US07983960B2
An interchange party computer system (IPCS) having means for presenting user interfaces to consumer computer systems and capturing data input through the user interfaces, the IPCS being associated with at least one database holding data representing a plurality of consumer profiles, the profiles including consumer profiles expressing service selection attributes for a plurality of service sectors, and at least one database holding data for a plurality of service programs under a plurality of service sectors, each sector being represented by service programs from a plurality of service providers, the IPCS including (a) a Service Comparison/Selection; (b) a Automatic Bill Payment Module; (c) an Automated Services Monitoring Module; (d) an Automated Best Services Selection Module; (e) a Services Search Module; (f) an Incentive Program Module; (g) a Data Mining Module; and/or (h) a Pooling Module.
US07983959B2
Systems and methods for determining the value of bids placed by content providers for placement positions on a page, e.g., a web page, rendered according to a given context, for instance, the search results listing for a particular query initiated on a search engine web site, are provided. Additionally, systems and methods are provided for determining placement of content items, e.g., advertisements and/or images, on a rendered page relative to other content items on the page based upon bid value.
US07983957B2
Some embodiments of the present invention provide a system that enters items into a gift registry. During operation, the system photographically captures images of items at stores containing the items. Moreover, the images include a set of barcodes identifying the items. Next, the system obtains a set of product codes for the one or more items from the barcodes in the images. Finally, the system enters the one or more items in the gift registry using the product codes.
US07983945B2
A method and system for analyzing an organization's investment in human capital resources is provided to assist in improving the organization's overall financial performance. The method includes receiving inputted data retrieved from common accounting records regularly maintained in connection with operation of the organization. Further, the present invention provides a novel approach particularly relevant for precise analysis of people-intensive organizations, such as service-providing organizations. The approach involves calculation of values for newly defined HCP, ROHS and PS metrics. Aggregation of the metric values into a single index value metric facilitates benchmarking of an organization against itself and others. A report is provided that identifies factors most responsible for influencing the overall index, which assists the organization's management in determining how to implement change in the organization that will improve the metrics and thus the overall profitability of the organization.
US07983939B2
In a method for automatically mapping a cabin and travel class structure of an disrupted flight into replacement flights, cabin and travel class structure of the disrupted flight are retrieved. For each affected passenger, a base disrupted flight is determined from the passenger itinerary. For the disruption period, cabin and travel class structure of the replacement flights are split into sub-periods. For each sub-period, mapping begins by establishing a direct match between cabin and travel class structures. The direct match is validated against actual cabin and travel class structure of the replacement flights, including pinpointing all found discrepancies. All class matching tables (CMTs) applying to the disrupted flight and disruption period considered are retrieved from a rule repository. Cabin and travel class structure of the replacement flights are further split in sub-periods to imbed the actual validity periods of retrieved CMTs. Rules of the retrieved CMTs resolve all found discrepancies.
US07983938B1
A method, system and computer-usable medium are disclosed for modeling recommended insurance coverage. Coverage parameters of a policy are displayed as graphical elements within a user interface (UI) of a computing device along with a plurality of claim scenario parameters for selection by a user. Once selected, the claim scenario parameters are applied to relevant claim data and a claim scenario is generated. The claim scenario is then applied to the policy coverage parameters of the policy to determine and graphically display coverage parameter disparities, which then graphically modified to offset any coverage parameter disparities. As coverage parameters are modified, corresponding adjustments to the premium of the current policy are made and displayed within the UI. Recommendations for modifying the coverage parameters are provided by help windows, an assistance wizard, or live help. An analysis of competitive policies with equivalent coverage is performed and an optimum policy choice is recommended. A resulting policy is generated, using the modified coverage parameters of the current policy and adjusted premiums, and then fulfilled, electronically or physically.
US07983929B2
A system for generating standardized greenhouse gas emission reduction credits based on mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions at a site resulting from use of renewable carbon as a fuel at the site to produce energy in substitution for previous use of a fossil fuel at the site, includes a computer, at least one database accessible by the computer and containing past site-specific data and subsequent site-specific data regarding the at least one variable impacting emissions of the greenhouse gas generated from the use of the renewable carbon as a fuel for generating energy at the site, a greenhouse gas emissions modeling module, and at least one interface to the computer, for outputting a report of the identified quantity of the standardized greenhouse gas emission reduction credits.
US07983922B2
On an encoder-side, a multi-channel input signal is analyzed for obtaining smoothing control information, which is to be used by a decoder-side multi-channel synthesis for smoothing quantized transmitted parameters or values derived from the quantized transmitted parameters for providing an improved subjective audio quality in particular for slowly moving point sources and rapidly moving point sources having tonal material such as fast moving sinusoids.
US07983921B2
An information processing apparatus whereby advice having appropriate content can be given at an appropriate timing with regard to a method of user utterance, thereby making it possible to reduce the probability of misrecognition due to the method of utterance. An execution unit executes processing that conforms to the result of speech recognition. An analyzing unit analyzes the suitability of input speech for the speech recognition. A cancel instruction unit inputs an instruction to cancel the processing that has been executed by the execution unit. In response to the cancel instruction, a notification unit notifies the user of guidance related to speech input, based upon the result of the analysis unit.
US07983910B2
Communicating across channels with emotion preservation includes: receiving, by a processor in a communication device, a voice communication; analyzing, by the processor in the communication device, the voice communication for first emotion content; analyzing, by the processor in the communication device, textual content of the voice communication for second emotion content; and marking up, by the processor in the communication device, the textual content with emotion metadata for one of the first emotion content and the second emotion content.
US07983903B2
Systems and methods for identifying translation pairs from web pages are provided. One disclosed method includes receiving monolingual web page data of a source language, and processing the web page data by detecting the occurrence of a predefined pattern in the web page data, and extracting a plurality of translation pair candidates. Each of the translation pair candidates may include a source language string and target language string. The method may further include determining whether each translation pair candidate is a valid transliteration. The method may also include, for each translation pair that is determined not to be a valid transliteration, determining whether each translation pair candidate is a valid translation. The method may further include adding each translation pair that is determined to be a valid translation or transliteration to a dictionary.
US07983902B2
Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer program products, to identify topic words in a document corpus that includes topic documents related to a topic are disclosed. A reference topic word divergence value based on the document corpus and the topic document corpus is determined. A candidate topic word divergence value for a candidate topic word is determined based on the document corpus and the topic document corpus. The candidate topic word is determined to be a topic word if the candidate topic word divergence value is greater than the reference topic word divergence value.
US07983901B2
The present invention uses a natural language understanding system that is currently being trained to assist in annotating training data for training that natural language understanding system. Unannotated training data is provided to the system and the system proposes annotations to the training data. The user is offered an opportunity to confirm or correct the proposed annotations, and the system is trained with the corrected or verified annotations.
US07983900B2
A computer-implemented method of analyzing symbols in a computer system, and a computer program and apparatus therefor are provided. The symbols conform to a specification for the symbols. The specification is codified into a set of computer-readable rules. The symbols are analyzed using the computer-readable rules to obtains patterns of the symbols by: determining the path that is taken by the symbols through the rules that successfully terminates, and grouping the symbols according to said paths.
US07983894B2
A data processor is arranged to execute software to emulate an instruction-handling processor having an instruction preparation stage and an instruction execution stage. The software is operable first to emulate the instruction preparation stage in respect of a group of two or more instructions to generate a group of prepared instructions; and then to emulate the instruction execution stage in respect of the group of prepared instructions, so that the completion of the emulation of the instruction execution stage in respect of each of the prepared instructions occurs serially in an instruction order.
US07983886B2
The present invention performs numerical simulation of surfactant flooding during enhanced oil recovery of a given hydrocarbon reservoir. The present invention utilizes an improved method for determining relative permeability while maintaining physical consistency when the phase behavior varies between different phase Types. This new relative permeability model maintains the physical consistency in the transition from Type II(−) to Type III to Type II(+) systems and vice versa.
US07983882B1
The present invention introduces a simulation software for displaying a human being comprising an arm. When the arm joint angle value, which indicates the angle created by the upper arm and the lower arm at the arm joint, indicates the first angle value, the upper arm of the first thickness value is produced together with the first wrinkle image generated on or near the arm joint. When the arm joint angle value indicates the second angle value, the upper arm of the second thickness value is produced together with the second wrinkle image generated on or near the arm joint. The more the arm joint angle value decreases, the more the thickness of the upper arm increases together with different wrinkle image generated on or near the arm joint, thereby enabling the simulation software to display the movement of the human being in a realistic manner.
US07983876B2
A shoe is improved by including: at least one accelerometer for generating acceleration signals and a processor configured to process the acceleration signals to determine one or both of speed and distance traveled of a person wearing the shoe. A shoe and a garment are provided with a wireless transmitter, to provide information about the shoe/garment or a person wearing same.
US07983874B2
Provided herein is a method of determining the similarity between a first multivariate data set and a second multivariate data set. The method may be applied to rapidly assess the similarity between fluorescence spectroscopy multivariate data sets in quality control analysis. The method includes representing the data of a first and a second multivariate data set in matrix form to yield a multivariate data matrix and calculating the magnitude of an additive and subtractive combination of each multivariate data matrix. The concept of a penalty parameter is introduced to set a detectable limit of variance between the first multivariate data set and the second multivariate data set and the penalty parameter is used in combination with the magnitude of an additive and subtractive combination of each multivariate data matrix to determine a similarity value.
US07983860B2
A system (10) and method for monitoring power consumption of a computer system component, such as a central processing unit (CPU), of a desktop computer system. The component is supplied with supply power from a power supply unit (22) of the computer through a power supply cable (14). A coupling (12) is disposed between the power supply unit (22) and a substrate (e.g., motherboard) on which the component is mounted, and is electrically connected to at least one power supply line (18) of the power supply cable (14) and a power supply connector (24) on the substrate (20). The power supply line (18) carries a supply voltage, and one or more devices (26,34,36,46) associated with the coupling (12) determine current flow through the power supply line (18) and provide a power consumption reading for the component based on the supply voltage and the current flow through the power supply line (18).
US07983852B2
There is provided a method of automatically identifying and characterizing spectral peaks of a spectrum generated by an analytical apparatus and reporting information relating to the spectral peaks to a user, comprising the steps of: receiving the spectrum generated by the analytical apparatus; automatically subtracting a baseline from the spectrum so as to generate a baseline-corrected spectrum; automatically detecting and characterizing the spectral peaks in the baseline-corrected spectrum; and reporting at least one item of information relating to each detected and characterized spectral peak to a user. In embodiments, baseline model curve parameters or peak model curve parameters are neither input by nor exposed to the user prior to the reporting step.
US07983849B2
The invention relates to methods of determining the mutational load of a gene bank obtained by random mutagenesis of a gene of interest by preparing a chart linking the mutational load of a gene bank obtained by random mutagenesis of a model gene with the fraction of mutated model genes observed in the bank; performing, in parallel, random mutagenesis of the model gene used for preparing the chart and the gene of interest to obtain the corresponding mutated gene banks; determining the mutational load of the gene bank obtained using the model gene on the basis of the chart plotted; and applying a correction factor to the mutational load of the mutated model gene bank to determine the mutational load in the gene bank of the mutated genes of interest.
US07983846B2
Systems and methods for determining in-situ hydrate saturation of hydrate-bearing formations using dielectric properties of gas hydrate amounts are described. In accordance with one aspect, a method for determining gas-hydrate saturation concentration of hydrate-bearing formations includes collecting data using a dielectric propagation tool indicative of propagation time (tpl) and attenuation time (α), collecting data indicative of density using a density device, and processing the combination of data indicative of tpl, α and density to determine the concentration of gas-hydrate saturation and porosity of the formations.
US07983842B2
There is a need for improving the accuracy of estimating a gain error for an angular velocity sensor. An error estimation section and a correction section are provided as well as a gyroscope that detects an angular velocity of a vehicle. The error estimation section assumes the gain error of the gyroscope to be a state quantity and finds an estimated value for the gain error using a Kalman filter. Based on the gain error found by the error estimation section, the correction section corrects a gain correction amount used for gain correction of values detected by the gyroscope. The correction section corrects the gain correction amount dedicated to right turn based on the gain error found by the error estimation section when the vehicle is assumed to turn right. The correction section corrects the gain correction amount dedicated to left turn based on the gain error found by the error estimation section when the vehicle is assumed to turn left.
US07983840B2
Embodiments of the present invention are directed to a method and system for disabling distracting features of electronic devices in a moving vehicle in order to enhance vehicle operator safety. A safety controller system may be operatively connected with a motion monitor within a vehicle and with a computing device in communication with the motion monitor. The safety controller system may include a motion monitor communication component for continuously receiving data from the motion monitor, which may be a GPS system installed within the vehicle. The safety controller system may additionally include a feature disabling module for disabling a feature of the electronic device based on detected motion conditions determined from the received data and a feature enabling module for enabling the feature of the electronic device based on a detected lack of motion determined from the received data.
US07983830B2
Methods and systems are described for conserving fuel used by an engine. In some embodiments a control module processes a user-provided input, as a first function, into a second function. The second function can be used to direct the engine with a directive output power. The directive output power may have regions equal to, greater than, and/or less than what the power output would be if the engine were controlled using the user-provided input.
US07983823B2
Method and control architecture for selection of optimal engine input torque for a powertrain system
A method and article of manufacture are provided for operating an internal combustion engine adapted to transmit torque to a hybrid transmission. The method comprises determining engine input torque transmittable to the hybrid transmission for each of a plurality of engine states. Costs are determined for operating the engine and hybrid transmission in the engine states to substantially meet an operator torque request. A preferred engine state is selected based upon the determined costs. The engine is controlled based upon the preferred engine state to substantially meet an operator torque request.
US07983820B2
Methods and systems of the present invention are provided for performing proxy control functions in an environment including one or more work machines. Such methods and systems may leverage one or more gateways to serve as a proxy for one or more distinct modules. A gateway, located in a work machine, may be programmed with proxy logic that performs functions associated with certain modules used in a work machine environment. The gateway may monitor a data link and retrieve broadcasted messages. The broadcasted messages may include source and/or destination module address identifiers. The gateway may retrieve messages from the data link based on a determination that the message is destined for a module for which the gateway serves as a proxy. The gateway may route a retrieved message, using a mapping structure, to the appropriate proxy logic that performs functions associated with the destination module.
US07983816B2
The present invention provides a control apparatus for an electric power steering apparatus comprises: a steering assist command value calculating section; a current control section that calculates a voltage command value; and a motor driving section that drives a motor based on the voltage command value, wherein an assist power from the motor is applied to a steering system, the control apparatus is characterized in that an SAT measuring section, that inputs an angular speed and an angular acceleration of the motor, the steering assist command value and the torque signal therein so as to estimate an SAT, is provided, and the SAT obtained by the SAT measuring section is feedbacked to the steering assist command value via a feedback section composed of a phase compensating section and a gain section.
US07983815B2
In an electric power steering control system, a phase compensator of the steering torque is made of an analog circuit and an anti-phase compensator is made by the software of a microcomputer, thereby to eliminate the changes in the gain and the phase by the phase compensator of the analog circuit near the oscillation frequency, so that the steering torque signal equivalent to that of no phase compensation necessary for the computation at the observer is computed from the phase-compensated steering torque signal.
US07983813B2
A method for actively suspending a real plant in a vehicle includes modifying a control signal on the basis of a difference between a property of the real plant, as indicated by the response of the real plant to the control signal, and a property of a nominal plant.
US07983810B2
A computer built into an automobile displays the owner's manual for the car. The user requests more information about the automobile through the computer, and the additional information is displayed to the user. Information may include a description of a specific function or device of the car, service history, and/or real time status of a component of the car.
US07983806B2
A system for computing car switching solutions in a railway switch yard. The system is computer based and has an input for receiving data conveying information about one or more arrival trains arriving at the switch yard and data conveying information about departure trains to depart the switch yard. A processing entity processes the data and computes car switching solutions for the railcars.
US07983802B2
Method for creating and managing a digital map for use by vehicles and including information relating to travel lanes on which the vehicles travel includes illuminating the environment outside of and around the vehicle with infrared illumination in an eye-safe part of the infrared spectrum as the vehicle is traveling on a travel lane to be mapped, forming, on the vehicle, at least one image from reflections from any objects in the path of the infrared illumination (such as by means of an image sensor), analyzing each image to obtain information about the object from which the infrared illumination has been reflected, and incorporating the information into the map if not already present therein. A driver of the vehicle may be alerted if the information obtained about an object in the environment outside of and around the vehicle indicates that a collision with the object is about to occur.
US07983798B2
This invention discloses an intelligent framework for the overall management of energy allocated to components of a system. When conservation is desired or a shortage occurs, it is desirable to modulate energy to components, or to notify components and allow them to modulate themselves. It also discusses the establishment of a standard communications API between entities and components within the system. Among other things, this framework: manages device and entity enrollment into the system; provides an interface to heterogeneous devices; establishes standard communication methods between entities and components; dictates throttling to entities and components when conservation is required; and monitors energy throttling and compliance with modulate requests.
US07983797B2
Aspects of the invention are directed to power distribution systems and methods for distributing power from a primary power source and a backup power source to a load. In one particular aspect, a power distribution system includes a first input to receive input power from the primary power source, a second input to receive input power from the backup power source, an output that provides output power from at least one of the primary power source and the backup power source, a first switch operatively coupled to the first input and the output and operative to selectively couple the first input to the output, a second switch operatively coupled to the second input and the output and operative to selectively couple the second input to the output, and a controller operatively coupled to the first switch and to the second switch and configured to control the first switch and the second switch to provide an electrical interlock.
US07983796B2
A method of monitoring and controlling an active environmental control system to impose energy efficient use of the system. The method includes the steps of monitoring a calling device for a change in calling data, time and date stamp the change in calling data, detecting a change in status of a plurality of physical sensors located within the system, wherein the state of each sensor represents a condition of the environment in which the system resides, time and date stamp the change in status of the plurality of physical sensors, measuring the temperature of a plurality of temperature locations within the system, time and date stamp the measured temperature of the temperature locations, storing for an extended period the calling data, the status change of the physical sensors and the measured temperature of the plurality of temperature locations, together with the respective time and date stamp, in a memory of the system, filtering the calling data, the physical sensors status change and the measured temperature for a system control trigger to identify system control trigger data, extracting a probability decision, to predict a direction of trend, by comparing recent system control trigger data with prior recorded system control trigger data, weighting the system control trigger data, based on the probability decision that the data is causing the output event trigger, in order to effect a desired change in output, and controlling the system based on the weighted system control trigger data.
US07983786B2
Neutral data computer control system for a multiaxis machine tool for producing workpieces having a helicoidal generated surface with an optional computer system (1) for generating machine control parameters for a multiaxis machine tool (2, 2a) in which there is provided at least one virtual axis, which can be parameterized as a guiding axis for other axes and then serves only for the synchronization of these other axes, and with at least one data processing unit and at least one memory, the data processing unit being set up in programming terms in such a way that it generates at least one data carrier or an electronic carrier signal (3) with machine control parameters for the machine (2, 2a), or an optional computer program or a computer program product for this and at least one such multiaxis machine tool (2, 2a).
US07983781B2
Sewing data of multiple sewing targets stored in RAM of a sewing sequence determining apparatus is acquired. Permutations or combinations of the sewing targets are created as sewing sequence candidates. A number of needle bars N provided at a multi-needle sewing machine is acquired. An optimal thread replacement count is initialized. A thread replacement count is calculated for each of sewing sequence candidates, in the case where sewing operations are carried out by the multi-needle sewing machine equipped with N needle bars on the sewing targets in accordance with the sewing sequence candidates. A sewing sequence candidate of the fewest thread replacement count is determined to be an optimal sewing sequence candidate. The optimal sewing sequence candidate is displayed on a liquid crystal display and announced. Determination of sewing sequences at the time of carrying out sewing operations with respect to multiple sewing targets is easily achieved.
US07983780B2
A sewing machine including an input unit that inputs a thread cut instruction; a thread cutting mechanism that cuts a needle thread and a bobbin thread based on the thread cut instruction; a feed dog vertically moving mechanism that vertically drives a feed dog for feeding a workpiece cloth; a feed dog activating switch unit that switches the feed dog between an active state in which the feed dog is vertically driven by the feed dog vertically moving mechanism and an inactive state in which an upper surface of the feed dog is positioned in a lowered position below an upper surface of a needle plate provided in a sewing machine bed; and a control unit that drives the thread cutting mechanism based on the thread cut instruction inputted from the input unit and that controls the feed dog activating switch unit to switch the feed dog to the inactive state in which the feed dog is positioned in the lowered position.
US07983779B2
Some embodiments for a fault detection apparatus may include one or more monitors to detect at least three operating states of a sensor, such as pass, fail, and inoperative so as to enable a manufacturing facility to differentiate between situations in which a container does not have the appropriate machine readable label and situations wherein the sensor is actually inoperative. The fail state may be indicative of an object on a conveyor system not matching a predetermined description, identity or characteristic. The pass state may be indicative of an object on a conveyor system matching the predetermined description, identity or characteristic. The inoperative state may be indicative of a sensor output associated with a malfunction in the sensor itself. The fault detection apparatus may also include a fail-to-safe controller configured to detect these operating states.
US07983777B2
Automated systems and methods for creating and obtaining devices, including biomedical implants. Systems can have a surgeon's device, an automated platform, and a server. The surgeon's device can send a request for a template of a biomedical implant, and can access tools to edit the template. The automated platform can receive the edited template, and can generate a response. The response can include translating the edited template into a design for a biomedical implant. The response can further include generating a notice if the edited template falls outside of an acceptable range, or if the edited template is similar to the design of a standard biomedical implant. There can also be provided a manufacturing facility that can manufacture the implant and send the implant to the surgeon.
US07983775B2
The present invention relates to a system and methodology facilitating material-driven processing in an industrial controller environment. Various models supported by database objects are provided to automatically and dynamically map inventory systems/processes to control systems/process such as in batch or recipe operations. A material model is provided that tracks to an inventory database and includes such aspects as defining material types and containers to house such materials. An area model maps the material model to possible units and equipment modules to process the materials. These models include phased-based parameters that define amounts of material that flow into and out of a determined area for processing the materials. Before, during and/or after automated manufacturing operations, object binding operations occur between material-based servers associated with an inventory system and batch servers associated with a process-control system. Such binding includes Just-In-Time or on-demand binding at run time, and relates material requirements of a recipe (or batch) to the units and equipment that are available to produce the recipe.
US07983773B2
A system for interacting with an article having a position-coding pattern and a plurality of different print elements printed thereon. Each print element corresponds to a different audio output. The system comprises: an optical sensor for reading a portion of the position-coding pattern; a processor coupled to the optical sensor for determining a position using the read portion of the position-coding pattern; a computer system configured for identifying an audio data file using the position determined by the processor; and an audio output device for playing an audio output corresponding to the identified audio data file.
US07983772B2
Embodiments of the present invention provide an audio system having wholly independent audio processing modules. The audio system includes a plurality of audio processing modules, a clock manager, a sample rate converter and a buffer. The audio processing modules are communicatively coupled to the clock manager and the buffer. The sample rate converter is communicatively coupled to the clock manager and the buffer. The buffer provides for storing audio data generated and consumed by the audio processing modules. The clock manager provides for determining the clock source of each audio processing module. The clock manager also provides for configuring the audio processing modules and the sample rate converter as a function the clock source of each audio processing module. The sample rate converter provides for synchronizing a flow rate of audio data generated by a first audio processing module and a flow rate of audio data consumed by a second audio processing module, when the clock source of the first and second audio processing modules are different.
US07983769B2
A system that enables controlling motion over a network comprises an interface that receives motion control data that includes a time stamp from the network. Additionally, the system includes a motion control component that utilizes the received motion control data to update properties associated with the motion control component based at least in part on the time stamp. The system can also include a clock that is synchronized with disparate clocks associated with disparate motion control components located on the network.
US07983768B2
An implantable tissue-stimulating prosthesis such as a cochlear implant system comprising an elongate carrier member having a distal end, a proximal end, and at least one electrode positioned thereon; at least one electrical conductor extending from one or more of the at least one electrode; a lead extending from the carrier member and enclosing the at least one electrical conductor; and a holding member constructed and arranged to radially extend outwardly from the surface of the carrier member to facilitate grasping of the holding member during implantation of the carrier member in a patient.
US07983765B1
An apparatus for and method of measuring pressure through a septum in a patient's heart. A lead inserted into the right side of a heart is routed through the septum to gain access to the left side of the heart. The lead includes a mounting mechanism that secures the lead to one or both sides of the septal walls. The lead also includes one or more sensors for measuring cardiac pressure on the left side of the heart and, as necessary, the right side of the heart.
US07983750B2
Various approaches are described for managing refractory periods based on the detection of an evoked response. The heart is paced and an evoked response is detected. At least one refractory period is adapted based on the detected evoked response. Adapting the refractory period may involve, for example, initiating a refractory period, terminating a refractory period, extending a refractory period or modifying one or more parameters of the refractory period. Adapting the refractory period may involve modifying a sensing threshold based on the detected evoked response. The sensing threshold of an atrial sensing channel may be adjusted, for example, to avoid sensing a ventricular evoked response on the atrial channel while allowing sensing of a P-wave on the atrial channel.
US07983745B2
Systems, devices and methods for using environmental data to manage health care are disclosed. One aspect is an advanced patient management system. In various embodiments, the system includes at least one implantable medical device (IMD) to acquire at least one IMD parameter indicative of patient wellness, means to acquire at least one environmental parameter from at least one external source, and means to correlate the at least one parameter indicative of patient wellness and the at least one environmental parameter to assist with patient health care decisions. Other aspects and embodiments are provided herein.
US07983744B2
A system for implementing a cardiac device having adaptive treatment therapies utilizing a neural network based learning engine is disclosed. The system includes an implantable cardiac device module and an external data processing system for specifying the operating characteristics of the cardiac device module. Both the cardiac device module and the external processing system possess an artificial neural network to specify the operation of the cardiac device module as it provides adaptive treatment therapies. The external data processing system includes a complete neural network module that trains and validates the operation of the neural network to match the optimal treatment options with a received set of collected patient data. A runtime neural network module that provides real time operation of the neural network using collected patient data is located within the cardiac device module. The cardiac device module and the external processing module are connected via a communication link.
US07983743B2
Noninvasive systems and methods are provided for determining electrical activity for a heart of a living being. A processor is configured to meshlessly compute data that represents heart electrical activity from a set of noninvasively measured body surface electrical potentials. This is accomplished using data that describes a geometric relationship between a plurality of locations corresponding to where the body surface electrical potentials were measured and the heart.
US07983734B2
The invention is directed to an intracorporeal marker, a delivery device and assembly for such marker and the method of delivering one or more of the markers to an intracorporeal location within a patient. The marker is a body formed at least in part of a bioabsorbable fibrous material such as a fibrous mat or fabric. The delivery devices preferably also include one or more bioabsorbable short term markers which are configured to expand within the body cavity due to contacting a body fluid. The fibrous marker has a radiographically detectable member which preferably hold a portion of the fibrous body in a compressed condition. Preferably, the fibrous marker has a fibrous felt core formed of bioabsorbable material with a fabric jacket formed of bioabsorbable material. Therapeutic, diagnostic and binding agents may be incorporated into the fibrous body of the marker.
US07983727B2
In a wall of a package base made of aluminum or aluminum alloy, there is formed a through-hole, through which a semi-rigid coaxial cable passes. A central conductor of the semi-rigid coaxial cable is joined to an electrode with a solder material. The semi-rigid coaxial cable has an insulating material through which the central conductor passes and an outer conductor provided therearound. The central conductor and outer conductor are made of stainless steel, for example, and the insulating material is made of fluororesin, for example. Inside the through-hole, the wall of the package base and the outer conductor are electrically connected to each other via a stainless material within the hole formed in a cylindrical fluororesin material. The semi-rigid coaxial cable and the like are fixed to the wall with a conductive screw.
US07983724B2
A mobile communication terminal according to the present invention includes a body, a PCB unit provided in a portion of the body for prescribed parts to be mounted, an antenna unit provided in another portion of the body, wherein a feeding point of the antenna unit is apart from the PCB unit, and a feeding connector which connects the feeding point with the PCB unit.
US07983722B2
The invention is directed at a headset for a mobile communication device having a multi-button control and is implemented with a standard headset jack. The multi-button control is decoded by a microprocessor after which an encoded signal is then transmitted from the processor to the handset. In this manner, by using the standard jack, no additional hardware is required on the handset.
US07983721B2
The present invention relates to a portable communication device and an antenna unit. The device includes a display having a display surface, a transparent non-conductive display window covering the display surface of the display, and an antenna having at least one antenna element, wherein the antenna element is provided as a transparent conductive layer provided on the display cover. With this antenna solution space is freed inside the device for use for other units or for further size reductions. Light passing through the window is furthermore not blocked.
US07983715B2
A method of printing first information using a mobile telecommunications device and retrieving further information. The method comprises the steps of: providing a print medium having a linear data track and a two-dimensional coding pattern; printing the first information; automatically reading and decoding the data track during printing to determine a print media identifier; communicating the print media identifier to a computer system; interacting with the print medium and sensing the coding pattern; decoding the sensed coding pattern to determine the print media identifier and a two-dimensional coordinate position; and retrieving further information.
US07983713B2
Smart cards, a communication device, methods for selecting a communication network to be used by a communication device, and a computer program product.
US07983699B2
A paging group network includes multiple paging groups formed by areas covered by base stations (BSs). The paging group network further includes an anchor paging controller (PC) and a relay PC. The anchor paging controller initiates a page to a mobile station (MS), addresses the paging group in which the MS is located, and stores status information about the MS in a corresponding location register (LR). The relay PC manages the paging groups. A method for updating MS locations is also provided. Thereby, the present invention optimizes the paging and location updating processes, and reduces the complexity of managing the idle mode.
