is cooled to form a gelate, unreacted thiol groups on the liposomes are alkylated, and the gelate, containing liposome-antibody conjugates, is washed and may be placed in a buffer for storage. By minimizing liposome aggregation, the accessible surface area of each liposome is increased as is the total reactivity of liposome preparations, thereby enhancing the efficacy of their diagnostic and therapeutic applications.
In another of its aspects, the present invention provides methods for preparing Fab' antibody fragments whereby antibody affinity for its complementary antigen is retained resulting in antibody sensitized liposomes with greatly improved sensitivity in a LILA. According to another aspect of the invention, antibody fragments are chemically modified to bear functional group(s) which are reactive toward certain moieties on the liposome surface and therefore are able to form antibody-liposome covalent linkages upon their mixing with liposomes. Illustratively, F(ab').sub.2 antibody fragments, prepared from whole antibody, e.g., goat anti-HCG antibody, are treated with a dithiol complexing agent, such as sodium arsenite, to stabilize vicinal dithiols and impede intramolecular disulfide formation, in the presence of a reductive cleavage agent such as cysteine-HCl. The resulting Fab' antibody fragments are then treated with a thiol activating agent, such as 5,5'-dithiobis(2-nitrobenzoic acid), to form thionitrobenzoate derivatized Fab' antibody fragments (TNB-Fab'). These derivatized Fab' antibody fragments may then be coupled to lipid vesicles to form antibody sensitized liposomes.
Other aspects and advantages of the present invention will be apparent upon consideration of the following detailed description thereof which includes numerous illustrative examples of practice of the invention. | {
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In recent years mobile devices have found widespread popular use. In many cases, these devices use a battery to provide electric power; in other cases they draw their power from another device such as a computer via an electrical cable, through a USB port for example. One of the most common drawbacks of such devices is the need for recharging the battery, in the case of a rechargeable battery, or replacement of the battery in the case of a non-rechargeable battery, or the inconvenience of requiring a cable connection. It would be desirable if such devices were able to receive their power, or at least part of it, wirelessly from a remote source, thus reducing the need for recharging cycles or change of batteries, while not limiting the device to be bound to a fixed location limited by a cable connection to a power source.
In published International Patent Application No. WO/2007/036937, entitled “Directional Light Transmitter and Receiver”, to one of the inventors in the present application, and incorporated herewithin by reference in its entirety, there is described a directional light transmitter and receiver that may be used to transmit power to such a mobile device. A transmitter, fixed for example at the ceiling of a room, contains an amplifying laser medium, and this together with a retroreflector in the receiver, forms a laser resonator. When lasing sets in, the receiver can extract some optical power through an output coupler and convert it to electrical power such as in a photovoltaic cell. The resonator described in WO/2007/036937 may be either a ring cavity or a regular cavity formed between the 6 mirrors of the two retroreflectors.
In order to ensure safe operation of the apparatus described in WO/2007/036937, a system is needed to ensure that the amounts of power that can be emitted outside the confines of the laser resonator in a manner that may pose risk to the neighboring environment, such as to people, animals or equipment, or to components of the system itself, is minimal and complies with the safety limitations in operation to prevent such a danger.
In a system such as the one described in WO/2007/036937, power is emitted to the destination device through the output coupler on the receiver. To ensure safe operation, the system must be designed and constructed in such a way that minimal power is dissipated by the system other than to the power destination. This is especially true for optical power, as it poses a bigger risk to persons and the environment than thermal loss, which is usually locally confined. The system described in WO/2007/036937 relies on the cessation of lasing in the event that an obstruction diverts power from the resonator. However, although such cessation of lasing will generally take place, the need for a high level of safety necessitates more comprehensive safety means to prevent leakage of power in unintended directions. However, the beam may be partially blocked by a transparent object, such as a window, causing a part of the power to be reflected outside the beam's path, but without stopping the lasing. Such a beam may pose a risk to persons or objects in its vicinity, and will also reduce the overall efficiency of transmission, such that there is a need to detect such an occurrence.
In published U.S. patent application number US 2008/0130124 there are described safety methods for preventing unintentional dispersion of a laser beam transmitted from a self-contained laser transmitter to a receiver. In published U.S. patent application number US 2008/0084596, there are described motorized mirror assemblies for use with such a laser beam transmission system. Other systems include a subsidiary beam sent from the receiver to the transmitter to verify that the line of sight between transmitter and receiver is not broken by an intruding object.
Other prior art patents of relevance to the techniques used in this field of interest include U.S. Pat. No. 5,553,088 for “Laser amplifying system” to A. Giesen, and U.S. Pat. No. 5,048,051 for “Optically-stabilized plano-plano optical resonators” to J. J. Zayhowski
The disclosures of each of the publications mentioned in this section and in other sections of the specification, are hereby incorporated by reference, each in its entirety. | {
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An electric vehicle (EV), also referred to as an electric powered vehicle (EPV), is a vehicle which uses one or more electric motors for propulsion. EPVs include electric cars that use electric motors for propulsion in place of more common propulsion systems, such as the internal combustion engine (ICE). Electric cars are commonly powered by on-board battery packs, and as such are battery electric vehicles (BEVs). Although electric cars often give good acceleration and have generally acceptable top speed, the poor energy capacity of batteries compared to that of fossil fuels causes the electric cars to have relatively poor range between charges, and consequently recharging can take significant lengths of time. However, for everyday use rather than long journeys, electric cars are practical means of transportation and can be recharged overnight at acceptable cost. Electric cars are expected to have an impact in the auto industry given advantages in city pollution, less dependence on oil, and expected rise in gasoline prices. | {
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The cloud computing environment is an enhancement to the predecessor grid environment, whereby multiple grids and other computation resources may be further abstracted by a cloud layer, thus making disparate devices appear to an end-consumer as a single pool of seamless resources. These resources may include such things as physical or logical compute engines, servers and devices, device memory, and storage devices.
Currently, Disaster Recovery (DR) tests are relatively inefficient and cumbersome to perform. Along these lines, DR tests per service often fail DR threshold requirements such as service Recovery Time Objective (RTO), component RTO, data RTO, and Recovery Point Objective (RPO). As such, it is difficult to gauge the success rate of DR tests and DR performance during actual disasters. In general, DR exercises range from table top exercises, and in-lab partial recovery tests, to full scale DR site recovery tests. Currently, availability of DR tests that allow for automated third party recovery tests that focus on specific services and service components is very limited. Given the larger portfolio of Information Technology (IT) enabled business services that large enterprises have and their interdependencies, it is difficult and costly to run full scale DR drills on a periodic basis. Moreover, the portfolio of Service Oriented Architecture (SOA)/Web services (e.g., atomic composite, and clustered services) and their relationship to business services and business processes introduce more complexity to DR scenarios and exercises. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to literacy tutoring and, more specifically, to automated, computer-based reading tutoring systems and methods particularly adapted to provide literacy tutoring in conjunction with user-specific content learning.
2. Brief Description of the Related Art
The demand for alternatives to traditional classroom instruction has been steadily growing, with increasing numbers of individuals being interested in self-guided learning experiences for personal fulfillment and/or career development. Concomitantly, many institutions are recognizing the need to implement educational and training opportunities to retain motivated employees and to remain competitive. Various institutions, for example, are being called upon to provide options for independent study using distance learning technologies. Presently available computer-based education or training, while responding to the aforementioned demands, has presented numerous drawbacks. Many computer-based training systems and methods (CBT) have proven to be too simplistic and “lock-step” to be of much value beyond the acquisition of rudimentary skills or information. Intelligent tutoring systems and methods (ITS) have proven valuable in some highly constrained domains, but generally require levels of effort and expense that are impractical for most applications.
In the area of literacy, there is a great need for self-guided reading tutoring systems and methods to improve the reading skills of learners of various ages. Many learners, particularly adults, are more comfortable and motivated to learn when in a private setting without the fear of public scrutiny and embarrassment. Self-guided reading tutoring systems and methods allow students to learn in comfort and privacy as well as to set their own time and pace for learning, which might otherwise not be possible in a traditional classroom setting.
Non-automated reading tutorials utilizing a hierarchical series of reading passages arranged according to levels of difficulty have been proposed. The passages typically derive from multiple sources and relate to a single topic. A student is assigned the least difficult passage to read, and an instructor thereafter manually evaluates the student's understanding of the passage. Where adequate comprehension is demonstrated, the student advances to the next level of difficulty, and the instructor must repeat the process of manually evaluating the student's reading comprehension at each level and selecting the next reading passage. Where the student fails to pass a particular level, the procedure is repeated for as many passages as needed at the same level until the student passes. Since reading tutoring systems and methods of the aforementioned type are very labor intensive, standardized generic instructional materials are developed and used with all students regardless of a student's interests, work experience, work requirements, prior knowledge of the subject matter, and individual learning differences. Unless a student happens to be interested in the subject matter, has frequent and timely interactions with an instructor, and is able to progress quickly and easily through the levels of difficulty, whatever motivation the student initially brings to the task is soon dissipated. Furthermore, traditional reading tutorials of this type are usually lacking in specific features by which vocabulary and reading fluency skills can be effectively enhanced.
An example of a self-paced, “CBT-like” educational package including a reading tutorial is the PLATO ® educational package developed by TRO Learning, Inc. The PLATO ® reading series is less labor intensive than traditional manual reading tutorials, but does not incorporate artificial intelligence to provide customized, learner-specific guidance and motivation. As with traditional manual reading tutorials, the PLATO ® reading series is pre-packaged with generic content.
There is significant agreement among educators and researchers that a student's ability to produce a good summary of lesson text is superior to other forms of assessment in evaluating the student's reading comprehension and that learning to write good summaries of lesson text is an effective way to develop reading comprehension strategies and skills. A major drawback to using student summaries for instruction and assessment of reading comprehension, however, is the time and effort required for human experts to evaluate the summaries and provide timely feedback to the student. Since written summaries must be scored by a human instructor, a significant delay in time ensues before the results of the scoring can be used to enable instruction to proceed. Accordingly, it is more typical for reading comprehension to be assessed using objective questions that can be scored automatically, but which are less valid in measuring actual comprehension.
A major impediment to providing automated, computer-based reading tutoring systems and methods is the difficulty involved in automating the critical functions of an expert human tutor to achieve an “ITS-like” learning experience with a “CBT-like” expenditure of effort and expense. In particular, the inability to automate the analysis and structuring of textual instructional material within a very large domain of discourse, the evaluation of a student's current reading level, the determination of the student's understanding of the instructional material, and the generation of recommendations about the next level of reading difficulty appropriate for the student are great deterrents to the implementation of automated, computer-based reading tutorials. While latent semantic analysis (LSA), a fully automatic mathematical/statistical technique for extracting and inferring relations of expected contextual usage of words in passages of discourse, has been found capable of simulating a variety of human cognitive phenomena, its applicability to automated, computer-based reading tutoring systems and methods has thus far not been recognized. U.S. Pat. No. 5,987,446 to Corey et al., U.S. Pat. No. 5,839,106 to Bellegarda, U.S. Pat. No. 5,301,019 to Landauer et al., and U.S. Pat. No. 4,839,853 to Deerwester et al. are representative of prior applications for latent semantic techniques.
Reading accuracy and fluency are known to play an important role in developing reading comprehension. Oral reading fluency is important because, without developing sufficient speed to maintain important sentence structures in short term memory, comprehension fails due to insufficiency of memory resources. Therefore, developing sufficient speed and fluency in reading are critical to improving reading comprehension. While speed in reading is greatly improved by repetition and practice, most learners are likely to avoid practice opportunities that might arise in traditional classroom settings due to the fear of failure. One-on-one fluency tutoring can be conducted with less fear of embarrassment, but is cost-prohibitive and impractical for most learners. Traditional reading tutorials, which typically are lacking in fluency instruction, thusly fail to address the needs of learners for whom the speed and accuracy with which they read are obstacles to improved reading comprehension. In particular, it is not possible with traditional reading tutorials to practice oral reading fluency in an automated environment using speech recognition software. | {
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This invention relates generally to accessories for firearms and more particularly concerns locks for plugging gun barrels.
The use of a lockable plug as a deterrent to unauthorized use or inadvertent or accidental discharge of a gun is well known. Such plugs typically rely on some form of inside-of-the-barrel plug expansion or outside-of-the-barrel plug compression to secure the plug in the barrel.
Plugs which radially expand within the barrel typically rely on frictional engagement against the circumferential wall of the barrel to resist removal of the plug from the barrel. They require complex expanding mechanisms in order to achieve sufficient frictional contact between the barrel and plug surfaces and, while the plug is in the barrel, a substantial portion of their operating structure is usually exposed to tampering outside of the barrel. While they are difficult for the user to install and remove, they offer only modest resistance to unauthorized removal of the plug from the barrel. Since, by definition, their expanding components must exert significant force against the barrel wall, they may all too easily mar or more severely damage the barrel surface in normal use. Because of the complexity of the expanding mechanisms, they generally can be used only with the specific caliber of weapon or length of barrel for which they are designed. In order to provide a more secure locking engagement than is possible with friction type expansion plugs, one variation of the expanding plug approach relies on radial expansion of locking pins. The plug is inserted through a narrow diameter portion of the barrel and the pins then extend into a wider diameter annular groove in the barrel. This grooving is, however, an unacceptable compromise of the barrel wall.
Plugs which operate by radial compression are generally inversions of the expanding plugs above described. They generally combine an in-the-barrel plug with an outside-the-barrel mechanism to secure the plug in place. The plug does not expand against the inner wall of the barrel. It only blocks the passage. It is held in place by an external structure. Some external structures frictionally grip the outer surface of the barrel. Others engage against a protrusion from the barrel to prevent removal. By reason of their compressive forces they, like the expansion plugs, are likely to mar or more severely damage the barrel, though at least only on the outside wall. However, these devices expose most, if not all, of the locking mechanism to outside-of-the-barrel tampering.
It is, therefore, an object of this invention to provide a gun barrel lock which deters unauthorized use and accidental or inadvertent discharge of a gun. Another object of this invention is to provide a gun barrel lock which is easily installed and removed by an authorized user. A further object of this invention is to provide a gun barrel lock which is substantially contained within the barrel. Yet another object of this invention is to provide a gun barrel lock which has most of its structure shielded from exposure to outside-the-barrel tampering. It is also an object of this invention to provide a gun barrel lock which does not exert radial forces against the inside wall of the barrel. Still another object of this invention is to provide a gun barrel lock which can be adjusted to accommodate barrels of different caliber. An additional object of this invention is to provide a gun barrel lock which can be adjusted to accommodate barrels of different length. | {
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a wireless image transmission system having a portable small-sized camera (hereinafter, referred to as xe2x80x98portable cameraxe2x80x99) for taking pictures in secret at a predetermined place, and more particularly to a wireless image transmission system having a portable camera for monitoring situations at a remote location by mounting a sensor or the like in a case which can not be recognized by others.
2. Description of the Prior Art
There is a situation in which a camera is; necessarily used without its exposure to others for various purposes. For example, a portable camera is sued by a policeman to photograph an illegal trade spot or for monitoring facilities or the like disposed at a specific location. In general, a small-sized camera is installed in a bag or the like, a signal is transmitted through a wire or in a wireless manner, and then a desired object is monitored or recorded at a remote location through the portable camera. Such portable cameras are getting smaller due to technology development. However, since a wireless transmission device or a recording device is needed for transmitting a signal to a remote location or for recording an image, there is a limitation in reducing the size of a portable camera. Further, even though cameras are becoming much smaller, it is difficult to made a camera small-sized to an extend that others can not recognize it.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a wireless image transmission system having a portable camera in a shape which can not be readily recognized by others.
In order to attain the above object, the portable camera includes a case having a ball-point pen appearance in a portion thereof and a through hole in one side; and a camera circuit part mounted in the case and for photographing an object through the through hole.
As a ball-point pen is carried in a pocket of a shirt in general, people do not pay particular attention to the ball-point pen held in the pocket. In the mean time, since the ball-point pen has adequate room therein for mounting a printed circuit board including an image sensor for taking pictures, a shape of a ball-point pen may be a most proper appearance of a portable small-sized camera.
In general, a ball-point pen has a button and a clip on an upper portion thereof and a protruded nib on a lower portion. In order to reduce weight of a portable camera of a ball-point pen shape, it is preferable to use only an upper portion of the ball-point pen. That is, as only an upper portion of a ball-point pen is held on a pocket of a shirt by a clip for use, the weight due to a refill or any parts on a lower portion can be reduced.