US07983698B2
A paging apparatus and method in a mobile communication system providing an MBMS (Multimedia Broadcast Multicast Service). In the mobile communication system, to page a UE for a first service through a primary carrier during a second service in progress through a secondary carrier, a PICH (Paging Indication Channel) transmitter in a Node B transmits paging indication information to the UE through the primary carrier by oscillating the primary carrier as a transmission frequency. A PCH (Paging Channel) transmitter transmits paging information to the UE through the primary carrier or the secondary carrier by oscillating the primary carrier or the secondary carrier as the transmission frequency under a predetermined control. A PBMSCH (Physical Broadcast Multicast Shared Channel) transmitter transmits data of the second service through the secondary carrier by oscillating the secondary carrier as the transmission frequency. A controller controls the primary carrier or the secondary carrier to be oscillated as the transmission frequency of the PCH transmitter if the paging indication information indicates paging.
US07983697B2
A paging group network includes multiple paging groups formed by areas covered by base stations (BSs). The paging group network further includes an anchor paging controller (PC) and a relay PC. The anchor paging controller initiates a page to a mobile station (MS), addresses the paging group in which the MS is located, and stores status information about the MS in a corresponding location register (LR). The relay PC manages the paging groups. A method for updating MS locations is also provided. Thereby, the present invention optimizes the paging and location updating processes, and reduces the complexity of managing the idle mode.
US07983676B2
A method of handover in a wireless communication system in which an asynchronous system and a synchronous system are mixed is disclosed. The method comprises the steps of: the asynchronous system ordering a dual mode mobile terminal to perform a handover from the asynchronous system to the synchronous system; when the handover order is received at the mobile terminal, the mobile terminal transmitting a frame or a preamble through a reverse traffic channel to the synchronous system, reporting to the synchronous system that the handover is completed and initiating a timer of the mobile terminal which is set according to a predetermined time; the mobile terminal switching from an asynchronous vocoder into a synchronous vocoder when the timer expires; and the wireless communication system switching vocoders of asynchronous and synchronous MSCs when the report is received.
US07983665B2
A method according to the present invention comprises determining an available information rate for communication, via a first base station, between a plurality of terminals and a second base station based on link capacity information for wireless communication between the first base station and the second base station, and controlling each of information rates for the communication between the plurality of terminals and the second base station based on the available information rate. Here, the plurality of terminals and the first base station being in a mobile object, the second base station being outside the mobile object.
US07983658B2
The invention is a method and a system, which allows the integration of email-enabled devices into a carrier service network without the need for user individual configuration of the devices. A system with an email proxy and a database is provided for handling email requests from a terminal. The network address of the terminal is used to retrieve email configuration settings from the database, whereupon the email proxy is able to communicate with an email server using the retrieved email configuration settings.
US07983655B2
A method and system for processing a prepaid call in a mobile telecommunications network is provided. A default call processing parameter for processing a call can control the processing of the call when communications between the Mobile Switching Center and the Service Control Point fails. The value of the default call processing parameter can be set to permit the call to continue or to be terminated in accordance with a characteristic associated with the call, such as a characteristic of the dialed telephone number or a nature of address in the case of an outgoing call or a location of the terminating mobile subscriber in the case of an incoming call.
US07983649B2
A RF device such as a tower mounted amplifier (TMA), mast-head amplifier (MHA), or Tower Mounted Boosters (TMB) includes a housing having a plurality of cavities and an input and an output, the input being coupled to the antenna and the output being coupled to a base station. The housing includes a transmission path holding multiple coaxial resonators. The housing further includes multiple receive paths including at least one path having a plurality of cavities, each cavity containing a dielectric resonator. The metallic transmit resonator nearest the antenna input is coupled to the first dielectric resonator via a common resonant wire. The last dielectric resonator in the receive path is coupled to a first metallic resonator of a downstream clean-up filter via another common resonant wire.
US07983646B2
Various embodiments to reduce radio frequency noise are described. An apparatus may comprise a mobile computing device having a radio frequency noise reduction module to disable a radio frequency noise source in response to a receive active signal from a radio receiver. Other embodiments are described and claimed.
US07983640B2
A receiver circuit for receiving an analog signal comprises a mixer device, a first integrator device coupled to the mixer device, a second integrator device following the first integrator device, a quantizer device, and first and second feedback digital/analog converters. The mixer device mixes the analog signal with a local-oscillator frequency and outputs a mixer current signal. The first integrator device generates a first intermediate signal by integrating the mixer current signal summed with a first feedback current signal, the second integrator device generates a quantizer input signal by integrating the first intermediate signal summed with a second feedback current signal, and the quantizer device generates a digital output signal by quantizing the quantizer input signal. The first feedback digital/analog converter converts the digital output signal into the first feedback current signal and the second feedback digital/analog converter converts the digital output signal into the second feedback current signal.
US07983634B2
The radio telecommunication terminal (2) comprises a data burst scheduler able to schedule the continuous transmission of consecutive data bursts which generate noise of similar energy on the radio-frequency channel as long as a specific radio-frequency channel is used to receive a radio signal, the respective energy of the noise generated by the transmission of two consecutive first and second data burst being similar only if the noise energy gradient between the end of the transmission of the first data burst and the beginning of the transmission of the second data burst is situated between predetermined upper and lower limits.
US07983633B2
Circuit scale and power consumption of a base station is reduced with a feature of a sector-free configuration in routing processing. The feature is realized in a base station having transmitters corresponding to a plurality of sectors, as there are a switch distributing signals corresponding to a plurality of subcarriers to the plurality of sectors, respectively, and an inverse Fourier transform processor performing inverse Fourier transform processing on the signals for the plurality of sectors distributed by the switch, so as to supply to each corresponding transmitter among transmitters corresponding to the plurality of sectors.
US07983629B2
Disclosed is a portable terminal with locking release device that includes a cover removably mounted on a side of a terminal housing; a first locking release having a button mounted in the terminal housing in such a manner as to be capable of linearly moving; and a second locking release having a rotary member mounted in the terminal housing and rotating as the button linearly moves, wherein the rotary member is rotated when the cover is mounted on the terminal housing, thereby linearly moving the cover. The portable terminal with the locking release device allows a battery cover to be easily mounted on or removed from a battery cover on a slim terminal, thereby stabilizing the battery mounting structure and enhancing the convenience in use.
US07983625B2
Notch filter and apparatus for receiving and transmitting radio-frequency signals incorporating same
A notch filter suitable for attenuating certain frequencies of a radio-frequency signal includes an input for receiving the radio-frequency signal and an output for the output of a portion of the radio-frequency signal, first and second capacitive means, at least one inductor and a negative resistance circuit suitable for compensating the resistive losses of said at least one inductor. The inductor and the first and second capacitive means are placed to produce a resonator and the filter comprises a control device suitable for controlling the negative resistance circuit. The input impedance of the filter comprises a pole and a zero, with the pole depending on the second capacitive means and the zero depending on both the first and second capacitive means. The first and second capacitive means are variable and the control device is suitable for controlling the first and second capacitive means.
US07983623B2
In a wireless network, plural downlink signals from plural base stations are transmitted to a terminal. The plural downlink signals all carry the same information to the terminal. The terminal provides feedback on the downlink channels. The feedback provides information on the taps of the channels. The amount of information fed back is constrained. Based on the feedback, transmission parameters of the downlink signals are adjusted. The process of transmitting, providing feedback, and adjusting the parameters continue so that the energy of the downlink signal is enhanced at the terminal location and suppressed elsewhere. Beam forming can be used to further suppress the energy signature at locations other than the terminal location.
US07983611B2
An electronic infrastructure consisting a plurality of client mobile devices, a distribution server and a media creator computer, wherein the client mobile devices present interactive media upon user request. The plurality of client mobile devices support dynamic screen display and, contain a plurality of soft keys. The distribution server that supports delivery of interactive media to the client mobile devices. The media creator is a personal computer that generates interactive media and sends them to the distribution server for distribution. A network such as combination of Internet and mobile network communicatively couple the plurality of client mobile devices, distribution server and personal computer (media creator). The personal computer sends interactive media to the distribution server, the distribution server processes and sends the interactive media to the client mobile device and the client mobile devices presents the interactive media in a series of screens to the user. The client mobile devices interactively send the user responses back to the distribution server.
US07983610B2
An image formation apparatus configured to switch between an inter-leaf operation and a non-inter-leaf operation is provided for double-sided printing.
US07983609B2
An image forming apparatus is provided with a cassette configured to accommodate printing sheets, a casing of the image forming apparatus, a belt member which circularly moves inside the casing, a cleaning device configured to remove particles adhering on the belt member, and a collection box in which the particles removed by the cleaning unit is collected. The casing has a cassette accommodating section for accommodating the cassette, a box accommodating section defined inside the casing and communicating with the cassette accommodating section and an opening formed on the casing and communicating with the cassette accommodating section. The cassette is removably installable into the cassette accommodating section through the opening, and the collection box is detached from or inserted in the box accommodating section through the opening.
US07983608B2
A cleaning apparatus for cleaning toner on an image bearing member includes a cleaning blade for collecting the toner by contacting an edge portion thereof with the image bearing member, a container for storing the toner, a first rotation axis for rotatably supporting the cleaning blade, an urging member for urging the cleaning blade, a positioning portion for positioning the cleaning blade so that the cleaning blade urged by the urging member stands by at a predetermined position when the cleaning blade is not in contact with the image bearing member, and a second rotation axis for rotatably supporting the cleaning apparatus while contacting a part of a main body when the cleaning apparatus is mounted on the main body, wherein the edge portion is positioned on a straight line or away from the image bearing member with respect to the straight line connecting rotation centers of the first rotation axis and of the second rotation axis when the cleaning blade is located at the predetermined position.
US07983605B2
A developing member is disclosed which can lessen the occurring of banding. The developing member has a shaft member, an elastic layer provided on the shaft member, and a resin layer provided on the surface, wherein the resin layer contains a urethane resin and a non-reactive silicone compound, and the non-reactive silicone compound has a polyether moiety whose total number of carbon atoms ranges from 3 to 9.
US07983600B2
An image forming apparatus is provided. The image forming apparatus includes a single drive source, at least four photosensitive drums, a plurality of drum drive gears which are provided to correspond to the photosensitive drums, and a plurality of intermediate gears which are interposed between the drive source and each of the drum drive gears. A number of the intermediate gears provided for each of the photosensitive drums is same.
US07983598B2
A fixing device includes a rotatable fixing member, a pressing member, a drive input rotating body, a first frame, a support shaft, and at least one positioning member. The pressing member contacts the fixing member to form a fixing nip therebetween. The drive input rotating body receives an external driving force and transmits the driving force to the fixing member. The first frame supports the fixing member and the pressing member. The support shaft is provided on the first frame to support the drive input rotating body. At least one positioning member is supported by an image forming apparatus body when the fixing device is installed in the image forming apparatus body.
US07983590B2
A developing unit includes a developer cartridge for accommodating developer and including a first opening for enabling communication between an inside of the developer cartridge and an outside of the developer cartridge, a housing including a cartridge housing part and a second opening provided in a position opposite to the first opening and formed toward the cartridge housing part, a shutter including a third opening and being movable between an open position and a closed position, and a protruding portion provided at an upstream end portion of the third opening in a movement direction of the shutter from the open position to the closed position and including a first end at a side close to the first opening and a second end at a side close to the second opening. The first end protrudes more downstream in the movement direction than the second end.
US07983584B2
An image forming apparatus in which surplus tabbed sheets produced in one set of output can be utilized for the next set of output, without requiring a user to perform a laborious task. In the image forming apparatus, a CPU calculates the number of tabbed sheet groups which will be used for one set of image formation and the number of tabbed sheets which will be used from among the last tabbed sheet group. Among the last tabbed sheet group, surplus tabbed sheets which will be left unused in the one set of image formation are determined. If the number of tabbed sheets is equal to or less than the number of the surplus tabbed sheets, at least one of the surplus tabbed sheets is used to carry out two sets of image formation.
US07983579B2
A light-transmissive transfer belt used in the system for determining toner mass amount and methods for making the belt. A system and method, using the transparent transfer belt, is capable of determining an amount of toner mass present on a toner application surface, and the real-time adjustment of parameters controlling xerographic transfer performance in the system. The system includes transmission-based sensors alone and in combination with reflective-based sensors.
US07983573B2
An optical receiver apparatus and methods for mitigating intersymbol interference (ISI) in a differentially-encoded modulation transmission system by controlling constructive and destructive transfer functions. The receiver includes a bandwidth control element for controlling transfer function bandwidth, a transfer phase controller for controlling transfer function phase and/or an imbalancer for imbalancing the transfer functions for compensating for intersymbol interference and optimizing the quality of the received optical signal.
US07983568B2
Disclosed are an apparatus and a method for visible light communication, which apparatus uses an illuminator equipped with a plurality of light sources, so that the apparatus can be used for illumination, as well as for visible light communication. The visible light communication apparatus includes an illuminator for generation of the illumination light, the illuminator including a plurality of light sources with luminescence center wavelengths on mutually different visible regions; a communication amount adjuster for receipt of the plurality of communication data signals, and generation of each dummy data so that data to be transmitted through each of the plurality of LEDs has an equal communication amount; and a modulator for receipt of the plurality of communication data signals and their corresponding dummy data, and modulation of the received communication data signals and their corresponding received dummy data into driving signals for a plurality of LEDs configured as a light source.
US07983558B1
An optical control plane (OCP) distinct from an electronic control plane helps the setup of path routes in a DWDM network. The OCP determines the optical feasibility of any path route selected by the electronic control plane, such as operated under GMPLS protocol, and asks the electronic control plane for another path route if the optical feasibility is determined to be negative. The OCP can be set in a server or distributed across the nodes of the network.
US07983557B2
A camera consists of a first unit and a second unit removably connectable to the first unit. The first unit is provided with an imaging section including an optical system and an imaging device, that enables to capture high-quality images. The first unit is formed with a grip portion for holding and handling the camera as a combination of the first unit and the second unit. The second unit is provided with a driving device including a CPU, a lens driver circuit, a stop driver circuit and a timing generator, and a second imaging section including an optical system and an imaging device, that enables to capture relatively low-quality images. While the second unit is connected to the first unit, the driving device drives the imaging section of the first unit. While the second unit is not connected to the first unit, the driving device drives the imaging section of the second unit.
US07983556B2
A novel digital camera module includes an image capture device, a lens unit including a body, a housing including an opening for receiving the lens unit and positioning the lens unit with respect to the image capture device, and a contaminant trap formed by an isolated annular space between the lens unit and the opening of the housing. In a particular embodiment, the opening of the housing includes surfaces having at least two different perimeters, the smaller of which slidably engages the outer surface of the lens unit. The contaminant trap collects and contains any contaminants before they reach vulnerable components such as the image capture device and/or other optical components within the camera module.
US07983555B2
An exemplary camera module includes a barrel, a holder, and a compressed resilient spring member. The barrel includes a first cylindrical part and a first threaded part. The first threaded part includes external threads. The barrel further includes a first surface facing the object side. The holder includes a second cylindrical part and a second threaded part. The second threaded part includes internal threads. The holder further includes a second surface facing the image side. The barrel is coupled to the holder via the internal threads and the external threads. A fit between the internal threads and the external threads is a clearance fit. The resilient spring member is sandwiched between the first surface of the barrel and the second surface of the holder.
US07983546B2
The optical image stabilizer (100) includes a first movable part including a first lens (11a) having one of positive and negative optical powers, a second movable part including a second lens (11b) having the other of the optical powers, and an actuator driving the first and second movable parts in the directions opposite to each other with respect to a supporting member (13). The actuator includes a first element (110a, 110b) provided on the supporting member, a second element (16a, 16b) provided on the first movable part and facing a first face of the first element, and a third element (16c, 16d) provided on the second movable part and facing a second face formed on an opposite side of the first element from the first face. The first element is one of a magnet and a coil, and the second element and the third element are the other of them.
US07983545B2
An image blur correction unit includes the following elements. A holder member, holding either an imager or a lens that constitutes a part of a lens system, moves in a straight line on a plane orthogonal to the optical axis of the lens system. A movable member, attached to a frame that serves as an outermost component, supports the holder member. A guide member guides movement of the holder member relative to the frame. A driving section drives the holder member. The guide member includes a guide shaft fixed to the movable member and support portions provided for the frame, the support portions supporting the guide shaft. The movable member moves relative to the frame while being integrated with the guide shaft.
US07983541B2
The present invention provides a heat exchange system for a closed loop fuel delivery system. The heat exchange system generally includes a first pump, a heat exchanger, a high pressure pump pressurizes fuel. The heat exchanger, which is located downstream of the first pump, receives the pressurized fuel flow. The high pressure pump, which is located downstream of the heat exchanger, delivers a predetermined amount of fuel flow to a jet engine. The circulating pump receives fuel flow downstream of the heat exchanger and recirculates the fuel flow upstream of the heat exchanger.
US07983540B2
A heat exchanger has a laminar fluid flow path receivable between the heating plates of a high flow rate infusion unit to which heat is conducted by contact with the heating plates. A bubble trap and a valve are integrated with the heat exchanger. The bubble trap collects air from the infusate exiting the laminar flow path, and includes an air vent in contact with the infusate that vents the air from the bubble trap. The valve shuts off the flow of infusate if air is detected in the bubble trap.
US07983528B2
For multiple moving-image recorded on a storage medium, one piece of meta-data or each of multiple pieces of meta-data recorded for a part or all of the moving-image is managed by meta-data indices. A meta-data index keeps invalidity information indicating whether a piece of meta-data is going to be invalid and validity information indicating validity of the current piece of meta-data in the same form, when operations such as editing and processing are performed on a part or all of a moving-image that is an object of a piece of meta-data. When cutting-out occurs on a section of a moving-image that is an object of a piece of meta-data and the piece of meta-data cannot be recalculated, the invalidity information is copied to the validity information. In this manner, a meta-data added to the moving-image can be adapted and be used after the moving-image is edited.
US07983519B2
A photonic connection includes a first fiber and a second fiber. The first fiber has a core with a first predetermined pattern defined on or in a facet thereof, and the second fiber has a core with a second predetermined pattern defined on or in a facet thereof. The second predetermined pattern is complementary to the first predetermined pattern such that the first fiber or the second fiber fits into another of the second fiber or the first fiber at a single orientation and position.
US07983516B2
The present disclosure includes methods, devices, and systems for zinc oxide diodes for optical interconnections. One system includes a ZnO emitter confined within a circular geometry in an oxide layer on a silicon substrate. An optical waveguide is formed in the oxide layer and has an input coupled to the ZnO emitter. A detector is coupled to an output of the optical waveguide.
US07983512B2
An image processing system embeds at least one image inside a second image. The images are displayed together as a composite image. The first and second images are each tiled and have image pyramids comprising representations at different resolutions formed for them. The image processing system allows a user to zoom into and out of the embedded image, to a desired depth, using its image pyramid.
US07983508B2
A noise eliminating device may include a noise eliminating mechanism that eliminates an isolated noise in an image being photographed. The noise eliminating mechanism may include a noise pixel detection mechanism and a pixel correction mechanism. The noise pixel detection mechanism may detect a noise pixel by scanning the image. The pixel correction mechanism may correct a level of a detected noise pixel based on a level of a pixel located in a predetermined area from the noise pixel. A noise eliminating method for eliminating an isolated noise in an image being photographed may include detecting a noise pixel by scanning the image and correcting a level of the detected noise pixel based on a level of a pixel located in a predetermined area away from the noise pixel.
US07983507B2
An image forming device for forming an image on an image carrier using a different grayscale reproduction method for each of two or more different attributes contained in portions of the image. The image forming device forms a different standard pattern in one-to-one correspondence with each different attribute contained in the image portions, using a grayscale reproduction method used for reproducing image portions containing the attribute, detects density of each standard pattern formed by the standard pattern forming unit, sets, for each different attribute, a condition for correcting grayscale of the image portions containing the attribute, in accordance with the detected density, and corrects grayscale of the image portions in accordance with each condition set by the correction condition setting unit.
US07983503B2
A noise reduction apparatus is presented that includes groups of one or more serially connected non-linear filter units. Each of the filter unit groups are driven by decimated input image data at a different level of decimation and the output of at least one of these groups serves as one of a plurality of inputs to another group driven at a different decimation level.
US07983502B2
A dynamic tone mapping technique is presented that produces a local tone map for a sub-image of a wide-angle, high dynamic range (HDR), which is used in rendering the sub-image for display. The technique generally involves first computing a global tone map of the wide-angle, HDR image in advance of rendering the sub-image. The global tone map is then used during rendering to compute a local tone map based on the average luminance and contrast of the pixels of the sub-image. In addition, the sub-image can be tone mapped as part of the rendering of a sequence of sub-images during a viewer-executed panning and/or zooming session. In this case, the local tone maps can be kept from changing too rapidly by adding a hysteresis feature to smooth out the intensity changes between successive sub-images.
US07983494B2
A pixel data compression/decompression system, medium, and method, including determining the similarity between a first pixel data and a second pixel data adjacent to the first pixel data, selecting one of a first compression mode, where a difference between a compression ratio of the first pixel data and a compression ratio of the second pixel data is high, and a second compression mode, where a difference between a compression ratio of the first pixel data and a compression ratio of the second pixel data is low, based on the similarity, and compressing the first pixel data and the second pixel data based on the selected compression mode.
US07983491B2
A method, system, and machine-readable medium for classifying an image element as one of a plurality of categories, including assigning the image element based on a ratio between an unoccluded perimeter of the image element and an occluded perimeter of the image element and coding the image element according to a coding scheme associated with the category to which the image element is classified. Exemplary applications include image compression, where categories include image foreground and background layers.
US07983488B2
A facility is provided for recognizing blank and nearly blank images. In various embodiments, the facility receives an indication of an image, creates an analysis image based on the received image by detecting edges, determines an edge ratio for the analysis image, determines whether the edge ratio exceeds a threshold and, when the edge ratio does not exceed the threshold, identifies the received image as a blank image. The facility can include an edge detector component that creates an analysis image based on a selected image by detecting edges in the selected image, a calculator component that calculates an edge ratio for the analysis image, and an analysis component that determines whether the calculated edge ratio exceeds a threshold.
US07983487B2
A method and system determines a 3D pose of an object in a scene. Depth edges are determined from a set of images acquired of a scene including multiple objects while varying illumination in the scene. The depth edges are linked to form contours. The images are segmented into regions according to the contours. An occlusion graph is constructed using the regions. The occlusion graph includes a source node representing an unoccluded region of an unoccluded object in scene. The contour associated with the unoccluded region is compared with a set of silhouettes of the objects, in which each silhouette has a known pose. The known pose of a best matching silhouette is selected as the pose of the unoccluded object.
US07983486B2
A method of automatically categorizing an input image comprises extracting texture features of the input image and generating a signature vector based on extracted texture features. The generated signature vector is processed using at least one classifier to classify the input image.
US07983483B2
An image-data-acquisition control unit controls an image-data acquiring unit that acquires computer-recognizable image data, to accumulate the image data in a set of information units. A character-recognition control unit controls an optical character-recognizing unit that extracts a character from the set of image data accumulated by the image-data-acquisition control unit, to accumulate a group of characters obtained by the optical character-recognizing unit in a set of character information units. Once a start signal is received from a starting unit, the image-data-acquisition control unit and the character-recognition control unit continue to operate independently.
US07983482B2
A matching technology for determining the similarity between two objects at high velocity with high precision. The matching method for comparing a set of feature points of two objects projected to an N-dimensional space and determining the similarity between the two objects, includes a mapping step of mapping the set to a one-dimensional space, a pairing step of creating a set of pairs of a feature point of first object that is the most approximate to a feature point of second object, a partial-set creating step of partly extracting the pairs in small order of the pair distance from the set of the pairs of the feature points and creating a partial set of the pairs of the feature points, an average-value calculating step, and a determining step of determining the similarity on the basis of an average value of the distance.
US07983481B2
In order to match the color appearance of the display image on a monitor to that of a print image, the white point of the monitor and that of the viewing light upon viewing the print image are obtained, and a white point upon viewing the display image on the monitor and that upon viewing the print image are calculated using the white point of the monitor, that of the viewing light, and a reference white point. An input color is corrected using the calculated white points. At this time, as the reference white point, a white color which the human visual system perceives as white is used.
US07983480B2
A method and system for scanning a digital image for detecting the representation of an object, such as a face, and for reducing memory requirements of the computer system performing the image scan. One example method includes identifying an original image and downsamples the original image in an x-dimension and in a y-dimension to obtain a downsampled image that requires less storage space than the original digital image. A first scan is performed of the downsampled image to detect the representation of an object within the downsampled image. Then, the original digital image is divided into at least two image blocks, where each image block contains a portion of the original digital image. A second scan is then performed of each of the image blocks to detect the representation of the object within the image blocks.
US07983478B2
An exemplary method for handwritten character generation includes receiving one or more characters and, for the one or more received characters, generating handwritten characters using Hidden Markov Models trained for generating handwritten characters. In such a method the trained Hidden Markov Models can be adapted using a technique such as a maximum a posterior technique, a maximum likelihood linear regression technique or an Eigen-space technique.
US07983476B2
A working apparatus comprises a working unit which executes work on a work subject, and a calibration jig on which a plurality of markers is arranged in a radial pattern from a center point of markers, the plurality of markers being arranged in three dimensions, and the calibration jig being attached to a working unit such that a calibration reference point set of a working unit coincides with a center point of markers. According to such a composition, it becomes possible to calibrate a position of a working unit even when a portion of the jig containing a center point of markers is occluded during image measurement.
US07983470B2
For assessing the position and quality of joins a combined image of a join including a light line image and a grey value image is taken in the same sensor, but in two different regions of the sensor. The grey value image is evaluated to detect the quality of the join. This allows both the position and the quality of the join to be detected in a simple way.
US07983464B2
A method and system for segmentation of the corpus callosum in MR brain images is disclosed. The method utilizes an active shape model (ASM) with confidence weighting to iteratively adjust an initial corpus callosum contour to define a boundary of the corpus callosum in an MR image. An ASM is used to determine a displacement value in a perpendicular direction of the corpus callosum contour for each node of the corpus callosum contour. The displacement value for each node is then weighted based on a confidence of that displacement value. The ASM is then fitted to the adjusted contour. These steps are iteratively performed until the contour converges to define the corpus callosum boundary. This boundary can be further refined based on intensity distributions in object and background regions defined by the boundary.
US07983463B2
A method for suppressing tagged material in prepless colonoscopy includes identifying and segmenting multiple density classes, intensity classes, or both in a volumetric medical image of a patient including a volume of the patient's colon and classifying the volume of the patient's colon into a plurality of types based upon the identified and segmented density classes, intensity classes, or both. The method further includes subtracting, suppressing, or leaving the tagged material in the image in accordance with the type classifications to produce a resulting image and visualizing the resulting image.
US07983458B2
A capsule camera apparatus includes a swallowable housing, a light source within the housing, a camera within the housing for capturing a first digital image and a second digital image of a view of the camera illuminated by the light source, a a motion detector that detects a motion of the housing the first digital image and the second digital image, and a motion evaluator that selects a disposition of the second digital image, based on a metric on the motion. The disposition may include writing the second image into an archival storage or providing the second digital image to the outside by a wireless communication link.
US07983453B2
A verification apparatus includes: a detection section that detects some or all of junction points, endpoints and turning points of a physical trait of a body part on an input image as feature points, the physical trait being used for verification; and a search section that searches a registered image of the physical trait for a pattern that is the same as or similar to a pattern of the feature points in a center area of the image whose vertical center line is perpendicular to the direction of motion of the physical trait that horizontally moves on a surface on which the body part is put, the registered image being taken along a curved surface of the body part and the center area being between two lines each of which is a predetermined distance away from the center line in opposite directions.
US07983451B2
A method is provided for identifying and verifying a person using hand biometrics with an anti-spoofing measure. The method comprises acquiring (51) a first image (10) of a hand in a first configuration, acquiring (52) a second image (30, 40) of the hand in one of the first and a second configuration for comparison with the first image (10), determining (52) whether a person can be identified from at least one of the first image (10) and the second image (30, 40), and determining (55) from a comparison of the second image (30, 40) with the first image (10) whether the hand is a counterfeit.
US07983447B2
An imaging environment that greatly affects image recognition accuracy is recognized for applications in onboard systems of various sorts including imaging devices.An imaging device for imaging areas around the vehicle is mounted on a vehicle. Before executing image recognition processing, information is acquired on objects and texture, such as traffic signs and pedestrian crossings, present within a field of view of the imaging device. An object or texture present within the field of view is then recognized by an image recognition section. Degrees of distortion and defocus of a shape or texture of the object recognized are calculated based on the shape or texture of the object recognized and information previously acquired on the objects or texture. Imaging environment, such as water droplets or dirt on a lens, and whether fog occurs or not, is then recognized based on the degrees of distortion and defocus calculated from the shape or texture of the object recognized.
US07983443B2
A method of managing media content provides a media signal in which perceptible portions are intentionally degraded in perceptual quality. In response to receiving authorization, the method transforms the media signal into a higher quality media signal in which the intentional degradation is corrected. In addition, the media content is transformed by embedding an identifying code into the higher quality media signal. Media signal processing hardware includes a receiver of the media signal and activation hardware that transforms the media signal content in response to authorization, including embedding the identifying code.
US07983432B2
The present invention provides methods and apparatuses for an audio transducer. The audio transducer is excited by driving a paddle of a diaphragm. A plurality of node regions of a paddle is determined for the higher-order modal components, which correspond to resonance frequencies and have an order greater than one. An intersection region of at least two higher-order modal components is identified, in which an excitation point is located with the intersection region. The diaphragm of the audio transducer includes a frame, at least one hinge, and a paddle. The paddle connects to the frame by the at least one hinge and is excited by a signal source at an excitation point to produce an acoustic signal.
US07983426B2
A method for monitoring and reporting sound pressure level exposure for a user of a first communication device (104) is implemented in one embodiment when the device measures a sound pressure level (SPL) of the surrounding environment. The device stores at least the SPL measurement in a memory, producing an SPL exposure record, and displays a visual representation of the SPL exposure record on a display screen (212). In another embodiment, the SPL is measured by a second communication device (102) and combined with a known SPL for an output audio transducer (306) of the second device, producing a user sound exposure level. The user sound exposure level is transmitted to the first communication device. The user is notified when the user sound exposure level exceeds a predetermined threshold. A server (112) may also be used to track SPLs over time and recommend corrective action when exposure limits are exceeded.
US07983425B2
The present invention provides a method for detecting acoustic shock in an audio input signal (s(t)), comprising the steps of monitoring the input signal (s(t)) in the time-domain. Thereby detecting the signal floor (Sn), detecting the peak level of the input signal (L), detecting the attack time of the input signal (t1-t0), detecting the duration of the input signal (T). Based on those detections, determining a shock contrast level (SCL) as difference between the peak level (L) and the signal floor (Sn), determining a shock index (SI) by use of a shock index normalization constant (σ) and comparing the shock contrast level (SCL) and the shock index (SI) with respective thresholds and indicating an acoustic shock if one or both thresholds are exceeded. Thus, the present method provides a quick and reliable shock detector that operates in the time-domain. The shock detection takes place with zero time delay, or even predicts the shock before it fully goes through the signal processing.
US07983420B2
A system and method are provided for imaging job authorization. The method comprises: an authorization server receiving a request from a first node print subsystem to communicate an imaging job; in response to analyzing imaging job information, sending an access inquiry to a second node; the authorization server receiving an authorization, including a one-time use public encryption key, from the second node; sending a confirmation, including the public key, to the first node print subsystem; the first node encrypting the imaging job using the public key; sending the encrypted imaging job to the second node from the first node; and, the second node decrypting the imaging job using a private key corresponding to the public key. The analyzed imaging job information used for access control may include user ID, job content, first node ID, first node communication address, imaging job access control, time/date, imaging job size, or imaging job options.
US07983417B2
The present invention is suitable for use in a multi-encrypted system that dynamically allocates stream identifiers in a secondary overlay stream depending upon the identifiers in a primary encrypted stream. The primary encrypted input stream is monitored to determine the presence of all identifier values. Once the identifier values are determined, the values are stored in an allocation table and marked as ‘in-use’ to ensure that these identifier values are not allocated to any of the secondary overlay streams. The primary encrypted stream is monitored and the allocation table is updated continuously to detect any changes or conflicts to the identifier values, and the secondary overlay streams are dynamically updated accordingly.
US07983412B2
A method and system for automating customer slamming and cramming complaints includes an automated reporting system having one or more receiving devices and a complaint module. Customers who want to report a slam or cram access the automated reporting system and report the complaint without having to speak with a customer service representative. The complaint module obtains the customer telephone number and retrieves customer account information using the customer telephone number. Using the customer account information, the complaint module extrapolates a type of complaint for the customer complaint and prompts the customer for information regarding the customer complaint and the type of the complaint. The customer provides customer responses to the prompts and the complaint module provides an indication to the customer regarding each customer response. Once the customer complaint has been resolved, the complaint module stores information regarding the slam or cram for reporting requirements and tracking purposes.
US07983411B2
A conversational agent receives a textual user message and escalates the user to a live agent if predetermined criteria are met.
US07983406B2
A method is disclosed to determine the presence of one or more cellular phones in the same sound field as an endpoint that is dedicated for teleconferencing, such as a speakerphone. The teleconference bridge of the illustrative embodiment continually receives geo-location information about the cell phone. Based on the geo-location of the cell phone relative to the position of the speakerphone, the bridge determines whether to include or exclude signals that are received from the cell phone when preparing a signal for transmission to the speakerphone during a conference call. The bridge also determines whether to refrain from transmitting an audio signal to the cell phone, when the bridge infers that the cell phone is being used as a satellite microphone, such as when the cell phone is placed on a conference room table. As a result, each conference call participant is able to use his or her own cell phone as a personal satellite microphone, which can improve the sound quality of the conference call.
US07983397B2
The present invention relates to a device and method for determining one or more characteristics of radiation using a sensor comprising one or more detector units capable of counting the number of photon or charged particle of said radiation impinging on said sensor in or above a determined energy range.
US07983395B2
There are provided an anode target which generates X-rays due to electrons e being incident, an emitter source which emits electrons e to be incident into the anode target, a ring-shaped recoil electron capturing structure which surrounds an orbit of electrons e heading from the emitter source toward the anode target, and captures electrons e emitted from the emitter source and recoiled on the anode target, and a vacuum envelop which keeps at least a periphery of the anode target, the emitter source, and the recoil electron capturing structure at a predetermined degree of vacuum, and the recoil electron capturing structure has a first member formed from strengthened copper which is exposed to the inside of the recoil electron capturing structure, and a second member formed from copper which is disposed at the outside in the radial direction of the first member.
US07983392B2
A method for obtaining an x-ray image stores an association between a digital radiology receiver panel, a label that is applied to one or more surfaces of the digital radiology receiver panel, and an x-ray imaging room. A response to an operator instruction designates the digital radiology receiver panel having the stored association as an active digital radiology receiver panel in the x-ray imaging room. Instructions are transmitted wirelessly to the active digital radiology receiver panel. Image data is obtained from the active digital radiology receiver panel following exposure to x-ray radiation.
US07983390B2
In energy subtraction processing, grid information representing grid use conditions at the time of imaging operations for a plurality of radiation images of an object is acquired. Weight factors are adjusted in accordance with the grid information, which has been acquired. A weighted addition or subtraction process is performed on corresponding pixels in the plurality of the radiation images of the object by use of the weight factors, which have thus been adjusted. A constituent image representing a predetermined constituent in the object is thus formed.
US07983388B2
An X-ray analysis instrument, in particular, an X-ray diffractometer (21), has an X-ray source (22; SC) that emits an X-ray beam (23), an X-ray optics (24), in particular a multi-layer X-ray mirror, and a collimator mechanism (BM), wherein the collimator mechanism (BM) forms an aperture window (2, 2′) with an aperture opening (3, 3′) through which at least part (26) of the X-ray beam (23) passes. The collimator mechanism (BM) comprises means for gradual movement of the aperture window (2, 2′) in at least one direction (A/B, x, y) transversely to the X-ray beam (23), the aperture opening (3, 3′) is at least as large as the cross-section (32) of the X-ray beam (23) at the location of the aperture window (2, 2′), and the path of movement (VWx, VWy) of the aperture window (2, 2′), which is accessible by the collimator mechanism (BM), in the at least one direction (A/B, x, y) is at least twice as large as the extension (RSx, RSy) of the X-ray beam (23) at the location of the aperture window (2, 2′) in this direction (A/B, x, y). The X-ray analysis instrument offers a wider scope of beam conditioning possibilities.
US07983387B1
The different advantageous embodiments provide a system for identifying a likelihood of detecting objects with a backscatter x-ray system comprising a structure having a number of objects, a plurality of databases, and a processor unit configured to execute a detection analysis process. The processor unit executes the detection analysis process to identify the number of objects, identify a number of densities associated with each of the number of objects, determine a likelihood of detecting each of the number of objects with the backscatter x-ray system, and generate a three-dimensional diagram of the likelihood of detecting each of the number of objects.
US07983386B2
An apparatus for carrying out both x-ray diffraction (XRD) and x-ray fluorescence (XRF) analysis of a crystalline sample. A sample holder is located within an evacuable chamber. An x-ray fluorescence source and separate x-ray diffraction source are mounted within the evacuable chamber. An XRF detection arrangement is also provided, for detecting secondary x-rays emitted from the surface of the crystalline sample as a result of illumination by x-rays from the said x-ray fluorescence source. An XRD detection arrangement is then provided for detecting x-rays of a characteristic wavelength which have been diffracted by the crystalline sample. A moveable XRD support assembly is provided, comprising a first part configured to mount the XRD source for relative movement between the XRD source and the sample holder, and a second part configured to mount the XRD detection arrangement for relative movement between the XRD detection arrangement and the sample holder.
US07983385B2
A computed tomography system (100) includes an x-ray source (112) that rotates about an examination region (108) and translates along a longitudinal axis (120). The x-ray source (112) remains at a first location on the longitudinal axis (120) while rotating about the examination region (108), accelerates to a scanning speed and performs a fly-by scan of a region of interest (220) in which at least one hundred and eighty degrees plus a fan angle of data is acquired. At least one detector (124) detects x-rays radiated by the x-ray source (112) that traverses the examination region (108) and generates signals indicative thereof. A reconstructor (132) reconstructs the signals to generate volumetric image data.
US07983384B2
The aim of the invention is to produce an x-ray computed tomography arrangement in which there is no axial offset between the path of the focal spot and the x-ray detector arc. Said aim is achieved by: —arranging the x-ray detector arc and the target around the examination cross-section within a radiation plane such that the x-ray focal spots generated by the deflected electron beam of the electron beam generator lie within an axial plane, the radiation plane, along with the active detector elements; —disposing the x-ray detector arc behind the target in a radial direction such that each imaginary x-ray extending from a focal spot position on the target to a detector element of the x-ray detector arc penetrates the target, which lies in front of the point of incidence on the x-ray detector arc in the direction of radiation, in the area in which the target and the x-ray detector arc angularly overlap; —producing the target from a target member which is preferably made of a material that has a low atomic number and great heat storage capacity or thermal conductance; —applying an electron-decelerating material layer, preferably made of a refractory material that has a high atomic number, to the side of the target member which faces the electron beam.
US07983379B2
An exemplary shift register (20) includes a plurality of shift register units (200). The shift register units receive a clock signal and an inverse clock signal and output a plurality of shift register signals in sequence. The outputs waveforms of pre-stage shift register unit and the rear-stage shift register unit have no overlapping signals.
US07983377B2
An emergency core cooling system directly injects emergency core cooling water, which is supplied from a high-pressure safety injection pump or a safety injection tank for a pressurized light water reactor, into a reactor vessel downcomer. A pipe connector is completely removed from between each direct vessel injection nozzle and each injection extension duct installed on an outer surface of the core barrel, which are opposite to each other. An emergency core cooling water intake port, through which the water is injected from each direct vessel injection nozzle, is formed on the surface of each injection extension duct facing an axis of each direct vessel injection nozzle. Thereby, a structure in which a jet of the emergency core cooling water flows into the injection extension ducts is adopted in a hydraulic connection fashion.
US07983375B2
A novel and useful variable delay digitally controlled crystal oscillator (DCXO) buffer (i.e. slicer). A conventional slicer following the DCXO is modified to introduce a controlled random variable delay into the buffered DCXO clock. The resultant output clock signal is then used as input to the TDC of an ADPLL circuit to alleviate the subharmonic mixing based deterioration caused by LO/TX coupling through the crystal pins, and to alleviate the dead-beat effects caused by the finite resolution of the TDC. Two mechanisms for introducing variable delay into the buffered DCXO output clock signal are presented: a first mechanism that creates variable delay in fine steps and a second mechanism that creates variable delay in coarse steps. In both mechanisms, switches are incorporated into the slicer circuitry and controlled using digital bit sequences which may comprise dithering signals. The switches are turned on and off via the digital bit sequences which varies the delay of the slicer clock output which serves to shift the rising and falling transition points of the resultant output clock signal. The jitter is shifted to higher frequencies where it is filtered out by the PLL loop filter.
US07983373B2
A 10GBASE-T clocking method that limits EMI and increases SNR, while reducing power and conserving chip space is provided. The method includes simultaneous clocking of transmitters in an analog front end of a 10 gigabit Ethernet. The method includes providing at least two channels to a 10GBase-T analog front end, where the channel has at least a transmitter port and a receiver port, and providing at least two phase interpreters to the analog front end, where each phase interpreter is dedicated to one receiver port. A central clock generator is disposed to distribute a transmit clock to the phase interpreters and to the transmitter ports, where the transmit clock is further provided to the receiver ports from the phase interpreters. Any clock delay between the clock generator and each channel is balanced and clock phases between the channels are matched.
US07983352B2
A telecommunication network component, comprising: a memory configured to store instructions, and a processor configured to execute the stored instructions, the instructions comprising: determining a plurality of power allocation adjustments for signals transmitted via an antenna array that promotes decision-feedback detection without using channel state information, and outputting the power allocation adjustments to the array. Also disclosed is a power allocation method comprising: determining a power allocation scheme that promotes decision-feedback detection in a multiple-input and multiple-output system without using channel state information, and implementing the power allocation scheme on an antenna array by modifying an adjustment for each of a plurality of antennas in the array.
US07983351B2
A communication apparatus includes a grouping controlling unit hierarchically groups frequency channels so that the number of channels included in a group of a layer becomes smaller than the number of channels included in a group of a layer immediately above; and a propagation path information estimating unit that estimates propagation path information of the channels. The apparatus also includes an average value calculating unit that calculates an average value of the propagation path information for each group in a highest layer with the estimate values, and calculates the estimate values used in each layer based on an average value of a layer immediately above to calculate an average value of the propagation path information for each group in other layers with the estimate values of the each layer; and a feedback unit that feeds back an average value acquired in each group as feedback information.
US07983350B1
In a transmitter of an orthogonal frequency division multiple access (OFDMA) system, a subchannelization module generates an OFDMA symbol with data on multiple subcarriers, from received incoming data packets. An input controller applies a first formula to determine a first index of each received data packet, and stores each received data packet at an address in memory according to its first index. An output controller applies a second formula to determine the nature of the data to be carried by each subcarrier in the OFDMA symbol and, if said second formula indicates that a data subcarrier should be output, reads the data from said memory, wherein said data packets are stored in said memory at addresses such that the data can be read out at least piecewise sequentially when generating the OFDMA symbol.
US07983349B2
A telecommunication interface is disclosed. One method of the invention provides for interfacing with guided line networks that receive and transmit data using ultra-wideband pulse transmissions.
US07983346B2
A method of encoding/decoding a digital signal using linear quantization by sections, and an apparatus for the same are provided. The method of encoding includes: converting a digital input signal, and removing redundant information from the digital signal; allocating a number of bits allocated to each predetermined quantized unit considering the importance of the digital signal; dividing the distribution of signal values into predetermined sections based on the predetermined quantized units, and linear quantizing data converted pin the operation of converting the digital input signal by sections; and generating a bit stream from the linear quantized data and predetermined side information. Therefore, a sound quality is improved compared to a sound quality produced by conventional linear quantizing devices and a complexity of a non-linear quantizing device is reduced.
US07983342B2
A macro-block level parallel video decoder for a parallel processing environment is provided. The video decoder includes a Variable Length Decoding (VLD) block for decoding the encoded Discrete Cosine Transform (DCT) coefficients, a master node that receives the decoded DCT coefficients, and multiple slave nodes/processors for parallel implementation of Inverse Discrete Cosine Transform (IDCT) and motion compensation at the macro-block level. Also provided is a method for macro-block level video decoding in a parallel processing system.
US07983340B2
A key frame extraction system and method for extracting key frames from a video based on motion analysis of frames within the video. Key frames are highlight frames that are effective in summarizing a video sequence. This allows a user to quickly find a desired spot in a video is long and contains differing subject matter. The key frame extraction system and method uses a triangle model of the motion energy in each frame and extracts key frames based on this model. More specifically, motion analysis is performed on the video frames in order to identify motion acceleration and motion deceleration points within the frames. A triangle model of motion then is constructed based on results of the motion analysis. The apex of the triangle represents a turning point between motion acceleration and motion deceleration. Frames corresponding to this apex are selected as key frames.
US07983334B2
A method between terminals in a cooperative UWB pulse telecommunications system including a source terminal, a relay terminal, and a recipient terminal, the method including: transmitting, at the source terminal, a data symbol for the recipient terminal as a source signal constituted by a sequence of identical frames, the sequence corresponding to a symbol time, and each frame containing a pulse that is position-modulated by a PPM modulation alphabet; receiving, at the relay terminal, the source signal; detecting, at the relay terminal, a modulation position of a pulse in at least one frame of the source signal, referred to as the first position; transmitting, at the relay terminal, a relayed signal containing, in at least one predetermined subsequent frame of the symbol time, a pulse of which a position, referred to as a second position, is obtained from the first position by a permutation of the PPM modulation alphabet.
US07983333B2
An equalizer is disclosed that compensates for non-linear effects resulting from a transmitter, a receiver, and/or a communication channel in a communication system. A non-linear decision feedback equalizer compensates for the non-linear effects impressed onto a received symbol by selecting between equalization coefficients based upon a previous received symbol. The received symbol may be represented in form of logic signals based on the binary number system. The two symbols most commonly chosen to represent the two logic values taken on by binary symbols are binary zero and binary one. When the previous received symbol is a binary zero, the non-linear decision feedback equalizer selects an equalization coefficient corresponding to binary zero to compensate for the non-linear effects impressed onto the received symbol. Likewise, when the previous received symbol is a binary one, the non-linear decision feedback equalizer selects an equalization coefficient corresponding to binary one to compensate for the non-linear effects impressed onto the received symbol.
US07983320B2
An impulse radio communications system using one or more subcarriers to communicate information from an impulse radio transmitter to an impulse radio receiver. The impulse radio communication system is an ultrawide-band time domain system. The use of subcarriers provides impulse radio transmissions added channelization, smoothing and fidelity. Subcarriers of different frequencies or waveforms can be used to add channelization of impulse radio signals. Thus, an impulse radio link can communicate many independent channels simultaneously by employing different subcarriers for each channel. The impulse radio uses modulated subcarrier(s) for time positioning a periodic timing signal or a coded timing signal. Alternatively, the coded timing signal can be summed or mixed with the modulated subcarrier(s) and the resultant signal is used to time modulate the periodic timing signal. Direct digital modulation of data is another form of subcarrier modulation for impulse radio signals. Direct digital modulation can be used alone to time modulate the periodic timing signal or the direct digitally modulated the periodic timing signal can be further modulated with one or more modulated subcarrier signals. Linearization of a time modulator permits the impulse radio transmitter and receiver to generate time delays having the necessary accuracy for impulse radio communications.
US07983314B2
Techniques, devices and applications of polarization stable lasers to provide laser operations against changes, variations or fluctuations in optical polarization in a laser cavity.
US07983306B2
A system for isolating individual channels in a broadcast signal is provided. The system includes a plurality of multipliers, each having an input and an output. A summer coupled to the outputs of each of the plurality of multipliers is provided to generate an output. A multiplication factor system provides a multiplication factor to each of the multipliers to select a predetermined frequency channel of the input signal.
US07983304B2
An audio frame format includes a channel field indicating a number of audio multi-channels, an ignore bit indicating whether or not an audio sample is present in a predetermined region of a packet format, and an A channel audio sample field for transmitting the audio sample. Further, the audio frame format includes a B channel audio sample field for transmitting the audio sample, and a payload of the packet that includes a repetition of an audio frame.
US07983294B2
A method of transmitting a message via an uplink access channel in a wireless communication system is disclosed. The method includes initiating a first preamble access procedure with Node B, receiving from Node B a first acknowledgement indication with respect to the first access preamble procedure, transmitting to Node B a first message upon receipt of the first acknowledgement indication, and receiving from Node B a second acknowledgment indication regarding the first message.
US07983293B2
If a trigger unit in a set range is received after a transmission, an annunciation portion is advised of a likelihood of radio interference. In this case, no trigger signal is supplied. If identifier information that has been received corresponds to the identifier information stored in a memory after the transmission of a trigger signal, a count value remains untouched (YES in S55). It is apparent that identifier information was transmitted before from one of wheel-side units that has supplied a trigger signal, and that the trigger signal has not been received by a desired one of the wheel-side units. An operator can supply a trigger signal again through a change in relative position or the like.
US07983292B2
A base station carrying out communications with a mobile station with an Orthogonal Frequency Division Multiplexing (OFDM) method by using a predetermined frequency band out of a transmission band is disclosed. The base station includes an allocation portion that allocates, for a mobile station performing peripheral cell search, a band that includes a center frequency on a raster of a first band and has a bandwidth equal to or greater than a bandwidth of a second band with which a synchronization channel is transmitted.
US07983286B2
A transport LAN segment service is provided over a transport network. The transport network will include edge devices configured to support one or more transparent LAN segments. Configuration is simplified by advertising TLS-port-label information, layer 2 address learning, and multicasting when the needed configuration information has not yet been learned or discovered.
US07983282B2
Methods, systems, and apparatuses are disclosed for enabling a virtual personalized network. Communications are established with a personal digital gateway to control access, sharing, security, and/or management of up-to-date personalized data exchanged between or among a plurality of associated communications devices and/or communications networks. The associated communications devices are owned, operated, and/or accessed by a common user.
US07983275B2
A method and device for local area network (LAN) emulation over an Infiniband (IB) fabric. An IB LAN driver at a first node on an IB fabric receives the port and associated local identifier (LID) of one or more remote peer nodes on the IB fabric. An IEEE 802.3 Ethernet MAC address with one LID imbedded is generated. The imbedded LID is for one or more remote peer nodes. The IB LAN driver sends the Ethernet MAC address to an Address Resolution Protocol (ARP). A logical address of a remote peer node is generated by a network protocol. The logical address is mapped to an Ethernet MAC address. The IB LAN driver sends the Ethernet MAC address onto the IB fabric to the one or more remote peer nodes. The remote peer nodes appear to reside on an Ethernet network to the network protocol.
US07983273B2
A scheduling apparatus for a switch includes multiple schedulers which are assigned in a variety of ways to non-intersecting control domains for establishing connections through the switch. The control domains are defined by spatial and temporal aspects. The control domains may be dynamically selected and assigned to schedulers in a manner that achieves a high throughput gain. Control domains may be considered in a cyclic and/or a pipeline discipline for accommodating connection requests. The invention enables the realization of a highly scalable controller of a switching node of fine granularity that scales to capacities of the order of hundreds of terabits per second.
US07983271B2
Quality of Service (QoS) support is provided by a Tiered Contention Multiple Access (TCMA) distributed medium access protocol that schedules transmission of different types of traffic based on their service quality specifications. In one embodiment, a wireless station is supplied with data from a source having a lower QoS priority QoS(A), such as file transfer data. Another wireless station is supplied with data from a source having a higher QoS priority QoS(B). Each wireless station can determine the urgency class of its pending packets according to a scheduling algorithm. There are several urgency classes which indicate the desired ordering. Pending packets in a given urgency class are transmitted before transmitting packets of a lower urgency class by relying on class-differentiated urgency arbitration times (UATs), which are the idle time intervals required before the random backoff counter is decreased.
US07983265B1
Method for and system validating a network packet is provided. The method includes receiving a network packet at a port of a network device, the packet including a first indicia value and a second indicia value; comparing the first indicia value of the packet with at least a first value stored at the network device; comparing the second indicia value of the packet with at least a second value stored at the network device; and processing the packet if the first indicia value matches with the first value and the second indicia value matches with the second value; wherein the first indicia value is a partition key that restricts communication between a packet source and at least one destination; and the second indicia value is one or more of a source address and a destination address, where a same physical port of a source is assigned more than one source address.
US07983258B1
Techniques are described for dynamically building an Ethernet virtual local area network (VLAN) interface in a network device. The techniques allow dynamic building of a second VLAN interface over a first VLAN interface statically built over an Ethernet port configured to support dynamic VLANs in a network device. A network device may receive a plurality of Ethernet packets from subscriber devices and dynamically build a second VLAN interface over the first VLAN interface for each of the subscribers. Once the second VLAN interface is built, the network device dynamically builds interface columns over the second VLAN interface for each protocol associated with the Ethernet packets. The network device may then authenticate a user associated with the plurality of Ethernet packets. Once the user has logged out of the network device, the network device may tear down the interface columns while persistently maintaining the corresponding second VLAN interface.
US07983256B2
A broadcast-content transmitting apparatus includes a content input unit (201) that receives frame data including a broadcast content and a ULE encapsulating unit (203) that performs a predetermined encapsulation process on the input frame data. The transmitting apparatus further includes an SNDU→DDB unit (212) or an SNDU→MODULE unit (213) that form the encapsulated frame data into a DDB, which is a predetermined block unit, generate a DII, which is information concerning the DDB, and output the DDB and the DII as a section based on a predetermined data carousel scheme and a transmitting unit (204) that transmits the section output from the SNDU→DDB unit (212) or the SNDU→MODULE unit (213) to a terrestrial digital broadcasting network.
US07983255B2
A second VLAN tag is prepended to a packet prepended with a first VLAN tag when the packet is forwarded from a first port to a second port to result in an Q-in-Q packet. The second port has output connected to input of a third port. A third VLAN tag is prepended to the Q-in-Q packet when the Q-in-Q packet is forwarded from the third port to a fourth port to result in an Q-in-Q-in-Q packet.In another embodiment, a third VLAN tag is stripped from a Q-in-Q-in-Q packet prepended with first, second, and third VLAN tags to result in a Q-in-Q packet when the Q-in-Q-in-Q packet is forwarded from a first port to a second port. The second port has output connected to input of a third port. The second VLAN tag is stripped from the Q-in-Q packet.
US07983251B2
Provided are a method and apparatus for providing fast access to a broadcasting service transferred. The apparatus includes a reception unit for receiving one or more transmission frame; a transmission frame processing unit for analyzing access information required to access a turbo stream for a primary service to be primarily processed from a predetermined region of each transmission frame and accessing the turbo stream for the primary service of each transmission frame by using the analyzed access information; and a turbo stream processing unit for processing the turbo stream.
US07983246B2
A multimedia access system includes: a database including user equipment spec information; an application server for transcoding multimedia data to be transmitted in accordance with user equipment spec information of a receiver side in the database; and an addressing unit for addressing a transmission packet so that that the multimedia data to be transmitted is transcoded by the application server.
US07983238B2
A method for branching data in a mobile communication terminal to perform data communication between a mobile station and a network which have media access control sublayers. In a data sending mode, each of the media access control sublayers of the mobile station and network attaches logical channel types based on traffic characteristic information and a radio bearer status to a media access control header contained in data to be sent. Then, each of the media access control sublayers branches the data to be sent, to transport channels corresponding to the attached logical channel types. In a data receiving mode, each of the media access control sublayers determines logical channels corresponding to logical channel types of a media access control header contained in received data. Then, each of the media access control sublayers branches the received data to the determined logical channels. Each of the media access control sublayers performs mapping and multiplexing/demultiplexing between logical channels and transport channels according to traffic characteristics to branch data. Therefore, it is possible to efficiently provide various multimedia and packet services.
US07983230B1
A method for controlling transmit power of a node in wireless network, such as, e.g., an ad-hoc wireless network operating in accordance with a carrier sense multiple access (CSMA) protocol and where asymmetrical radio links may exist. During a request to send (RTS) and clear to send (CTS) exchange between a first node and a second node, both a request to send (RTS) packet and a probing request to send (PrRTS) packet are transmitted from the first node to the second node. The transmit power and data rate of the PrRTS packet may be different from the transmit power and data rate of the RTS packet. In response, the second node returns a CTS packet that includes a signal to noise ratio (SNR) for both the RTS packet and the PrRTS packet. A correction factor for data transmit power is then computed based in part on both the SNR for the RTS and the SNR for the PrRTS, and a data packet is thereafter transmitted at a power level that has been modified in accordance with the correction factor. The correction factor may further aid the estimation of the signal-to-noise-and-interference ratio (S/(N+I)) at a receiving node, which enables a sending node either to overcome the interference by adjusting the transmit power or avoid the interference by not accessing the channel until it hears the node again.
US07983226B2
Apparatus, and an associated method, for facilitating exchange of configuration indicia associated with a mobile node operable in a radio communication system. The mobile node is dynamically-configurable, and includes a logic tree. The indicia is provided to a network manager responsive to request therefore or upon initiation by the mobile node. When initiated at the network, a request message generator located at a network manager generates a get message to request that certain configuration indicia be provided to the network manager. The mobile node, upon delivery of the get message thereto, retrieves the requested information, at a selected level of detail, and returns the indicia to the network manager.
US07983225B2
An apparatus and method of a wireless network timing transmission of multiple BSSID beacons is disclosed. The method includes identifying multiple personalities of the wireless network, wherein a separate MAC address corresponding with each of the personalities. A beacon type is assigned for each of the personalities. During each transmission interval, a plurality of the beacon types are consecutively transmitted, wherein the different beacon types are consecutively spaced during transmission by a predetermined inter-frame spacing, wherein the predetermined inter-frame spacing is substantially less than an air-time duration of each transmission interval.
US07983217B2
The high quality PCS communications are enabled in environments where adjacent PCS service bands operate with out-of-band harmonics that would otherwise interfere with the system's operation. The highly bandwidth-efficient communications method combines a form of time division duplex (TDD), frequency division duplex (FDD), time division multiple access (TDMA), orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM), spatial diversity, and polarization diversity in various unique combinations. The method provides excellent fade resistance. The method enables changing a user's available bandwidth on demand by assigning additional TDMA slots during the user's session.
US07983210B2
A method for scanning a TDMA channel by a mobile station in a wireless communications landscape is disclosed. A mobile station detects RF energy on a TDMA channel to detect activity in the detected RF energy. The mobile station maintains knowledge of previous activity on the channel. If activity is present on the channel, the mobile station performs inspection of the activity to determine whether the activity is activity of interest, wherein the activity is activity of interest based on a comparison of the activity with the previous activity. The mobile station aborts the inspection of the activity, if activity is not present on the channel and the mobile station aborts the inspection of the activity, if the determined activity is not activity of interest.