In case that a user carries a portable camera with him, it is preferable to form a through hole of the portable camera at a position enabling a user to take pictures frontwards. It is preferable to form the through hole on the clip concretely, on the connection portion of the clip and the body of a ball-point pen more concretely. In case that a microphone is provided to the portable camera under the necessity of catching an audio signal, it is preferable to mount the microphone on an upper portion, that is, on a portion for a button of a ball-point pen. In order to enhance voice transmission to the microphone, it is preferable to form a through hole on a portion on which the microphone is mounted.
A lens may be mounted in the through hole or on an image sensor in order for light to be projected to the image sensor from outside. Preferably, the lens is mounted for an image to be exactly projected on the image sensor. If necessary, a lens driver may be provided for an exact lens focus.
Preferably, the camera circuit part includes an image sensor and a control circuit for processing a signal of the image sensor. Any device, as an image sensor, for taking pictures may be used, but it is preferable to use a small sensor manufactured in a semiconductor process. The image sensor for black and white colors is preferable for simplifying its component specification. It is preferable for the control circuit to process both an audio signal of the microphone and a signal of the image sensor.
Further, in order to attain the above object, the wireless image transmission system for transmitting an image to a remote location includes a portable camera having a ball-point pen appearance in a portion thereof and a camera circuit part mounted therein for taking pictures; a transmission device for transmitting a signal from the portable camera to a remote location; and a receiving device for receiving a signal transmitted from the transmission device.
Even though a ball-point pen has enough space therein for mounting circuit components, the space is not so spacious enough to accommodate a recording device for recording images taken by the camera or the transmission device. Accordingly, such devices, which has a relatively complex structure with a large volume, are preferably provided as independent devices from the portable camera.
For example, the portable camera is connected to the wireless transmission device by electric wires, and then an image signal and an audio signal are transmitted to a wireless receiving device at a remote location through the wireless transmission device. It is preferable that the portable camera and the wireless transmission device are carried somewhere in the body of a user and the wireless receiving device is separately mounted at a remote location. The valid transmission distance of a signal from the wireless transmission device is different according to a frequency in use, a conversion method, and an environment in use. Accordingly, in certain circumstances, the wireless receiving device, which is small-sized, is connected to the recording device and then may be put in a portable bag, or the wireless transmission device is constructed to amplify and transmit a signal from the wireless transmission device to a more remote location. Any method known in this field may be employed as a wireless transmission method of the wireless transmission device, but it is preferable to perform the transmission through the RF modulation. If a RF modulation method is employed, it is more preferable to use a frequency band free from any interference with other RF signal. It is preferable that the wireless transmission device has a size and weight to an extent that a user can bear it on the belt around his waist.
Power supply for operating the wireless transmission device and the portable camera is preferably provided to the wireless transmission device, but if necessary, the power supply may be provided separately from the wireless transmission device or the portable camera. In case that power supply is mounted to the wireless transmission device, it is preferable that the power supply is provided to the portable camera through a cable which connects the portable camera with the wireless transmission device. | {
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Almost any purchase involves small change and one often is handed a mixture of notes, coins and receipts. This is difficult to handle because of the desire to place the notes in the particular pouch of a wallet or purse, and the coins in a pocket; and it becomes more difficult when the other hand is carrying a parcel.
It is an object of the present invention to alleviate this difficult and to produce a new wallet or purse (both terms hereafter being referred to as a wallet. | {
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The present invention relates to vehicle roof racks and accessories. In particular, the present invention relates to a cargo carrier system for carrying and supporting cargo on a vehicle roof rack.
Many of today""s vehicles are equipped with roof racks for stowing cargo. Such roof racks typically include feet or towers that are mounted to the roof of the vehicle and that support a plurality of transversely extending load beams. The load beams typically support cargo above the roof of the vehicle and provide structures for tying down and securing the cargo.
Although providing a basic structure for supporting cargo upon the roof of the vehicle, such roof racks are not well suited for supporting elongate, irregularly shaped cargo, such as various watercraft, surfboards, ski equipment and the like. In particular, securely mounting such elongate cargo to and upon the transverse load beams is difficult. Moreover, the elongate cargo is susceptible to shifting and possible damage. As a result, various specialized brackets and mounting arrangements have been developed for more securely supporting and holding such elongate cargo upon a roof rack. Examples of such mounting arrangements are found in U.S. Pat. No. 5,516,017 and U.S. Pat. No. 5,951,231. Although such mounting arrangements facilitate more reliable mounting of elongate cargo upon the roof of the vehicle, such arrangements only minimally conform to the contour of the elongate cargo being stowed and are difficult to load with the elongated cargo.
Another problem associated with merely using a conventional roof rack or the aforementioned mounting arrangements to support the elongated cargo is the extremely difficult task of loading or unloading elongated cargo onto or off of the roof rack or mounting arrangement. Because such elongated cargo is frequently heavy or extremely awkward to handle, maneuvering and positioning such elongated cargo onto the roof rack or onto the roof-mounting arrangement on top of the roof rack is tedious, time consuming and prone to mistakes. In an attempt to provide easier loading and unloading of elongated cargo onto and off of a vehicle roof rack, a multitude of loading arrangements have been developed. Examples of such loading arrangements are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 5,884,824; 3,756,648; 3,746,194; 3,338,156; 4,329,100; 5,346,355; 5,360,151; 5,850,891; 5,398,778; and 5,360,150. Such known loading arrangements are extremely complex, difficult to manipulate and difficult to mount to an existing roof rack.
Thus, there is a continuing need for a cargo carrier system that more securely mounts elongate cargo to an existing vehicle roof rack irregardless of the precise shape or contours of the elongate cargo. There is also a continuing need for a cargo carrier system that is simple, easy to mount to an existing roof rack and that is easy to shift or manipulate for loading and unloading cargo, including elongate cargo such as watercraft, skis and surfboards.
According to one exemplary embodiment, a cargo carrier for use with a vehicle having a front, a rear, a first side, a second side and a roof rack is provided. The carrier includes a base adapted to be pivotably coupled to the roof rack about a first axis extending parallel to the first side, a cargo holder configured to be secured to cargo, a first link having a first end pivotably coupled to the base about a second axis extending parallel to the first axis and a second end pivotably coupled to the holder about a third axis extending parallel to the first axis, and a second link having a first end pivotably coupled to the base about a fourth axis extending parallel to the first axis and a second end pivotably coupled to the holder about a fifth axis extending parallel to the first axis.
According to another exemplary embodiment, a cargo carrier for use with a vehicle having a front, a rear, a first side, a second side and a roof rack is provided. The cargo carrier includes a base adapted to be mounted to the roof rack, a cargo holder configured to be secured to cargo, a first link having a first end pivotably coupled to the base about a first axis parallel to the first side and a second end pivotably coupled to the holder about a second axis extending parallel to the first axis and a second link having a first end pivotably coupled to the base about a third axis extending parallel to the first axis and a second end pivotably coupled to the holder about a fourth axis extending parallel to the first axis. The holder moves between a vertical raised position in which the holder extends above the base in a first plane and a vertical lowered position in which the holder extends at least partially below the base in a second plane parallel to or coextensive with the first plane.
According to yet another exemplary embodiment, a cargo carrier for use with a vehicle having a front, a rear, a first side, a second side and a roof rack is provided. The carrier includes a base adapted to be coupled to the roof rack, a cargo holder configured to be secured to cargo and a first link having a first end pivotably coupled to the base about a first axis extending parallel to the first side and a second end pivotably coupled to the holder about a second axis extending parallel to the first axis. The holder moves between a vertical raised position in which the holder extends above the base in a first plane and a vertical lowered position in which the holder extends at least partially below the base in a second plane parallel to or coextensive with the first plane.
According to yet another exemplary embodiment, a cargo carrier for use with a vehicle having a front, a rear, a first side, a second side and a roof is provided. The cargo carrier includes a cargo holder configured to be coupled to the roof rack. The cargo holder includes a rigid arm having an arcuate portion configured to receive an elongate watercraft, a flexible support and an elongate flexible member. The flexible support has a first portion, a second opposite portion and an intermediate portion between the first portion and the second portion. The first portion is coupled to a first side of the arcuate portion while the second portion is coupled to a second side of the arcuate portion. The intermediate portion is spaced above the arm and is adapted to support the elongate watercraft at a distance spaced above the arm such that a gap extends between the arm and the intermediate portion. The elongate flexible member has a first end and a second end. The first end is coupled to a first side of the arcuate portion while the second end is coupled to a second side of the arcuate portion. The flexible member and the flexible support are configured such that the elongate watercraft is sandwiched therebetween.
According to another exemplary embodiment, a cargo carrier for use with a vehicle having a front, a rear, a first side, a second side and a roof rack is provided. The cargo carrier includes a base adapted to be coupled to the roof rack, a cargo holder coupled to the base and configured to be secured to cargo, and a locking mechanism. The cargo holder is configured to move between a raised position and at least one lowered position. The cargo is biased towards the raised position. The locking mechanism is configured to releasably lock the cargo holder in the at least one lowered position. | {
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In recent years, with the spread of a broadband network, necessity of services is increasing that allow viewing of wanted images when wanted. These services can be realized by delivering contents such as an image to a terminal via a network. As a technology which realizes such services, there exists an image contents delivery system. This system installs an image delivery server in which image contents are accumulated in advance in a network, for example, and delivers image contents from the image delivery server according to a delivery request from a user terminal.
Also, as a contents delivery system similar to the image contents delivery system mentioned above, there exits a web system in which a web delivery server delivers web contents (home page, text data and so on) to a user terminal of delivery request source.
In this web system, when requests of information delivery concentrate on a web delivery server, the web delivery server cannot process the requests by processing power of the web delivery server any more. Therefore, a user terminal may be made to wait a long time for information delivery. Or, in such a case, a failure may occur in which the user terminal cannot receive delivery at all.
Therefore, a delivery server with which a large number of receiving terminals are connected requires construction of a system which balances or reduces a load of the delivery server, and can continue information delivery stably.
Here, as a means to solve load concentration of a delivery server, a method which utilizes a load balancer in a network in which a client (receiving terminal) and a delivery server transmit and receive data is generally used.
For example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2003-242057 (hereinafter, referred to as patent document 1) discloses a contents delivery system using a load balancer. In the contents delivery system described in this patent document 1, a plurality of web delivery servers which can deliver same web contents and a load balancer are installed. The load balancer receives registration of an IP address of respective web delivery servers and also receives setting of one IP address for the load balancer itself. The IP address of the load balancer is disclosed to a receiving terminal as a client as an address of a web delivery server which delivers web contents.
Also, the load balancer always collects load status of the web delivery servers and grasps free web delivery servers with enough room of processing power.
On the other hand, the receiving terminal regards the load balancer as a web delivery server and transmits a delivery request.
The load balancer transmits the received delivery request to a free web server. Then, the free web delivery server outputs a processing result to the delivery request to the load balancer. The load balancer outputs the received processing result to the receiving terminal which is the delivery source of the request.
A contents delivery system with such a structure includes a plurality of web delivery servers. A load balancer manages these web delivery servers and further performs transmission or reception of data. By this structure, even if access concentrates in the contents delivery system, a load of web delivery servers is balanced.
However, in case of an image delivery server, it is difficult to utilize the load balancer mentioned above. In case of delivery of small data such as text data, because processing in which the load balancer transmits delivery data to the receiving terminal is completed in a short time, quantity of computational resources which is needed for transmission processing is little. However, in case of image delivery, image data which an image delivery server transmits is huge. Moreover, the load balancer has to keep transmitting image data to the receiving terminal continually. For this reason, transmission processing consumes computational resources and so on of the load balancer in large quantities, and as a result, the load of the load balancer itself becomes high. This is the reason why it is difficult to utilize the load balancer mentioned above in case of an image delivery server.
Also, in case a number of connections of receiving terminals is large, and when a load balancer is used, the load balancer will become a bottleneck and the image delivery server cannot deliver an image stably any more. By the way, in case such as the contents delivery system mentioned above delivers image data such as program contents, for example, volume of data which constitutes the image is extremely large compared with text data and so on which a web delivery server and so on delivers. Also, the contents delivery system needs to keep delivering the data continually.
Therefore, delivery processing of an image uses CPU (Central Processing Unit; central processing unit) of the delivery server for a long time. Also, the delivery processing of an image consumes computational resources such as a network band in large quantities. Accordingly, the load of the image delivery server which delivers image data is easy to become high.
Accordingly, when an image delivery server is structured, a technology of load balancing of the image delivery server becomes more important.
Accordingly, as a technology of load balancing of an image delivery server, utilization of not a load balancer but a media director can be considered. As an example of a media director, there is a contents delivery system described in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2005-332373 (hereinafter, referred to as patent document 2). The contents delivery system described in patent document 2 includes one media director and a plurality of media engines. The contents delivery system with such a structure operates as follows.
The respective media engines include a memory unit for media contents. Also, the respective media engines include a communication channel for taking out media contents via a network. Also, the respective media engines include a communication channel for streaming media contents via a network. The media director directs extraction of media contents through the network by a selected media engine. Also, the media director includes a controller which fits to trace contents stored in a media engine. This controller fits with redirecting contents which are requested from a media console connected to a media station to one selected media engine among media engines which stores contents corresponding to a streaming request.
However, when a scale becomes large, by the same reason as in the case of a load balancer, an image delivery service will also become difficult to utilize the media director like the contents delivery system described in patent document 2.
From such reasons, an image delivery service needs a means which controls to balance a load of the image delivery service and to reduce a load of a delivery server without using a load balancer or a media director
Accordingly, as a contents delivery system which balances a load of an image delivery service without utilizing a load balancer or a media director, a contents delivery system described in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2006-113735 (hereinafter, referred to as patent document 3) is proposed. This contents delivery system transmits to a receiving terminal, as delivery data which a contents delivery server delivers, one which are contents data added with an identifier of the contents data and status of a load of the server. The receiving terminal determines the load status of the contents delivery server, connects with other contents delivery server with light load, and continues reception of the contents data.
Also a load balancing system described in Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 2008-71156 (hereinafter, patent document 4) includes a means to exchange load information among a plurality of servers. In this invention, by exchanging this load information, flexibility of processing is accomplished such as when a load of own server exceeds a load target value, making other server execute processing. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Conventionally, in a region such as a high rotation speed and high load region of an internal combustion engine, increase in amount of fuel or the like is performed in order to prevent excessive temperature rise in such an exhaust component as a catalyst, an exhaust pipe and the like beyond a limit value. In a technology of preventing such an excessive temperature rise in the exhaust component as recited in Patent Literature 1, in a variable compression ratio internal combustion engine equipped with a variable compression ratio device capable of changing an engine compression ratio, a value of increase in amount of fuel is set in accordance with the engine compression ratio. Specifically, as the engine compression ratio becomes higher, thermal efficiency is further enhanced and the temperature of exhaust gas is decreased. Therefore, the value of increase in amount of fuel is set such that as the engine compression ratio becomes higher, the value of increase in amount of fuel becomes smaller. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to flash memory. More particularly, the invention relates to a flash memory device capable of operating at multiple speeds.
2. Description of the Related Art
Flash memory is one type of commonly used nonvolatile memory. Nonvolatile memory is distinguished from volatile memory (e.g., Dynamic Random Access Memory (DRAM) and Static Random Access Memory (SRAM)) in its ability to retain stored data in the absence of applied electrical power. As conventionally available, flash memory may be classified into NOR flash memory and NAND flash memory.
FIG. 1 is a block diagram illustrating a portion of an array structure for a conventional flash memory device.
Referring to FIG. 1, a conventional flash memory device includes a memory cell array comprising a plurality of memory blocks (BLK0 through BLKn−1) and a plurality of bit lines (BLei and BLoi, where “i” varies from 0 to m−1). A collection of page buffers is associated with odd and even pairs of bit lines (e.g., BLe0 and BLo0). Each page buffer may be configured to select one or both of the corresponding pair of bit lines. For example, during a bit line setup interval of a program operation, each page buffer may be configured to drive its corresponding pair of bit lines with a pre-charge voltage. Subsequently, each page buffer may be configured to drive either one of its corresponding pair of bit lines with a program voltage (e.g., a ground voltage) or a program-inhibit voltage (e.g., a power supply voltage).
FIG. 2 is a circuit diagram showing a portion of the bit line and memory block arrangement identified by the dotted line shown in FIG. 1.
Referring to FIG. 2, paired bit lines BLe0 and BLo0 are respectively connected in strings of memory cells (MC). Each string includes a string select transistor (SST) having its source connected to a corresponding bit line, a ground select transistor (GST) having its source connected to a common source line CSL. The memory cells, or more particularly the transistors associated with the memory cells (MC31 through MC0), are connected in series between the source of the string select transistor (SST) and the drain of the ground select transistor (GST).