US07983209B2
A system and method for converting a schema based synchronous service to a schema based asynchronous service. The asynchronous service for implementing on a server configured for communication with a respective client over a network. The system and method comprising a subscription module for identifying a port type with each notification method added to a description of the synchronous service and for associating a subscription operation with the identified port type. The system and method can also include an artifact module for generating at least one conversion artifact related to the added notification method, the conversion artifact configured for use by a developer to assist in developing the supporting clients of the asynchronous service as well as the asynchronous service itself. The system and method can also include an integration module for combining the notification methods and subscription operations and conversion artifacts to produce a description of the asynchronous service. The developer uses the asynchronous service description for generating a service implementation of the schema based asynchronous service to include appropriate business logic for subsequent installation in the server as an asynchronous service interface.
US07983196B2
A broadcast device in a tree-type broadcast system forming plural hierarchy levels with the broadcast device located at the top and connecting the nodes so as to be sequentially transferred from higher to lower nodes, whereinthe nodes select a first mode determining a reconnection destination by acquiring node information from a server or a second mode determining a reconnection destination by acquiring node information of the reconnection destination candidate, and determines the reconnection destination by acquiring the node information according to the mode currently selected when the higher nodes are disconnected and the node except for the own is reconnected, andthe broadcast device monitors a load status of the server, and broadcasts to switch selection to the second mode to thereby enable sequential transfer of the switch instruction from the higher to the lower nodes when a monitor level becomes a threshold level or more.
US07983193B2
To provide an information distribution system which forms a tree-shaped hierarchical structure and distributes contents information, and in which it is possible for a connection destination of a terminal apparatus newly participating in a hierarchical structure of a distribution channel to be selected by a user of the terminal apparatus. A terminal apparatus, when participating in a hierarchical structure of a certain distribution channel, acquires information on the hierarchical structure, and displays participation statuses in the hierarchical structure of a plurality of terminal apparatus configuring the hierarchical structure in a predetermined topology information display area 22. A user of a terminal apparatus selects at least one terminal apparatus, among the plurality of terminal apparatus whose participation statuses are displayed, as a connection destination candidate, and connects the connection destination candidate as an upper layer terminal apparatus.
US07983188B2
In one of many possible embodiments, a system includes a monitoring portal configured to receive state information descriptive of usage of a plurality of communication services provided on a plurality of communication networks of different types and to make the state information available to a subscriber of the plurality of communication services, in substantially real time.
US07983181B1
A technique for negotiating the width of a link between a first device and a second device includes detecting, during initialization, a respective signal on one or more control lines associated with at least a portion of an N-bit link. The N-bit link is configured as a single link having a width of N or multiple sublinks having a width less than N based on a respective value of the respective signal on the one or more control lines.
US07983170B2
IP packets are scheduled at source devices such as cell phones on a private network that connect to the Internet at an edge device. A private traffic controller by the edge device detects pre-Internet congestion on the private network. The private traffic controller uses in-band piggybacked signaling of policy changes by intercepting return packets to the source devices and modifying bits such as DSCP bits in the header. Source traffic controllers in the source devices read the modified DSCP bits and implement specified policy changes, dropping or delaying packets at the source device before transmission. Congestion on RF links from cell phones is reduced by the source traffic controllers dropping packets before transmission. The source device limits or drops future packets in response to the policies signaled by the DSCP bits. Rather than indicate the existing packet's priority, private DSCP bits signal policy changes to the source device.
US07983167B1
A first sub-switch for a network switch includes a plurality of ports. A forwarding engine communicates with the ports. A control plane processor communicates with the forwarding engine. A first sub-switch interface communicates with the forwarding engine and receives a path message from a second sub-switch in the network switch. A second sub-switch interface communicates with the forwarding engine, transmits the path message to a third sub-switch in the network switch, and receives a reserve message from the third sub-switch identifying requested resources for a planned data flow having a quality of service. The control plane processor attempts to reserve the requested resources on the second sub-switch interface based on the quality of service.
US07983157B2
When a plurality of pre-stage packet controllers receive an instruction on transmission of the priority information from a post-stage packet controller, they derive priority information on the basis of the ratios of bandwidths which can be used at minimum by the user devices, and statuses of storing packets in the buffers, and transmit the priority information to the post-stage packet controller. The post-stage packet controller then selects a pre-stage packet controller to be actually given packet transmission permission on the basis of the priority information received from the plurality of pre-stage packet controllers, and transmits an instruction on packet transmission permission to the selected pre-stage packet controller. The pre-stage packet controller which has received the instruction on packet transmission permission from the post-stage packet controller then transmits a packet to the post-stage packet controller.
US07983142B2
An apparatus and a system, as well as a method and article, may operate to separate, in the frequency domain, a combined plurality of asynchronous data streams received at substantially the same time into a separated plurality of data streams, converting to the time domain for detection, synchronizing, and decoding.
US07983141B2
A multipoint-to-point, orthogonal frequency division multiplexed (OFDM) communication system is provided. The system includes a plurality of remote units and a host unit that includes a demodulator. Each of the remote units transmits an upstream OFDM signal using a multiple access scheme to the host unit demodulator using at least one of a plurality of orthogonal tones within an OFDM waveform. The host unit receives the upstream OFDM signals from a plurality of the remote units. Portions of upstream OFDM signals from at least two of the remote units arrive at the host unit at the same time. The host unit demodulator demodulates the portions and the upstream signals from the plurality of remote units arrive at the host unit synchronized in time and frequency within the OFDM waveform.
US07983127B2
Provided is an optical disk device installed in a personal computer, including: an information creation unit that creates identification information for identifying the type of the personal computer based on a command transmitted from the personal computer; and a parameter selection unit that conducts switching, for parameter selection, concerning a parameter indicating an amount of unbalance of an optical disk, which has previously been determined depending on the type of the personal computer, in accordance with the identification information created by the information creation unit.
US07983106B2
A voltage stabilization circuit of a semiconductor memory apparatus includes an operation speed detecting unit configured to detect an operation speed of the semiconductor memory apparatus to generate a detection signal, and a voltage line controlling unit configured to interconnect a first voltage line and a second voltage line in response to the detection signal.
US07983104B2
An array of non-volatile memory cells arranged in logical columns and logical rows, and associated circuitry to enable reading or writing one or more memory cells on a row in parallel. In some embodiments, the array of memory cells may include a phase change material. In some embodiments, the circuitry may include a write driver, a read driver, a sense amplifier, and circuitry to isolate the memory cells from the sense amplifier with extended refresh.
US07983100B2
A method for generating a read enable signal which is for controlling reading of a pair of data strobe signals and a data signal in a memory system is provided. The method comprises: detecting whether the pair of data strobe signals are both high or low; and generating the read enable signal if the pair of data strobe signals are detected being both high or low. Because the read enable signal is generated using the pair of strobe signals, DLL can be turned off, thus the power consumption of the memory system can be reduced. In addition, the read enable signal is self-aligned with a certain point of the pair of strobe signals, this may enhance precision of the transmission of the pair of strobe signals and the data signal.
US07983091B2
A flash memory array and a method for performing read operation therein are disclosed. The flash memory array comprises a plurality of memory segment, a data cache and a plurality of data handlers coupled between a pair of memory segment and between a memory segment and the data cache. A read operation of selected bitlines of a selected memory segment is performed by a segment data handler coupled to the selected memory segment locally and the read data is transmitted to the data cache. A segment data handler is configured to get read data from the selected bitlines by first pre-charging the bitlines and sensing the bitlines. Further, the read data is transmitted to the data cache through all of the segment data handlers in a sequential manner, if present between the selected memory segment and the data cache.
US07983090B2
The present disclosure includes various method, device, system, and module embodiments for memory cycle voltage adjustment. One such method embodiment includes counting a number of process cycles performed on a first memory block in a memory device. This method embodiment also includes adjusting at least one program voltage, from an initial program voltage to an adjusted voltage, in response to the counted number of process cycles.
US07983089B2
During first portion of a first read cycle determining that a first input of a sense amplifier is to receive information based upon a state of a storage cell during a first portion of a read cycle, and determining that a conductance at the first input is substantially equal to a conductance at a second input of the sense amplifier during the first portion. A plurality of NAND string modules are connected to a global bit line of a memory device that includes a memory column where a plurality of NAND strings and a buffer are formed.
US07983082B2
A multi-bit programming apparatus may include a first control unit that may generates 2N threshold voltage states based on a target bit error rate (BER) of each of the page programming operations, a second control unit that may assign any one of the threshold voltage states to the N-bit data, and a programming unit that may program the assigned threshold voltage state in each of the at least one multi-bit cell to program the N-bit data.
US07983079B2
Provided is a program method of a multi-bit flash memory device. The program method includes correspondingly programming multi-bit data into selected memory cells through pluralities of programming loops. In each programming loop, an increment of a programming voltage applied to the selected memory cells is variable in accordance with a result of program-verification to each of data states with the multi-bit data and the program-verification for the data state corresponding to program-pass is skipped if the result of the program-verification to the data state is passed.
US07983078B2
Techniques for operating non-volatile storage compensate. The techniques compensate for differences in floating gate coupling effect experienced by non-volatile storage elements on different word lines. An erase of a group of non-volatile storage elements is performed. A set of the non-volatile storage elements are for storing data and at least one of the non-volatile storage elements is a dummy that is not for storing data. The dummy is a neighbor to one of the data non-volatile storage elements. The data non-volatile storage elements are programmed at some point after the erase. Then, a programming voltage is applied to the dummy non-volatile storage element to increase the threshold voltage of the dummy to cause floating gate coupling effect to the neighbor non-volatile storage element to compensate for lesser floating gate coupling effect that the neighbor experienced during programming.
US07983073B2
A static random access memory device capable of preventing stability issues during a write operation is provided, in which a memory cell is coupled to a read word line, a write word line, a read bit line, a write bit line and a complementary write bit line, and a multiplexing unit is coupled to the read bit line, the write bit line and the complementary write bit line. The multiplexing unit applies first and second logic voltages representing a logic state stored in the memory cell to the write bit line and the complementary write bit line, respectively, when the memory cell is not selected to be written by an input signal from a data driver and the read word line is activated, in which the first and second logic voltages are opposite to each other.
US07983066B2
Disclosed is a passive matrix-addressable memory apparatus. The passive matrix-addressable memory apparatus comprises: a plurality of first electrode lines horizontally arranged with respect to each other; a plurality of second electrode lines disposed orthogonal to the plurality of first electrode lines to be horizontally arranged with respect to each other; a memory unit formed between the plurality of first electrode lines and the plurality of second electrode lines, and containing an electrically polarizable material exhibiting hysteresis; and a switch unit. The switch unit comprises: first electrodes of a cantilever structure respectively formed between the memory unit and the plurality of first electrode lines to be electrically connected to the plurality of first electrode lines; and second electrodes electrically connected to the memory unit to be spaced apart from the first electrodes to face the first electrodes.
US07983062B2
The present invention discloses a minimum on-time reduction method for a switching power conversion, comprising the steps of: generating a first reset signal and an over-supply pulse signal according to a current sensing signal and a reference signal; generating a blanking signal according to a count number of the over-supply pulse signal; and generating a second reset signal by performing Logic-AND operation on the first reset signal and the blanking signal. Furthermore, the present invention also provides a minimum on-time reduction apparatus for a power conversion, and a system using the minimum on-time reduction apparatus for a power conversion.
US07983050B2
An electronics module for automotive vehicles includes a housing; an electrical connector having a commercial standard electrical connector footprint mounted on the housing; and an electronics assembly including commercial standard communication bus electronics contained in the housing, the electronics assembly being electrically connected to the electrical connector. The electronics module is adapted to be plugged into a power distribution unit of an automotive vehicle in order to control power distribution components of the unit.
US07983047B2
A mounting assembly includes a circuit board, a chip socket mounted on a topside of the circuit board with a chip attached thereon, a heat sink positioned on a top surface of the chip, and a backplate attached to an underside of the circuit board. The heat sink includes a pair of securing legs at two corners of the heat sink, and a pair of securing members. Each securing leg defines a securing hole thereon. Each securing member includes a spring thereon positioned between the corresponding securing legs and the circuit board. The securing members are secured in the corresponding securing holes to secure the heat sink to the circuit board.
US07983040B2
Apparatus and method are provided for facilitating pumped, immersion-cooling of an electronic subsystem having multiple different types of components to be immersion-cooled. The apparatus includes a container sized to receive the electronic subsystem, and a coolant inlet port and a coolant outlet port for facilitating ingress and egress of coolant through the container. The apparatus further includes a coolant pump assembly coupled in fluid communication with the coolant inlet and outlet ports of the container for facilitating active pumping of coolant through the container. When the electronic subsystem is operatively inserted into the container and coolant is pumped through the container, the multiple different types of components of the electronic subsystem are immersion-cooled by the coolant. In one embodiment, a filler element is disposed within the container, and is sized to reduce the amount of coolant within the container, while still maintaining the components of the electronic subsystem immersion-cooled.
US07983037B2
A battery cover mechanism includes a housing, a battery cover and a releasing assembly. The housing has a first surface and at least one latching hook disposed thereon. The battery cover defines a notch therethrough corresponding to the latching hook of the housing and is detachably assembled with the housing by the releasing assembly. The releasing assembly includes a fixing base, an elastic piece and a releasing piece. The fixing base is mounted on the inner side surface of the battery cover and there form an assembling space together with the notch. The elastic piece is mounted on the fixing base and the releasing piece is slidably mounted on the fixing base. The releasing piece is slidably mounted on the fixing base to slidably resist the elastic piece to make the elastic piece release from the latching hook.
US07983032B2
Carrier for the rack mounting of two or more data storage devices into a chassis. The carrier includes support members along the length of the carrier, to receive and retain the two or more data storage devices. The carrier further includes a single electrical communication connector to provide an electrical communication interface for all of the data storage devices in the carrier, to and from a mating connector on a board of the chassis. The carrier further includes an interposer to adapt electrical signals from the single electrical communication connector into a form that is usable by the data storage devices.
US07983024B2
A fuse assembly includes: (i) a junction box including a battery B+ board having a plurality of metallized slots and a distribution board having a plurality of metallized slots; and (ii) a plurality of fuses releasably secured within the metallized slots, the fuses each including a substrate, first and second contacts positioned on the substrate, each contact in electrical communication with one of the metallized slots, and a fuse element in electrical communication with the first and second contacts.
US07983021B2
An oblong electrochemical double-layer capacitor is disclosed having a modified jelly roll design and having a plurality of fingers extending from each electrode in substantially the same direction. A packaged electrochemical double-layer capacitor is also disclosed comprising the oblong electrochemical double-layer capacitor having a modified jelly roll design. A method for manufacturing an oblong electrochemical double-layer capacitor having a modified jelly roll design is also disclosed.
US07983015B2
An electrostatic discharge protection device for an optical disc drive is provided. A rail disposed on the casing of the disc drive has an opening. A guide bar is slidable disposed on the rail. A conductive elastic plate is fixed around the opening on the rail. The elastic plate has an elastic-pressing end leaning against the guide bar through the opening, and a protrusion electrically contacting the casing. A tray supported by the guide bar to move in and out of the casing has an underside covered by a protection bottom plate. A conductive strip-shaped elastic element is fixed on the tray by a fixing screw, which fastens the protection bottom plate on the tray. As such, the elastic element is in contact with the protection bottom plate; besides, the elastic element also leans against the guide bar, so as to dissipate electrostatic discharge by the guide bar.
US07983014B2
The disconnector of the present invention comprises: a current transformer that detects a current flowing through electric wires; a rectifying part that rectifies the current outputted from the current transformer; a charging part that charges the current outputted from the rectifying part; a switching part that disconnects the electric wires upon driving; and a trigger part that drives the switching part when the charge stored in the charging part becomes a predetermined drive area. In this regard, the drive area is set larger than the charge that can be stored in the charging part by a lightning surge current. The disconnector of the present invention and the overvoltage protectors may be combined to constitute the overvoltage protection device.
US07983013B2
A circuit and method to provide dynamic fault protection to transistors are disclosed. The fault protection may be particularly suited for protecting insulated gate bipolar transistors (IGBTs).
US07983004B2
According to one embodiment, there is provided a magnetic recording media including a substrate, and a magnetic recording layer including magnetic film patterns formed in a protruded form on the substrate, sidewalls of the magnetic film patterns having at least two faces of different slope angles.
US07983001B2
The present invention relates to a perpendicular recording magnetic head. A main magnetic pole film includes an electrode film and a plated magnetic film. The electrode film includes a Ru film and a conductive magnetic film, and the Ru film, which follows the shape of an inner wall surface of a recess formed in a first non-magnetic film, is adhered to the inner wall surface of the recess or a surface of a second non-magnetic film adhered thereto. The conductive magnetic film is adhered to a surface of the Ru film, thereby following the shape of the inner wall surface of the recess. The plated magnetic film is disposed adjacent the conductive magnetic film, thereby filling up the recess.
US07982997B2
Provided is a method for receiving a DSS sequence and a DSS readback sequence, which is a function of a channel processing of the DSS sequence by a read channel. A coefficient cyclic equalizer vector is generated as a function of the DSS sequence and the DSS readback sequence. An error signal is generated as a function of a comparison of the DSS sequence and an equalization of the DSS readback sequence based on the coefficient cyclic equalizer vector. An unacceptable error signal indicates a need to adjust the coefficient cyclic equalizer vector to yield an acceptable comparison of the DSS sequence and an equalization of the DSS readback sequence based on the coefficient cyclic equalizer vector.
US07982982B2
Disclosed herein is a wafer level packaging image sensor module, including a wafer including an image sensor, a circuit portion and a lower electrode on one side thereof, a lens actuator disposed on the lower electrode and made of electroactive polymer, an upper electrode disposed on the lens actuator, and a lens unit disposed on the upper electrode to allow light to be transmitted to the image sensor therethrough. The wafer level packaging image sensor module includes the lens actuator made of electroactive polymer, and thus it enables realization of the autofocusing of the wafer level packaging image sensor module.
US07982981B2
Provided is a lens barrel comprising a cylinder that is provided on a base and that extends in a direction of the axis of the cylinder; a guide axle that slides in the direction of the axis of the cylinder along an inner peripheral surface of the cylinder; a first holding component that holds a first lens and is fixed to the guide axle; and a second holding component that holds a second lens, which is different from the first lens, and slides in the direction of the axis of the cylinder along an outer peripheral surface of the cylinder.
US07982980B2
An adjustable optical mount embodiment includes a first plate configured to mount an optical element and a second plate disposed adjacent the first plate with a pivot point between the plates. At least one adjustable threaded member has a contact end in contact with a rear surface of the first plate and a threaded outer surface in threaded engagement with a threaded bore of the second plate. A lock collar having a threaded bore in threaded engagement with a threaded outer surface of the adjustable threaded member which extends from a rear surface of the second plate has a torqueable surface disposed at an adjustment end which is configured to be engaged for the application of torque from a rearward position relative to the adjustable optical mount.
US07982975B2
The invention relates to a high-performance imaging optical system that achieves a magnification high enough to be capable of microscopic viewing under an endoscope, and is compatible with high-definition imaging devices. The objective optical system comprises, at least in order from the object side, a positive, first group G1, a second group G2 and a third group G3. In association with an object point change, at least the second group G2 is moved along an optical axis. The objective optical system satisfies a condition with respect to an optical magnification β upon focusing on the closest range.
US07982969B2
A projection objective of a microlithographic projection exposure apparatus has a high index refractive optical element with an index of refraction greater than 1.6. This element has a volume and a material related optical property which varies over the volume. Variations of this optical property cause an aberration of the objective. In one embodiment at least 4 optical surfaces are provided that are arranged in at least one volume which is optically conjugate with the volume of the refractive optical element. Each optical surface comprises at least one correction means, for example a surface deformation or a birefringent layer with locally varying properties, which at least partially corrects the aberration caused by the variation of the optical property.
US07982966B2
In a zoom lens ZL having a plurality of lens groups which are disposed in order from an object, a first lens group that is disposed to closest to the object among the plurality of lens groups has positive refractive power and comprises a light path bending element which bends the path of light and a plurality of lens components which are disposed closer to the object than the light path bending element, and the plurality of lens components comprise at least one negative lens whose refractive index with respect to d-line exceeds 1.90.
US07982958B2
A projection type image display apparatus is provided which includes a housing to hold an optical system including multi-lenses, a polarized-light conversion element and the color separation portion. The housing operates to provide an optical path between a light source, located outside the housing, and penetration-type image display elements and an optical synthesizing portion also located outside of the housing.
US07982957B2
In an optical apparatus according to the present invention, the lens thicknesses and curvature radiuses of respective first lenses are optimized so that beam waist positions of optical beams emitted from the respective first lenses of a lens array are independently changed according to aberration of a second lens, and the focal position deviation due to the aberration of the second lens is cancelled by a difference between the beam waist positions, which is given on the lens array side. As a result, it is possible to suppress, at a low cost, variations in focal positions of the optical beams which are emitted from respective ports of the lens array to be condensed by the common lens.
US07982956B2
A direct beam solar lighting system for collecting and distributing sunlight into a room. The system includes a rotatable solar collector head to receive sunlight and to reflect the sunlight downward into a transition tube having a reflective interior surface. The light-concentrating transition tube reflects sunlight into a reflective light tube which directs the reflected sunlight through a plenum space into the room. The system includes a drive mechanism for rotating the rotatable solar collector, and a light fixture at end of the light tube to disburse said reflected sunlight onto a ceiling and a wall in the room. In an embodiment the system includes one or more homogenizing reflectors within the solar collector for collecting the sunlight and directing the sunlight more uniformly over the aperture of the transition tube. In an alternative embodiment, the solar collector includes a rotatable tiltable mirror for providing two-axis tracking.
US07982953B2
An antireflection film comprising: a transparent plastic film substrate; a hard coat layer; and a low refractive layer, in this order, wherein the low refractive layer is formed by a curable composition comprising: (a) an inorganic fine particle; (b) at least one of a cationic polymerizable compound having a silyl group within the molecule; a hydrolysate of the compound; and a partial condensate of the compound; and (c) a photo-cationic polymerization initiator.
US07982946B1
An apparatus and method for generating modulated terahertz radiation are provided. The apparatus comprises: (A) a means for generating Terahertz radiation by pumping nonequilibrium electrons into Magnon Gain Medium (MGM); wherein the nonequilibrium electrons emit nonequilibrium magnons, and wherein interaction between nonequilibrium magnons in the Magnon Gain Medium (MGM) causes generation of Terahertz radiation; and (B) a means for modulating the generated Terahertz radiation. The modulating means further comprises: an AC magnetic field generator, or an AC electric field generator.
US07982945B2
The present invention relates to an optical amplification module having a construction which effectively suppresses photodarkening, and to a laser light source including the same. The laser light source comprises a light source for outputting light to be amplified, and an optical amplification module. The optical amplification module comprises two types of optical amplification media having different rare earth element concentrations, and a pumping light source. The low concentration medium and the high concentration medium are disposed in the propagation direction of pumping light such that the population inversion of the low concentration medium is higher than that of the high concentration medium. Hence, by arranging two types of optical amplification media with different rare earth concentrations such that the population inversion of the low concentration medium is higher than that of the high concentration medium, sufficient overall gain of the laser light source can be obtained while effectively suppressing photodarkening in the two types of optical amplification media.
US07982935B2
A mirror positioning assembly for use in beam switching is provided that employs a novel arrangement of the mirrors and the motors to selectively position the mirrors. The assembly is installed into the housing of an assembly for distributing laser energy where the mirrors are contained within the beam cavity and the remainder of the assembly is outside of the housing. The assembly is received in a port within the housing in a manner that allows 360° of rotational adjustment so that the mirror can be carefully aligned to insure near lossless distribution of the beam energy as it passes through the device. This arrangement keeps the electronics, motors, bearings and adjustments of the mirror switching external to the beam cavity herby reducing the number of potential contaminants contained therein.
US07982931B2
A master holographic media storing large quantities of holographic media is disclosed. Holographic images may be recorded onto individual Child Plates. A Child Plate may be obtained by culling a portion of a starting or working parent holographic plate with the Child Plate portion comprising all the necessary data required for holographic image reconstruction. A series of plurality of Child Plates are arranged on and compiled to the master holographic media. The resulting information stored on the master holographic media is capable of being displayed as a continuous three-dimensional holographic image.
US07982926B2
An image reading apparatus capable of preventing the occurrence of a streak and reading a quality image from the leading edge to the trailing edge of a original. An original is conveyed along a convey pass. The original being conveyed is guided by a guide member, at least part of the guide member being transparent. An image of the original being conveyed is read by an image sensor through the guide member. Airflow is generated, the airflow being blown into the convey pass from a location upstream in a conveying direction compared to a location of the image sensor. The guide member has a convex portion disposed at a location upstream in the conveying direction compared to the location of the image sensor.
US07982924B2
A compact image reading device is provided in which a plurality of illumination devices are not needed, and by which a hologram image can be accurately identified in a short period. The image reading device includes a first light source, arranged in a main-scanning direction on a face perpendicular to the conveying direction, for emitting light having a plurality of wavelengths, a second light source, arranged, in parallel to the first-light-source arrangement, on the same face on which the first light source is provided, or in the periphery thereof, for emitting light having a plurality of wavelengths, a light guide for guiding light from the first and second light sources in a sub-scanning direction, and the light guide, having total reflection faces whose illumination angles are different from each other, for irradiating a portion, of a hologram region, to be irradiated with light after totally reflected by the reflection faces, a lighting control means for controlling in a time division manner an exposure ratio between light quantities incident on the total reflection faces of the light guide, a lens assembly for focusing reflection light reflected by a reflective portion of a target positioned at the portion to be light-irradiated, and a sensor for receiving, for each divided time, light focused by the lens assembly, whereby the device is configured to enable detection of the hologram region in the target.
US07982923B2
An image forming apparatus that includes an image reading part, an image forming part to form an image on a sheet, a sheet discharge part to discharge the sheet from front to rear of the image forming apparatus, a sheet stack part to stack the sheet between the image reading part and the image forming part, a supporter provided outside the sheet stack part along a discharge direction of the sheet to form a space between the sheet stack part and the image reading part, a connector to electrically connect the image forming part with the image reading part, a bending unit provided between the image reading part and the supporter to bend back the connector in a sliding direction of the image reading part, and a bend limiter provided at a rear position of the image reading part in the sliding direction to limit bending of the connector.
US07982917B2
A document comprising a latent security image that is visible when the document is reproduced after being scanned by a standard commercial bank scanner. The security image comprises a plurality of lines, dots, or spots having a frequency and a density such that the image is reproduced after being scanned by the standard commercial bank scanner. A method of making a reproducible document comprising a security device comprises generating the document by creating an original containing the security device, scanning the original to a digital computer using a conventional scanner, and converting the scanned original to a digital image file which is printable via a digital press, a color copier, etc. A document comprises a security image that is not visible under ordinary light, and is visible when the document is exposed to a predetermined type of light. The security image is printed with an ink visible under one of UV light, infrared light, X-rays, of Gamma rays.
US07982916B2
A method for multi-toning an input digital image having input pixels with two or more color channels to form an output digital image having modified output levels. The method includes determining modified output levels using a combined error signal formed from intermediate error signals for each color channel together with an error signal offset value, and adjusting the input levels for the nearby pixels responsive to weighted error signals.
US07982914B2
When one or both of color conversion data for chromatic colors and color conversion data for achromatic colors are rewritten, attribute information of the color conversion data for chromatic colors or the color conversion data for achromatic colors is updated and this attribute information is displayed on a display.
US07982909B2
The present disclosure relates to automatically generating a dynamic set of metadata from digitized hardcopy media. The technique includes scanning the image side and non-image side of a plurality of hardcopy media. A dynamic digital metadata record of each of the plurality of hardcopy media is created and used for manipulating each of the plurality of hardcopy media.
US07982906B2
An optical scanning device is constituted without using any arc sin .theta. correction lens, while maintaining quality of an image. The optical scanning device comprises an optical flux generator, a resonance-type deflection element, a drive signal generator and a dot clock generator that is configured to sequentially generate dot clocks which satisfy a first, second and third condition, wherein the optical flux generator radiates the optical fluxes having brightnesses corresponding to the clock cycles of the dot clocks generated by the dot clock generator.
US07982898B2
A method of creating a printed interactive document using a printer connected to a computer. The method includes the steps of: receiving a print request for the interactive document at the computer; requesting and retrieving a unique document identity to a server in response to the print request; indexing the document with the unique document identity and archiving the indexed document in a database; sending the unique document identity and the document to the printer; and printing the graphic content together with coded data coincident with the graphic content onto a substrate so as to create the printed interactive document. The coded data identifies the unique document identity and a plurality of locations on the substrate.
US07982897B2
A printer (100) for printing based on a print job signal sent from a data processing device (200) registers print job signal sending sources and a message corresponding to each sending source in memory (111, 112). A controller (113) detects whether the sending source of a received print job signal is registered in memory. If the sending source is registered, a messaging unit (110, 111) outputs a corresponding message. Sending sources that are permitted to print can also be registered in memory (111, 112). In this case, the controller (113) detects whether the sending source of a received print job signal is registered in memory, and instructs the printer (110) to print only when the sending source is registered as permitted to print.
US07982893B2
An information processing apparatus includes a transmitting unit that transmits image data and related data that has a data quantity smaller than that of the image data and is related to the image data. The transmitting unit transmits the related data earlier than the image data.
US07982889B2
To provide an image processing apparatus that can reduce power consumption as compared to a conventional case by energizing required minimum devices at an appropriate timing depending on contents of a request received from an external apparatus through a communicating medium during a power-saving state, if a data processing request is received from the external apparatus through a NIC during a sleep mode, an MPU of the NIC and an MPU of each controlling unit control automatic changeover switches, which switch energization states of sub-power sources, to control energization of each function block based on contents of the data processing request and the state of the own apparatus. When switching the function blocks from a “non-energized state” to an “energized state”, a hierarchical energization controlling process is performed to switch the functional blocks with hierarchical relationships to the “energized state” in the order from higher to lower blocks.