In the foregoing configuration, operation of the string select transistor (SST) is controlled by a voltage applied to a string select line (SSL), and operation of the ground select transistor (GST) is controlled by a voltage applied to a ground select line (GSL). Operation of the memory cells (MC31 to MC0) is controlled by a voltage applied through a corresponding word line (WL31 to WL0). In FIG. 2, one of the bit lines BLe0 and BLo0 may be driven with a program voltage or a program-inhibit voltage by a corresponding page buffer. During such operation, and as is well known in the art, the non-driven bit line in the paired bit lines operates as a shield line. Before being driven with the program or program-inhibit voltage, however, both of the paired bit lines BLe0 and BLo0 may be simultaneously pre-charged with a pre-charge voltage via the corresponding page buffer.
FIG. 3 is a diagram illustrating nominal power consumption as a function of program operation internal within a conventional flash memory device, such as the one illustrated in FIG. 1.
As is well understood in the art, the program operation illustrated in FIG. 3 includes a high-voltage enable interval 10, a bit line setup interval 11, a program execution interval 12, and a verify read interval 13. During the high-voltage enable interval 10, a high voltage required for the program execution interval 12 is generated. In the bit line setup interval 11, both bit lines (BLei and BLoi) are pre-charged by a corresponding page buffer, and then one of the paired bit lines is driven with a program voltage or a program-inhibit voltage via the corresponding page buffer. During the program execution interval 12, a selected word line is driven with a program voltage while unselected word lines are driven with a pass voltage. During the verify read interval 13, a determination is made as to whether the memory cells connected to the selected word line (i.e., the memory cells in the selected page) have been properly programmed (i.e., “programmed normally”). One sequential pass through the foregoing intervals 11 to 13 constitutes “a program loop”, or “a unit loop”, which may be repeated until memory cells in the selected page are programmed normally.
As depicted in FIG. 3, the program operation draws the greatest operating current, and thereby consumes the most power, during the bit line setup interval 11. This result arises from the fact that both of the paired bit lines (BLei and BLoi) are simultaneously pre-charged with the pre-charge voltage. A peak current drain is indicated in FIG. 3 by the level “Imax”. Of note in this regard, the peak amount of current drawn during the bit line setup interval 11 may be limited not to exceed some defined critical limit. Such a critical limit may be defined in relation to any number of system requirements or tolerances within a flash memory device.
For example, in an exemplary case where a flash memory device is characterized by a 2 KByte page depth and an even/odd bit line configuration, a peak current limit (Imax) may arise when 2 KB*2 (4 KB) bit lines are simultaneously pre-charged with a power supply voltage (VCC) during a bit line setup interval. Under these assumptions, the peak current limit (Imax) may reach 60 to 120 mA. This peak current limit may preclude (or greatly inhibit) the use of multiple operating speeds within a flash memory device supporting selectively enabled modes characterized by different operating speeds. In such devices, peak current consumption may exceed a defined peak current limit in one operating mode during its bit line setup interval.
One conventional example of a flash memory device supporting selectively enabled operating modes having different operating speeds is disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,724,682, the subject matter of which is hereby incorporated by reference. In this conventional example, a flash memory device is disclosed having both single and double speed operating modes. Continuing forward with the assumptions stated above, a flash memory device with a single speed operating mode performs a read or program operation in relation to a 2 KB unit, and therefore simultaneously drives 2 KB bit lines. (As will be appreciated by those of ordinary skill in the art, this unit size may alternately be configured (e.g.,) as 512 B, 1 KB, etc.). Thus, in a case where each page buffer is connected to a pair of even and odd bit lines, and although the flash memory device is running in a single speed operating mode, 4 KB (2 KB*2) bit lines must be simultaneously driven.
Where this type of flash memory device is embedded in a portable or mobile host device, the capabilities of the supporting host device battery must be considered, along with other flash memory related system considerations. For example, the effect of simultaneously driving (pre-charging) paired bit lines must be considered. Yet, the possible provision of single and double speed operating modes must also be considered. That is, battery capabilities, peak current limit definition, and global programming intervals must be carefully balanced to allow multiple speed operating modes, such that peak current demanded by one operating mode does not exceed allowable critical limits and/or battery capabilities. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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As computing evolves, there is a growing demand to make the user's computing experience much more user-centric, or tailored to the particular user. Consider, for example, web browsers. Web browsers are application programs that execute on a user's computer and enable a user to navigate the web and search for content, typically in the form of web pages that are displayed on their computer. To make the user's web browsing experience more user-centric, most web browsers include what is known as a “add favorite” function in which a user can add particular web sites to a “favorites” list. When a user adds a web site or web page to their favorites list (in the form of a link), they physically create an entry in a database that maintains a URL (i.e. universal resource locator) associated with the web site or page. Anytime a user wishes to return to one of these web sites or pages, they simply pull up their “favorites” list, click on the appropriate link, and their web browser obtains and displays a web page that corresponds to the link.
Another way that web browsers attempt to create a user-centric experience is by keeping track of a very limited amount of so-called “history data” pertaining to the user's historical browsing activities. History data might include the last three web sites that were browsed by the user. The user can typically view this information by clicking on a feature that provides a drop down menu that lists links to the browsed sites. For example, on the web browser's navigation bar, there is typically a “back” and “forward” button that can be clicked by the user to navigate backward or forward among entries that are maintained in a navigation stack that keeps track of the user's browsing activities. The “back” and “forward” buttons can also have drop down menus associated with them that enable the user to display a drop down menu that might include links for the last three sites that the user encountered. By selecting one of these links, the user's browser displays the corresponding web page.
While these solutions provide a very basic user-centric functionality, they fall far short of providing a versatile, intelligently flexible and dynamic system. For example, many of these systems require the user to initiate or take some action in order for particular links to appear (i.e. the user necessarily must add a link to their favorites list). In addition, many of these systems are unintelligent in the way that they present information or links to the user. For example, a favorites list may have a large number of links that have been added by the user. When a user attempts to find a link to a favorite web site, their browser will typically present them with all of the links that are in their favorites list. It is then up to the user to find the appropriate link so that they can select it.
Another challenge in the general area of information use is that which is posed by the move toward context-aware computing systems. Context-aware computing systems are those systems that provide services to a user based upon their context. In the future, information processing systems are going to have to be sensitive to the user's desire to accomplish tasks in context-aware systems. For example, it may be desirable to provide services to a user without requiring the user to change their context in order to consume the services. As an example, consider the following scenario. A user is working in a word processing application on a particular document of interest. The document is provided by an application program that is executing on the user's computer and that displays the document in a window that is defined by the program. Consider now that the user receives four or five email messages during the course of working on the document. In order to view indicia of these email messages (i.e. the “From” and “Subject” fields), in today's computing environment, the user is typically required to pull up their email application program which separately displays a different window that includes the indicia that the user wishes to view. This is a “modal” operation in that the user is required to temporarily quit working on their document in the word processing application program so that they can view information provided by the email application program. Thus, the user is undesirably required to change their context.
This invention arose out of concerns associated with improving methods and systems that provide information to computer users. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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In the conventional technology, in order to perform recording information onto, reproducing it from, or both recording onto and reproducing from DVD (digital versatile disc) and CD (compact disc), a two-light-source-type optical pickup device has been used that has a DVD laser output unit whose output wavelength is approximately 650 nm, and a CD laser output unit whose output wavelength is approximately 780 nm. Moreover, for the purpose of downsizing each of these light sources, a two-wavelength integrated laser output unit by which beams of two-kind wavelengths can be outputted using a single package has also been practically used. There are known as the two-wavelength integrated laser output unit, for example, a monolithic-type laser output unit that is obtained by forming two laser diodes on a monolithic-type semiconductor substrate, and a hybrid-type laser output unit that is obtained by bonding closely together two semiconductor substrates on each of which a laser diode is formed.
In the two-wavelength integrated laser output unit, beam-emitting portions of the two laser diodes (for DVD and CD) are slightly apart from each other, and the distance therebetween is generally approximately 110 μm. Therefore, when the optical axis of one of the laser diodes coincides with the system optical axis passing through the centers of the objective lens and the collimating lens of the optical pickup device, the optical axis of the laser beam emitted from the other laser diode is displaced from the system optical axis. In the as-is state, each of the return light beams having been outputted from the DVD laser diode and the CD laser diode and then reflected by the optical recording medium cannot be received by a common photo-detector. Accordingly, a method is proposed, in which both of the return light beams are guided to the common photo-detector by diffracting one of the return light beams or both of them, using a diffraction grating, etc., either or both of the return light beams (for example, refer to Patent Documents 1 and 2).
Moreover, in recent years, mass storage of optical recording media has been required, and an optical recording medium such as an optical recording disc, compatible with the blue-violet laser system, whose capacity is several times larger than that of DVD and CD has been practically used. Resultantly, from a viewpoint of device downsizing and cost reduction, a method has been required that information can be recorded onto and reproduced from, for example, DVD, CD, and an optical recording medium compatible with the blue-violet laser system by a single optical pickup device. Consequently, a three-light-source type pickup device having a blue-violet laser diode, in addition to a DVD laser diode and a CD laser diode, has been developed.
As an example of the three-light-source type optical pickup device, the following configuration has been proposed. That is, each of the optical axes of three-kind-wavelength optical beams whose output wavelengths are different from each other, using prisms corresponding to respective wavelengths, made coincident with the system optical axis of the optical pickup device; thereby, light beams of each wavelength are guided to an optical recording medium. Three-kind-wavelength return light beams of the light beams of each wavelength that are reflected by the optical recording medium pass through the respective prisms to be guided to a common photo-detector, and then detected by the photo-detector (for example, refer to Non-Patent Document 1).
[Patent Document 1] Japanese Laid-Open Publication No. 2001-143312
[Patent Document 2] Japanese Laid-Open Publication No. 2001-256670
[Non-Patent Document 1] “Philips, Holland, has developed optical head that enables recording onto and reproducing from CD, DVD, and Blu-ray Disc”, [ONLINE], Jul. 16, 2004, Nikkei Business Publications, Inc., [accessed on Feb. 20, 2005], Internet <http://TECHON.nikkeibp.co.jp/members/NEWS/20040716/104521/> | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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As is known in the art, the eXtensible Markup Language (XML) employs a tree-structured model for representing data. Queries in XML query languages typically specify patterns of selection predicates on multiple elements that have some specified tree structured relationships. For example, the XQuery expression:book[title=‘XML///author[fn=jane’ AND In='doe]matches author elements that (i) have a child subelement “fn” with content lane”, (ii) have a child subelement “In” with content “doe”, and (iii) are descendants of book elements that have a child title subelement with content XML. This expression can be represented as a node-labeled twig (or small tree) pattern with elements and string values as node labels.
Finding all occurrences of a twig pattern in a database is a core operation in XML query processing, both in relational implementations of XML databases, and in native XML databases. Known processing techniques typically decompose the twig pattern into a set of binary (parent-child and ancestor-descendant) relationships between pairs of nodes, e.g., the parent-child relationships (book, title) and (author, fn), and the ancestor-descendant relationship (book, author). The query twig pattern can then be matched by (i) matching each of the binary structural relationships against the XML database, and (ii) “stitching” together these basic matches.
In one known attempt at solving the first sub-problem of matching binary structural relationships, Zhang et al., “On Supporting Containment Queries in Relational Database Management Systems,” Proceedings of ACM SIGMOD, 2001, (hereafter “Zhang”), proposed a variation of the traditional merge join algorithm, the multi-predicate merge join (MPMGJN) algorithm, based on the (Dodd, LeftPos RightPos, LevelNum) representation of positions of XML elements and string values. Zhang's results showed that the MPMGJN algorithm could outperform standard RDBMS join algorithms by more than an order of magnitude. Zhang is incorporated herein by reference.
A further sub-problem of stitching together the basic matches obtained using binary “structural” joins requires identifying a ‘good’ join ordering in a computational cost-based manner taking selectivities and intermediate result size estimates into account. A basic limitation of this traditional approach for matching query twig patterns is that intermediate result sizes can get quite large, even when the input and final result sizes are more manageable.
It would, therefore, be desirable to overcome the aforesaid and other disadvantages. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Paper and paperboard webs are used in a myriad of applications as packaging materials such as wrappings and boxes. When formed into these packaging materials, it is often desirable to reinforce certain areas of the paper web, particularly critical areas where tears and damage are most likely to occur such as the corners of a box. However, it is normally wasteful to reinforce the entire web including both high and low stress points.
Typically, the solution in the past has been to bond reinforcement strips to the substrate or web in areas which need reinforcement by means of an adhesive or glue placed between the surface of the substrate and the reinforcement strip. The substrate and reinforcement are thus directly bonded to one another.
This solution has disadvantages. In particular, because the substrate and reinforcement are directly bonded to one another, the two have no freedom to move or deform independently of each other. The substrate and reinforcement are in effect combined into a single unit. This in turn leads to a tendency for the substrate and reinforcement to tear and fail together rather than individually and to generally exhibit a lower combined strength than would be expected from the sum of the strengths of the two acting in opposition to a force independently of one another.
Accordingly, it is an object of the invention to provide a method for making a reinforced substrate having improved strength properties.
Another object of the invention is to provide a reinforced substrate wherein the reinforcement is not directly bonded to the substrate.
Still another object of the invention is to provide a reinforced packaging materials have selectively applied reinforcements. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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“Push-in” or “drive” fasteners of a variety of types and styles are well known in the fastener art. Typically, such fasteners have a shank with series of vertically spaced flexible tabs or wing-like members extending away from an axis of the fastener. As such, fasteners of this variety are also referred to as tree fasteners.
Such fasteners are driven axially into preformed openings or holes in a workpiece article with the flexible tabs or wings-like members engaging the article and flexing as they move through opening or hole in the article The workpiece article into which the fastener is introduced or inserted may be a panel of a shipping container of a particular type, with the fastener being used to secure another panel, i.e., nameplate, strip of molding, or the like to such container.
The flexible tabs or wing-like members on the shank of the fastener are specifically designed such that the force required to install or push the fastener through the hole or opening is relatively low thereby facilitating ergonomic considerations. Ideally, it is desirable in many situations to further design the fastener such that the force required to remove the fastener from the hole is relatively high. The relatively high retention force securely holds the article or nameplate to the shipping container during transport and other rough handling conditions.
A problem arises, however, when the nameplate or article held by the fastener is to be removed from the container. Since conventional tree fasteners are typically designed to exert high retention force following their insertion, extensive efforts are often required when the nameplate or article held by the fastener is to be removed. As will be appreciated, such extensive efforts at replacing the nameplate or the like is not conducive to repetitive use of such containers along with required timely turn around of the product stored and transported therewithin
Accordingly, the nameplate or article held by the fastener is typically torn or pulled from the container often resulting in destruction of the nameplate, container, or both, as well as destruction of the fastener. Of course, requiring a new or replacement nameplate adds to the transportation costs of the product. Moreover, when the nameplate or article is torn from the container, such action frequently results with the fastener head being broken off from the shank. Thus, when the new nameplate is to be attached to the container, the remaining shank of the broken fastener must be drilled or otherwise removed from the container. As will be appreciated, this requires a labor intensive effort resulting in the waste of valuable time in a highly competitive market. Moreover, forcible removal of the broken fastener frequently results in the hole through which the fastener is inserted to become enlarged, thus, adversely effecting the holding ability of the replacement fastener used to secure a replacement nameplate to the container.
Thus, there is a continuing need and desire for a push-in type fastener requiring a relatively low insertion force and offering a relatively high retention force after the fastener is inserted into an opening or hole in an article while providing for quick and easy non-destructive removal of the fastener. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a data generation apparatus, a data generation method, and a computer-readable medium in a book generation system that performs bookbinding by bundling a plurality of paper sheets.
2. Description of the Related Art
There is conventionally a system that performs bookbinding by bundling a plurality of paper sheets into a book form and stapling one of the four sides of the book. The book thus generated may include various contents. Hence, a demand has arisen for classifying and laying out the contents in the book or easily visually inspecting classification of the contents included in the book. One of related arts discloses giving additional information to each of a plurality of contents and inserting page breaks by determining the degree of change of details of each content based on the additional information (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2001-5838). There also exists a technique of assigning a thumb index to the fore edge of an output paper sheet in accordance with classification of the content in the page (Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2002-8049).