US07982882B2
The relative position of a test surface is sequentially changed from a reference position where a surface central axis is aligned with a measurement optical axis such that the measurement optical axis is sequentially moved to a plurality of annular regions obtained by dividing the test surface in a diametric direction. The test surface is rotated on a rotation axis whenever the relative position is changed. Measurement light that travels while being converged by a Mirau objective interference optical system is radiated to the rotating test surface, and a one-dimensional image sensor captures interference fringes at each of a plurality of rotational positions. The shape information of each annular region is calculated on the basis of the captured interference fringes at each rotational position, and the shape information is connected to calculate the shape information of the entire measurement region.
US07982862B2
The invention is a line of sight wind detection system that has a laser with an output that is directed at a target. The system also has a receiver with a Hartmann aperture array receiving a reflected beam impinging on the Hartmann aperture array. A multiple pixel sensor senses a number of spots of light from the Hartmann aperture array. An analyzer receives an output from the multiple pixel sensor and determines an effective wind speed along a line of sight using a position of the spots. The system takes advantage of the fact that the wind along the line of sight will result in a shift in the angle of the wave front of the reflected beam. This shift in the angle of the wave front contains all the information of the cumulative effect on a projectile fired at the target.
US07982852B2
A scanning exposure apparatus exposing a substrate to a pattern of an original through a projection optical system while relatively moving the original and the substrate, includes a substrate stage movable while holding the substrate; a measurement system measuring a position of the substrate in an optical-axis direction of the projection optical system; and a controller relatively moving the original and the substrate while controlling a position of the substrate stage in the optical-axis direction, on the basis of the position of the substrate detected by the measurement system. The controller keeps accelerating the substrate stage up to a starting position of the irradiation of the exposure light for a target shot area on the substrate, and during the acceleration, controls the position of the substrate stage in the optical-axis direction, on the basis of a position of a surface of an exposed shot area, which has been exposed previously.
US07982843B2
An image display apparatus includes a display panel having a plurality of wirings and a plurality of display devices connected to the plurality of wirings, a control circuit substrate which outputs a control signal and is arranged on a backside of the display panel, and a flexible printed circuit board which has a flexible substrate and wirings formed on the flexible substrate and electrically connects the display panel and the control circuit substrate. The flexible printed circuit board has an angular shape. In addition, a conductive cover covers the flexible printed circuit board from a portion connected to the control circuit substrate to a portion connected to the display panel with an angular shape according to the shape of the flexible printed circuit board, and is connected to the control circuit substrate.
US07982842B2
An interconnect structure for a display device includes a driver from which display data are supplied, and an interconnect material having a plurality of signal lines disposed in parallel through which the display data are supplied from the driver. In the interconnect structure for a display device, the signal lines from which the display data are transmitted via the interconnect material are rearranged such that the display data via the signal lines having a comparatively larger effect of the inductance components and the display data via the signal lines having a comparatively smaller effect of the inductance components in the interconnect material are alternately supplied to adjacent pixels or groups of pixels of the display device. As a result, an image is displayed based on the luminance suitable for the display data.
US07982836B2
A liquid crystal display device in which a pair of substrates having electrodes face each other, and liquid crystal is sealed between the substrates. The liquid crystal display device includes a insulating layer that varies electric field orientations in a pixel region when a voltage is applied between the pair of substrates.
US07982830B2
The liquid crystal panel of the invention can restrain coloration following a change in the viewing angle when black is displayed, and can be produced into a relatively thin form. This panel has a liquid crystal cell 20 having a color filter having individual blue, green and red regions, a first polarizer 10 formed on one side of the cell 20, a second polarizer 40 formed on the other side of the cell 20, and a compensation layer 30 arranged between the first and second polarizers 10 and 40. The compensation layer 30 has an optical characteristic that the layer gives a larger retardation for a longer wavelength, and the cell 20 has a liquid crystal layer in a vertical alignment mode, and the thickness direction retardation values Rth(B), Rth(G) and Rth(R) of the liquid crystal cell to light transmitted through the individual color regions in the liquid crystal cell 20 satisfy: |Rth(B)|<|Rth(G)|<|Rth(R)|.
US07982827B2
System and method for dynamically altering a color gamut used in projection display systems. An embodiment comprises determining a dim color from colors used in representing an image, adjusting the dim color to increase an available display time for a non-dim color used to represent the image, adjusting the non-dim color using the available display time, and generating a color sequence based on the adjusted dim color and the adjusted non-dim color. The pixel intensities of a dim color are increased, permitting a shortening of the display time of the dim color. The newly freed display time can be reallocated to all colors to increase the amount of light used to display the image, thereby increasing image brightness or altering color point.
US07982824B2
Disclosed is a liquid crystal display device including an optical member with a region using an optical component such as a light emitting diode (LED) used as a backlight source, namely, a light characteristics changing layer for changing a spectrum distribution and chromaticity coordinates of light emitted from a back light. The LCD device including: a liquid crystal panel that displays an image; a backlight unit provided on a rear surface of the liquid crystal panel and providing light; and an optical member provided between the liquid crystal panel and the backlight unit and having a light characteristics changing layer for changing a spectrum distribution of light outputted from the backlight unit and chromaticity coordinates and providing the same to the liquid crystal panel.
US07982821B2
A display device of the present invention includes: an illumination device that emits light; first and second substrates provided opposite each other; and the first substrate being disposed closer to the backlight device than the second substrate is; and a plurality of microlenses (2) provided on the surface, opposite the backlight device, of the first substrate, the plurality of microlenses converging light (7) emitted from the illumination device, the first substrate having a plurality of pixels (Px) disposed in a matrix, each of the pixels including: a transparent region (Tr) through which light passes; and a reflective region (Rf) from which light is reflected, wherein the light (7) emitted from the illumination device is converged onto the transparent region (Tr) through the microlens (2), wherein an uneven section (19) with convexities and concavities is provided between the neighboring microlenses (2) on the surface of the first substrate which surface is opposite the illumination device (3). With this arrangement, it is possible to provide a display device which enhances efficiency in utilization of light emitted from the illumination device (backlight) and increases luminance of the display device without such display problems as bright lines and moiré.
US07982807B2
A method for processing an image includes inputting an image, generating a first mean luminance value and a second mean luminance value according to a plurality of pixels within a first luminance interval and a second luminance interval of the image, generating a first luminance threshold according to the first mean luminance value, setting a compensation parameter, generating a first compensation luminance value according to the first mean luminance value and the compensation parameter, generating a second compensation luminance value according to the first luminance threshold, the first mean luminance value, the second mean luminance value, and the compensation parameter, and adjusting luminance values of pixels within the a smaller compensation luminance value and a greater compensation luminance value according to the smaller compensation value and a comparison between the first compensation luminance value and the second compensation luminance value.
US07982802B2
A text subtitle decoder includes a text subtitle processor, a text renderer, and a presentation controller. The text subtitle processor parses a text subtitle stream into text data and reproduction control information, where the text data represent a subtitle text to be displayed within a text subtitle region. After the text subtitle stream is parsed, the text renderer renders the text data into bitmap data using the reproduction control information. The presentation controller controls operations of the text subtitle processor and the text renderer.
US07982786B2
A solid-state imaging device includes a plurality of photoelectric conversion elements provided at a surface portion of a semiconductor substrate by being arranged in a form of a two-dimensional array, spectral elements each provided on a number of the photoelectric conversion elements which are arranged linearly, a trapezoidal opening which is longitudinally elongated in a direction from a base toward an upper side thereof and which introduces incident light to the number of the photoelectric conversion elements being provided in each of the spectral elements, so as to cause spectral separation in the longitudinal direction by interference between the incident light and light reflected on inner side surfaces of the trapezoidal opening and a signal reading unit for reading a signal which is detected by each of the number of the photoelectric conversion elements arranged in the longitudinal direction by receiving the light incident through the trapezoidal opening.
US07982784B2
A method for reducing the row noise from complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) image sensor by using average values from sub-regions of the shielded pixels. The method operates on sensor with and without a Color Filter Array (CFA) before any interpolation is applied and estimates the local offset by subtracting out outliers and averaging the averages of sub-regions in the shielded pixels. The method also reduces the pixel-to-pixel noise while reducing the row noise.
US07982782B2
The present invention includes a color converting section carrying out color conversion processing and a coefficient correcting section setting a correcting coefficient group to a coefficient group of the color conversion. The coefficient correcting section sets a local area containing a pixel to be processed, and calculates “feature information of the local area” containing at least one of averaged color information, averaged luminance information, and flatness on the basis of the pixel signals of the local area. The coefficient correcting section determines a correcting coefficient group to be used for the pixel to be processed on the basis of the feature information of the local area. With this construction, the present invention suppresses influence of noise when changing the color conversion processing for each pixel.
US07982781B2
An image processing device includes a correlation value calculating unit calculating plural correlation values indicating degrees of correlation of an image for a pixel of attention to be interpolated on a solid-state imaging device having filters of predetermined color coding; a judging unit judging a direction in which interpolation should be performed by calculating, in different directions, at least two patterns of the plural correlation values calculated by the correlation value calculating unit and comparing the correlation values of at least two patterns with correlation lines obtained by plotting the correlation values with respect to straight lines of various angles; and an interpolating unit applying interpolation processing to the pixel of attention on the basis of information on pixels around the pixel of attention present in the direction judged by the judging unit.
US07982780B2
A photographing apparatus having a plurality of displays and a method of displaying an image. A photographing apparatus to photograph and record an image includes a lens unit, first and second photograph buttons to input commands to photograph the image, first and second zoom buttons to input zoom commands, a recording unit to record the image photographed via the lens unit, and a battery to supply a power supply voltage to the photographing apparatus. The first photograph button and the first zoom button are disposed on a front panel of the photographing apparatus, and the second photograph button and the second zoom button are disposed on a top panel of the photographing apparatus. This allows a user to more easily photograph an infant, check a photographed image, and photograph an object located in a lower position.
US07982773B2
An imaging apparatus includes a diaphragm unit configured to adjust an amount of incident light on an image sensor, a correction unit configured to perform a correction of an image signal that corresponds to driving of the diaphragm unit, and a control unit configured to control the diaphragm unit and the correction unit. The correction unit includes at least a first state for performing a correction of the image signal when it can be determined that the diaphragm unit is not being driven by the control unit and a second state for not performing a correction of the image signal or for performing a correction of the image signal weaker than that performed in the first state when it can be determined that the diaphragm unit is being driven by the control unit.
US07982759B2
A light scanning unit of an image forming apparatus to scan a light beam in forward and reverse directions, the light scanning unit including: a beam deflector to deflect the light beam, and to form forward direction and reverse direction scanning lines in an image section and first and second non-image sections respectively provided on opposite sides of the image section; a reflecting member to reflect a light beam inputted from the beam deflector; and a light detecting unit to receive a first light beam directly inputted from the beam deflector, and a second light beam inputted via the reflecting member, wherein the reflecting member includes a reflecting unit to reflect the inputted light beam to the light detecting unit, and a distinguishing unit to distinguish the reflected second light beam from the first light beam.
US07982756B2
A timing controller is provided. The timing controller comprises a data analyzer, a gain processor, an operator unit and an original gamma voltage generator. The present invention utilizes the data analyzer to analyze a gray level distribution of video data, and then the gain processor selects a gain value. The operator unit converts an original gamma voltage produced by the original gamma voltage generator into an actual gamma voltage according to the gain value. Therefore, the present invention adaptively adjusts the gamma voltage according to the gray level distribution of the video data for increasing display quality.
US07982744B2
An image processing device outputs four-color image data to a display section, the display section performing display using display pixels each composed of four sub-pixels, and having an arrangement of the display pixels in which a pixel arrangement in an even line of a scan lines and a pixel arrangement in an odd line of the scan lines are shifted a half pitch of the display pixels from each other, and the image processing device includes a color conversion section which obtains three-color image data and converts the three-color image data into first four-color image data while maintaining the number of display pixels in the three-color image data, a conversion section which generates second four-color image data by performing an interpolation process on the first four-color image data based on a relationship between a position of a sub-pixel in the first four-color image data and a position of a sub-pixel in the display section, and an output section which outputs the second four-color image data to the display section.
US07982738B2
A “Video Browser” provides interactive browsing of unique events occurring within an overall video recording. In particular, the Video Browser processes the video to generate a set of video sprites representing unique events occurring within the overall period of the video. These unique events include, for example, motion events, security events, or other predefined event types, occurring within all or part of the total period covered by the video. Once the video has been processed to identify the sprites, the sprites are then arranged over a background image extracted from the video to create an interactive static video montage. The interactive video montage illustrates all events occurring within the video in a single static frame. User selection of sprites within the montage causes either playback of a portion of the video in which the selected sprites were identified, or concurrent playback of the selected sprites within a dynamic video montage.
US07982724B2
The present invention provides a multiple region vibration-sensing touch sensor that incorporates at least two sets of vibration sensors on a single touch plate, each set of vibration sensors defining distinct touch regions. The vibration sensors detect vibrations indicative of a touch to the touch plate, and are configured to communicate signals representing the detected vibrations to controller electronics for determining information related to the touch input. Touches within each touch region can be distinguished.
US07982723B2
A touch screen capable of correctly identifying multiple touches employs multiple active line arrays oriented to provide multi-dimensional data. Three arrays of capacitance based active lines are each distinctly oriented to form a plurality of intersections. A first and second array are generally oriented perpendicularly while a third array is oriented to bisect the resulting matrix such that the active lines of the third array also intersect the existing vertices. As a result of a touch each active line array identifies the location of the touch from three distinct directions. Ambiguity from dual touch scenarios existing in dual array systems is removed by providing an additional reference.
US07982719B2
A fault-tolerant method, apparatus, and medium for a touch sensor is disclosed. The fault-tolerant apparatus for a touch sensor includes a plurality of sensor pads composed of outer sensor pads and an inner sensor pad to receive an input of operation signals, a clustering unit detecting signals by clustering the sensor pads according to the input signals, and an operation mode judgment unit judging an operation mode through the detected signals and removing a signal noise and an inter-signal interference.
US07982702B2
A liquid crystal display device, in which the liquid crystal molecules are aligned vertically when no voltage is applied, includes pixels each having plural sub-pixel electrodes, a data bus drive circuit for applying drive signals to the sub-pixel electrodes via a data bus line and a switching element, and alignment regulation structure for regulating the direction of alignment of liquid crystal molecules. The first and second sub-pixel electrodes have different areas. The data bus drive circuit applies a first drive signal, which causes luminance to change from minimum to maximum for an increase of input grayscale of image signal, to the first sub-pixel electrode, and a second drive signal, which causes the luminance to be lower than the first drive signal, to the second sub-pixel electrode.
US07982679B2
An underwater communication method is provided. EM signals are transmitted via a seabed using an underwater electrically insulated magnetically coupled antenna. By making use of the low loss properties of the seabed, EM signal attenuation can be reduced and consequently the transmission range can be increased. The underwater electrically insulated magnetically coupled antenna may be located within a body of water or may be buried in the seabed.
US07982674B2
A dual-band antenna has a feeding portion including a first feeding portion and a second feeding portion extending perpendicularly from a top of the first feeding portion. A first high-frequency portion spaced away from the second feeding portion extends upwards from the first feeding portion, and a second high-frequency portion extends perpendicularly from the first high-frequency portion and located at a same side with respect to the first feeding portion as the second feeding portion. A first low-frequency portion located at a same side with respect to the first feeding portion as the second high-frequency portion extends perpendicularly from an end of the first feeding portion. A second low-frequency portion extends upwards from the first low-frequency portion. A third low-frequency portion extends back to the first low-frequency portion from the second low-frequency portion. A grounding portion connected with the feeding portion by a connecting portion faces the low-frequency radiator.
US07982670B2
The present invention relates to a method and a system for determining the direction of arrival of one or multiple radio or acoustic waves and, more particularly, to such a method and system especially advantageous in situations where the number of available observations is small and/or the available observations are received with low power. The method significantly improves the performance of traditional subspace signal processing algorithms in the low sample size regime. The algorithm is specifically designed to provide consistent estimates even when the observation dimension has the same order of magnitude as the number of observations. This guarantees a good behavior in finite sample size situations, where the number of sensors or antennae and the number of samples have the same order of magnitude or in scenarios where the received signal power is not sufficiently high to guarantee detection via conventional one-dimensional search methods.
US07982665B2
The present invention provides a GPS-installed all-azimuth camera, comprising at least a pair of GPS antennas (29a and 29b) disposed on up and down in parallel to each other, a plurality of cameras (28a-28f) which are disposed on a plane running in parallel to the GPS antennas and are capable of obtaining images in all azimuths, and a case (27) for accommodating the cameras and the GPS antennas, wherein a reference position of the GPS antennas is concurred with an image reference position of the cameras.
US07982660B2
A measuring device , e.g., a measuring device for a motor vehicle, is for measuring a distance between the measuring device and at least one object and/or measuring a difference in speed between the measuring device and the at least one object. The measuring device includes an emitting apparatus for transmitting a transmission signal encompassing at least two sequences of signal portions, a first sequence of signal portions and a second sequence of signal portions with two respective temporally alternating signal portions. The frequency of at least two signal portions of a sequence of signal portions differs by one respective difference frequency, the difference frequency of the first sequence of signal portions being different from the difference frequency of the second sequence of signal portions.
US07982651B1
An analog-to-digital converter (ADC) of a radio receiver can consume a relatively large amount of power. It is typically desirable to minimize power consumption, particularly with battery-powered devices, such as in wireless receivers. In certain conditions, the effective number of bits (ENOB) required from an ADC of a receiver can vary. The power consumption of certain ADC topologies, such as pipelined converter topologies, can vary with the number of bits. One embodiment dynamically varies the ENOB of an ADC to more optimally consume power. This can extend battery life.
US07982632B2
Disclosed herein is a sensor system having a sensor and at least one communication line operable with the sensor. The transmission medium is configured to convey data transmitted by the sensor to a remote location. The sensor transmits data on the communication line a plurality of times by at least two methods of transmission or modulation. Further disclosed herein is a method based on the foregoing. Further disclosed is a method of communicating by modifying a voltage amplitude of a signal and receiving the communication signal by employing a variable threshold detection circuit in the downhole device. Further disclosed is a system for communicating data between a downhole device and a remote location including a remote device for generating a communication signal, the remote device configured to modify a voltage amplitude of said communication signal.
US07982631B2
A light emitter for a traffic control preemption system. The emitter includes a plurality of groups of infrared (IR) LEDs and a power source coupled to the groups of LEDs. A plurality of controlled current sources is coupled to the plurality of groups of LEDs, respectively. A controller is configured to trigger an IR light pulse pattern from the groups of LEDs and maintain a first level of IR radiant power from the groups of LEDs using individual control of respective current levels to the groups of LEDs in response to current sense levels from the groups of LEDs. The pulse pattern and first level of IR radiant power activate preemption in the traffic control preemption system.
US07982629B2
A method and system that controls the playback of different audio or video files in a motor vehicle mounted electronic device that includes a plurality of different audio or video files and an audio file player software program. The electronic device is connected to at least one external sensor that measures one of the following: the motor vehicle's current location, the time of day, and/or the weather or temperature. The software program is designed to automatically play the audio file when the external condition occurs. When the driver is driving and listening to the electronic device, the audio or video files are automatically played based on the occurrence of the linked external conditions.
US07982628B2
A verbal language based output system includes data defining a geometrical region, such as a building, configuration data relative to various detectors in the region, and a plurality of event inputs associated with the detectors. Verbal language generation software, in response to the data and the event inputs, produces verbal descriptions of developing events. Such verbal descriptions can be audibly output for use by personnel needing to enter the region to address the events.
US07982627B2
A meter device includes an indicator unit, movably supported within a predetermined range, for representing an amplitude value of an input signal by a movement amount Δθ from a reference position θ0 which is one end of the predetermined range. A gain acquiring unit acquire a gain of the input signal; and a maximum movement amount determining part determines a maximum movement amount ΔθM of the indicator unit at the gain based on the gain acquired by the gain acquiring unit. A drive control unit moves the indicator unit to a position corresponding to the amplitude value of the input signal between the reference position θ0 and a maximum movement position θM moved from the reference position θ0 by the maximum movement amount ΔθM based on the maximum movement amount ΔθM determined by the maximum movement amount determining part and the amplitude value of the input signal.
US07982623B2
A radio-type transmitting device capable of transmitting information other than information in an internal memory is provided. A RFID tag includes a encoding circuit for digitalizing receiving sensitivity of a radio wave sent from an external transmitting/receiving apparatus and then sending the digitalized receiving sensitivity to the external transmitting/receiving apparatus. Thus, the external transmitting/receiving apparatus can obtain a distance between the external transmitting/receiving apparatus and the RFID tag based on received sensitivity information.
US07982621B2
Disclosed is an apparatus for controlling power of an electronic device, controlled by a touch input. To this end, a power control apparatus for an electronic device according to a preferred embodiment of the present invention is disclosed including a touch sensor for sensing a user's touch by a user's finger or the like, and a temperature sensor for sensing a body temperature detected through the touch. Through such a touch sensor and such a temperature sensor, the power control apparatus senses the touch and body temperature of a user, and controls the power of the electronic device. As a result, even without a separate power button installed on the outside of the electronic device, it becomes possible to control the power of the electronic device.
US07982618B2
A wakefulness maintaining apparatus includes an event detecting part, a drowsiness level determining part, a threshold setting part, and a stimulus supplying part. The event detecting part detects an event related to a drowsiness of a person. The drowsiness level determining part determines a drowsiness level that changes in accordance with a strength of the drowsiness. The threshold setting part sets a threshold value to divide the drowsiness level into a first level range and a second level range in such a manner that the first level range is equal to or lower than the threshold value and the second level range is higher than the threshold value. The stimulus supplying part supplies a stimulus having an awaking effect to the person when the drowsiness level is in the second level range and the event is detected.
US07982608B2
A method and system for identifying a lost or stolen device is disclosed herein. The system includes: a transmitter, coupled to said device, for transmitting identification information; a receiver for receiving the identification information transmitted by the transmitter, when the transmitter is within a defined distance from the receiver; and a computer, coupled to the receiver for receiving the information from the receiver, and having a database for storing data associated with lost or stolen devices; wherein the computer compares the information with the data, and generates an alarm if the information indicates that the device is lost or stolen. The method includes: receiving information transmitted by a radio frequency identification (RFID) device, coupled to an item, when the item comes within a defined range of a receiver which receives the information; storing data associated with lost or stolen goods in a database coupled to the receiver; comparing the information to the data and determining if the information matches the data associated with the lost or stolen goods; and generating an alarm, if the information matches the data.
US07982603B2
In order to easily provide data successively generated from a real world sensor network in a time series to a user, a unit for generally and flexibly performing mapping between a source for generating physical electronic information (for example, a tiny sensor node) and sensing data to be provided to the user is provided. Therefore, a manager of the sensor network is composed of a device management table for mapping among a wireless sensor node, a wireless base station, and a data managing server, a real world model table capable of including device information and giving plural attributes, a registration/search processing unit for registering/searching that information, and a data manager for data mapping between the tables.
US07982598B2
An interface for integrating and presenting user notifications and alerts consistently on an electronic device such as a mobile device is disclosed. First, an application programming interface provides the segregation to multiple preselected levels of priority notifications and alerts from all applications on the mobile device. Second, the application programming interface provides for the ability to display the notifications and alerts in a consistent manner for the user to handle.
US07982585B2
A method and an apparatus for evaluating an expression embedded inside a communication packet received from an RFID (Radio Frequency Identification) interrogator device are described. The evaluation result may determine a selection with another RFID interrogator device. An RFID data packet may be sent to an RFID interrogator device based on a selection to be associated with the RFID interrogator. A task may be performed based on the evaluation as instructed by a remote RFID interrogator through a command included in the wireless communication packet.
US07982580B2
A temperature sensor capable of operation in high vibration environment includes a sensor sheath mounted at the distal end of a mineral insulated cable. A resistance temperature detector (RTD) sensing element is connected to leads of the cable within the sheath. The sheath is filled at least partially with a ceramic thermal adhesive.
US07982569B2
In one embodiment, an inductance element includes a toroidal core and a bottomed insulating resin case. The bottomed insulating resin case includes a cylindrical outer wall section, a cylindrical inner wall section, a bottom section, an open section and a hollow section. The cylindrical outer wall section has an extending section exceeding the height of the toroidal core. The open section of the insulating resin case is covered with a cover portion having a bent section formed by bending an extending section of the cylindrical outer wall section.
US07982567B2
An actuator comprising: a fixed part comprising a ferromagnetic yoke and a magnetized assembly mounted on a face of the yoke and extending substantially over the whole dimension of said face parallel to the axis of movement of a moving part, the moving part comprising a ferromagnetic element comprising a first air-gap surface to form a magnetic air-gap of variable thickness and a second air-gap surface parallel to the axis of movement to form a residual magnetic air-gap of constant thickness with a corresponding air-gap surface of the magnetized assembly. an excitation coil. An electric switch apparatus equipped with the actuator.
US07982566B2
A cryostat (1) with a magnet coil system including superconductors for the production of a magnet field B0 in a measuring volume (3) within a room temperature bore (2) of the cryostat has a plurality of radially nested solenoid-shaped coil sections (4, 5, 6) which surround the room temperature bore and which are electrically connected in series, at least one of which being an LTS section (5, 6) with a conventional low temperature superconductor (LTS) and at least one of which being an HTS section (4) including a high temperature superconductor (HTS), wherein the LTS section (5, 6) is located in a helium tank (9) of the cryostat (1) along with liquid helium at a helium temperature TL. The apparatus is characterized in that the HTS section (4) is disposed radially within the LTS section (5, 6) in a vacuum portion of the cryostat and is separated from the LTS section (5, 6) by the helium tank (9) wall (9a) facing the room temperature bore. The HTS coil section can be reliably used in the cryostat over a long period of time (FIG. 1a).
US07982553B2
This invention discloses a clock generator capable of automatically adjusting output clock when process, voltage, or temperature variation occurred. The clock generator comprises a current generator, for generating a first current and a second current according to a control voltage; a oscillator, coupled to the current generator, for generating a clock signal according to the first current; and a voltage adjuster, coupled to the current generator and the oscillator, for adjusting the control voltage according to the clock signal and the second current; wherein, when the signal frequency of the clock signal changed, the voltage adjuster correspondingly adjusts the control voltage so as to adjust the first current.
US07982544B2
A power amplifier includes a transistor, a transmission line transformer, and a capacitor. The transistor is operable to receive a signal and to generate an amplified signal. The transistor has a source, a drain, and a gate. The gate has a first impedance and is operable to receive the signal to be amplified. The transmission line transformer has a first, second, third, and fourth port, the first port and the third port being coupled directly to the gate of the transistor, and the fourth port being coupled to a source device having a second impedance. The capacitor has a first end and a second end. The first end of the capacitor is coupled to the second port of the transmission line transformer and the second end is coupled to a ground.
US07982543B1
Embodiments of circuits, apparatuses, and systems for a switchable radio frequency (RF) power amplifier are disclosed. Some embodiments include a matching network configured to alternatively provide a first load impedance or second load impedance based at least in part on an amplification mode of a power amplification section. Other embodiments may be described and claimed.
US07982534B2
A charge domain filter having a phase divider, first switched capacitor networks, second switched capacitor networks and a connecting circuit. The phase divider receives a first and a second input signal to output first phase divided signals based on the first input signal and second phase divided signals based on the second input signal. The first switched capacitor networks, holding a one to one relationship with the first phase divided signals, each has an input terminal receiving the corresponding first phase divided signal and has an output terminal. The second switched capacitor networks, holding a one to one relationship with the second phase divided signals, each has an input terminal receiving the corresponding second phase divided signal and has an output terminal. The connecting circuit determines connections between the output terminals of the first and second switched capacitor networks to generate a plurality of output signals.
US07982533B2
A transceiving system utilizing a shared filter module is provided. The shared filter module is selectively filtering signals in a first band in a first mode and a second band in a second mode. The first mode is a receiver mode whereas the second mode is a transmission mode. The shared filter module comprises a compound filter comprising two low pass filters and a coupling controller to manage input and output wiring of the low pass filters. When the coupling controller is enabled in the first mode, the compound filter acts as a bandpass filter. When the coupling controller is disabled, the compound filter acts as two independent low pass filters.
US07982529B2
Disclosed are systems and methods which provide voltage conversion in increments less than integer multiples of a power supply (e.g., battery) voltage. A representative embodiment provides power supply voltage multipliers in a binary ladder distribution to provide a desired number of output voltage steps using a relatively uncomplicated circuit design. By using different sources in various combinations and/or by “stacking” different sources in various ways, the voltage multiplier circuit may be used to provide desired voltages. In order to minimize the number of components used in a voltage converter of an embodiment, a capacitive voltage converter circuit uses one or more storage capacitors in place of pump capacitors in a voltage generation cycle. Also, certain embodiments do not operate to generate an output voltage until the time that voltage is needed.
US07982528B2
An embodiment of a power device having a first current-conduction terminal, a second current-conduction terminal, a control terminal receiving, in use, a control voltage of the power device, and a thyristor device and a first insulated-gate switch device connected in series between the first and the second conduction terminals; the first insulated-gate switch device has a gate terminal connected to the control terminal, and the thyristor device has a base terminal. The power device is further provided with: a second insulated-gate switch device, connected between the first current-conduction terminal and the base terminal of the thyristor device, and having a respective gate terminal connected to the control terminal; and a Zener diode, connected between the base terminal of the thyristor device and the second current-conduction terminal so as to enable extraction of current from the base terminal in a given operating condition.