In the above-described technical literatures, pages are partitioned based on content classification, or content classification in a book can be visualized by assigning a thumb index to each page. However, the thumb indices are always assigned even if the effect is small or absent from the viewpoint of visualization because the content composition of the book is not taken into consideration. For example, when determining content classification in a book by thumb indices, the effect is small if the book includes few pages. If the number of classifications is large, thumb index assignment may be redundant. When the grammage of paper sheets is large, the classification cannot be identified from the fore edge side even if thumb indices are assigned. The above-described technical literatures do not deal with these problems. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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The background description provided herein is for the purpose of generally presenting the context of the disclosure. Work of the presently named inventors, to the extent that it is described in this background section, as well as aspects of the description that may not otherwise qualify as prior art at the time of filing, are neither expressly nor impliedly admitted as prior art against the present disclosure.
Catalytic converters may be used to reduce emissions. Generally, the catalytic converters are more efficient at elevated temperatures. For example, “a light-off temperature” is a point where the conversion of carbon monoxide (CO), unburned hydrocarbons (HC), and nitride oxides (NOx) has reached 50% efficiency. To more quickly increase the temperature of a catalytic converter, ignition timing may be retarded to generate more heat to the exhaust gas during the engine cold start period. The ignition timing retardation is generally achieved by shifting the spark timing from a point where the engine outputs a desired torque. Due to the spark timing shift, the engine may not output the desired engine torque. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Two main types of current are provided, one for cutting and one for coagulation. The optimal cutting current is a continuous wave output from the electrosurgical unit. For smooth cutting a continuous arc is required between the active probe and the patient. Upon application of a high power continuous wave arc, the tissue cells volatize resulting in a smooth cutting action as the probe is moved along the surface of the tissue. To introduce hemostasis, the cutting current wave form is pulsed. The lower the duty cycle, the greater will be the amount of hemostasis and the less the cutting effect. Duty cycle is defined as the ratio of pulse on time to duration of the total pulse period times 100%. For effective coagulation a current with a duty cycle of approximately 20% to less than 5% is required. The longer off-time with a low duty cycle allows the tissue to cool off, so as to avoid volatization of cells, but enough power must be applied to sear off exposed blood vessels.
Both electrodes are available in various configurations to be selected by the surgeon according to the intended use. The active probe selected by the surgeon can range in size from a pair of forceps or a knife blade to a fine needle. The contact area of the probe and the type of tissue encountered are factors determining the amount of power necessary to effectively cut or coagulate the blood vessels contigous to the operating situs.
Electrosurgical units have previously used either spark gap or vacuum tube methods to achieve radio frequency levels of several hundred watts. For many years the generator used for producing a coagulation current was a spark gap type of generator. A spark gap oscillator can generate large peak powers at a low duty cycle while maintaining about 120 watts of average power. Spark gap methods, however, generate while noise whereas spectrum purity is desirable with electrosurgical units, particularly since electronic equipment is becoming more prevalent in hospitals. Vacuum tube units are capable of generating a power output of several hundred watts in the megahertz range, but, they generally also operate at low efficiency and have low reliability compared to presently available solid state circuitry. With the advent of solid state units it has been found that presently available transistors cannot generate the large amounts of peak power required under some conditions. Hence, so the duty cycle had to be increased to allow for adequate power, but, the larger duty cycle introduced a cutting effect in the coagulation mode. To minimize the cutting effect in the coagulation mode, a low duty cycle is required.
The amount of power required varies depending upon whether the active probe is arcing or in physical contact with the tissue and is also dependent upon the effective current density at the operating site, as determined by the contact area of the probe. All electrosurgical units on the market today employ amplitude control to vary the amount of coagulation power. Since a low duty cycle results in less cutting effect it would, therefore, be desirable to vary the duty cycle of electrosurgical units in response to load conditions as opposed to varying the amplitude control. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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These packages comprise a printed circuit with at least one chip, encapsulated by a protective resin, and are provided on their lower surface with connection balls. These are for example packages of the BGA (Ball Grid Array) or FBGA (Fine Ball Grid Array) type.
They are stacked to form an electronic module. FIG. 1a shows, in cross section, a known electronic module 100 comprising two packages 10a, 10b. It includes, for each package, a circuit 20 for interconnecting the package shown in FIG. 1b seen from above, the area of which is the same size as that of the package, and the tracks 21 of which connects pads 22 positioned facing the balls 12, at the edges of the circuit. A central band, with no connections or pads, corresponds to the central band of the lower surface of the package that protects the wires of the wiring connecting the balls to the printed circuit of the package. These circuits 20 are connected together via their edges, in this case by a metal bus 30 located on one side of the module. Connection balls 12 are placed beneath the lower interconnection circuit 10a for connecting the module 100 to an interconnection substrate 200. An insulating lacquer 14 is placed beneath the lower surface of body 11 of the package.
At the present time, electronic modules are subject to thickness and area constraints—a module with two packages must not exceed 2.7 mm in thickness and its area must not exceed that of a package. A package body 11 typically has a thickness of 0.8 mm, a printed interconnection circuit 20 has a thickness of 0.15 mm and a connection ball 12 has a thickness of 0.4 mm. The overall thickness is 3.1 mm, and therefore exceeds the required limit. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Phosphatidylinositol (hereinafter abbreviated as “PI”) is one of a number of phospholipids found in cell membranes. In recent years it has become clear that PI plays an important role in intracellular signal transduction. In the late 1980s, a PI3 kinase (PI3K) was found to be an enzyme which phosphorylates the 3-position of the inositol ring of phosphatidylinositol (D. Whitman et al, 1988, Nature, 332, 664).
PI3K was originally considered to be a single enzyme, but it has now been clarified that a plurality of subtypes are present in PI3K. Each subtype has its own mechanism for regulating activity. Three major classes of PI3Ks have been identified on the basis of their in vitro substrate specificity (B. Vanhaesebroeck, 1997, Trend in Biol. Sci, 22, 267). Substrates for class I PI3Ks are PI, PI 4-phosphate (PI4P) and PI 4,5-biphosphate (PI (4,5)P2). Class I PI3Ks are further divided into two groups, class Ia and class Ib, in terms of their activation mechanism. Class Ia PI3Ks include PI3K p110α, p110β and p110δ subtypes, which transmit signals from tyrosine kinase-coupled receptors. Class Ib PI3K includes a p101γ subtype activated by a G protein-coupled receptor. PI and PI(4)P are known as substrates for class II PI3Ks. Class II PI3Ks include PI3K C2α, C2β and C2γ subtypes, which are characterized by containing C2 domains at the C terminus. The substrate for class III PI3Ks is PI only.
In the PI3K subtypes, the class Ia subtype has been most extensively investigated to date. The three subtypes of class Ia are heterodimers of a catalytic 110 kDa subunit and regulatory subunits of 85 kDa or 55 kDa. The regulatory subunits contain SH2 domains and bind to tyrosine residues phosphorylated by growth factor receptors with a tyrosine kinase activity or oncogene products, thereby inducing the PI3K activity of the p 110 catalytic subunit which phosphorylates its lipid substrate. Thus, the class Ia subtypes are considered to be associated with cell proliferation and carcinogenesis.
WO 01/083456 describes a series of condensed heteroaryl derivatives which have activity as inhibitors of PI3K and which suppress cancer cell growth. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a system and method for the generation of images of three-dimensional surfaces on a computer graphics display. More specifically the present invention relates to generating such images without aliasing effects and without the need for special hardware.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Surface data typically consists of a two-dimensional array of values that represent surface heights. For example, this is the standard form of data in a digital terrain model. There are two main classes of techniques for generating an image of such a surface: polygon-based techniques and ray-tracing techniques. Polygon-based techniques divide the surface into shaded polygons, which are then projected to the display screen. Ray-tracing techniques trace rays from the display screen to their intersections with the surface. Ray-tracing techniques produce highly realistic images but, are very slow due to the computational burden of searching for ray-surface intersections. Polygon techniques, on the other hand, are much faster but, they are still slow due the problem of detecting and removing hidden portions of the surface.
Three techniques for hidden surface removal, which are well-known in the art, are the z-buffer (or depth buffer) method, the scan-line method and the depth-sorting method. The z-buffer method tests the visibility of surfaces one point at a time. For each pixel location on the display screen, the polygon that is closest to the screen and projects to that pixel is visible. Scan-line methods generalize this approach by testing the visibility of polygons for each horizontal or vertical scan line of the display screen. The screen is divided into horizontal or vertical lines, and as each line is processed, all polygons intersecting that line are examined to determine which are nearest to the screen. The depth sorting method, on the other hand, sons the polygons in order of nearness to the display screen. The polygons are then projected to the screen in order, beginning with the farthest polygon. The nearer polygons overwrite the farther ones, thereby obscuring them.
Although faster than ray-tracing techniques, polygon techniques are very slow when the surface has many polygons. A surface defined on a 1000.times.1000-element grid, for example, has one million square polygons. Fitting a fewer number of polygons to the surface speeds up the image generation process but, causes the loss of surface detail such as roughness and texture. To speed up the image generation process, many polygon techniques require specialized three-dimensional graphics hardware. Many workstations, personal computers, notebook computers, and personal digital assistants (PDA) however, do not have this specialized hardware. Furthermore, these algorithms generally suffer from aliasing effects due to pixel discretization, which results in jagged lines and edges.
To generate images of surfaces more quickly, a prior art technique has been developed that exploits the gridded structure of a surface to remove hidden surfaces more quickly. This technique is described in "Fast Perspective Views of Images Using One-Dimensional Operations" by P. K. Robertson in the February 1987 issue of IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications. This technique first resamples the surface so that the columns of the grid on which it is defined project to the vertical columns of pixels on the display screen. As a result, any surface point can be occluded only by other points in front of it in the same column. The image is then generated by projecting the surface points to the display screen from back to front, so that the nearer points overwrite the farther ones. Although this method is much faster than previous methods, it suffers from aliasing effects that are caused by pixels overwriting other pixels. For example, the boundary of a portion of the surface that occludes another portion of the surface will appear jagged. A tall, narrow peak will also appear jagged. In addition, if detailed image or texture data is overlaid on the surface, the overlaid image or texture will be severely degraded by the pixel overwriting.
There is a long-felt need in the art for a graphics display technique that can create images of three-dimensional surfaces in real time without aliasing effects. There is also a long-felt need to produce images on a workstation, PC, notebook computer, PDA or other computer system without the need for specialized three-dimensional graphics hardware. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The Internet offers access to the most current information available online across the world. As a result, the world appears to be a smaller place as news and information from across the world is made available to Internet users almost instantly.
Issues often arise with organizing and reducing the amount of incoming information. Internet users desire easy access to the most interesting and updated information. However, computers cannot read a user's mind and provide organized, summarized and filtered data based on the users preferred information presentation format.
Current Internet users receive information from many various information sources. In addition, the information does not regularly come to the user. Instead, the user has to seek the information by navigating to different web addresses and Internet websites. Often, there is overlapping information that could be summarized and filtered prior to being presented to the user. An organized summary of the information would reduce the overflow of information, and provide a simpler way for the user to stay abreast with the information sought.
Having a common information organizational pattern and/or a predetermined time frame (i.e., hourly/daily/weekly/monthly) that is used to present information to users would reduce the amount of time and effort users would spend obtaining Internet information manually. By including user predefined organizational and presentation criteria would also reduce confusion and offer end users search aids and presentation formats with reduced user time and energy. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
While attempts have been made in the past to produce a lighter, more natural, and even biodegradable cat litter, improvements nonetheless remain desirable. Conventional clay-based and gel-based litters are relatively heavy, cost a considerable amount of money to ship, and are often a burden for purchasers to carry. While many so-called natural cat litters have been introduced into the marketplace, they can be nearly as heavy as conventional litter, typically absorb far less urine than conventional litter, can produce their own unpleasant odor, and many times do not clump well, if they even clump at all. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field
The present invention relates to apparatus and method for injecting a vapor into an internal combustion engine and particularly to systems and apparatus for injecting vapor into the carburetor of a gasoline engine.
2. Prior Art
Injection of water vapor into the carburetor of an internal combustion engine has been generally acknowledged to improve the efficiency and performance of the engine. It has also been utilized as an aid to acceleration.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,027,630 of Giardini, et al. discloses an apparatus and system which is structured to feed a mixture of water vapor and alcohol to an internal combustion engine upon demand caused by acceleration of the engine.
Another device for elevating the humidity of the air supply to an internal combustion engine is illustrated and described in U.S. Pat. No. 4,557,222 of Nelson. Air is pumped through water-saturated porous media prior to introduction to the engine. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The ink jet recording system directly ejects an ink onto a recording paper and is lower in running cost than conventional recording apparatuses and is noticed as a recording method which causes little noise and can easily perform color recording. From the points of safety and printing characteristics, an aqueous ink is used in such recording system. Furthermore, the recording papers used are demanded to have the following characteristics, i.e., they are high in ink absorption and even when ink dots of different color overlap each other, cause no overflow of the ink; spread of ink dots is proper; shape of dots is close to true circle; the dot edge is sharp; and naturally ink dots have a high density and the papers have a sufficiently high ISO whiteness for making distinct the contrast of dot in color recording.
As recording papers used for the ink jet recording system which meet the above conventional demands, it has been proposed to use the exclusive coated papers as disclosed in JP-A-59-35977 and JP-A-1-135682. On the other hand, in the fields of mono-chromatic recording and business color recording, it is desired to use inexpensive and general purpose recording papers, namely, plain papers generally used in the field or electrophotographic recording apparatuses.
When toner transfer papers which are neutral papers and recently becoming main recording papers used in electrophotographic recording apparatuses are used as recording papers for ink jet recording systems, fillers to be used in base papers are restricted, and there are not obtained recording papers which are better in color reproducibility in color recording and higher in ISO whiteness as compared with coated papers exclusively used for full color ink jet recording. Furthermore, the so-called plain paper type ink jet recording papers having no coating of pigments on the recording surface have a principal point in possibility of ink jet recording and are not improved at all in water resistance which is a problem in ink jet recording system.
The object of the present invention is to improve the conventional problems in the above technical field, and it relates to an ink jet recording paper of so-called plain paper type which has no coating of pigment on the recording surface. That is, the object is to provide an ink jet recording paper which is excellent in surface strength and, especially, in water resistance of images recorded thereon and is high in image density of the recorded images and in color reproducibility by enhancing ISO whiteness. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Epidermal traumas include, for example, but not limited to, maladies such as pressure sores, burns, cuts, abrasions, wounds, rashes, lesions, skin conditions, skin infections and decubitus ulcers. Generally, these epidermal traumas are treated with ointments or preparations, sometimes with little or no success.
Pressure sores and decubitus ulcers are particularly painful for the patients and difficult to treat. Pressure on a area of skin for an extended time period may cause pressure sores. Generally, pressure sores occur at weight bearing sites. Patients eventually develop necrosis at these pressure sores since the pressure at the weight bearing sites can exceed local perfusion pressure. As the skin sloughs, bacteria tends to colonize at these sites. Abetted by further pressure induced necrosis, the infection tends to get deeper and deeper, possibly resulting in decubitus ulcers. Other factors which contribute to pressure sores include skin over bony prominence, anemia, malnutrition and immobilization. Pressure sores are especially prevalent among individuals incapable of moving, such as patients who are bedridden due to various infirmities such as strokes, quadriplegia, paraplegia or those who are in a coma. These patients suffer greatly from the pain caused by these wounds.
Generally, patients with pressure sores or decubitus ulcers are treated with topical antiseptics or relief of pressure by frequent turning. Sometimes topical debriding enzymes such as sutilains available under the trademark "Travase", manufactured by the Boots Company, collagenase available under the trademark "Santyl", manufactured by Knoll Pharmaceuticals, and fibrinolysin with desoxyribonuclease available under the trademark "Elase", manufactured by Fujisawa[Parke Davis] are used in the treatment of pressure sores and decubital ulcers. Various drug therapies may be prescribed dependent upon the type of infections that occur. Additionally, specialized beds that distribute the pressure more evenly may be used. As a final measure, surgical treatment may be necessary to remove the pressure sore itself.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,407,670 to Shinault discloses a topical ointment for the treatment of epidermal trauma. The topical ointment includes a mixture of polymyxin, bacitracin, neomycin, iodine and sugar. This ointment is applied daily until healing of the wound occurs. Numerous other ointments also exist for these traumas.
U.S. Pat. No. 5,503,847 discloses a hydrocolloid wound gel composition useful for cleansing and debriding wounds. The composition includes sodium carboxymethyl cellulose, pectin, propylene glycol and water. In addition, if desired, the hydrocolloid wound gel composition can contain a small amount of an antibiotic such as metronidazole, or a skin protective agent such as zinc oxide. This hydrocolloid gel is applied directly to the wound itself. Usually, the wound cavity is partially filled with the gel and sealed with an occlusive dressing.
Similarly, U.S. Pat. No. 5,662,924 discloses a wound dressing. The wound dressing contains a water insoluble, water swellable cross-linked cellulose derivative, water and a polyol component, wherein the dressing comprises a gel and the cellulose derivative which comprises less than 10% by weight of gel. The wound dressing may also include the antimicrobial agent metronidazole. The dressing is placed into the wound itself; the patent states a minimum depth of 5 mm should be achieved. The gel is then covered with additional absorbent material.
Nonetheless, despite these dressings, there exists a need for effective treatment and relief of epidermal traumas. In particular, there exists a great need for treatment and relief of pressure sores and decubitus ulcers, which is easy to use yet still effective on the wound. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to the field of topical skin treatments. More specifically the present invention relates to a reconstituted ocean water skin treatment mixture for topical application to the skin of a person for cleaning and healing and to methods of producing the mixture and of using the mixture to treat a pierced area of the skin of a person. The mixture includes purified ocean water, sea salt, and the natural enzyme lysozyme, mixed in critical ranges of percentage by weight and preferably additionally including the preservative sodium benzoate to enhance shelf life. The method of producing the mixture preferably includes the steps of boiling purified water and sea salt for ten minutes, adding sodium benzoate after a certain salinity level is reached, cooling the mixture, placing a quantity of lysozyme in a separate quantity of water to form a lysozyme solution, adding the lysozyme solution to the mixture, adding the sterilizing the water/mixture with ultraviolet radiation, and finally testing the resulting mixture for bacteria.
2. Description of the Prior Art
There have long been cleansing solutions such as hydrogen peroxide and antiseptics such as methylate for decontaminating and otherwise treating skin abrasions and lacerations, such as those produced during body piercing and for application to infected or inflamed inner throat membranes. Problems with these prior antiseptics have been that they often contain harsh and complex chemicals unfamiliar to consumers which can cause pain upon contact with wounds.
It is thus an object of the present invention to provide a skin treatment mixture having antibacterial, antiseptic, cleansing and healing properties which is suitable for removing dried discharge and lymph secretions safely while reducing bumps and scar tissue, reducing itching and increasing circulation to the treated area, and which is suitable for topical application to pierced skin areas such as those produced by body piercing or stitches closing a wound, to mouth sores and bed sores, to acne and to infected membranes of the throat, abscessed teeth, infected gums and canker sores, for tonsillitis, and also for skin tanning.
It is another object of the present invention to provide such a skin treatment mixture which is formed of components with which consumers are familiar and comfortable and which are safe, natural common, mild, pure and sterile, specifically including purified water.
It is still another object of the present invention to provide such a skin treatment mixture which is causes little or no stinging when applied to a wound.
It is finally an object of the present invention to provide such a skin treatment mixture which is inexpensive to manufacture. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
This invention is related to a safety arming device for use as part of an apparatus for perforating oil wells, etc. and to methods of providing an armed device. More particularly, the invention is related to a detonator assembly for initiating perforating charges in an underground perforating gun.
Underground perforating guns are used in the production of oil and gas for provision of perforations through an oil well casing and into a hydrocarbon producing formation to provide access from the formation into the wellbore such that oil and gas may be produced.
After the oil well has been drilled, a steel casing is lowered into the wellbore and cemented into place to protect the wellbore and to prevent migration of formation fluid from one formation to another.
A perforating gun is then lowered into the steel casing and perforations are made at a desired spacing through the steel liner and into the formation such that hydrocarbons in the desired formation may flow into the oil wellbore and from there be produced to the surface.
An electrically-actuated or so-called xe2x80x9celectricxe2x80x9d detonator (initiator) is typically employed for operating the explosive charges on a perforating gun. In a typical arrangement, a gun is dependently supported in a wellbore by a so-called wireline (suspension) cable which has electrical conductors connected to a surface power source. The electric detonators that are most commonly used on oilfield well tools have a fluid-tight hollow shell in which is encapsulated an ignitor charge (such as a black powder or an ignition bead) that is disposed around an electrical bridge wire and positioned next to a primer explosive charge (such as lead azide or some other sensitive primary explosive). In some detonators, a booster charge of a secondary explosive (such as RDX, PETN, HMX, HNS or PYX, etc.) is arranged in a serial relationship with the primer charge to be detonated.
The electric detonator detonates an explosive detonating cord (detcord) which, in turn, sets off the charge(s) carried by the gun, once the tool is positioned at a desired depth location in a wellbore.
One practice in the industry is for an end user to purchase perforating guns in an unassembled or partially assembled condition and transport these to the oil well site. One reason for this is that the configuration of a perforating gun (spacing and number of charges, gun length and diameter, number of gun housings to be strung together, etc.) varies from wellbore to wellbore. Oil well sites are often in locations remote from assembly shops. For safety reasons, the shaped charges are transported separate from the detonating devices so that if the detonating devices were accidentally discharged, the shaped charge perforating units would not be detonated in turn.
A practice in the industry is thus to complete assembly and arm a gun on-site. A detonator is connected to an electrical conductor and then grounded to the gun housing. The detonating cord (previously strung between charges mounted on a charge holder and installed in the gun housing), an end of which sticks out of an end of the gun housing is clamped to the detonator or the detonator is slid axially onto the detonating cord. The detonator is inserted into the end of the gun housing, which can be either the top or bottom end of the gun. An end cap is then sealingly fastened to the end of the gun with the electrical conductor connecting the detonator and surface power source being strung through the cap, and/or through the gun, provision being made to seal the passage by which the conductor emerges from the gun to preclude entry of well fluids into the gun housing. As mentioned above, an alternative arrangement includes a booster.
In the context of this industry practice, the possibility exists of premature detonation of gun components during arming of the gun. In arrangements in which the detonator is directly connected to the detonating cord, it is possible to kink the detonating cord as the detonator is pushed into the gun housing and the sealing cap screwed onto the gun housing. In arrangements in which there is a booster attached to the detonating cord, it is possible to crush the booster. It is thus possible to short the wires when replacing the sealing cap in this manner.
This situation, which can lead to premature actuation, or unintended detonation, is clearly a hazard to the persons charged with gun assembly. While safe arm devices exist, many are designed to operate outside the practice of arming a gun on-site to meet the needs of a particular wellbore. It is in the context of this practice that the present invention presents a solution.
The invention includes a safety arming device for an underground well tool having an explosive charge mounted in a longitudinal housing. In one embodiment, the device includes:
a hollow member for connection at an end of the housing, the member having an outer wall which defines a window to permit lateral insertion therethrough of a detonator into an operable position in the member when the member is connected to the housing; and
a sealing member for mounting on the hollow member in sealing engagement therewith, so as to preclude ingress of liquids into the member through the window.
The sealing member of the device can be a hollow sleeve longitudinally movable with respect to the hollow member between an open position and a closed position, wherein:
in the open position, the sleeve is located to permit access to the window for said insertion of the detonator therethrough, and in the closed position, the sleeve is in said sealing engagement with the hollow member.
The hollow member can be provided with threads at a first longitudinal end thereof and the sleeve is provided with threads for engagement of the threads of the hollow member to secure the sleeve in the closed position.
The sealing engagement can be provided by first and second circumferential seals located between the sleeve and hollow member, the seals being positioned longitudinally on either side of the window.
The hollow member can be adapted to be connected directly to the gun housing.
The hollow member can include threads for threaded connection at said end of the housing.
In another aspect, the invention provides a safety arming device for an underground well tool having an explosive charge mounted in a tubular longitudinal housing, the charge being actuatable by a detonator connected thereto by a detonation cord. The device can include:
a first sleeve having a wall defining a sleeve interior, the sleeve being adapted to be sealingly affixed to the tubular housing, wherein the wall has an aperture therein sized to permit lateral insertion therethrough of the detonator into the sleeve interior and, when the sleeve and housing are connected, the sleeve interior is in communication with an interior of the housing containing the charge; and
a second sleeve, axially moveable with respect to the first sleeve, between an open position and a closed position; wherein,
in the open position, the second sleeve is located to provide clearance for the detonator to be inserted through the aperture into the interior of the first sleeve, and in the closed position, the second sleeve is in sealing engagement with the first sleeve to preclude ingress of liquids into the sleeve interior through said aperture.
In another embodiment, the invention is a safety arming device for an underground well tool having an explosive charge mounted in a tubular longitudinal housing, the charge being actuatable by a detonator in operable connection with a booster connected to the charge by a detonation cord. In this embodiment, the device includes:
a first sleeve having a wall defining a sleeve interior, the sleeve being adapted to be sealingly affixed to the tubular housing, wherein:
the wall has an aperture therein sized to permit lateral insertion therethrough of the detonator into the sleeve interior;
the wall defines an interior sleeve portion for receipt of the booster therein to locate the booster in operable proximity to the detonator when the booster and cord are connected to each other; and
a second sleeve, axially moveable with respect to the first sleeve, between an open position and a closed position; wherein:
in the open position, the second sleeve is located to provide clearance for the detonator to be inserted through the aperture into the interior of the first sleeve, and in the closed position, the second sleeve is in sealing engagement with the first sleeve to preclude ingress of liquids into the sleeve interior through said aperture.
The second sleeve can be external of the first sleeve and be of substantially circular cross section; and the first sleeve can include external first threads and the second sleeve includes internal second threads, the first and second threads being mutually threadingly engageable for securing the second sleeve in the closed position.
The first sleeve can include first and second seals disposed around an exterior surface thereof located longitudinally on first and second sides, respectively, of the aperture and to be in abutting contact with an interior surface of the second sleeve when in the second position so as to provide said sealing engagement. There can be a plurality of said first seals and a plurality of said second seals.
In another aspect, the present invention is a safety arming device for an underground perforation gun having an explosive charge mounted in a tubular housing having a major longitudinal axis, the charge being actuatable by a detonator connected thereto by a detonation cord. The device includes:
a hollow inner sleeve having threads at a first end for threaded connection to a threaded end of the housing such that respective interiors of the housing and sleeve are in communication with each other;
a hollow outer sleeve disposed around the inner sleeve, axially moveable between a first position distal to the first end of the inner sleeve and a second position proximal to the first end of the inner sleeve; wherein:
the inner sleeve includes a tubular wall having an aperture therein, accessible when the outer sleeve is in the distal position, the aperture being sized to permit lateral insertion therethrough of the detonator into the interior of the inner sleeve; and
the tubular wall of the inner sleeve has external threads located axially between the aperture and the proximal end thereof and an interior surface of the outer sleeve is threaded at a proximal end thereof for threaded engagement of the external threads of the inner sleeve, to secure the outer sleeve in the second position;
at least a first seal disposed around the exterior of the inner sleeve, located axially between the aperture and the external threads of the inner sleeve;
at least a second seal disposed around the exterior of the inner sleeve, located axially between the aperture and the distal end of the inner sleeve; and wherein:
when the outer sleeve is secured in the second position, the seals are in abutting contact with the exterior surface of inner surface and interior surface of the outer sleeve so as to preclude ingress of liquid into the interior of the inner sleeve.
In another aspect, the invention is a safety arming device for an underground well tool having an explosive charge mounted in a tubular housing having a major longitudinal axis, the charge being actuatable by a detonator in operable connection with a booster connected to the charge by a detonation cord. The device includes:
a hollow inner sleeve having threads at a first end for threaded connection to a threaded end of the housing, such that respective interiors of the housing and sleeve are in axial alignment with each other, the sleeve having an internal wall defining a first zone for receipt of the booster therein;
a hollow outer sleeve disposed around the inner sleeve, axially moveable between a first position distal to the first end of the inner sleeve and a second position proximal to the first end of the inner sleeve; wherein:
the inner sleeve includes a tubular wall having an aperture therein, accessible when the outer sleeve is in the distal position, the aperture being sized to permit lateral insertion therethrough of the detonator into a second zone of the interior of the inner sleeve, to permit spaced apart positioning of the detonator and booster in axial alignment with each; and
the tubular wall of the inner sleeve has external threads located axially between the aperture and the proximal end thereof and an interior surface of the outer sleeve is threaded at a proximal end thereof for threaded engagement of the external threads of the inner sleeve, to secure the outer sleeve in the second position;
at least a first seal disposed around the exterior of the inner sleeve, located axially between the aperture and the external threads of the inner sleeve;
at least a second seal disposed around the exterior of the inner sleeve, located axially between the aperture and the distal end of the inner sleeve; and wherein:
when the outer sleeve is secured in the second position, the seals are in abutting contact with the exterior surface of inner surface and interior surface of the outer sleeve so as to preclude ingress of liquid into the interior of the inner sleeve.
A safety arming device of the invention can includes a joining member for connecting the hollow member to the gun housing, the joining member having an aperture therethrough so as to permit communication between an interior of the housing and an interior of the hollow member for passage of the detonator cord therethrough.
The hollow member can define an aperture dimensioned to receive a detonator therein, so as to be positioned in axial alignment with a booster received with the aperture of the joining member.
The invention also includes a method of installing a safety arming device on a longitudinal underground perforating gun. The method includes steps of:
providing a hollow member for connection at an end of a housing of the gun, wherein the hollow member comprises an outer wall which defines a window dimensioned to permit insertion therethrough of a first detonator into an interior of the member;
providing a sealing member for mounting to the hollow member in sealing engagement therewith, so as to preclude ingress of liquids into the member through the window; and
installing the hollow member to the housing such that the window is positioned to permit lateral insertion of the detonator therethrough into the interior of the hollow member and with the interior of the housing positioned (i) to receive therein a first end of a detonating cord having a second end connected to a charge within the housing therein, or (ii) to permit positioning of the detonator therein with respect to a booster connected to a said first end of the detonating cord for actuating the booster by the installed detonator.
The method can be conducted with a sealing member that includes a hollow sleeve longitudinally movable with respect to the installed hollow member between an open position and a closed position, wherein:
in the open position, the sleeve is located to permit access to the window for said insertion of the detonator therethrough, and in the closed position, the sleeve is in said sealing engagement with the hollow member.
The method can be carried out where the hollow member is provided with threads at a first longitudinal end thereof and the sleeve is provided with threads for engagement of the threads of the hollow member to secure the sleeve in the closed position.
The said sealing engagement can be provided by first and second circumferential seals located between the sleeve and hollow member, the seals being positioned longitudinally on either side of the window.
The hollow member can further include means for connecting the member to a gun delivery system, at a distal end of the member with respect to the gun housing.
The connecting means can be provided by threads or another connecting means suitable for the purpose, as would be readily understood by the skilled person.
The hollow member can include an opening in a wall thereof, the opening being sealable against ingress of well fluids thereinto, for installing a conductive wire therethrough to electrically connect the detonator to an aboveground power source.
Installing the hollow member on the housing can include threadingly engaging threads of the member with threads of the housing.
The gun can include a second detonator connected to a said first end of the detonating cord, and the method can further comprise the steps of:
providing an apertured member having an aperture therethrough; and
prior to installing the hollow member on the housing, installing a first longitudinal end of the apertured member to the end of the housing with the aperture extending between longitudinal ends of the apertured member and passing a free end of the first end of the detonating cord connected to the second detonator through the aperture to permit connection thereof to the first detonator.
The invention also includes a method of arming an underground perforating gun having a longitudinal housing. The method can include the steps of:
mounting a hollow member at an end of a housing of the gun, wherein the hollow member comprises an outer wall which defines a window dimensioned to permit insertion therethrough of a first detonator into an interior of the member, and wherein the interior of the hollow member is positioned (i) to receive therein a first end of a detonating cord having a second end connected to a charge within the housing therein, or (ii) to permit positioning of the detonator therein with respect to a booster connected to a said first end of the detonating cord for actuating the booster by the installed detonator;
inserting the detonator through the window to install the detonator in the interior of the hollow member and:
connecting the first end of the detonating cord thereto, or positioning the detonator with respect to a booster connected to the first end of the detonating cord for actuating the booster by the installed detonator; and
securing a sealing member to the hollow member in sealing engagement therewith, so as to preclude ingress of liquids into the member through the window.
The method can also include connecting the detonator to an electrically conductive wire connected to a power source.
The sealing member can include a hollow sleeve longitudinally movable with respect to the installed hollow member between an open position and a closed position, wherein:
in the open position, the sleeve is located to permit access to the window for said insertion of the detonator therethrough, and in the closed position, the sleeve is in said sealing engagement with the hollow member.
The hollow member can be provided with threads at a first longitudinal end thereof and the sleeve is provided with threads for engagement of the threads of the hollow member to secure the sleeve in the closed position and securing the sealing member to the hollow member includes mutually engaging the respective threads of the hollow and sealing members.
The sealing engagement can be provided by first and second circumferential seals located between the sleeve and hollow member, the seals being positioned longitudinally on either side of the window.