US07982526B2
Exemplary embodiments of the disclosure include adaptively generating a bias current for a switched-capacitor circuit. An exemplary apparatus includes a first phase signal and a second phase signal operating at a sampling rate. An asserted time of the first phase signal and an asserted time of the second phase signal are separated by a predefined non-overlap time. The apparatus also includes a switched-capacitor circuit with a plurality of switched capacitors operably coupled to the first phase signal and the second phase signal. An amplifier is operably coupled to the switched-capacitor circuit and has a response time inversely proportional to an adaptive bias current. A bias generator is coupled to the amplifier and operates to modify the adaptive bias current responsive to the asserted time of the first phase signal.
US07982519B2
A system and method to establish the lock point of a digital synchronous circuit (e.g., a DLL) at the center of or close to the center of its delay line is disclosed. The synchronous circuit is configured to selectively use either a reference clock or its inverted version as the clock signal input to the delay line based on a relationship among the phases of the reference clock, the inverted reference clock, and a feedback clock may be used during determination of the phase relationship. The selective use of the opposite phase of the reference clock for the input of the delay line results in centralization of the lock point for most cases as well as improvement in the tuning range and the time to establish the initial lock, without requiring an additional delay line.
US07982516B1
A programmable delay element with a variable delay generator employs feed forward and feedback control signals to corresponding feed forward and feedback control elements integrated within the variable delay generator. The variable delay generator is responsive to a control signal. The variable delay generator uses transfer switches to couple reactive circuit elements to a signal node in accordance with the control signal. The feed forward element couples a fixed voltage to corresponding nodes of the feed back element. The feedback element completes a bypass circuit to apply the fixed voltage to the signal node once the programmable delay element has delayed a source signal. The feed forward element is responsive to a buffered version of the source signal. The feedback element is responsive to a buffered version of the output of the delay element. A corresponding method for reducing frequency induced delay variation in a programmable delay element is disclosed.
US07982508B2
A switching circuit includes: a transistor having a first electrode, a second electrode and a control electrode; a zener diode; and a capacitor. A connection between the first electrode and the second electrode is capable of temporally switching between a condition state and a non-conduction state by switching a control voltage of the transistor. The zener diode and the capacitor are coupled in series between the first electrode and the control electrode of the transistor. The first electrode is a drain or a collector.
US07982499B2
Capacitive node isolation circuitry in an integrated circuit eliminates the creation of hot spots (stored charge) on high capacitive nodes during a test of electrostatic discharge (ESD) protection circuitry of the integrated circuit or during any ESD event occurring while the integrated circuit is in a standby mode. The isolation circuitry includes a standby mode logic circuit responsive to a standby mode signal received at one of its inputs and provides an output signal to a gate of an active switching device located in a path between an external pin of the integrated circuit and the internal high capacitive node. The output signal keeps the active switching device turned off for the duration of the ESD test or ESD event. The standby mode logic circuit transparently passes an input logic signal to the active switching device whenever the integrated circuit is in a normal operating mode.
US07982490B2
Provided is a semiconductor integrated circuit including: an output circuit connected between a power supply (VDD0) and a ground (GND0), having an input connected to an input terminal, and having an output connected to an output terminal; and a power-supply-noise cancelling circuit connected between the input terminal and the output terminal to generate a current that cancels a current flowing from the power supply (VDD0) to the output terminal or a current flowing from the output terminal to the ground (GND0), based on a potential difference between the input terminal and the output terminal.
US07982489B2
The exemplary embodiments provide a resilient integrated circuit. An exemplary IC comprises a plurality of composite circuit elements, a state machine element (SME), and a plurality of communication elements. Each composite circuit element comprises an element interface and a selected circuit element which may vary by element type, and which may be configurable. The state machine element assigns various functions based on element type, such as assigning a first configuration to a first element type, assigning a second configuration to a second element type, and providing a first data link for the corresponding assignments. In response to detection of a fault or failure, the state machine element re-assigns the first configuration to another composite circuit element and creates a second data link for performance of the same function. The assignment, routing, fault detection, and re-assignment and data re-routing can occur in real time for a wide variety of programs and algorithms, providing for the IC to continue the same functioning despite defects which may arise during operation.
US07982476B2
According to one embodiment of the invention, a testing apparatus for executing highly accelerated life testing on at least one test subject includes at least one structure operable to thermally stress the test subject via conduction and at least one pneumatic hammer operable to input imparting vibrations to the test subject. According to another embodiment of the invention, a method for executing highly accelerated life testing of at least one test subject includes applying a thermal stress to the test subject via conduction at a rate of change of at least 8° C. per minute and imparting vibrations to the test subject at a rate of at least 3 Gs rms.
US07982473B2
A method for diagnosing a position detector used in determining the position of a control means. The position detector includes a resistance track, and a first terminal in connection with its first end, and a second terminal in connection with second end of the resistance track, and a slide electrically connected to the resistance track. The slide is arranged to move in relation to the control by the effect of a position change. Additionally, the position detector includes a slide terminal in connection with the slide, an electricity supply, a voltage measurer and a signal processing unit for diagnosing measurement data. In the method, a supply voltage is arranged in the slide terminal, the output voltage of the first terminal is measured, the output voltage of the second terminal is measured, and at least a first and a second output voltage are arranged to the signal processing unit.
US07982468B2
A test system including a package with switchable paths. The package may have conductive paths that are selected by switches. The electrically switchable conductive paths may yield increased data without significantly increasing the required testing hardware.
US07982466B2
A method for inspecting a semiconductor memory having nonvolatile memory cells using ferroelectric capacitors is disclosed which comprises, after shelf-aging the ferroelectric capacitor in a first polarized state, the steps of: (a) writing a second polarized state opposite to the first polarized state; (b) shelf-aging the ferroelectric capacitor in the second polarized state; and (c) reading the second polarized state. The temperature or voltage in the step (a) is lower than the temperature or voltage in the step (c). This method for inspecting a semiconductor memory enables to evaluate the imprint characteristics in a short time.
US07982459B2
A method for detecting a position of a cylinder rod includes depositing a plurality of welds substantially along the length of a steel rod and depositing a corrosion resistant material onto the steel rod by laser cladding. The cylinder rod is then placed proximate to a sensor assembly. One of the cylinder rod and the sensor assembly are moved relative to the other. The sensor assembly detects a change in properties between the steel rod and the welds and generates a corresponding signal. A change in position of the cylinder rod or damage to the cylinder rod can be detected by analyzing the number and strength of the signals.
US07982456B2
In a magnetic detection apparatus, a magnetic detection sensor generates a sensor output signal whose high level and low level have different potentials in accordance with the moving direction of a magnetic moving object, and a computer unit includes three comparator circuits and detects the output signal of the magnetic detection sensor with three levels of comparison threshold values, so that the moving direction of the magnetic moving object can be detected accurately without any delay.
US07982451B2
In adopting a structure in which an oscillator circuit unit and an instrument main body including a measuring unit are separately formed in a sensing instrument measuring the concentration of or determining the presence/absence of a substance to be sensed by using a quartz sensor, the present invention has an object to enable the instrument main body side to know an oscillation frequency of the connected oscillator circuit unit. A plurality of band-pass filters having pass characteristics corresponding to oscillation frequencies of the oscillator circuits respectively are provided in the instrument main body side to sort frequency signals, it is determined whether or not levels of the sorted frequency signals are equal to or higher than a threshold value, and a switching unit is controlled so as to connect a channel having a signal level equal to or higher than the threshold value to the measuring unit, and a reference frequency used in the measuring unit, for instance, is selected according to the frequency of the frequency signal corresponding to this channel.
US07982443B1
A circuit for converting voltages is provided. The circuit includes a switch circuit coupled in series with an input node and a reference node. The switch circuit includes at least three controllable switches coupled in series and an inductive low pass output stage coupled to a connecting node between each of the switches. Each output stage is configured to output an average of the voltage generated at the connecting node. The circuit also includes a control circuit coupled to the controllable switches. The control circuit is configured to generate a plurality of control signals for control nodes of the switches, where the control signals have a plurality of complementary periodic components. Each of the complementary periodic components alternates a predetermined combination of the switches for alternating a voltage at each connecting node between a voltage at the input node and a voltage at the reference node.
US07982430B2
For operating each smart battery included in a smart battery system, the smart battery is initialized prior to the smart battery being electrically coupled to the smart battery system. The smart battery system or an external power source is selected to provide power to an information handling system device. The smart battery includes an electronics device, a charge switch and a discharge switch. The electronics device operates the charge and discharge switches to jointly control an operating condition of the smart battery in response to receiving a control input from a controller of the device. The charge and discharge switches are closed in response to the electronics device and the controller being in agreement to charge the first smart battery. The charge or the discharge switch is opened in response to either the electronics device or the controller directing either of the switches to be opened.
US07982421B2
An electric vehicle controller includes a speed sensorless vector controller for estimating the rotating speed of an AC motor from an output voltage command and an output current from a VVVF inverter, and controlling the VVVF inverter based on the estimate. An overhead wire current detector detects the current flowing through an overhead wire. A wrong action sensor senses an abnormality in the speed sensorless vector controller from the sign of the current flowing through the overhead wire and detected by the overhead wire current detector when the VVVF inverter is in operation. A gate stop circuit stops the VVVF inverter when the wrong action sensor senses an abnormality.
US07982413B2
The present invention discloses an electronic ballast with dimming control from power line sensing for a fluorescent lamp, comprising: a line switching sensing circuit, used to generate a switching sensing signal by performing a voltage comparison operation on a DC voltage, and generate a reset signal according to the off time of the power line; a dimming voltage generator, used to generate a dimming voltage according to a count of the switching sensing signal; and a phase-controlled non-overlapping driver, used to generate a high side driving signal and a low side driving signal for delivering a lamp current according to the dimming voltage, wherein the dimming voltage is used to generate a phase, and the phase is used to generate the lamp current.
US07982407B1
A photographic illumination system, comprising a first stroboscopic flash tube, for emitting an intense broadband illumination pulse comprising ultraviolet rays; a second stroboscopic flash tube, for emitting a continuous series of broadband illumination pulses comprising ultraviolet rays; an optional filter, within a common optical path of the first and second stroboscopic flash tubes, for filtering a portion of the broadband illumination; and a control, for synchronizing the illumination pulse of the first stroboscopic flash tube with an external trigger pulse, wherein the second stroboscopic flash tube provides an output suitable for use by a human, unaided by viewing accessories, to compose a subject at a distance from the first and second stroboscopic flash tubes, and the first stroboscopic flash tube provides an output pulse suitable for exposure of an image capture medium. Both tubes are preferably manufactured to maintain the same spectral signature by adjusting fill pressure and gas mixture, and envelope material.
US07982402B2
A PAR38 light source assembly for use with a fixture having PAR38 socket connected to a ballast circuit for generating a ballast voltage. An electrically insulating housing supports a PAR38 screw base and encloses a CMH lamp and a circuit board providing a high voltage to ignite or re-ignite the lamp. The housing supports a reflector a lens wherein the lens, the reflector and the housing form an electrically insulating enclosure so that the PAR38 screw base is the only electrically conductive portion.
US07982401B2
A xenon short arc lamp which has a middle section with a length to diameter ratio greater than 1.6 and which is directly interchangeable with a xenon short arc lamp of the same wattage in a lamphouse without modifying the lamphouse.
US07982390B2
A phosphor element (10) includes an electron hole injection electrode (2) and an electron injection electrode (8) disposed opposite to each other, an electron hole transport layer (3), a phosphor layer (4), and an electron transport layer (7) stacked in this order from the side of the electron hole injection electrode toward the side of the electron injection electrode. The stacked layers are sandwiched between the electron hole injection electrode and the electron injection electrode, and. The phosphor layer is formed of an inorganic phosphor material (4) in which at least one part of the surface is covered with an organic material (5).
US07982382B2
A thermionic electron source includes a substrate, at least two electrodes, and a thermionic emitter. The electrodes are electrically connected to the thermionic emitter. The thermionic emitter has a film structure. Wherein there a space is defined between the thermionic emitter and the substrate.
US07982371B1
Systems and methods of harvesting and converting naturally occurring energy are described that include exposing a material to an ambient condition and harvesting at least a portion of energy that is created. Energy harvesting from fluidic and flow environments or vibration can be accomplished using types of energy harvesters, such as flexible polymers. Active materials or Electro-Active Polymer (EAP)-metal composite thin films like Ionic Polymers, Piezoceramic materials, and electromagnetic systems may be used as mechanical to electrical energy transducers. One type of an ionic EAP is ionic polymer-metal composite (IPMC), which includes a base polymer membrane that may be coated with a metal to act as a surface electrode. The surface electrode may be silver (Ag) nanoparticles. The silver nanoparticle functionalized IPMC can be used to convert mechanical vibrations and fluidic flow to electrical energy to power wireless devices and microelectronic systems, for example.
US07982370B2
A small scale electrical generator includes an elongated substrate and a first piezoelectric fine wire. The first piezoelectric fine wire is disposed along a surface of the substrate. The first piezoelectric fine wire has a first end and a spaced-apart second end. A first conductive contact secures the first end of the fine wire to a first portion of the substrate and a second conductive contact secures the second end of the fine wire to a second portion of the substrate. A fabric made of interwoven strands that includes fibers from which piezoelectric nanowires extend radially therefrom and conductive nanostructures extend therefrom is configured to generate electricity.
US07982366B2
An ultrasound transducer has a cup-shaped casing. The cup-shaped casing has a sidewall. A cross section of an inner surface of the sidewall being perpendicular to a central axis of the ultrasound transducer substantially shows a dumbbell-shaped contour. The dumbbell-shaped contour has a pair of opposite straight-line sections being substantially parallel to a longitudinal axis of the dumbbell-shaped contour and a pair of opposite arc sections being located respectively at two ends of the longitudinal axis of the dumbbell-shaped contour and respectively forming two enlarged portions of the dumbbell-shaped contour. Two ends of each arc section of the dumbbell-shaped contour respectively joint the straight-line sections through two curve sections and each curve section is connected to one end of the arc section and one straight-line section. At least one enlarged area of a dumbbell-shaped surface of an inside bottom surface has a recessed portion.
US07982365B2
The elastic wave device of the present invention has an piezoelectric substrate; a first dielectric layer disposed on the piezoelectric substrate; a second dielectric layer disposed on the first dielectric layer; and an acoustical layer on the second dielectric layer. Determining each film thickness of the first and the second dielectric layers provides advantageous effects. That is, energy of an SH wave as a main wave is confined in the boundary between the piezoelectric substrate and the first dielectric layer, and at the same time, an SV wave is suppressed as an unwanted wave. The device allows the SV wave—whose displacement distribution is similar to that of Stoneley wave—to have displacement distribution on the upper surface of the second dielectric layer and to be suppressed by the acoustical layer disposed on the second dielectric layer.
US07982363B2
A method for fabricating a bulk acoustic wave (BAW) device comprising providing a growth substrate and growing an Group-III nitride epitaxial layer on the growth substrate. A first electrode is deposited on the epitaxial layer. A carrier substrate is provided and the growth substrate, epitaxial layer and first electrode combination is flip-chip mounted on the carrier substrate. The growth substrate is removed and a second electrode is deposited on the epitaxial layer with the epitaxial layer sandwiched between the first and second electrodes. A bulk acoustic wave (BAW) device comprises first and second metal electrodes and a Group-III nitride epitaxial layer sandwiched between the first and second electrodes. A carrier substrate is included, with the first and second electrodes and epitaxial layer on the carrier substrate.
US07982360B2
The present invention relates to a new method and apparatus for converting heat to electric energy. The invention exploits the rapid changes in spontaneous polarization that occur in ferroelectric materials during phase change. The invention permits robust and economical generation of electric energy from thermal energy, and it can be used in many different applications. In one aspect, the present invention relates to an apparatus for converting heat to electric energy comprising a pair of electrodes; a ferroelectric layer formed there between with a ferroelectric material characterized with a Curie temperature, Tc, such that when the temperature of the ferroelectric material is lower than Tc, the ferroelectric material is in a ferroelectric phase in which very powerful polarization is established spontaneously in the unit cells of the ferroelectric material, and when the temperature of the ferroelectric material is greater than Tc, spontaneous polarization is not established in the unit cells of the ferroelectric material; and a means for alternately delivering a flow of cold fluid and a flow of hot fluid to the ferroelectric layer so as to alternately cool the ferroelectric layer at a first temperature TL that is lower than Tc, and heat the ferroelectric layer at a second temperature TH that is higher than Tc, thereby the ferroelectric material of the ferroelectric layer undergoes alternating phase transitions between the ferroelectric phase and the paraelectric phase with temperature cycling.
US07982351B2
Embodiments provide an electrical machine bearing first and second pluralities of permanent magnets having different number of pole pairs, a plurality of pole-pieces that enable the magnetic interaction between the pluralities of permanent magnets, and winding that couples with the first/fundamental harmonic of the first plurality of permanent magnets to enable electromechanical energy conversion.
US07982338B2
A control system and method of controlling an uninterruptible power supply (UPS) system prevents a load anomaly, such as transformer DC offset, resulting from a supply disruption, such as a voltage sag, by modifying the UPS supplied power curve. The UPS supplied power curve maintains a predetermined power for a predetermined duration to cause the UPS supplied power curve to depart from normal supply curve post sag detection. Following the predetermined duration, the UPS supplied power curve is conformed to the normal power supply curve until restoration of the source power supply or engagement of a secondary power source.
US07982332B2
A power device for use in a vehicle includes a housing, a voltage converter, and a charge-storing device. The housing carries the voltage converter and the charge-storing device. The voltage converter includes a circuit that converts a power signal having a first voltage level to a second voltage level. The charge-storing device electrically couples with the voltage converter and stores the power signal having the second voltage level.
US07982327B2
A wind turbine generator system includes: a wind turbine rotor including a blade having a variable pitch angle; a generator driven by the wind turbine rotor; and a control unit controlling the output power of the generator and the pitch angle of the blade in response to the rotational speed of the wind turbine rotor or the generator. The control unit performs a first control in which the output power is controlled in accordance with a predetermined power-rotational speed curve until the rotational speed is increased to reach a predetermined rated rotational speed, and performs a second control in which the output power is controlled to a predetermined rated power when the rotational speed exceeds the rated rotational speed; the control unit is responsive to the pitch angle for maintaining a state of performing the second control is or for switching to a state of performing the first control, when the rotational speed is reduced below the rated rotational speed after the control unit is once placed into the state of performing the second control.
US07982325B2
The purpose of the invention is to reduce the contribution of wind power installations to frequency errors on the grid, and preferably to contribute to the elimination of such errors. Thus, the method involves the use of PID control and/or control with hysteresis so as to regulate the active power injected into the grid, in view of the deviation between a measured grid frequency and the nominal grid frequency.
US07982324B2
A power generation control device for a generator driven by a four-stroke cycle engine is provided. The power generation control device includes a switching circuit for controlling an output current from the generator; and a power generation period control device configured to operate the switching circuit to output the output current from the generator in only a predetermined power generation period of the four strokes of the engine, wherein the power generation period ranges from an expansion stroke to an intake stroke of the four strokes.
US07982320B2
An apparatus and a process for the manufacture of a solder-bump adhered wafer substrate for use in the semiconductor industry, comprising one or more of the following steps including: arranging a first compressive member and a second compressive member in an opposed, compressibly displaceable, spaced-apart relationship, with a pattern plate disposed therebetween with the pattern plate having a plurality of aligned through-holes arranged thereon; filling the through-holes with a molten solder; compressing the solder and the pattern plate between the first and second opposed compressive members to compact the solder therein and cleans the pattern plate of excess solder; chilling the pattern plate to solidify the molten solder in the through-holes; and removing the pattern plate from the spaced-apart compressive members to produce a wafer with solder bumps thereon.
US07982311B2
An apparatus comprises a semiconductor substrate having a device layer, a plurality of metallization layers, a passivation layer, and a metal bump formed on the passivation layer that is electrically coupled to at least one of the metallization layers. The apparatus further includes a solder limiting layer formed on the passivation layer that masks an outer edge of the top surface of the metal bump, thereby making the outer edge of the top surface non-wettable to a solder material.
US07982297B1
A semiconductor package including a package body which is uniquely configured to partially expose the semiconductor die of the package. The partial exposure of the semiconductor die enhances heat dissipation from the die. Additionally, the reduced amount of encapsulant material used in the fabrication of the semiconductor package attributable to only the partial encapsulation of the semiconductor die facilitates a reduction in the overall manufacturing cost related to the semiconductor package, and further allows one or more additional semiconductor packages to be stacked upon the package while still maintaining an overall profile of reduced thickness in the resultant stack.
US07982286B2
The invention, in one aspect, provides a method of manufacturing a semiconductor device. This method includes providing a semiconductor substrate and depositing a metal layer over the semiconductor substrate that has an overall thickness of about 1 micron or greater. The metal layer is formed by depositing a first portion of the thickness of the metal layer, which has a compressive or tensile stress associated therewith over the semiconductor substrate. A stress-compensating layer is deposited over the first portion, such that the stress-compensating layer imparts a stress to the first portion that is opposite to the compressive or tensile stress associated with the first portion. A second portion of the thickness of the metal layer is then deposited over the stress-compensating layer.
US07982278B2
A thermoelectric module has a first substrate, a second substrate spaced from the first substrate, a plurality of P type thermoelectric elements and N type thermoelectric elements arranged in the space between the first and second substrates, and a plurality of electrodes which connect the P type and N type thermoelectric elements in series. Each electrode is connected to a respective one of the plurality of P type thermoelectric elements at a first connection and a respective one of the plurality of N type thermoelectric elements in the space, and a sealant is located at an edge portion of the space. Each one of a series of first or outer electrodes closest to the edge portion of the space has a concave portion that is concaved in a direction departing from the edge portion of the space and is at a position between the first connection and the second connection.
US07982276B2
An optical semiconductor device is provided with a low concentration p-type silicon substrate (1); a low dopant concentration n-type epitaxial layer (second epitaxial layer) (26); a low dopant concentration p-type anode layer (27); a high concentration n-type cathode contact layer (9); a photodiode (2) made of the anode layer (27) and the cathode contact layer (9); and an NPN transistor (3) formed on the n-type epitaxial layer (26). The anode can be substantially completely depleted in the case where the anode layer (27) has its dopant concentration peak in the vicinity of the interface between the silicon substrate (1) and the n-type epitaxial layer (26). Therefore, high speed and high light receiving sensitivity characteristics can be obtained, and further, any influence of auto-doping from peripheral embedding layers can be controlled, so that a depletion layer can be stably formed in the anode. Thus, a photodiode characterized in its high speed and high light receiving sensitivity for short wavelength light and a transistor characterized in its high speed can be mounted on the same semiconductor substrate.
US07982275B2
A magnetic device including a magnetic element is described. The magnetic element includes a fixed layer having a fixed layer magnetization, a spacer layer that is nonmagnetic, and a free layer having a free layer magnetization. The free layer is changeable due to spin transfer when a write current above a threshold is passed through the first free layer. The free layer is includes low saturation magnetization materials.
US07982269B2
A semiconductor structure. The structure includes (a) a fin region having (i) a first source/drain portion having a first surface and a third surface, wherein the first and third surfaces are (A) parallel to each other and (B) not coplanar, (ii) a second source/drain portion having a second surface and a fourth surface, wherein the second and fourth surfaces are (A) parallel to each other and (B) not coplanar, and (iii) a channel region; (b) a gate dielectric layer; (c) a gate electrode region, wherein the gate dielectric layer (i) is sandwiched between, and (ii) electrically insulates the gate electrode region and the channel region; and (d) first second strain creating regions on the third and fourth surfaces, respectively, wherein the first and second strain creating regions comprise a strain creating material.
US07982256B2
A semiconductor memory device may have a DRAM cell mode and a non-volatile memory cell mode without a capacitor, including multiple transistors arranged in an array and having floating bodies, word lines connected to gate electrodes of the transistors, bit lines at a first side of the gate electrodes connected to drains of the transistors, source lines at a second side of the gate electrodes, different from the first side, and connected to sources of the transistors on the semiconductor substrate, and charge storage regions between the gate electrodes and the floating bodies.
US07982253B2
A semiconductor device with a dynamic gate drain capacitance. One embodiment provides a semiconductor device. The device includes a semiconductor substrate, a field effect transistor structure including a source region, a first body region, a drain region, a gate electrode structure and a gate insulating layer. The gate insulating layer is arranged between the gate electrode structure and the body region. The gate electrode structure and the drain region partially form a capacitor structure including a gate-drain capacitance configured to dynamically change with varying reverse voltages applied between the source and drain regions. The gate-drain capacitance includes at least one local maximum at a given threshold or a plateau-like course at given reverse voltage.
US07982241B2
A buffer layer formed of Inx1Aly1Gaz1N formed on a base, with an upper part of the buffer layer containing columnar polycrystalline including a grain boundary existing in a direction substantially perpendicular to a surface of the base. The number of grain boundaries in the lower part of the buffer layer is greater than that in the upper part, and a full width at half maximum of an X-ray rocking curve of the upper part is 300-3000 seconds, RMS of the surface of the buffer layer is 0.2 nm-6 nm, and the ratio of the grain boundary width of the crystal grain of the upper part in a direction parallel to the base surface to the formation thickness of the buffer layer is 0.5-1.5.
US07982236B2
The present invention provides a light emitting element capable or realizing at least one of lower resistance, higher output, higher power efficiency (1m/W), higher mass productivity and lower cost of the element using a light transmissive electrode for an electrode arranged exterior to the light emitting structure. A semiconductor light emitting element includes a light emitting section, a first electrode and a second electrode on a semiconductor structure including first and second conductive type semiconductor layers, the first and the second electrodes respectively including at least two layers of a first layer of a light transmissive conductive film conducting to the first and the second conductive type semiconductor and a second layer arranged so as to conduct with the first layer. First and second light transmissive insulating films are respectively arranged so as to overlap at least one part of the first and the second layers.
US07982234B2
There is provided a light emitting device, which comprises compound semiconductor layers including a first conductive semiconductor layer, an active layer and a second conductive semiconductor layer; a metal reflection layer formed on a region of the second conductive semiconductor layer; an insulating structure formed at least in a boundary region of the second conductive semiconductor layer; a metal material structure formed to cover the second conductive semiconductor layer having the metal reflection layer and the insulating structure formed; and a substrate bonded to the metal material structure, wherein the boundary region of the second conductive semiconductor layer includes an outer region of the second conductive semiconductor layer along an outer circumference of the second conductive semiconductor layer.
US07982221B2
A semiconductor device and method for arranging and manufacturing the same are disclosed. The semiconductor device includes a plurality of inverters including at least one first pull-up transistor and first pull-down transistor and inverting and outputting an input signal, respectively; and a plurality of NAND gates including at least two second pull-up transistor and second pull-down transistor and generating an output signal having a high level if at least one of at least two input signals has a low level, respectively, wherein the at least one first pull-up transistor and first pull-down transistor and the at least two second pull-up transistor and second pull-down transistor are stacked and arranged on at least two layers.
US07982218B2
A TFT array substrate comprises an insulator base; a first metal layer on the insulator base, a first portion thereof forming a gate electrode of a TFT; a gate insulating layer overlying the first metal layer and the insulator base; an amorphous silicon layer and a first layer of conductive transparent material both on the gate insulating layer; a doped amorphous silicon layer positioned on the amorphous silicon layer; a second metal layer on the doped amorphous silicon layer and the first layer of conductive transparent material, a first portion thereof forming source and drain electrodes of the TFT; a passivation layer on the second metal layer; and a second layer of conductive transparent material on the passivation layer, a first portion thereof forming a pixel electrode, wherein the first layer of conductive transparent material forms a portion of a common electrode of the array substrate.
US07982217B2
A second semiconductor chip including the operation of receiving operation instructions given from a first semiconductor chip and outputting a signal corresponding to it is mounted on mounting means. Internal wirings for interconnecting the first and second semiconductor chips, and external terminals respectively connected to the internal wirings are provided in the mounting means to constitute a multi chip module. Further, a signal path for selectively invalidating operation instructions from the first semiconductor chip to the second semiconductor chip is provided inside the module.
US07982209B2
A rewritable nonvolatile memory cell is disclosed comprising a steering element in series with a carbon nanotube fabric. The steering element is preferably a diode, but may also be a transistor. The carbon nanotube fabric reversibly changes resistivity when subjected to an appropriate electrical pulse. The different resistivity states of the carbon nanotube fabric can be sensed, and can correspond to distinct data states of the memory cell. A first memory level of such memory cells can be monolithically formed above a substrate, a second memory level monolithically formed above the first, and so on, forming a highly dense monolithic three dimensional memory array of stacked memory levels.
US07982205B2
A III-V group compound semiconductor light-emitting diode, containing a substrate 1 having plural crystal planes, and a grown layer formed on the substrate by epitaxial growth, the grown layer at least including a barrier layer 2 and 3 and an active layer 8, wherein at least the active layer of the grown layer has plural crystal planes each having a different bandgap energy in the in-plane direction, and an Ohmic electrode 4 for current injection is formed on a crystal plane (3) having a higher bandgap energy among the plural crystal planes.
US07982200B2
Treatment planning methods are provided that determine the variability of relative biological effectiveness (RBE) along a beam line and calculate, among other things, what intensity of hadron beam such as a proton or a carbon ion beam should be applied to achieve a desired biological dose at treatment site of a patient afflicted with a medical condition. Typically, three or four RBE values at three or four corresponding spacially-dispersed intervals along the beam line are calculated. In one embodiment, two RBE values for the spread-out Bragg peak (SOBP) region of the treatment site; one for the proximal section and one for the declining distal section is calculated. A third and different RBE value may be determined for the distal edge region of the SOBP. A fourth value may also be calculated for a pre-SOBP region.