The method can include connecting the hollow member to a gun delivery system.
Connecting the hollow member to the gun delivery system can include threadingly engaging threads of the hollow member to counterpart threads of an element of the gun delivery system.
The hollow member can include an opening in a wall thereof, the opening being sealable against ingress of well fluids thereinto, and comprising the further steps of installing a conductive wire through the opening and electrically connecting the detonator to an above-ground power source.
Installing the hollow member on the housing can include threadingly engaging threads of the member with threads of the housing.
The gun can include a second detonator connected to a said first end of the detonating cord, and the method further comprises the steps of:
providing an apertured member having an aperture therethrough; and
prior to installing the hollow member on the housing, installing a first longitudinal end of the apertured member to the end of the housing with the aperture extending between longitudinal ends of the apertured member and passing a free end of the first end of the detonating cord connected to the second detonator through the aperture to permit said connecting thereof to the first detonator.
The invention is also a method of manufacturing a safety arming device for an underground well tool having an explosive charge mounted in a longitudinal housing. The method includes the steps of:
manufacturing a hollow member for connection at an end of the housing with an outer wall;
contouring the wall to define a window to permit lateral insertion therethrough of a detonator into an operable position in the member when the member is connected to the housing; and
manufacturing a sealing member for mounting on the hollow member in sealing engagement therewith, so as to preclude ingress of liquids into the member through the window. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The invention concerns systems for protecting information and more particularly concerns systems for protecting information that is transmitted by means of a wired or wireless medium against unauthorized access.
One way of distributing information is to broadcast it, that is, to place the information on a medium from which it can be received by any device that is connected to the medium. Television and radio are well-known broadcast media. If one wishes to make money by distributing information on a broadcast medium, there are a couple of alternatives. A first is to find sponsors to pay for broadcasting the information. A second is to permit access to the broadcast information only to those who have paid for it. This is generally done by broadcasting the information in scrambled or encrypted form. Although any device that is connected to the medium can receive the scrambled or encrypted information, only the devices of those users who have paid to have access to the information are able to unscramble or decrypt the information. A service distribution organization, for example a CATV company or a satellite television company, provides its subscribers with information from a number of program sources, that is, collections of certain kinds of information. For example, the History Channel is a program source that provides television programs about history. Each program provided by the History Channel is an xe2x80x9cinstancexe2x80x9d of that program source. When the service distribution organization broadcasts an instance of the program source, it encrypts or scrambles the instance to form encrypted instance. An encrypted instance contains instance data, which is the encrypted information making up the program.
An encrypted instance is broadcast over a transmission medium. The transmission medium may be wireless or it may be xe2x80x9cwiredxe2x80x9d, that is, provided via a wire, a coaxial cable, or a fiber optic cable. It is received in a large number of set top boxes. The function of set-top box is to determine whether encrypted instance should be decrypted and, if so, to decrypt it to produce a decrypted instance comprising the information making up the program. This information is delivered to a television set. Known set top boxes include decryptors to decrypt the encrypted instance.
Subscribers generally purchase services by the month (though a service may be a one-time event), and after a subscriber has purchased a service, the service distribution organization sends the set top box belonging to the subscriber messages required to provide the authorization information for the purchased services. Authorization information may be sent with the instance data or may be sent via a separate channel, for example, via an out-of-band RF link, to a set top box. Various techniques have been employed to encrypt the authorization information. Authorization information may include a key for a service of the service distribution organization and an indication of what programs in the service the subscriber is entitled to watch. If the authorization information indicates that the subscriber is entitled to watch the program of an encrypted instance, the set-top box decrypts the encrypted instance.
It will be appreciated that xe2x80x9cencryptionxe2x80x9d and xe2x80x9cscramblingxe2x80x9d are similar processes and that xe2x80x9cdecryptionxe2x80x9d and xe2x80x9cdescramblingxe2x80x9d are similar processes; a difference is that scrambling and descrambling are generally analog in nature, while encryption and description processes are usually digital.
The access restrictions are required in both analog and digital systems. In all systems, the continued technological improvements being used to overcome the access restrictions require more secure and flexible access restrictions. As more systems switch from an analog format to a digital format, or a hybrid system containing both analog and digital formats, flexible access restrictions will be required.
Restricting access to broadcast information is even more important for digital information. One reason for this is that each copy of digital information is as good as the original; another is that digital information can be compressed, and consequently, a given amount of bandwidth carries much more information in digital form; a third is that the service distribution organizations are adding reverse paths which permit a set-top box to send a message to the service distribution organization, thereby permitting various interactive services.
Thus, the service distribution organizations require access restrictions which are both more secure and more flexible than those in conventional systems. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Of the presently known various printing systems, the ink jet printing system has been evaluated as a very effective non-impact printing system in that printing can be conducted at a high speed while substantially not causing noise.
A typical ink jet printing head used in the ink jet printing system is of the configuration shown in FIG. 2.
In FIG. 2, reference numeral 1 indicates a substrate for an ink jet printing head. The substrate is constituted by a glass, aluminum or silicon material. Reference numeral 4 indicates liquid pathways formed by joining the substrate 1 to a top plate 2 provided with a plurality of grooves which define liquid pathways. In each of the liquid pathways 4, there is installed an energy generating element 3 for generating energy for discharging ink. Reference numeral 7 indicates a nozzle plate provided with a plurality of discharging outlets 7a each being communicated with the corresponding liquid pathway 4. The nozzle plate 7 is joined to the assembly comprising the substrate 1 and the top plate 2 to establish an ink jet printing head.
In the ink jet printing head thus configured, when printing is conducted by discharging ink droplets through the discharging outlets of the ink jet printing head, part of those ink droplets are sometimes dropped to deposit on the discharging outlet face at which the discharging outlets are arranged. There is a tendency that such an ink deposit on the discharging outlet face comes to contact with ink droplets successively discharged from the discharging outlets, causing the flying direction of the ink droplets discharged to be deviated, and or the ink deposit causes a load to the ink droplets discharged and so reduces their discharge speed. These phenomena are apparently found in the case where the ink discharging is conducted at high frequency. And, in the case of the high speed printing system in which ink discharging is conducted at a frequency of 10,000 or more times per second, the occurrence of these phenomena causes serious problems such that not only the ink discharging direction but also the ink discharging speed are varied and in addition to this, in the worst case, the foregoing ink deposits on the discharging outlet face sometimes plug up the discharging outlets to prevent ink droplets from being discharged from the discharging outlets.
In order to prevent these problems from occurring, there is a proposal of applying a water repellent treatment at peripheral portions of the arrangement of the discharging outlets of the ink jet printing head. In the case of subjecting the peripheral portions of the arrangement of the discharging outlets to water repellent treatment in accordance with this proposal, it is possible to prevent ink deposition from occurring at the peripheral portions of the arrangement of the discharging outlets so that the foregoing problems can be solved, to some extent. It is known that the water repellent treatment herein is desired to be conducted for the discharging outlet face only. The reason for this is due to the fact that in the case where the water repellent treatment is applied on portions other than the discharging outlet face, particularly, the liquid pathways, a reduction is caused in the capillary action effected for the ink supply in the liquid pathways to diminish the ink supply efficiency.
The above water repellent treatment to the discharging outlet face is usually conducted so that a distinct contrast is established between the discharging outlet face and the liquid pathway inner walls, in order to enable stable discharging for the discharging outlets.
Now, the discharging outlet face thus applied with the water repellent treatment desirably exhibits its water-repellent property in the earlier printing operations of the ink jet printing head, but as the ink jet printing head is repeatedly used, the water repellent material applied on the discharging outlet face is gradually oxidized by air or ink or is sometimes partially peeled off by the action of ink effused whereby the discharging outlet face is deteriorated in terms of the water-repellent property. In view of this, in the water repellent treatment of the discharging outlet face, it is necessary to have due care for the chemical stability and adhesion properties of the water repellent material applied.
Incidentally, even in the case where the discharging outlet face applied with the foregoing water repellent treatment is satisfactory in terms of the ink-repellent property, ink droplets are sometimes deposited thereon. These ink droplets deposited on the discharging outlet face are only slightly removed unless they are removed by way of an external force, specifically, by applying an external vibration so as to remove them or by wiping them off using a mechanical means. In the case where such ink droplets remain on the discharging outlet face without being removed, they collect and grow in size, forming large-sized ink droplets, wherein problems arise in that the discharging outlets are hindered by those large-sized ink droplets in terms of the ink discharging performance, the direction of ink discharged from the discharging outlets is deflected due to those large-sized ink droplets, or some of the discharging outlets are liable to be defective in terms of the ink discharging performance due to those large-sized ink droplets. In order to prevent these problems from occurring, the ink jet printing apparatus is usually provided with a wiping mechanism comprising a cleaning blade which serves to wipe the discharging outlet face in terms of conducting the recovery treatment for the ink jet printing head.
In general, such a recovery treatment mechanism in the ink jet printing apparatus comprises, in addition to the above wiping mechanism, a suction recovery mechanism including a pump or the like for removing an ink residue having an increased viscosity in the nozzle portions.
However, in order to comply with a demand for miniaturization of the ink jet printing head in recent years, the suction recovery mechanism is occasionally omitted. In the case of an ink jet printing apparatus with no suction recovery mechanism, an ink residue having an increased viscosity is often left in the vicinity of the arrangement of the discharging outlets without being removed. In order to remove such highly viscous ink residue, the wiping operation by means of the foregoing wiping mechanism has to be conducted while press-contacting the cleaning blade against the peripheral portions of the discharging outlets at a higher cleaning blade contact pressure than that employed in the case of the ordinary ink jet printing apparatus. In this case where the cleaning blade contact pressure is raised, there now may arise a problem such that the discharging outlet face applied with the water repellent treatment, i.e., the water repellent discharging outlet face, is gradually worn due to the press contact of the cleaning blade at an increased contact pressure upon conducting the wiping operation to deteriorate in terms of the water-repellent effect, making the ink discharging performance unstable. In this case, in addition to this problem, a further problem arises. That is, when either the water repellent discharging outlet face of the ink jet printing head or the cleaning blade accumulates foreign matter, there is a tendency for the water repellent discharging outlet face to be readily damaged due to the foreign matter upon conducting the wiping operation while press-contacting the cleaning blade against the discharging outlet face. Other than these problems, there is also a problem in that when trouble occurs in the transportation of a printing member such as a paper, the water repellent discharging outlet face is liable to be worn with such printing member, making the water repellent discharging outlet defective in terms of the water-repellent effect. In order for the water repellent discharging outlet face to be free of the above problems, it is required to be more sufficient in terms of the abrasion resistance than that required in the case of the ordinary ink jet printing apparatus.
Now, as above described, in the case of the high speed printing system in which ink discharging is conducted at a frequency of 10,000 or more times per second, the amount of ink discharged per unit period of time is relatively great and because of this, the opportunity for ink to be deposited on the peripheries of the discharging outlets of the ink jet printing head used is increased accordingly. In order to prevent the occurrence of problems caused by such ink deposits, it is necessary to conduct frequently the wiping operation using the cleaning blade for the ink jet printing head at a relatively shortened interval. In this respect, even in the case of the high speed printing system, it is required for the discharging outlet face of the ink jet printing head used to be sufficient enough in terms of the abrasion resistance.
Incidentally, Japanese Patent Laid-open application No. 211956/1992 discloses a technique of treating a discharging outlet face of an ink jet recording head so as to have a water-repellent property using a water repellent material comprising a polymer having a fluorine heterocyclic structure in the principal chain, in order to improve the discharging outlet face in terms of the abrasion resistance. However, the water repellent material used in this technique is not sufficient enough in terms of providing a satisfactory abrasion resistance to the discharging outlet face although it is sufficient in terms of providing a desirable water-repellent property thereto. Particularly, in the case of the foregoing ink jet printing apparatus in which the suction recovery mechanism is omitted and which requires the wiping operation to be conducted by press-contacting the cleaning blade against the discharging outlet face at an increased contact pressure, even if the discharging outlet face should be treated using the water repellent material, the discharging outlet face applied with the water repellent treatment is still insufficient in terms of the abrasion resistance, wherein the foregoing problems cannot be eliminated as desired. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention generally relates to fishing devices, and more particularly relates to trolling devices for fishing from a moving boat.
2. Background Information
Trolling for fish from a moving boat is a common and productive method of catching fish. The simplest way to perform this activity is for a person with a conventional fishing pole to sit in a boat as the boat moves slowly through the water. A number of devices are patented which are directed toward trolling type activities. Some of these involve dropping a fishing line over the side of a stationary boat and lowering the line vertically into the water. When a fish is caught, it is reeled into the boat. Other devices are directed at trolling from a moving boat. Some of these devices are devices for carrying one or more fishing lines into a lateral position from the boat, so that more than one fishing line can be spread out over an area behind the boat.
One theory of fishing is that trolling from a moving boat is more productive if the speed of the moving lure or bait changes. The speed change will cause a following fish to strike at a lure as if the lure were a prey fish, and its burst of speed would allow it to escape. This speed change when trolling is commonly achieved by changing the speed of retrieval or using the pole to pull the lure faster through the water during retrieval using a conventional fishing pole from a boat. What is lacking in the prior art is a mechanized way to troll from a moving boat using conventional fishing poles. What is also lacking is a mechanized way to impart a speed change to the lure or bait being towed through the water. Therefore, it is an object of the present invention to provide a trolling device for trolling behind a moving boat. It is also an object to provide a trolling device which utilizes a conventional fishing rod and reel. It is another object of the invention to provide a trolling device which imparts one or more speed changes to the lure being towed.
These and other objects are achieved in the trolling device of the present invention. The trolling device of the present invention is designed for use on a moving boat. The trolling device moves in one direction and then in another direction, on an axis generally parallel with the long axis of the boat. The trolling device utilizes a reciprocating assembly for motion in a first direction, towards the bow of the boat, and in a second direction towards the stern of the boat. Attached to the reciprocating assembly is a fishing tackle assembly which has a first end and a second end. As the reciprocating assembly moves back and forth on the boat, the fishing tackle assembly, since it is attached to the reciprocating assembly, also moves back and forth. The first end of the fishing tackle assembly extends into a body of water and has attached to it fishing gear such as hooks, lures and bait, for catching fish. The second end of the fishing tackle attaches to the fishing tackle assembly and is configured for retrieval with a retrieval system. This trolling device is made for use with a boat moving through water at a certain speed. If the speed of the boat through the water remains constant, the travel of the reciprocating assembly back and forth on the boat will cause the hook or lure being dragged behind the boat to move at speeds different than the speed of the boat, depending on whether it is moving backwards or forwards in relation to the boat. The fishing tackle assembly can be a conventional fishing rod and reel, attached by a mount to the reciprocating assembly.
The trolling device can also be configured so that it moves in the first direction at a different speed than it moves in a second direction. The rate of speed can also be variable so that the user can control the rate of speed of the fishing tackle first end through the water.
One manner of achieving the travel of the reciprocating assembly in a first and second direction is by the use of a driveshaft which moves the reciprocating assembly back and forth. The driveshaft includes a spiral guide which drives the reciprocating assembly back and forth as the driveshaft rotates. As noted above, the fishing tackle assembly can be comprised of a conventional fishing rod and reel with line on the reel and a lure, hook, or bait on the end of the line and comprising the first end of the fishing tackle assembly.
The spiral guide of the driveshaft can be a guide groove which is a depression defined in the driveshaft itself. The reciprocating assembly can thus further include a travel pin which is configured for an interfitting relationship with the guide groove so that as the guide shaft rotates, the travel pin remains fixed on one side of the driveshaft and travels backwards or forwards in the guide grooves in the first direction and the second direction. In such a configuration, the travel pin is attached to the fishing tackle assembly, and these together form the reciprocating assembly of the trolling device.
The spiral guide can move the reciprocating assembly in a first direction and second direction by turning the driveshaft for a period of time and then reversing the direction of rotation of the driveshaft. This would cause the travel pin and the attached fishing tackle assembly to move in one direction and then to reverse direction and move in the other direction. This reversal of rotation can be achieved by limit switches, or by gearing. The spiral guide can also be formed in the shape of a forward and reverse spiral which are linked together at a first end and a second end of the driveshaft. Thus, the forward and reverse spirals form one continuous looped guide groove. With this arrangement, the driveshaft can rotate continuously in one direction and the travel pin and the attached fishing tackle assembly will travel alternately in the first direction and then the second direction. When it reaches the end of the forward spiral, it enters the loop which feeds it automatically into the reverse spiral and the travel pin and the fishing tackle assembly travel to the opposite end of the driveshaft and enter a second loop which connects the reverse spiral with the forward spiral. In this way, the driveshaft can rotate in one direction continuously and the fishing tackle assembly moves back and forth.
An additional feature of the device is a speed change zone either in the forward or reverse loops, or both of them. The speed change zones can be a portion of the continuous looped guide groove which is set at a different pitch than other portions. The typical position for this speed change zone would be in the middle of the driveshaft in either the forward or reverse loop or both of these loops. With the driveshaft rotating at a constant speed, when the travel pin attached to the reciprocating assembly and the fishing tackle assembly enters the speed change zone, it would have more lineal feet of guide groove to follow before it moved on down the driveshaft. This feature would induce one or more speed changes to the action of the lure in the water. If the speed change zone were in the reverse loop, the speed of the lure in the water would slow down, and would approximate the speed of the boat. If the speed change zone were in the forward loop, the lure would slow down when in the speed change zone and then speed up again as it left the speed change zone. This extra action on the lure is designed to entice fish to aggressively attack the lure. The continuous looped guide groove can also have more than one speed change zones, and the speed change zones can be to speed up as well as to slow down the rate of travel of the fishing tackle assembly.
In one configuration of the device, the reciprocating assembly is enclosed within a box with a rod mount, and a conventional fishing rod and reel is attached to the rod mount so that it is enclosed in the box as the reciprocating assembly, and moves back and forth within the box. The driveshaft can be powered by a direct drive motor and it can also utilize a motor with speed reduction gears. The motor could be electrical, hydraulic, or based on any conventional type of power plant. Either a direct drive of a reduction gear motor can be set to operate with a continuous rotation in one direction, and/or optional reversing of direction. The rate of travel of the reciprocating assembly can be further adjusted by changing the speed of the motor.
Still other objects and advantages of the present invention will become readily apparent to those skilled in this art from the following detailed description wherein I have shown and described only the preferred embodiment of the invention, simply by way of illustration of the best mode contemplated by carrying out my invention. As will be realized, the invention is capable of modification in various obvious respects all without departing from the invention. Accordingly, the drawings and description of the preferred embodiment are to be regarded as illustrative in nature, and not as restrictive. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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As is known, operating electronic components produce heat. This heat should be removed in order to maintain device junction temperatures within desirable limits, with failure to remove heat effectively resulting in increased component temperatures, potentially leading to thermal runaway conditions. Several trends in the electronics industry have combined to increase the importance of thermal management, including heat removal for electronic components, including technologies where thermal management has traditionally been less of a concern, such as CMOS. In particular, the need for faster and more densely packed circuits has had a direct impact on the importance of thermal management. First, power dissipation, and therefore heat production, increases as device operating frequencies increase. Second, increased operating frequencies may be possible at lower device junction temperatures. Further, as more and more devices or components are packed onto a single chip, heat flux (Watts/cm2) increases, resulting in the need to remove more power from a given size chip or module. These trends have combined to create applications where it is no longer desirable to remove heat from modern devices solely by traditional air cooling methods, such as by using air cooled heat sinks with heat pipes or vapor chambers. Such air cooling techniques are inherently limited in their ability to extract heat from an electronic component with high power density. The need to cool current and future high heat load, high heat flux electronic devices therefore mandates the development of aggressive thermal management techniques, using, for instance, liquid cooling.
As an example, some existing supercomputers have compute nodes that route their traffic through racks of switching equipment to other compute nodes. Every switch in this data path adds latency. At a supercomputing scale, there is a point that increasing the number of compute drawers will not increase performance due to the additional switching latency.
In a system using hub modules, networking and compute traffic is routed to idle compute processors with the hub modules to maximize speed and efficiency. In the system, every compute drawer is directly connected to every other compute drawer via the hub modules, which typically include traffic routing hub chips and a network of fiber-optic transmit and receive modules.
In a system with a network of fiber optic transmit and receive modules or fiber optic interconnects, scalability is enabled to a much higher level than previously possible. However, a problem exists creating a reliable arrangement having manufacturability and delivering a required package density and heat removal. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
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Structural openings in the walls of commercial and residential buildings include openings provided to enable the installation of doors, windows, passageways and recessed areas for bookcases, shelves, niches and the like. The framing of such openings during building construction allows sufficient space to enable precise positioning, adjustment and final alignment, then fastening of doors, windows and other elements during installation. Door and window units come in standardized sizes to simplify the installation processes, and are often provided with attached frames that simplify the installation of such units into framed structural openings. However, when such units are installed into structural openings, permanent gaps often appear between the structural framework and the abutting surfaces of the frames surrounding the units as a consequence of precise vertical and horizontal alignment of the units within, and fastening to, the structural openings.
It is common construction practice to cover the gaps between the framework of structural openings and installed units with trim mouldings, also commonly known and referred to hereinafter as casings. These are usually elongated relatively thin flat pieces of trim bounded by elongated linear side edges and shorter linear end edges. It is also common practice to have decorative profiles cut into at least one linear edge of casing pieces to enhance the visual appeal of the casings. Such decorative profiles can be simple or complex depending on the type of aesthetically pleasing appearance desired. The process of cutting decorative profiles into the edges of casing pieces is commonly known as milling.
Casing pieces with aesthetically pleasing decorative profiles milled into their linear edges are often used to construct other decorative elements in commercial and residential structures. Such decorative elements include chair railings, wainscoting, borders around the perimeters of walls and ceilings, and the like.
However, installation of casings to conceal the gaps between installed units and the framework of structural openings, and to produce other decorative design elements on walls and ceilings, is time consuming and requires considerable skill and precision to achieve aesthetically pleasing results.
There are two common methods for installation of casings. The first method involves fitting together the individual vertical and horizontal casing pieces surrounding a structural opening by means of mitre joints wherein each end of a casing piece is cut precisely at a 45° angle to enable the formation of a tightly fitted and squared 90° corner. If the end-cuts are not precisely made with 45° angles, then visually displeasing small gaps will result in the mitred corners that join the vertical and horizontal casing pieces. In these cases, even more construction time is required to fill the gaps with a suitable putty or other filling compound, to allow the filling compound to harden, and then to remove excess filling compound by sanding to eliminate the gaps. As the complexity of the design milled into the linear edge of casing pieces increases, the difficulty of precisely cutting and fitting mitred corners is increased.
The second method involves installation of square blocks at the top corners around units such as doors and windows in a manner that bridges the gap between the units and the framework of the structural openings. The ends of the individual horizontal and vertical casing pieces are cut at precise 90° angles and are then tightly butted against the corner blocks. However, the second method is also time-consuming and requires considerable skill and precision to ensure that the corner blocks are perfectly squared and vertically aligned. Misalignment or un-squared corners will result in aesthetically unappealing gaps between the casing pieces and corner blocks. These gaps must also be filled with an appropriate filling compound that has been sanded after it has hardened.
An additional problem encountered when installing decorative casing pieces is that of joining vertical and horizontal casings which have different decorative profiles milled into their edges. One example of such a situation is the joining of a vertical casing piece to a horizontal casing piece installed in a vertical orientation at the juncture of a wall with a floor. In these situations, the decorative profile milled into the linear edge of one casing piece must be traced onto a paper pattern that is then transferred to the receiving edge of a casing piece with a different decorative profile milled into its linear edge. The first decorative profile is then cut into the second decorative profile by means of a coping saw. This process requires considerable skill, precision, time and patience in order to produce tightly fitting joints between adjoining casing pieces.
Because of their decorative properties, casings are also commonly used for installation of aesthetically appealing chair rails, wainscoting and other decorative elements on walls and ceilings. The vertical and horizontal casing pieces used to create such decorative trim work are abutted and joined by means of mitre joints. Consequently, the installation process for casing pieces used for decorative trim work is also time consuming and requires skill, precision and patience to produce tightly fitting squared joints.
There is therefore a need for an improved system for assembling and installing casing pieces that avoids at least some of the problems indicated above. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to an apparatus for curing an ultraviolet sensitive coating and bonding material which is applied to the surface of a person's fingernail and an artificial nail tip previously applied to the person's fingernail or a person's fingernail without an artificial tip. More particularly, this invention relates to a ultraviolet light curing apparatus having a finger guide for guiding the person's fingernail and applied nail tip to a predetermined location for curing.
2. Information Disclosure Statement
For many years women have spent large sums and expended many hours in beauty salons having their fingernails treated by cosmetologists in order to improve the appearance of their fingernails.
In times past, women's fingernails were worn long and were carefully manicured in order to present a slender, long and uniformly curved configuration. However, in view of the fact that such persons wearing these elegant fingernails were often employed as secretaries working with key operated machines, such as typewriters, much frustration was caused by such slender fingernails breaking through contact with the keys of these typewriters or the like.
In view of this aforementioned problem, various artificial materials were developed so that the artificial nail could be applied over the top of the natural fingernail and thereafter be buffed and filed to the desired configuration.
Not only has the advent of artificial fingernails to a large extent overcome the problem of broken nails, but more particularly a person could instantly have such artificial fingernails applied by a cosmetologist without the need for growing the natural fingernails to the required dimensions.
Usually when such artificial nail tips are applied to the person's fingernail it is necessary that the cosmetologist first of all prepare the person's natural fingernail by cleaning it and by making a straight cut through the tip of the natural fingernail transverse to the length of the fingernail. A nail tip is then selected to match the size of the natural fingernail to which the nail tip is to be applied. Next a small amount of glue, such as a cyanoacrylate glue, is applied to the area of the natural fingernail which is to be overlapped by the nail tip. The nail tip is then placed onto the natural nail and held in place for a few seconds until the glue bonds. A space is left between the artificial nail tip and the cuticle to aid in blending the artificial nail surface to the natural nail surface. The artificial nail tip is then filed to blend in with the person's fingernail. The person's fingernail and artificial nail tip are then coated with a fingernail polish.
In recent practice however, the artificial nail tip is not filed to blend in with the person's natural fingernail. Instead the artificial tip is first bonded to the natural fingernail by the method described above, then an ultravoilet sensitive (curable) bonding material is then applied to both the artificial tip and natural fingernail. The now coated nails are bathed in ultravoilet light initiating polymerization (photoinitiation). That is, the entire nail surface is coated from the cuticle forward as shown in FIG. 12. Prior art apparatus includes lamps and lamp enclosures which provide a source of ultraviolet light for accomplishing the curing process. These apparatus require the holding of the hands at different positions without benefit of total support in order to cure the bonding material. In these prior art apparatus problems have been experienced in that the ultraviolet sensitive material cures unevenly resulting in a tacky and uneven nail surface. Also, burns to the skin have resulted because of the higher watt bulbs used in order to speed the process.
Therefore, it is the primary object of the present invention to provide an apparatus for curing an ultraviolet sensitive coating and bonding material applied to the surface of a person's natural fingernail and an artificial fingernail attached thereon that overcomes the aforementioned inadequacy of the prior art devices and provides an improvement which significantly contributes to the safety and reliability with such bonding material may be cured.
Another object of the present invention is the provision of an apparatus for curing an ultraviolet sensitive coating and bonding material applied to the surface of a person's fingernail and an artificial tip attached thereon, the apparatus including a finger guide slidably extending through an enclosure for guiding the person's fingernail and applied nail tip to a predetermined location within the enclosure such that the coating and bonding material is cured at the predetermined location.
Another object of the present invention is the provision of a curing apparatus which includes an enclosure having a front face which defines an opening for the reception therein of a person's artificial nail tip when applied to the fingernail.
Another object of the present invention is the provision of a curing apparatus including a plurality of lamps for emitting ultraviolet light for curing the coating and bonding material.
Another object of the present invention is the provision of a curing apparatus including a first, second and third lamp with the first lamp secured to a top wall of the enclosure and the second and third lamps being secured to a rear wall of the enclosure.
Another object of the present invention is the provision of a curing apparatus which includes an on/off electrical timer switch for energizing the lamps which emit ultraviolet light and timing their duration.
Another object of the present invention is the provision of a curing apparatus in which the finger guide includes a shaped block for enabling the person whose nails are surfaced or coated with a ultraviolet light sensitive coating and bonding material, to grip the block such that the person's fingernails and attached nail tips are exposed to said ultraviolet light when the block is disposed in the predetermined location thereby resulting in an evenly cured, tightly bonded, contiguously level coat and smoothly surfaced nail tip.
A further object of the present invention is the provision of a curing apparatus having a first rail means which includes a first and a second track secured to the block with the first and second tracks spaced and parallel to each other and a second rail means including a third and fourth track secured to the base of the enclosure. The third and fourth tracks are spaced and parallel relative to each other such that the first and the third tracks and the second and fourth tracks interconnect for guiding the block from the opening towards the predetermined location.
The foregoing has outlined some of the more pertinent objects of the present invention. These objects should be construed to be merely illustrative of some of the more prominent features and application of the invention. Many other beneficial results can be obtained by applying the disclosed invention in a different manner or modifying the invention within the scope of the invention. Particularly with regard to the use of the invention disclosed herein, this should not be construed to be limited to a curing apparatus for curing an ultraviolet sensitive coating and bonding material applied to the surface of one nail including an artificial tip attached or glued thereon, but should be construed as applicable to curing the ultraviolet sensitive coating and bonding material applied to a plurality of nail surfaces such that sets of nails surfaced with an ultraviolet curing sensitive material may be cured simultaneously. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a window wherein a panel is mounted in a window frame in such a manner as to cover the outer surfaces of mullions or vertical frame members which are components of the window frame.
2. Description of the Prior Art
There is so far known a window comprising a rectangular window frame formed by a pair of upper and lower horizontal frame members, and a pair of left and right vertical frame members assembled therewith, and a panel whose upper and lower margins are fitted in and supported by the downward recess of the upper horizontal frame member and the upward recess of the lower horizontal frame member, the arrangement being made such that the pair of left and right vertical frame members are covered with the panel by adhesively bonding the inner left and right vertical margins of the panel onto the outer surfaces of the pair of left and right vertical frame members, respectively.
Further, as described in Japanese Laid-Open Specification No. SHO 63-268849 of Japanese Patent Application, there is also known a window which comprises a window frame including at least a pair of mutually adjacent left and right mullions having engaging flanges formed integrally therewith, and a panel whose left and right vertical margins are adhesively bonded to two vertical frames having U-shaped and inverted U-shaped sections, respectively, so as to form openings adapted to be engaged with these left and right engaging flanges, the panel being mounted on the outer surfaces of the left and right mullions so as to cover the latter.
The former prior art window is pleasing in appearance since the pair of left and right vertical frame members cannot be seen from the outdoor side; however, in case of damage of the panel, etc., replacement of the panel is difficult since the outer left and right margins of the panel are adhesively bonded to the outer surfaces of the pair of left and right vertical frame members, respectively.
The latter window disclosed in the above-mentioned Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application has the following disadvantages.
(1) In case the panel is mounted:
The above-mentioned vertical frames are adhesively bonded to the left and right vertical margins, respectively, of the panel. Subsequently, the panel in such a condition is located diagonally relative to the panel mounting surface, and the flange on one side thereof is engaged with or fitted in the opening in the vertical frame on one side thereof. Then, the panel is turned in a horizontal plane about the engaging portion on one side thereof which serves as a fulcrum (or center) so as to locate the surface of the panel flush with the panel mounting surface. After that, the panel is moved towards the engaging flange on the other side thereof and in parallel thereto so as to engage the latter with the opening of the vertical frame bonded to the other margin of the panel.
Thus, the heavy panel must be moved obliquely in one direction, or moved in parallel, or to another direction so that the panel mounting work becomes very troublesome. Further, once the engaging flange on one side thereof has been engaged with the opening of the vertical frame on one side thereof, the panel is moved in parallel so as to allow the engaging flange on the other side thereof to engage with the opening of the vertical frame on the other side thereof, and as a result, the length of engagement of the vertical frames bonded to the left and right vertical margins of the panel with the left and right engaging flanges becomes short thereby weakening the strength of the panel mounted portions.
(2) In case the panel is dismounted:
The operations mentioned in the above item (1) are conducted in reverse order, and therefore the panel removal work is very troublesome. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
This invention relates to a toilet training device.
Toilet training of small children is generally undertaken when they are between 18 and 24 months old, and it is not uncommon for a child still to be wearing diapers up to the age of three. The adverse environmental impact as a result of “nappy mountains” is well known. Using fewer nappies not only helps to save the environment but also reduces the cost of nappies to the parent or caregiver.
Conventionally, various toilet training aids are used. The most basic of these is a chamber pot or “potty” which the child is taught to use as a step towards the use of a conventional flushing toilet. The child relieves him/herself in the pot and the parent or other caregiver has to empty the contents of the pot into the toilet bowl. The transition from the potty to the adult toilet is a big step.