US07982197B2
A hydrogen ion implanter for the exfoliation of silicon from silicon wafers uses a large scan wheel carrying 50+ wafers around its periphery and rotating about an axis. In one embodiment, the axis of rotation of the wheel is fixed and the wheel is formed with tensioned spokes supporting a rim carrying the wafer supports. The spokes may be used for carrying cooling fluid to and from the wafer supports. Detachable connections in the cooling fluid conduits in the vacuum chamber may comprise tandem seals with an intermediate chamber between them which can be vented outside the vacuum chamber, or independently vacuum pumped. In one embodiment, a ribbon beam of hydrogen ions is directed down on a peripheral edge of the wheel. The ribbon beam extends over the full radial width of wafers on the wheel.
US07982192B2
In a beam processing apparatus including a beam scanner having a two electrodes type deflection scanning electrode, the beam scanner further includes shielding suppression electrode assemblies respectively at vicinities of upstream side and downstream side of the two electrodes type deflection scanning electrode and having openings in a rectangular shape for passing a charged particle beam. Each of the shielding suppression electrode assemblies is an assembly electrode comprising one sheet of a suppression electrode and two sheets of shielding ground electrodes interposing the suppression electrode. A total of front side portions and rear side portions of the two electrodes type deflection scanning electrode is shielded by the two sheets of shielding ground electrodes.
US07982190B2
According to one embodiment, a radiation detector includes, a substrate, a scintillator layer, a moistureproof body, and an adhesion layer. The substrate comprises a photoelectric conversion element. The scintillator layer is formed on the substrate and converts radiation into fluorescence. The moistureproof body comprises a flange portion in a periphery thereof, the moistureproof body being deep enough to contain at least the scintillator layer. The adhesion layer causes the substrate and the flange portion of the moistureproof body to adhere to each other in a sealed manner.
US07982182B2
The present invention relates to an ion trap with a large trap capacity. A mass spectrometer comprises a first linear ion trap that performs mass selective ejection, and a second linear ion trap that accumulates and then mass selectively ejects ions ejected from the first linear ion trap. Directions of resonant excitation of ions of the first linear ion trap and of the second linear ion trap are orthogonal. Compared to conventional art, sensitivity is significantly improved.
US07982176B2
An absolute position length measurement type encoder includes: a scale in which an ABS pattern based on a pseudorandom code is provided; a light-receiving element for receiving bright and dark patterns formed by the scale; and a signal processing circuit for processing signals subjected to output of the light-receiving element and measuring an absolute position of the scale to the light-receiving element, wherein the signal processing circuit includes a space-dividing number conversion circuit that obtains finer intervals D than the array interval PPDA of the ABS light-receiving element array of the light-receiving element, and simultaneously obtains and outputs a digital value for each of the intervals D subjected to output of the ABS light-receiving element array. Therefore, even where the minimum line width of the ABS pattern is not an integral multiple of the array interval of the ABS light-receiving element array, an arithmetic operation for the correlation can be carried out, and the moving distance can be measured at high accuracy.
US07982175B2
Disclosed are various embodiments of a reflective optical encoder system having at least three channels—two data channels and at least one index channel. The various configurations of reflective optical encoders disclosed herein permits very high resolution reflective optical encoders in small packages to be provided. In addition, the embodiments of the reflective optical encoder systems disclosed herein reduce problems associated with misalignment between code scales and light detectors, permit relatively simple electronic circuitry to be used to process outputs, and reduce manufacturing, assembly, integrated circuit and encoder costs. Methods of making and using such optical encoders are also disclosed.
US07982172B2
In an MCP assembly 10 having one or a plurality of MCPs 5, 6 sandwiched with an input-side electrode 4 and an output-side electrode 7, there provided at the surface facing the MCP 5, 6 of at least either (preferably, both) of the input-side electrode 4 and the output-side electrode 7, is a substantially annular contact face that contacts the MCP surface to fix the same, and there provided at a periphery of the contact face is a separation surface retracted in a direction to be separated from the MCP surface. Thereby, provided is an MCP assembly having a construction enabled to prevent damage to the MCP in manufacturing and handling.
US07982169B2
An apparatus and a method are presented for detecting the focal position of an optical system (10) with a radiation source (12), a focusing imaging system (16), an at least partially reflective surface (18) on the focus (18a), a digital camera (24) for recording an image reflected by said surface (18), a computer (C) for evaluating the image recorded by the camera (24), and with an optical element (34; 36) in the beam path of the optical system (10) upstream of the focusing imaging system (16), which element influences said image depending on the focal position.
US07982168B2
Various constructs that absorb exudates and enhance browning and crisping of a food item during heating in a microwave oven are provided.
US07982150B2
A switch assembly having an indicator includes a case, a switch member, at least two terminals, a conductive member and an indicator. The case includes a cover and the switch member is pivotally connected to the case. The terminals are electrically connected to a circuit and the conductive member actuated by the switch member to control the circuit to be an open circuit or a closed circuit. The indicator is installed within the switch member and has two legs which are connected to the cover of the case. Two resilient members are respectively biased between the two legs and the two terminals, thereby ensuring electrically connecting the legs with the terminals.
US07982149B2
Mechanical architecture for providing maximum viewing area on key button tops of keys for a user input device. The viewing area is for the display of information on the key buttons, and also includes tactile feedback similar to standard laptop keyboards, all using low cost manufacturing methods such as injection molding. The architecture optimizes an aperture through the core of the key switch assembly in order to project an image through the aperture and onto the display area of the key button. The architecture relocates in at least one embodiment the tactile feedback mechanism (e.g., dome assembly) out from underneath the key button to the perimeter or side of the key switch assembly. The architecture finds particular application to input devices such as keyboards, game pods, data entry device, etc., that operate in combination with an optical surface (e.g., wedge lens).
US07982148B2
Disclosed is a frame for a circuit breaker, including: a plurality of unit frames having a plurality of inner spaces, and a connection unit coupled between two adjacent unit frames among the unit frames and connecting the two unit frames to each other, thereby reducing the manufacturing cost as well as facilitating its manufacture and reducing the manufacturing time.
US07982142B2
A diverter switch with an operating member and an electric circuit. The electric circuit has a main branch and a resistance branch connected in parallel with the main branch. Each branch includes a contact and a vacuum switch. The resistance branch also includes a resistance. The main rotary selector contact is always operated before the resistance contact. The operating member is arranged, during operation, always to rotate the main contact in one and the same direction of rotation. Also a corresponding method for operating a diverter switch and use of such a switch.
US07982133B2
An electrically insulated coil assembly for use in a high vibration environment, such as with an aircraft engine, includes a coil of metal wires encompassed by a resin base matrix. A fabric is embedded in the resin matrix near an outer surface of the resin base matrix to divide a thin layer of the resin base matrix into a plurality of segments. In an embodiment, a notch blunting additive is provided in the resin to impede crack propagation.
US07982130B2
A photovoltaic device includes a photoactive region disposed between and electrically connected to two electrodes where the photoactive region includes photoactive polymer-wrapped carbon nanotubes that create excitons upon absorption of light in the range of about 400 nm to 1400 nm.
US07982125B2
A transducer includes a piezoelectric element attached to a stringed musical instrument with an adhesive layer, and at least one intermediate layer provided in a thickness-wise middle portion of the adhesive layer and made of a material different from a material of the adhesive layer. The transducer has a mounting surface attached to face a back surface of a top of a body of the stringed musical instrument, and the mounting surface is disposed in an area, in the top, including an area right under an installation area of a bridge which is provided on a front surface of the top and supports a saddle supporting one-end sides of strings.
US07982120B2
A performance apparatus capable of reproducing music pieces while making changeover between the music pieces without disturbing the rhythm of exercise, dance, or the like performed by a user to the rhythm of music. A beat position is acquired that will appear in a preceding performance data for the first time after a preparatory time required for changing the reproduction of the preceding music piece to the reproduction of a subsequent music piece elapses from when a music selection instruction is given. The reproduction of the subsequent music piece is started at the same time when the music is reproduced up to the acquired beat position.
US07982119B2
Methods, systems, and devices are described for automatically converting audio input signal data into musical score representation data. Embodiments of the invention identify a change in frequency information from the audio signal that exceeds a first threshold value; identify a change in amplitude information from the audio signal that exceeds a second threshold value; and generate a note onset event, each note onset event representing a time location in the audio signal of at least one of an identified change in the frequency information that exceeds the first threshold value or an identified change in the amplitude information that exceeds the second threshold value. The generation of note onset events and other information from the audio input signal may be used to extract note pitch, note value, tempo, meter, key, instrumentation, and other score representation information.
US07982113B2
A method and device of synchronizing at least one multimedia peripheral of a portable communication device with a synthetic audio file include storing parameters in the portable communication device. The parameters include a list of preferred instruments. Information is read from the synthetic audio file. The information relates to an instrument corresponding to each track available in the synthetic audio file. A track is selected from among the tracks available in the synthetic audio file based on the list of preferred instruments. At least one synchronization signal is generated from the synthetic audio file using the selected track.
US07982107B1
A novel inbred maize variety designated PHHEP and seed, plants and plant parts thereof. Methods for producing a maize plant that comprise crossing inbred maize variety PHHEP with another maize plant. Methods for producing a maize plant containing in its genetic material one or more traits introgressed into PHHEP through backcross conversion and/or transformation, and to the maize seed, plant and plant part produced thereby. Hybrid maize seed, plant or plant part produced by crossing the inbred variety PHHEP or a trait conversion of PHHEP with another maize variety. Inbred maize varieties derived from inbred maize variety PHHEP, methods for producing other inbred maize varieties derived from inbred maize variety PHHEP and the inbred maize varieties and their parts derived by the use of those methods.
US07982106B1
An inbred maize line, designated HMA02ND, is disclosed. The invention relates to the seeds of inbred maize line HMA02ND, to the plants of inbred maize line HMA02ND and to methods for producing a maize plant, either inbred or hybrid, by crossing the inbred line HMA02ND with itself or another maize line. The invention further relates to methods for producing a maize plant containing in its genetic material one or more transgenes and to the transgenic plants produced by that method and to methods for producing other inbred maize lines derived from the inbred HMA02ND.
US07982101B2
The invention provides Brassica plants and lines having an improved Sclerotinia sclerotiorum Disease Incidence (SSDI %) score and represented by, or descended from, NCIMB accession number 41398.
US07982100B2
The invention provides Brassica plants and lines having an improved Sclerotinia sclerotiorum Disease Incidence (SSDI %) score and represented by, or descended from, NCIMB accession number 41289 or 41391.
US07982094B2
The present invention relates to genes for enzymes having the activity of transferring a methyl group to lignans, plants with an altered lignan composition using these methyltransferases, and so on. More particularly, the present invention relates to enzyme genes having the activity of synthesizing methylated lignans, preferably enzyme genes having the activity of synthesizing sesame-derived methylated lignans, and use thereof.
US07982089B2
There is provided a tampon pledget or tampon applicator that is covered by a wrapper having microcapsules thereon. Alternatively, the microcapsules may simply be disposed on the tampon pledget or tampon applicator. The microcapsules may contain a lubricant or a fragrance or a combination of both. The microcapsules may be ruptured prior to inserting the tampon pledget or tampon applicator and the resultant free-flowing lubricant and/or fragrance is spread on the tampon pledget, tampon applicator, or a combination thereof. The lubricant increases the ease and comfort of inserting and positioning the tampon pledget or tampon applicator. The amount of lubricant desired may be controlled by varying the pressure applied to the microcapsules. Thus, the number of microcapsules ruptured can be controlled by varying the pressure applied.
US07982086B2
A process for fractionating isobutene from normal butenes, including: introducing hydrogen and a feed stream comprising isobutene, 1-butene, and 2-butene into a first column including a reaction zone containing a hydroisomerization catalyst operating at a first pressure and concurrently: (i) converting at least a portion of the 1-butene to 2-butene, and (ii) separating isobutene from the 2-butene; recovering a first overheads fraction comprising isobutene from the first column; recovering a first bottoms fraction comprising isobutene, 2-butene, and unreacted 1-butene from the first column; introducing the first bottoms fraction into a top portion of a second column comprising a fractionation column operating at a second pressure lower than the first pressure; separating the first bottoms into a second overheads fraction comprising isobutene and 1-butene and a second bottoms fraction comprising 2-butene; compressing the second overheads fraction; and introducing the compressed second overheads fraction to a lower portion of the first column.
US07982081B2
Alkylation processes such as the alkylation of aromatics, are catalyzed by the UZM-35 family of crystalline aluminosilicate zeolites represented by the empirical formula: Mmn+Rr+Al(1−x)ExSiyOz where M represents a combination of potassium and sodium exchangeable cations, R is a singly charged organoammonium cation such as the dimethyldipropylammonium cation and E is a framework element such as gallium. These UZM-35 zeolites are active and selective in alkylation processes.
US07982080B2
In a process for converting a low carbon number aliphatic hydrocarbon to higher hydrocarbons including aromatic hydrocarbons, a feed containing the aliphatic hydrocarbon is contacted with a dehydrocyclization catalyst under conditions effective to convert the aliphatic hydrocarbon to aromatic hydrocarbons and produce an effluent stream comprising aromatic hydrocarbons and hydrogen. The dehydrocyclization catalyst comprises a metal or metal compound and a molecular sieve wherein the ratio of the amount of any Bronsted acid sites in the catalyst to the amount of said metal in the catalyst is less than 0.4 mol/mol of said metal.
US07982073B2
A process is disclosed for making CF3CF═CHF. The process involves contacting at least one hexafluoropropane selected from the group consisting of CF3CF2CH2F and CF3CHFCHF2 with a chromium oxyfluoride catalyst in a reactor to obtain a product mixture comprising CF3CF═CHF, and recovering CF3CF═CHF from the product mixture.A process is disclosed for making CF3CH═CHF. The process involves contacting CF3CH2CHF2 with a chromium oxyfluoride catalyst in a reactor to obtain a product mixture comprising CF3CH═CHF, and recovering CF3CH═CHF from the product mixture.A process is disclosed for making CF3CF═CH2. The process involves contacting CF3CF2CH3 with a chromium oxyfluoride catalyst in a reactor to obtain a product mixture comprising CF3CF═CH2, and recovering CF3CF═CH2 from the product mixture.
US07982072B2
Process for the obtention of HFC-227ea having a reduced content of organic impurities, comprising at least subjecting a crude HFC-227ea to two distillation steps at different pressures.
US07982068B2
A process for urea production from ammonia and carbon dioxide, in which part of the aqueous solution comprising urea, ammonium carbamate and ammonia obtained in a urea synthesis section is subjected to dissociation in a treatment section operating at a predetermined medium pressure for the recovery of the ammonium carbamate and of the ammonia contained in it, comprises the steps of subjecting the urea aqueous solution resulting from the aforementioned dissociation step to decomposition in a low pressure urea recovery section and of using at least a part of the condensed steam, obtained by indirect thermal exchange with a second part of said aqueous solution comprising urea, ammonium carbmate and ammonia in a high-pressure stripping unit, as a heating fluid for the dissociation of the first part of the aqueous solution comprising urea, ammonium carbmate and ammonia in the medium-pressure treatment section.
US07982065B2
A process for the selective production of vinyl ester by the reaction of a carboxylic acid with acetylene under heterogeneous catalytic conditions is disclosed and claimed. In a preferred embodiment of this invention, reaction of benzoic acid and acetylene in the presence of supported platinum catalyst at a temperature of from about 100 to 180° C. results in quantitative yields of vinyl benzoate.
US07982063B2
The invention relates to a composite material comprising nanoparticles of at least one metal derivative and at least one type of carboxylic and/or sulfonic acid derivative organic compound chemically bound in a covalent manner with said nanoparticles by means of at least one carboxylic and/or sulfonic function.
US07982062B2
A process for the preparation of high purity cholanic acids, typically in purity equal to or higher than 99%.
US07982057B2
The present invention relates to novel compound of stemphones obtained by culturing microorganism belonging to genus Aspergillus and having ability to produce compound of stemphones selected from the group consisting of stemphone D substance, stemphone E substance, stemphone E1 substance, stemphone E2 substance, stemphone E3 substance and stemphone F substance, accumulating the compound of stemphones in the cultured mass, and isolating the compound of stemphones from the cultured mass. Since the obtained compound has enhancing activity for imipenem and activity for reducing cytotoxicity, it can be expected to be useful as lead compounds for combination remedy for methicillin resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) infection.
US07982055B2
A heterocyclic fused selenophenes and a method of making a heterocyclic fused selenophenes of formula (1): wherein X is S or Se, Y is S or Se, wherein one or both of X and Y is Se, R is a substituent group. The monomer being capable of polymerization to form an electrically conductive polymer or oligomer.
US07982052B2
Process for the preparation of stable nitroxyl radicals (I) starting from N-benzylphthalimide in two steps. In the first step, the intermediate N-benzyl-1,1,3,3-tetra-alkylisoindoline is prepared by treatment with a Grignard reagent, prepared in methyl-tert-butyl ether, of N-benzylphthalimide, obtained in the same reaction environment starting from phthalic anhydride and benzylamine. In the second step, the N-benzyl-1,1,3,3-tetra-alkylisoindoline is transformed into the nitroxyl radical by hydrogenolysis and subsequent oxidation with hydrogen peroxide in the presence of a catalyst selected from acids and salts of polymolybdic or polytungstic acids.
US07982045B2
Compounds of the formula I, in which R(1), R(2), R(3), R(4), R(5), R(6), R(7), R(8), R(30) and R(31) have the meanings indicated in the claims, are very particularly suitable as novel and antiarrythmic active compounds, in particular for the treatment and prophylaxis of atrial arrythmias, e.g. atrial fibrillation (AF), or atrial flutter.
US07982037B2
This invention describes novel pyrazole compounds of formula IIIa: wherein R1 is T-Ring D, wherein Ring D is a 5-7 membered monocyclic ring or 8-10 membered bicyclic ring selected from aryl, heteroaryl, heterocyclyl or carbocyclyl; Rx, Ry, R2, and R2′ are as described in the specification. The compounds are useful as protein kinase inhibitors, especially as inhibitors of Aurora-2 and GSK-3, for treating diseases such as cancer, diabetes and Alzheimer's disease.
US07982031B2
The present invention relates to a method for the selective oxidation of a carbohydrate in the presence of a gold catalyst which includes nanodispersed gold particles on a metal oxide support, to a method for the selective oxidation of an oligosaccharide in the presence of a gold catalyst which comprises nanodispersed gold particles on a carbon or metal oxide support, and to the aldonic acid oxidation products prepared by use of these methods.
US07982025B2
The present invention relates to fusion proteins containing at least two Mycobacterium species antigens. In particular, it relates to nucleic acids encoding fusion proteins that include two or more individual M. tuberculosis antigens, which increase serological sensitivity of sera from individuals infected with tuberculosis, and methods for their use in the diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of tuberculosis infection.
US07982024B2
The present invention relates to antibodies and antigen-binding portions thereof that specifically bind to insulin-like growth factor I receptor (IGF-IR), which is preferably human IGF-IR. The invention also relates to human anti-IGF-IR antibodies, including chimeric, bispecific, derivatized, single chain antibodies or portions of fusion proteins. The invention also relates to isolated heavy and light chain immunoglobulin molecules derived from anti-IGF-IR antibodies and nucleic acid molecules encoding such molecules. The present invention also relates to methods of making anti-IGF-IR antibodies, pharmaceutical compositions comprising these antibodies and methods of using the antibodies and compositions thereof for diagnosis and treatment. The invention also provides gene therapy methods using nucleic acid molecules encoding the heavy and/or light immunoglobulin molecules that comprise the human anti-IGF-IR antibodies. The invention also relates to gene therapy methods and transgenic animals comprising nucleic acid molecules of the present invention.
US07982012B2
The present invention provides novel anti-cytomegalovirus antibodies and related compositions and methods. These antibodies may be used in the diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of cytomegalovirus infection.
US07982011B2
Recombinant immunotoxins are fusion proteins composed of the Fv domains of antibodies fused to bacterial or plant toxins. RFB4 (Fv)-PE38 is an immunotoxin that targets CD22 expressed on B cells and B cell malignancies. The present invention provides antibodies and antibody fragments that have improved ability to bind the CD22 antigen compared to RFB4. Immunotoxins made with the antibodies and antibody fragments of the invention have improved cytotoxicity to CD22-expressing cancer cells. Compositions that incorporate these antibodies into chimeric immunotoxin molecules that can be used in medicaments and methods for inhibiting the growth and proliferation of such cancers. Additionally, the invention provides a method of increasing the cytotoxicity of forms of Pseudomonas exotoxin A (“PE”) with the mutation of a single amino acid, as well as compositions of such mutated PEs, nucleic acids encoding them, and methods for using the mutated PEs.
US07982010B2
The invention is a proteinaceous construct comprising a Factor VIII molecule which is conjugated to a water-soluble polymer via carbohydrate moieties of Factor VIII, and methods of preparing same.
US07982008B2
The invention provides methods for the treatment of diseases and conditions mediated by increased phosphorylation, such as inflammation and cancer. The invention also provides methods for the inhibition of increased phosphorylation in cells, tissues and organs. The methods utilize a phosphate acceptor compound (PAC). The invention also provides products comprising a PAC.
US07981993B2
A 1-butene ethylene copolymer having an ethylene derived units content ranging from 15.10% by molto 18.00% by mol having the following properties: a) distribution of molecular weight lower than 3; preferably b) hardness shore A (measured according to ISO 868) lower than 65; c) tension set lower than 30% at 100% of deformation (ISO 2285) d) no melting pointdetectable at the DSC; e) Melting enthalpy measured after 10 days of aging at room temperature comprised between 4 and 15 J/g.
US07981990B2
A method comprising: (a) forming a living liquid polymer, wherein said living liquid polymer is anionically initiated and comprises a cation; (b) adding a functional initiator precursor of the formula FI-H, wherein H is hydrogen and FI is a functional group, said H terminates said living liquid polymer resulting in said liquid polymer having a number average molecular weight of about 20,000 (g/mole) to about 100,000 (g/mole), and said FI and said cation form a functional initiator; (c) adding monomer, wherein said functional initiator initiates anionic polymerization of said monomer; and (d) terminating the polymerization reaction initiated in step (c). Steps (a) through (c) may be conducted in a single reactor, allowing a liquid polymer to be dispersed in a functionalized polymer in a single polymerization step. Thus, the liquid polymer does not have to be handled separately and processing efficiency is improved.
US07981986B2
Microstructured optical films and polymerizable resin compositions comprising at one aromatic monomer or oligomer having at least two polymerizable (meth)acrylate groups and a fluorenol (meth)acrylate monomer.
US07981973B2
The present disclosure relates to a process for latex preparation comprising a first heating of a latomer mixture comprising at least one free radical polymerizable monomer to low conversion and then adding at least one alkylene anhydride; a second heating of the latomer mixture to low conversion; a third heating of the latomer mixture to form polymeric particles; and combining at least one amine with the polymeric particles.
US07981967B2
The invention is directed to a composition suitable for high gloss air quenched blown films. The films are comprised of from 2 to 15 percent by weight of a substantially isotactic propylene-based copolymer having a melt flow rate of at least 5 g/10 minutes and having from 8 to 21 mole percent units derived from an alpha olefin; and from 85 to 98 percent by weight of an ethylene-based copolymer having a melt index of from 0.1 to 9 g/10 minutes. An air quenched blown film made from the inventive composition exhibits a value for gloss greater than the value for gloss exhibited by an air quenched blown film made solely from the ethylene-based copolymer.
US07981961B2
Binder-containing aqueous dispersions containing organopolysiloxanes R1xSi(OR2)yO(4-x-y)/2 where x+y is ≦3, x averages 1.0 to 2.0 and y averages 0 to 0.5, and a water soluble or self-dispersing silane-containing polymer provides both high adhesion as well as soil-repellant properties when applied to substrates such as textiles and carpeting.
US07981960B2
A thermoplastic resin composition can include (A) about 30 to about 99 parts by weight of an epoxy group-containing styrenic polymer comprising (A1) about 5 to about 100% by weight of an epoxy group-containing vinyl copolymer and (A2) about 0 to about 95% by weight of a rubber modified styrenic copolymer resin; and (B) about 1 to about 70 parts by weight of a polyester resin. The resin composition may further comprise (C) about 3 to about 20 parts by weight of a bromine-containing flame retardant, per 100 parts by weight of a base resin comprising (A) and (B); and (D) about 0.1 to about 6 parts by weight of a flame retardant aid, per 100 parts by weight of a base resin comprising (A) and (B).
US07981956B2
An emulsion composition according to the present invention includes: a nonionic compound having a molecular weight that is greater than or equal to 500 and a cloud point that is less than or equal to 80 degrees Celsius in a 1 percent aqueous solution in which ethylene oxide and an alkylene oxide having a carbon number that is greater than or equal to 3 are added in block and/or random form to an aliphatic alcohol having a carbon number that is less than or equal to 18; and a synthetic resin.
US07981955B2
Electrical insulation system, which optionally contains a filler material and/or further additives, wherein said electrical insulation system comprises poly(dicyclopentadiene) as the main component, and method of making said electrical insulation system.
US07981952B2
The present invention provides a functionally dry warm mix asphalt binder composition modified with lubricating agents or additives that can be mixed with aggregate and compacted at temperatures substantially below asphalt binder compositions that do not contain the disclosed lubricating additives.
US07981942B2
The present invention relates to a new molding powder comprising polyethylene polymer particles. The molecular weight of the polyethylene polymer is within the range of from about 600,000 g/mol to about 2,700,000 g/mol as determined by ASTM 4020. The average particle size of the particles of the polyethylene polymer is within the range of from about 5 microns to about 1000 microns and the polyethylene has a powder bulk density in the range of from about 0.10 to about 0.30 g/cc. Also disclosed is a process for molding a shape from a molding powder comprising the inventive polyethylene polymer particles, as well as porous articles made in accordance with the process. The articles have excellent porosity and good strength for porous and porous filtration applications.
US07981939B2
Use of 2-bromo-isovanillin in the preparation of an anticancer medicament and/or radio- and chemotherapy sensitizing medicament is disclosed. The medicament for the treatment of cancers and/or for radio- and chemotherapy sensitization comprising 2-bromo-isovanillin as active ingredient provided herein has the following features: (1) low toxicity, without evident adverse effects; (2) significant therapeutic effect, with remarkable proliferation inhibiting and pro-apoptotic effects in tumor cells; (3) a broad-spectrum anticancer activity; (4) suitable to be used in combination with antimetabolites, to enhance the effects and meanwhile lower the toxicity, and also to reduce multi-drug resistance; (5) convenient and safe administration, the main route being oral.
US07981936B2
The invention is directed to the Form A polymorph of N-benzyl-N′-(2,6-diisopropyl-phenyl)-N-isopropyl-malonamide and its use as a therapeutic/cosmetic agent.
US07981927B2
The present invention is directed to novel steroid derivatives, pharmaceutical compositions containing them and their use in the treatment of disorders and conditions modulated by at least one progesterone or glucocorticoid receptor.
US07981926B2
The invention relates to fluorinated second generation taxoid compounds, pharmaceutical formulations thereof, and their use for inhibiting the growth of cancer cells in a mammal.
US07981925B2
Described herein are compounds and pharmaceutical compositions containing such compounds, which modulate the activity of store-operated calcium (SOC) channels. Also described herein are methods of using such SOC channel modulators, alone and in combination with other compounds, for treating diseases or conditions that would benefit from inhibition of SOC channel activity.
US07981922B2
This invention relates to a process for synthesizing an amino acid derivative of a tripeptidomimetic, such as lisinopril. The invention also relates to a derivative of lisinopril, incorporating a amino acid moeity such as tryptophan at the P2′ position.
US07981919B2
The present invention generally relates to a series of compounds, to pharmaceutical compositions containing the compounds, and to use of the compounds and compositions as therapeutic agents. More specifically, compounds of the present invention are hexahydroazepinoindole and octahydroazepinoindole compounds. These compounds are serotonin receptor (5-HT) ligands and are useful for treating diseases, disorders, and conditions wherein modulation of the activity of serotonin receptors (5-HT) is desired (e.g. anxiety, depression and obesity).
US07981916B2
Metronidazole is solubilized in an aqueous phase, by mixing same with niacinamide and at least two glycolic cosolvents; the resulting solutions and pharmaceutical compositions comprised thereof are useful for the treatment of dermatological conditions/afflictions, notably rosacea.
US07981915B2
This invention features methods for treating diseases associated with mutations in the CFTR gene by administering PPAR agonists, specifically PPARγ, PPARα, and PPARδ agonists, PPAR inducers, and/or antioxidants. Also disclosed are screening methods for identifying therapeutically useful candidate compounds.
US07981904B2
The present invention relates to acetyl coenzyme-A carboxylase (“ACC”) inhibiting compounds of the formula wherein the variables are as defined herein. In particular, the present invention relates to ACC1 and/or ACC2 inhibitors, compositions of matter, kits and articles of manufacture comprising these compounds, methods for inhibiting ACC1 and/or ACC2, and methods of making the inhibitors.
US07981902B2
A compound for treating cancer tumors, particularly ovarian cancer tumors, is described, where a fused cyclic pyrimidine having a cancer treating ability is effective to allow selective delivery to a cancerous tumor.
US07981893B2
Provided herein are Heteroaryl Compounds having the following structure: wherein R1, R2, L, X, Y, Z, Q, A and B are as defined herein, compositions comprising an effective amount of a Heteroaryl Compound and methods for treating or preventing cancer, inflammatory conditions, immunological conditions, metabolic conditions and conditions treatable or preventable by inhibition of a kinase pathway comprising administering an effective amount of a Heteroaryl Compound to a patient in need thereof.