Other devices for assisting in toilet training are known. For example, a step-up stool is known which enables a child to reach a toilet seat. Although this aid helps the child to climb up to the toilet seat, the aid is mainly suited for use by older toddlers and creates a risk of falling.
Generally, existing toilet training devices are not suitable for very young children (especially children under the age of 18 months) and require substantial intervention and supervision by an adult for effective use.
It is an object of the present invention to provide an alternative toilet training device. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Several years ago the present inventors pioneered the concept of using digitally captured images to identify objects within the images, and then using such identifications to retrieve information from various databases. Examples include: Using a local device (cell phone, digital camera, PDA or other device) to capture an image of an object in an art museum, identifying the object from the image data, and then providing the user with information regarding the object (i.e., about or relating to the object); Using a local device (cell phone, digital camera, PDA or other device) to capture an image of an automobile as it drives along a road, identifying the make and model from the image data, and then providing a user with a link to a website relating to that particular make and model; Using a local device (cell phone, digital camera, PDA or other device) to capture an image of a bar code, logo, or other indicia in a magazine, using information contained in the indicia to identify a product, and providing a telephone number or other contact information relating to that product; Using a local device (cell phone, digital camera, PDA or other device) to photograph a billboard of a restaurant, identifying the restaurant from a barcode, special target, written language, or other information contained in the photograph, and using that information to access a database to provide the user with restaurant's location, menu, or telephone number; and Using a local device (cell phone, digital camera, PDA or other device) to capture an image of a sign at a sports stadium, using information extracted from the image to automatically purchase an entry ticket for the user, and providing the user with an entry code that can be used to bypass the long lines of ordinary ticket purchasers.
In such embodiments it was specifically contemplated that analysis of the images could be performed locally (i.e. on the cell phone, PDA or other device capturing the image), distally at a server, or more preferably using some combination of the two. It was also contemplated that any available database could be accessed to provide the returned information, including publicly accessible databases on the Internet. It was not appreciated, however, that one could integrate these concepts with the searching capabilities of standard Search Engines.
In the 1990s Yahoo!™ introduced the idea of indexing web pages accessible on Internet, and providing a Search Engine that to access the index. Since that time dozens of other searching systems have been developed, which use all manner of various search methods, algorithms, hardware and/or software. All such systems and methods that accept user inputs of Key Information, and then utilize such Key Information to provide the user with information of interest, are referred to herein as Search Engines. The user, of course, can be a natural person, as well as a device (computing or otherwise), algorithm, system, organization, or any other entity. In searching for information, a Search Engine can utilize any suitable search domain, including for example: A database (including for example a relational database, an object database, or an XML database). A network of resources including for example web pages accessible within the Internet; and A public or private collection of documents or information (e.g., documents, information, and/or messages of a company or other organization(s)) such as that maintained by LEXIS™.
In a typical search, Key Information is provided to the Search Engine in the form of key words comprising text, numbers, strings, or other machine-readable information types. The Search Engine then searches its indices of web pages for matches, and returns to the user a hyperlinked listing of Internet Uniform Resource Locators (“URLs”), as well as some brief display of context in which the key word(s) are used. The information of interest can sometimes be found in the hyperlinked listing, but is more frequently found by linking directly to the listed web pages.
Providing Key Information to Search Engines in the form of text strings has inherent difficulties. It involves strategy in the selection of the text to be entered, and even with respect to the format of the keywords (for example using wildcards). Another difficulty is that small computing and/or telephony devices (e.g. telephones, both mobile and non-mobile), have small and/or limited keyboards, thus making text entry difficult. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
As computer processors have decreased in size and expense, mobile computing devices have become increasingly widespread. Designed to be portable, many mobile computing devices are lightweight and small enough to be worn or carried in a pocket or handbag. However, the portability of modern mobile computing devices comes at a price: today's mobile computing devices often incorporate small input devices to reduce the size and weight of the device. For example, many current mobile devices include small QWERTY keyboards that many people (especially those with poor dexterity) find difficult to use. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to games, and more particularly to a system and method for playing a game of knowledge and wagering. The game system allows players to wager upon the ability of themselves and/or other players to correctly answer information or trivia questions at particularly determined odds levels.
2. Description of Related Art
The prior art includes various trivia games which may be played by groups of individuals for entertainment purposes. Trivia games generally include questions on diverse subjects which are posed to individuals or teams of individuals. In some embodiments, questions have been assigned discreet point values related to their difficulty and the point at which they are posed during game play. Other trivia and information games have been developed which include board game elements, wherein the players move game pieces across the surface of a game board to determine the particular questions to be answered. These boardtype trivia games are particularly well suited to home or party use by small groups of players.
However, trivia board games have generally lacked a strategy component, instead concentrating solely on luck and knowledge. Incorporation of a strategy component, such as player wagering, into a trivia board game would serve to increase the entertainment value of the game. Additionally, the method of play in previous trivia board games typically involves little or no participation by the opposing players when a particular player is answering a question, thereby making the game less exciting than one in which all players may be continuously involved.
Thus, there is a need for an informational or trivia board game incorporating a strategy component such as player wagering. Furthermore, there is a need for an informational or trivia game which allows all players to participate and have a stake in the outcome of all phases of game play.
Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a game system and method which allows players to wager desired amounts of either points, currency or tokens upon their ability to answer trivia-type questions.
It is also an object of the present invention to provide a game system and method which allows players to wager desired amounts of either points or currency upon the ability of their opponents to answer informational or trivia-type questions.
It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a game system and method wherein players may bet upon their ability to answer a particular question at a preset odds level related to the difficulty of the particular question.
It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a game system and method wherein all players will participate throughout the play of the game.
A method is provided for allowing an active player and a plurality of opposing players to play a game by taking turns in an alternating manner. The method includes the step of providing a question to be answered by an active player. The opposing players wager desired amounts on the active player""s ability to answer said question. The active player then answers the question and the wagers are paid off or collected based upon the accuracy of the active player""s answer. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
Integrated circuit switches used in 3D and other integrated circuits can be formed from solid state structures (e.g., transistors) or passive wires (MEMS). MEMS switches are typically employed because of their almost ideal isolation, which is a critical requirement for wireless radio applications where they are used for mode switching of power amplifiers (PAs) and due to their low insertion loss (i.e. resistance) at frequencies of 10 GHz and higher. MEMS switches can be used in a variety of applications, primarily analog and mixed signal applications. One such example is cellular telephone chips containing a power amplifier (PA) and circuitry tuned for each broadcast mode. Integrated switches on the chip would connect the PA to the appropriate circuitry so that one PA per mode was not required.
MEMS can be manufactured in a number of ways using a number of different tools. In general, though, the methodologies and tools are used to form small structures with dimensions in the micrometer scale with switch dimensions of approximately 5 microns thick, 100 microns wide, and 200 microns long. Also, many of the methodologies, i.e., technologies, employed to manufacture MEMS have been adopted from integrated circuit (IC) technology. For example, almost all MEMS are built on wafers and are realized in thin films of materials patterned by photolithographic processes on the top of the wafer. More specifically, the fabrication of MEMS use three basic building blocks: (i) deposition of thin films of material on a substrate, (ii) applying a patterned mask on top of the films by photolithographic imaging, and (iii) etching the films selectively to the mask. In any of these methodologies, the switches are fabricated in a horizontal orientation above the wafer/chip.
Depending on the particular application and engineering criteria, MEMS structures can come in many different forms. For example, MEMS can be realized in the form of a single cantilever structure such as, for example, shown in U.S. Pat. No. 5,578,976. In this cantilever application, a single cantilever arm (suspended electrode) is pulled toward a fixed electrode by application of a voltage. To manufacture such a cantilever structure, though, several extra and expensive processing steps are required, in addition to the building of the CMOS structure itself. For example, once all of the CMOS wiring is completed, additional process steps are required to form the MEMS switch, which adds considerable processing costs to the structure.
Also, as clearly shown in such application, the MEMS are horizontal cantilever type switches fabricated above the wafer/chip. These horizontal cantilever type switches are known to add costs to the fabrication of the device, as well as adding to package interaction issues. In addition, horizontal cantilever type switches, in many current applications, are known to stick, e.g., exhibit an inability to open the switch due to freezing closed during processing and the relatively small contact or actuation gap used in the switch, which on the order of 1 micron. This is known as sticktion.
Additionally, in known applications, the voltage required to pull the suspended electrode down to the fixed electrode by electrostatic force may be high. This has been seen to cause unwanted charging on the insulator after prolonged use and eventual failure of the switch. In certain applications, the high voltage, e.g., 100 volts, is also difficult to obtain since this has to be stepped up from about 1.5-5 volts to 30 to 100 volts using charge pumping or similar methods . The minimum voltage required for switching is called pull-in voltage, which is dependent on several parameters including the length of the suspended electrode, spacing or gap between the suspended and fixed electrodes, and spring constant of the suspended electrode, which is a function of the materials and their thickness.
Reducing the pull-in voltage without decreasing the gap and without softening the spring is desirable, as the spring provides the restoring force and determines the switching speed. In U.S. Pat. No. 7,265,429, a pair of side parallel-plate electrostatic actuators is implemented for lowering or eliminating of the bias voltages. These additional electrostatic actuators are used to reduce or eliminate the bias voltage to be applied on the fixed signal electrode. In implementation, the fixed electrode of the side parallel-plate electrostatic actuators can be elevated above a fixed signal electrode. Thus due to a smaller gap, the pull-in voltage required to pull the suspended electrode down to the fixed electrode can be lowered. However, the MEMS shown in U.S. Pat. No. 7,265,429 are not hermetically sealed, and the additional electrostatic actuators can increase fabrication costs. Also, the MEMS are horizontal cantilever type switches fabricated above the wafer/chip.
Accordingly, there exists a need in the art to overcome the deficiencies and limitations described hereinabove. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The traditional implantable cardiac pacemaker includes a pulse generator device to which one or more flexible elongate lead wires are coupled. The device is typically implanted in a subcutaneous pocket, remote from the heart, and each of the one or more lead wires extends therefrom to a corresponding electrode, coupled thereto and positioned at a pacing site, either endocardial or epicardial. Mechanical complications and/or MRI compatibility issues, which are sometimes associated with elongate lead wires and well known to those skilled in the art, have motivated the development of implantable cardiac pacing devices that are wholly contained within a relatively compact package for implant in close proximity to the pacing site, for example, within the right ventricle RV of the heart. With reference to FIG. 1, such an implantable medical device 100 is illustrated, wherein an hermetically sealed housing 105, preferably formed from a biocompatible and biostable metal such as titanium, contains a pulse generator, or an electronic controller (not shown), to which at least one electrode 111 is coupled, for example, by a hermetic feedthrough assembly (not shown) like those known to those skilled in the art of implantable medical devices. Housing 105 may be overlaid with an insulative layer, for example, medical grade polyurethane, silicone, or parylene.
FIG. 1 further illustrates a distal portion of a standard guiding catheter 150 having been maneuvered up through the inferior vena cava IVC and into the right ventricle RV from the right atrium RA, according to methods known in the art of interventional cardiology. Although catheter 150 may be employed to deliver device 100 to the right ventricle RV, for implant, more sophisticated tools, which are more suitable to facilitate deployment of relatively compact implantable devices, like device 100, are desired. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
A microfiche appendix, containing 3 microfiche and 207 total frames is filed herewith.
The invention concerns management of RESOURCEs, which take the form of (a) downloadable computer data and programs and (b) physical objects, which are located at multiple REPOSITORIEs, at different sites. The RESOURCEs appear to a user, at any given site, as though the RESOURCEs were actually present at the user""s site.
A database is somewhat analogous to a card catalog of a library. The card catalog cross-indexes books in several ways.
For example, an xe2x80x9cauthorxe2x80x9d card exists. This card is located in the catalog at the alphabetical position of the author""s surname.
In addition, a xe2x80x9ctitlexe2x80x9d card exists, located in the alphabetical position of the book""s title. Also, a xe2x80x9csubjectxe2x80x9d card generally exists, which describes the subject of the book, and which is located in the alphabetical position of the subject, such as xe2x80x9cpressed flower collecting,xe2x80x9d for example. Of course, other cards can exist for a given book (for example, books having multiple authors generally have an author card for each).
In database terms, these cards represent xe2x80x9cfieldsxe2x80x9d within the database. For example, in a library, to find all of the books written by Ernest Hemingway, one looks up xe2x80x9cHemingwayxe2x80x9d in the card catalog. All of the library""s books written by any Hemingway are identified by respective author cards. In a computer database, a similar search could be done, upon the xe2x80x9cauthorxe2x80x9d field.
Similar searches can be done on the title fields, as well as on the subject fields.
Computer databases, in general, have more fields than does the card catalog. For example, if the card catalog were contained within a computer database, there would probably exist a xe2x80x9cdatexe2x80x9d field. To search using the xe2x80x9cdatexe2x80x9d field, one specifies a date, or range of dates, and the database responds by listing all books having a copyright which complies with the specified date, or range.
Presently existing databases have limitations. For example, many databases require that a user undergo significant training in order to learn how to use the data base. Some databases use arcane commands which the user must memorize.
Some databases contain only that information which is owned by the database owner. Returning to the library analogy, if a public library were to computerize its card catalog, by entering all of the information contained within the card catalog into the database program, the database program would, of course, only contain the card catalog information. A user could not, for example, gain access to the card catalog of a second library, in order to locate a book not owned by the first library. The user must go to the second library.
An object of the invention is to provide a system for storing information in a manner in which retrieval is simple.
Another object of the invention is to provide a system for storing information, in which entering information, as well as retrieving the information, is self-explanatory, and requires no resort to external instructions.
Another object of the invention is to provide a system for storing information, which can communicate with other systems which store information, and make available all of the information stored by all systems.
Another object of the invention is to provide a system which allows a user to search all information contained, in multiple databases, according to key words.
Another object of the invention is to provide a system which allows a user to establish a standing search, which searches, by key words, new information, at specified intervals in the future.
In one form of the invention, physical objects are stored at multiple different locations, and a profile is maintained for each physical object. The profiles contain descriptions of the physical objects, including location, and are key-word searchable. A user is allowed to issue a query containing key words, and the profiles containing the key words are identified and presented to the user. The user may order delivery of a physical object described in the delivered profiles, whereupon a notice is issued to a transportation agent, who picks up the physical objects and delivers them to the user. The profiles need not be stored at the same location, but can be distributed, as are the physical objects. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
The present invention is directed to methods of increasing the rate of production of methane from a subterranean coal seam, and more particularly, to such methods that use the injection and production of a gas which causes the coal to swell and shrink near the wellbore.
2. SETTING OF THE INVENTION
Subterranean coal seams contain substantial quantities of natural gas, primarily in the form of methane. The methane is sorbed onto the coal and various techniques have been developed to enhance the production of the methane from the coal seam. These various techniques all attempt to increase the near wellbore permeability of the coal, which will permit an increase in the rate of production of methane from the coal seam. One technique is to hydraulically fracture the coal by the injection of liquids or gels with proppant into the coal seam. Although hydraulic fracturing of coal seams is most often effective in increasing the near wellbore permeability of the coal, it is not always economical if the thickness of the coal seam is thin, e.g., less than about five feet. Furthermore, hydraulic fracturing of the coal is not environmentally desirable when there is an active aquifer immediately adjacent to the coal seam because the created fractures may extend into the aquifer which will then permit unwanted water to invade the coal seam and the wellbore. Further, some laboratory evidence suggests that fracturing fluids can lead to long term loss in coal permeability due to sorption of the fracturing fluids in the coal matrix causing swelling, and due to the plugging of the coal cleat or natural fracture system by unrecovered fracturing fluids.
Another technique to stimulate coalbed methane production from a wellbore is to inject a gas, such as air, ammonia or carbon dioxide, into the coal seam to fracture the coal seam. This technique has been utilized primarily to degassify coal mines for safety reasons. U.S. Pat. No. 3,384,416 discloses such a technique where a refrigerant fluid with proppant is injected into the coal seam to fracture the coal. The injected refrigerant fluid and methane are permitted to escape from a borehole under its own pressure or the fluid and methane may be removed with the help of pumps.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,083,395 discloses a technique for recovering methane from a coal seam where a carbon dioxide-containing fluid is introduced into the coal deposit through an injection well and held therein for a period sufficient to enable a substantial amount of methane to be desorbed from the surfaces of the coal deposit Following the hold period, the injected carbon dioxide-containing fluid and desorbed methane are recovered through a recovery well or wells spaced from the injection well. The process is repeated until sufficient methane has been removed to enable safe mining of the coal deposit. | {
"pile_set_name": "USPTO Backgrounds"
} |
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