US07981884B2
The invention relates to a process for the preparation of 2-methyl-4-(4-methylpiperazin-1-yl)-10H-thieno-[2,3-b][1,5]benzodiazepine (olanzapine) of the formula (I) by reacting 4-amino-2-methyl-10H-thieno[2,3-b][1/5]benzodiazepine hydrochloride of the formula (II) with N-methylpiperazine in an organic solvent, which comprises carrying out the reaction in the mixture of toluene and 1,3-dimethyl-2-imidazolidinone. The invention also encompasses new 2-methyl-4-(4-methylpiperazin-1-yl)-10H-thieno[2,3-b] [1,5]benzodiazepine dihydrochloride trihydrate of the formula (IB), the preparation thereof and pharmaceutical compositions comprising said new compound.
US07981871B2
Described herein are compounds such as macromolecules that have been modified in order to facilitate crosslinking by introduction of at least one hydrazide-reactive group and/or aminooxy-reactive group, and methods of making and using thereof for scar-free wound healing, for delivering bioactive agents or living cells, for preventing adhesion after a surgical procedure or for bone and cartilage repair. The macromolecule can be an oligonucleotide, a necleic acid, a polypeptide, a lipid, a glycoprotein, a glycolipid, a polysaccharide, a protein or a synthetic polymer, preferably a glycosaminoglycan like hyaluronan.
US07981869B2
The present invention is based on the in vivo demonstration that RSV can be inhibited through intranasal administration of iRNA agents as well as by parenteral administration of such agents. Further, it is shown that effective viral reduction can be achieved with more than one virus being treated concurrently. Based on these findings, the present invention provides general and specific compositions and methods that are useful in reducing RSV mRNA levels, RSV protein levels and viral titers in a subject, e.g., a mammal, such as a human. These findings can be applied to other respiratory viruses.
US07981866B2
Disclosed herein are nucleic acid sequences that encode novel polypeptides. Also disclosed are polypeptides encoded by these nucleic acid sequences, and antibodies, which immunospecifically-bind to the polypeptide, as well as derivatives, variants, mutants, or fragments of the aforementioned polypeptide, polynucleotide, or antibody. The invention further discloses therapeutic, diagnostic and research methods for diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of disorders involving any one of these novel human nucleic acids and proteins.
US07981862B2
A composition comprising a synthetic growth factor analogue comprising a non-growth factor heparin binding region, a linker and a sequence that binds specifically to a cell surface receptor and an osteoconductive material where the synthetic growth factor analogue is attached to and can be released from the osteoconductive material and is an amplifier/co-activator of osteoinduction.
US07981857B2
The invention relates to Cerberus/Dan/Gremlin polypeptides or variants thereof for use in treating a variety of disorders associated with myostatin, nodal and GDF-11. Preferred polypeptides are Coco or Cerberus derivatives.
US07981845B2
This relates to a method and composition for forming and utilizing a fluid in the oilfield services industry including exposing a polyacid and/or polyacid derivative to a preparation method, introducing the prepared polyacid and/or polyacid derivative to a fluid to form a treatment fluid, and treating a subterranean formation and/or a wellbore with the treatment fluid, wherein the viscosity of the treatment fluid is not observably reduced by introducing the prepared polyacid and/or polyacid derivative to a treatment fluid. This also relates to a method and composition for use in the oil field services industry including a prepared polyacid and/or polyacid derivative, a fluid, and a viscosity control agent, wherein the viscosity of the composition is not observably lower than if the prepared polyacid and/or polyacid derivative were not present.
US07981843B2
The present invention provides methods of making antibodies having the binding specificity of a reference antibody. Antibodies generated by the methods of the inventions have at least one minimal essential binding specificity determinant from a heavy chain or light chain CDR3 from the reference antibody. The method can be used, e.g., in humanization procedures. The invention also provides libraries and antibodies made in accordance with the methods.
US07981840B2
A well-crystallized a-axis (or b-axis) oriented Bi-based oxide superconductor thin film is manufactured in order to obtain a high performance layered Josephson junction using a Bi-based oxide superconductor. In manufacturing a well-crystallized a-axis oriented Bi-based oxide superconductor thin film, a (110) plane of a single crystal substrate of LaSrAlO4 or a vicinal cut substrate of a single crystal of LaSrAlO4 is used, on which an a-axis oriented Bi-2223 or Bi-2201 thin film is heteroepitaxially grown at a low film forming temperature T1, then homoepitaxially grown on the grown film at a high film forming temperature T2 (double temperature growth method). Although it is difficult to grow an a-axis oriented film directly on a substrate at a high temperature T2, an a-axis oriented Bi-2223 or Bi-2201 thin film is formed on the base by previously forming the base film at low deposition temperature.
US07981839B2
A herbicidal suspension comprising (1) a sulfonylurea compound or its salt as a herbicidal component, (2) at least one surfactant selected from the group consisting of an alkoxylated sorbitol fatty acid ester and an alkoxylated sorbitan fatty acid ester, and (3) a water-immiscible diluent. A method for controlling undesired plants or inhibiting their growth, which comprises applying a herbicidally effective amount of the herbicidal suspension to the undesired plants or to a place where they grow.
US07981837B2
A heat-sensitive transfer image-receiving sheet, containing; a support; at least one receptor layer containing a latex polymer, the latex polymer containing a repeating unit derived from vinyl chloride in a proportion of 50 mass % or above in the latex polymer; and at least one heat-insulation layer containing hollow latex polymer particles and a water-soluble polymer, the at least one heat-insulation layer being provided between the support and the at least one receptor layer.
US07981835B2
A system and method for producing activated carbon comprising carbonizing a solid carbonaceous material in a carbonization zone of an activated carbon production apparatus (ACPA) to yield a carbonized product and carbonization product gases, the carbonization zone comprising carbonaceous material inlet, char outlet and carbonization gas outlet; activating the carbonized product via activation with steam in an activation zone of the ACPA to yield activated carbon and activation product gases, the activation zone comprising activated carbon outlet, activation gas outlet, and activation steam inlet; and utilizing process gas comprising at least a portion of the carbonization product gases or a combustion product thereof; at least a portion of the activation product gases or a combustion product thereof; or a combination thereof in a solid fuel boiler system that burns a solid fuel boiler feed with air to produce boiler-produced steam and flue gas, the boiler upstream of an air heater within a steam/electricity generation plant, said boiler comprising a combustion zone, a boiler-produced steam outlet and at least one flue gas outlet.
US07981828B2
The invention is about a catalyst comprising at least one support, at least one group VIII element, at least one group VIB element and phosphorus, in which the density of group VIB elements per unit surface area of the support is in the range (limits included) 2×10−4 to 18×10−4 of oxides of group VIB elements per m2 of support, in which the molar ratio of phosphorus to the group VIB element is in the range 0.27 to 2.00, and in which the amount of group VIB elements is in the range (limits included) 1% to 20% by weight of oxides of group VIB elements and in which the support has a specific surface area of less than 135 m2/g. The invention is also about a process for hydrodesulphurizing gasoline cuts containing sulphur and olefins in the presence of this catalyst.
US07981826B2
A method of preparing a supported catalyst includes dissolving a cation exchange polymer in alcohol to prepare a solution containing cation exchange polymer; mixing the cation exchange polymer containing solution with a catalytic metal precursor or a solution containing catalytic metal precursor; heating the mixture after adjusting its pH to a predetermined range; adding a reducing agent to the resultant and stirring the solution to reduce the catalytic metal precursor; mixing the resultant with a catalyst support; adding a precipitating agent to the resultant to form precipitates; and filtering and drying the precipitates. The method of preparing a supported catalyst can provide a highly dispersed supported catalyst containing catalytic metal particles with a reduced average size regardless of the type of catalyst support, which provides better catalytic activity than conventional catalysts at the same loading amount of catalytic metal.
US07981825B2
Systems and methods that facilitate operating proton exchange membrane (PEM) fuel cells are provided. The methods can involve contacting a reducing agent comprising a mixture of hydrogen and nitrogen, or a reducing plasma with a cathode catalyst of a proton exchange membrane fuel cell to reduce the cathode catalyst. The systems employ a fuel supply component that supplies fuel to the proton exchange membrane fuel cell; and a regeneration component that provides a reducing agent comprising a mixture of hydrogen and nitrogen, or a reducing plasma to a cathode catalyst of the proton exchange membrane fuel cell to reduce the cathode catalyst.
US07981819B2
A fire resistant fabric material comprising a substrate having an ionic charge which is coated with a coating having essentially the same ionic charge. The coating consists essentially of a filler material comprising clay and a binder material. The substrate is preferably fiberglass, the filler material may further comprise at least one additional filler selected from the group consisting of decabromodiphenyloxide, antimony trioxide, fly ash, charged calcium carbonate, mica, glass microspheres and ceramic microspheres and mixtures thereof and the binder material is preferably acrylic latex.
US07981812B2
Methods for forming an ultra thin structure using a method that includes multiple cycles of polymer deposition of photoresist (PDP) process and etching process. The embodiments described herein may be advantageously utilized to fabricate a submicron structure on a substrate having a critical dimension less than 55 nm and beyond. In one embodiment, a method of forming a submicron structure on a substrate may include providing a substrate having a patterned photoresist layer disposed on a film stack into an etch chamber, wherein the film stack includes at least a hardmask layer disposed on a dielectric layer, performing a polymer deposition process to deposit a polymer layer on the pattered photoresist layer, thus reducing a critical dimension of an opening in the patterned photoresist layer, and etching the underlying hardmask layer through the opening having the reduced dimension.
US07981809B2
A film formation method for a semiconductor process for forming a silicon oxynitride film on a target substrate within a reaction chamber includes a step of performing a pre-process on members inside the reaction chamber without the target substrate loaded therein, and a step of then forming a silicon oxynitride film on the target substrate within the reaction chamber. The pre-process is arranged to supply a pre-process gas containing a nitriding gas or oxynitriding gas into the reaction chamber, and setting an interior of the reaction chamber at a first temperature and a first pressure.
US07981808B2
A method of forming a gate dielectric layer includes forming a first dielectric layer over a semiconductor substrate using a first plasma, performing a first in-situ plasma nitridation of the first dielectric layer to form a first nitrided dielectric layer, forming a second dielectric layer over the first dielectric layer using a second plasma, performing a second in-situ plasma nitridation of the second dielectric layer to form a second nitrided dielectric layer; and annealing the first nitrided dielectric layer and the second nitrided dielectric layer, wherein the gate dielectric layer comprises the first nitrided dielectric layer and the second nitrided dielectric layer. In other embodiments, the steps of forming a dielectric layer using a plasma and performing an in-situ plasma nitridation are repeated so that more than two nitrided dielectric layers are formed and used as the gate dielectric layer.
US07981803B2
The present invention relates to a method of forming a micro pattern of a semiconductor device. In the method according to an aspect of the present invention, an etch target layer, a first hard mask layer, and insulating patterns of a lonzenge are formed over a semiconductor substrate. A first auxiliary pattern is formed on the first hard mask layer including the insulating patterns, wherein a contact hole having the same shape as that of the insulating pattern is formed at the center of four adjacent insulating patterns, which form a quadrilateral. A second auxiliary pattern is formed by etching the first auxiliary pattern so that a top surface of the insulating patterns is exposed. The exposed insulating patterns are removed. A first hard mask pattern is formed by etching the first hard mask layer using an etch process employing the second auxiliary pattern as an etch mask. The etch target layer is etched using the first hard mask pattern.
US07981801B2
A method for fabricating a semiconductor device is provided which includes providing a semiconductor substrate, forming a plurality of transistors, each transistor having a dummy gate structure, forming a contact etch stop layer (CESL) over the substrate including the dummy gate structures, forming a first dielectric layer to fill in a portion of each region between adjacent dummy gate structures, forming a chemical mechanical polishing (CMP) stop layer over the CESL and first dielectric layer, forming a second dielectric layer over the CMP stop layer, performing a CMP on the second dielectric layer that substantially stops at the CMP stop layer, and performing an overpolishing to expose the dummy gate structure.
US07981800B1
A shallow trench isolation (STI) structure and method for forming the same is provided that reduces defects in a nitride film used as a field oxide mask and variations in pad oxide thickness. Generally, the method involves depositing a nitride over pad oxide on a substrate using plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD), and patterning the PECVD nitride to form a field oxide mask. In certain embodiments, patterning the PECVD nitride involves: (i) forming a patterned resist layer on the PECVD nitride; (ii) etching in a process chamber at least one opening through at least the PECVD nitride; and (iii) stripping the patterned resist layer in-situ in the same process chamber in which the at least one opening was etched through the PECVD nitride using a fluorine based plasma. Other embodiments are also disclosed.
US07981789B2
Methods of patterning features, methods of manufacturing semiconductor devices, and semiconductor devices are disclosed. In one embodiment, a method of patterning a feature includes forming a first portion of the feature in a first material layer. A second portion of the feature is formed in the first material layer, and a third portion of the feature is formed in a second material layer.
US07981788B2
The degree of freedom of the chip layout in a semiconductor device is improved, and improvement in packaging density is aimed at.Since it becomes possible to form the wire of two directions on the pad of a memory chip by performing the over-bonding of reverse bonding by ball bonding, an effect equivalent to continuation stitch bonding of wedge bonding can be produced by ball bonding. Hereby, the degree of freedom of a chip layout and the degree of freedom of the lead layout of substrate 3 can be improved, and the packaging density on a substrate in a chip lamination type semiconductor device (memory card) can be improved.
US07981787B2
A semiconductor device manufacturing method includes: providing a laminated member in which at least a first GaAs layer, an InAlGaAs layer and a second GaAs layer are laminated on or above a substrate in this order; and etching the second GaAs layer using the InAlGaAs layer as an etching stopper layer. A ratio of In:Al of the InAlGaAs layer is in a range of approximately 4:6 to approximately 6:4 and a ratio of (In+Al):Ga of the InAlGaAs layer is in a range of approximately 1.5:8.5 to approximately 5:5.
US07981780B2
A semiconductor wafer implanted with impurities is loaded into a chamber. After oxygen gas is introduced around the semiconductor wafer, the semiconductor wafer is irradiated with a flash of light from flash lamps for an irradiation time not shorter than 0.1 milliseconds and not longer than 100 milliseconds, to thereby momentarily raise the surface temperature of the semiconductor wafer up to not lower than 800° C. and not higher than 1300° C. Since the temperature rises in an extremely short time, it is possible to activate the impurities while suppressing thermal diffusion thereof. Further, since an extremely thin oxide film is formed on a surface of the semiconductor wafer, this film serves as a protection film in a subsequent cleaning process, to prevent removal of the impurities.
US07981779B2
An object of this invention is to provide a method for making a junction which is simple in the process, high in the throughput, and can make a shallow junction with high accuracy. After the suitable state of a substrate surface adapted to the wavelength of an electromagnetic wave to be applied has been formed, the electromagnetic wave is applied to electrically activate impurities so that the excited energy is effectively absorbed within the impurity thin film, thereby effectively making a shallow junction.
US07981774B2
A method and system for assembling a quasicrystalline heterostructure. A plurality of particles is provided with desirable predetermined character. The particles are suspended in a medium, and holographic optical traps are used to position the particles in a way to achieve an arrangement which provides a desired property.
US07981772B2
A method is shown for fabricating nanostructures, and more particularly, to methods of fabricating silicon nanowires. The method of manufacturing a nanowire includes forming a sandwich structure of SiX material and material Si over a substrate and etching the sandwich structure to expose sidewalls of the Si material and the SiX material. The method further includes etching the SiX material to expose portions of the Si material and etching the exposed portions of the Si material. The method also includes breaking away the Si material to form silicon nanowires.
US07981771B2
The invention generally relates to semiconductor devices, and more particularly to structures and methods for enhancing electromigration (EM) performance in interconnects. A method includes forming an interconnect, forming a cap on the interconnect, and forming a plurality of holes in the cap to improve electromigration performance of the interconnect.
US07981770B2
A wafer working method which is capable of feeding a wafer diced by a laser dicing apparatus to a subsequent step without breaking the wafer. The wafer working method involves: a first machining step of grinding a reverse side of a wafer W and then polishing the reverse side of the wafer thus ground to a thickness which is larger than a finally worked wafer thickness; a modified region forming step of irradiating laser light to a region of the wafer thus subjected to the first machining which lies inwardly of a modification-free zone measuring 0.1 mm to 10 mm from a periphery of the wafer, to form a modified region inside the wafer; and a second machining step of grinding the reverse side of the wafer thus formed with the modified region and then polishing the reverse side of the wafer thus ground to the finally worked wafer thickness.
US07981769B2
A solid-state imaging device having a high sensitivity and a structure in which a miniaturized pixel is obtained, and a method for manufacturing the solid-state imaging device in which an interface is stable, a spectroscopic characteristic is excellent and which can be manufactured with a high yield ratio are provided. The solid-state imaging device includes at least a silicon layer formed with a photo sensor portion and a wiring layer formed on the front-surface side of the silicon layer, and in which light L is made to enter from the rear-surface side opposite to the front-surface side of the silicon layer and the thickness of the silicon layer 4 is 10 μm or less. Also, the method for manufacturing the solid-state imaging device at least includes the steps of: forming a semiconductor region of a photo sensor portion in a silicon layer of a layered substrate in which a silicon substrate, an intermediate layer and a silicon layer are laminated; bonding a first supporting substrate onto the silicon layer; removing the silicon substrate and the intermediate layer; forming thereafter a wiring portion above the silicon layer; bonding a second supporting substrate onto the wiring portion, and removing the first supporting substrate to make the silicon layer exposed.
US07981768B2
A method for producing an epitaxial layer. First, a structure is fabricated by: formation of an intermediate layer on a donor substrate; and formation of the epitaxial layer on the intermediate layer by epitaxy; with the melting temperature of the intermediate layer being lower than the melting temperature of the epitaxial layer; and then a detachment step for transferring the epitaxial layer from the donor substrate. The detachment step includes applying at least one thermal treatment performed at a temperature of between the melting temperature of the intermediate layer and the melting temperature of the epitaxial layer.
US07981760B2
A method for manufacturing a nonvolatile storage element that minimizes shape shift between an upper electrode and a lower electrode, and which includes: depositing, in sequence, a connecting electrode layer which is conductive, a lower electrode layer and a variable resistance layer which are made of a non-noble metal nitride and are conductive, an upper electrode layer made of noble metal, and a mask layer; forming the mask layer into a predetermined shape; forming the upper electrode layer, the variable resistance layer, and the lower electrode layer into the predetermined shape by etching using the mask layer as a mask; and removing, simultaneously, the mask and a region of the connecting electrode layer that has been exposed by the etching.
US07981757B2
A semiconductor component that includes an integrated passive device and method for manufacturing the semiconductor component. Vertically integrated passive devices are manufactured above a substrate. In accordance with one embodiment, a resistor is manufactured in a first level above a substrate, a capacitor is manufactured in a second level that is vertically above the first level, and a copper inductor is manufactured in a third level that is vertically above the second level. The capacitor has aluminum plates. In accordance with another embodiment, a resistor is manufactured in a first level above a substrate, a copper inductor is manufactured in a second level that is vertically above the first level, and a capacitor is manufactured in a third level that is vertically above the second level. The capacitor may have aluminum plates or a portion of the copper inductor may serve as one of its plates.
US07981751B2
A semiconductor structure including at least one transistor is provided which has a stressed channel region that is a result of having a stressed layer present atop a gate conductor that includes a stack comprising a bottom polysilicon (polySi) layer and a top metal semiconductor alloy (i.e., metal silicide) layer. The stressed layer is self-aligned to the gate conductor. The inventive structure also has a reduced external parasitic S/D resistance as a result of having a metallic contact located atop source/drain regions that include a surface region comprised of a metal semiconductor alloy. The metallic contact is self-aligned to the gate conductor.
US07981750B2
In one aspect, a method of fabricating a semiconductor device is provided. The method includes forming at least one capping layer over epitaxial source/drain regions of a PMOS device, forming a stress memorization (SM) layer over the PMOS device including the at least one capping layer and over an adjacent NMOS device, and treating the SM layer formed over the NMOS and PMOS devices to induce tensile stress in a channel region of the NMOS device.
US07981749B2
MOS structures that exhibit lower contact resistance and methods for fabricating such MOS structures are provided. In one method, a semiconductor substrate is provided and a gate stack is fabricated on the semiconductor substrate. An impurity-doped region within the semiconductor substrate aligned with the gate stack is formed. Adjacent contact fins extending from the impurity-doped region are fabricated and a metal silicide layer is formed on the contact fins. A contact to at least a portion of the metal silicide layer on at least one of the contact fins is fabricated.
US07981748B2
Vertical field effect transistor semiconductor structures and methods for fabrication of the vertical field effect transistor semiconductor structures provide an array of semiconductor pillars. Each vertical portion of each semiconductor pillar in the array of semiconductor pillars has a linewidth greater than a separation distance to an adjacent semiconductor pillar. Alternatively, the array may comprise semiconductor pillars with different linewidths, optionally within the context of the foregoing linewidth and separation distance limitations. A method for fabricating the array of semiconductor pillars uses a minimally photolithographically dimensioned pillar mask layer that is annularly augmented with at least one spacer layer prior to being used as an etch mask.
US07981740B2
When forming transistor elements on the basis of sophisticated high-k metal gate structures, the efficiency of a replacement gate approach may be enhanced by more efficiently adjusting the gate height of transistors of different conductivity type when the dielectric cap layers of transistors may have experienced a different process history and may thus require a subsequent adaptation of the final cap layer thickness in one type of the transistors. For this purpose, a hard mask material may be used during a process sequence for forming offset spacer elements in one gate electrode structure while covering another gate electrode structure.
US07981738B2
A memory cell of an SRAM has two drive MISFETs and two vertical MISFETs. The p channel vertical MISFETs are formed above the n channel drive MISFETs. The vertical MISFETs respectively mainly include a laminate formed of a lower semiconductor layer, intermediate semiconductor layer and upper semiconductor layer laminated in this sequence, a gate insulating film of silicon oxide formed on the surface of the side wall of the laminate, and a gate electrode formed so as to cover the side wall of the laminate. The vertical MISFETs are perfect depletion type MISFETs.
US07981737B2
A thin film transistor array panel according to the present invention includes: a gate line formed on a substrate and including a gate electrode; a gate insulating layer formed on the gate electrode; a mold layer formed on the gate insulating layer and having an opening overlapping the gate electrode; a semiconductor layer filled in the opening; a data line formed on the mold layer and including a source electrode contacted with the semiconductor layer; a drain electrode contacted with the semiconductor layer on the mold layer and facing the source electrode; a passivation layer formed on the data line and the drain electrode; and a pixel electrode formed on the passivation layer and connected to the drain electrode, wherein the passivation layer, the source electrode, and the drain electrode have at least one through-hole connected to the opening.
US07981729B2
A multi-chip stack structure and a fabrication method thereof are proposed, including providing a leadframe having a die base and a plurality of leads and disposing a first and a second chips on the two surfaces of the die base respectively; disposing the leadframe on a heating block having a cavity in a wire bonding process with the second chip received in the cavity of the heating block; performing a first wire bonding process to electrically connect the first chip to the leads through a plurality of first bonding wires, and forming a bump on one side of the leads connected with the first bonding wires; disposing the leadframe in an upside down manner to the heating block via the bump with the first chip and the first bonding wires received in the cavity of the heating block; and performing a second wire bonding process to electrically connect the second chip to the leads through a plurality of second bonding wires. The bump is used for supporting the leads to a certain height so as to keep the bonding wires from contacting the heating block and eliminate the need of using a second heating block in the second wire bonding process of the prior art, thereby saving time and costs in a fabrication process. Also, as positions where the first and second bonding wires are bonded to the leads on opposite sides of the leadframe correspond with each other, the conventional problems of adversely affected electrical performance and electrical mismatch can be prevented.
US07981718B2
Disclosed herein is a method of manufacturing a solid-state image pickup element, the method including the steps of forming a plurality of photoelectric conversion elements within a semiconductor substrate; forming a wiring layer via an insulating film on a surface of the semiconductor substrate in which surface the plurality of photoelectric conversion elements are formed; laminating a supporting substrate to a surface of the semiconductor substrate in which surface the wiring layer is formed via an adhesive; applying a pressure to the semiconductor substrate and the supporting substrate in a state of the semiconductor substrate and the supporting substrate being laminated to each other via the adhesive; and curing the adhesive by heating the adhesive to a curing temperature of the adhesive after releasing the applied pressure.
US07981715B2
The invention relates to a method for producing a MEMS/NEMS structure from a substrate made in a monocrystalline semiconductor material, the structure comprising a flexible mechanical element connected to the substrate by at least one anchoring zone, the method comprising the following steps: the formation of a protection layer on one face of the substrate, the protection layer being made in a monocrystalline material different from the material of the substrate, etching of the protection layer and the substrate in order to produce at least one cavity, the etching being done so as to leave an overhang made in the material of the protection layer on the edges of the cavity, filling in of the cavity with an electrically insulating material in order to obtain an insulating anchoring portion, epitaxy of a semiconductor material from the protection layer and the electrically insulating material in order to obtain a layer designed to produce the flexible mechanical element, liberation of the flexible mechanical element while allowing at least a portion of said overhang to remain.
US07981714B2
Disclosed are a nitride based semiconductor device, including a high-quality GaN layer formed on a silicone substrate, and a process for preparing the same. A nitride based semiconductor device in accordance with the present invention comprises a plurality of nanorods aligned and formed on the silicone substrate in the vertical direction; an amorphous matrix layer filling spaces between nanorods so as to protrude some upper portion of the nanorods; and a GaN layer formed on the matrix layer.
US07981711B2
A manufacture method of a multilayer structure having a non-polar a-plane {11-22} III-nitride layer includes forming a nucleation layer on a r-plane substrate, wherein the nucleation layer is composed of multiple nitride layers; and forming a non-polar a-plane {11-20} III-nitride layer on the nucleation layer. The nucleation layer features reduced stress, reduced phase difference of lattice, blocked elongation of dislocation, and reduced density of dislocation. Thus, the non-polar a-plane {11-20} III-nitride layer with flat surface can be formed.
US07981705B2
In a method of manufacturing a vertical type light-emitting diode, a multilayered structure of group III nitride semiconductor compounds is epitaxy deposited on an irregular surface of a substrate. The substrate is then removed to expose an irregular surface of the multilayered structure corresponding to the irregular surface of the substrate. A portion of the exposed irregular surface of the multilayered structure is then etched for forming an electrode contact surface on which an electrode layer is subsequently formed. With this method, no specific planarized region is required on the irregular surface of the substrate. As a result, planarization treatment of the substrate is not necessary. The same substrate with the irregular surface can be reused for fabricating vertical and horizontal light-emitting diodes.
US07981704B2
After a metal cap layer is laminated on a semiconductor laminated structure, a waveguide ridge is formed, the waveguide ridge is coated with an SiO2 film, and a resist is applied; then, a resist pattern is formed, the resist pattern exposing the surface of the SiO2 film on the top of the waveguide ridge, and burying the SiO2 film in channels with a resist film having a surface higher than the surface of the metal cap layer of the waveguide ridge and lower than the surface of the SiO2 film of the waveguide ridge; the SiO2 film is removed by dry etching, using the resist pattern as a mask. The metal cap layer is removed by wet etching, and a p-GaN layer of the waveguide ridge is exposed to form the electrode layer.
US07981701B2
A method of forming a semiconductor thin film includes a highly sensitive inspection method for detecting lateral crystals and a crystallizing method. In the crystallizing method, the time-based pulse width of a laser SXL is modulated and an approximate band-like crystal silicon film SPSI is formed in a desired region while scanning the substrate SUB1 bidirectionally in the X and −X directions. In the inspection method, an inspection beam PRO1 is irradiated to the substrate just after the laser SXL is turned off. A protrusion TOKI will be formed on the silicon film portion where the laser SXL is turned off if the state of the silicon film is that of a lateral crystal SPSI. The inspection beam PRO1 is scattered by the protrusion TOKI and observed by a detector. If the state of the silicon film is granular crystal GGSI or aggregated film AGSI, such a protrusion TOKI is not observed.
US07981698B2
Packaging is substantially entirely removed from an integrated circuit die. The method allows the batch processing of several integrated circuit dies, such that packaging is removed from each die approximately simultaneously.
US07981697B2
One embodiment of the present invention includes a memory element having a composite free layer including a first free sub-layer formed on top of the bottom electrode, a nano-current-channel (NCC) layer formed on top of the first free sub-layer, and a second free sub-layer formed on top of the NCC layer, wherein when switching current is applied to the memory element, in a direction that is substantially perpendicular to the layers of the memory element, local magnetic moments of the NCC layer switch the state of the memory element.
US07981691B2
An isolated polypeptide, Z domain, derived from B domain of Staphylococcal protein A, comprising a pair of anti-parallel alpha helices that are capable of binding a target, is provided herein. Introduction of a covalent bridge between two modified amino acids in the polypeptide is provided here. Also provided are methods of using the two-helix binders.
US07981690B2
By using an antibody which is covalently bonded to a water soluble polymer as an antibody to be used in a competitive immunoagglutination assay in a homogeneous system, a protein antigen at a high concentration can be accurately assayed in an undiluted system without resorting to dilution.
US07981688B2
Stimuli-responsive magnetic nanoparticles, methods of making the nanoparticles, and methods of using the nanoparticles.
US07981677B2
Compositions related to the quantitative trait locus 6 (QTL6) in maize and methods for their use are provided. The compositions are novel molecular marker loci that are genetically linked with QTL6 and which are associated with increased oil content and/or increased oleic acid content and/or an increased oleic acid/linoleic acid ratio of a plant or plant part thereof. These novel markers are characterized by the presence of at least one polymorphism relative to the corresponding marker locus from the QTL6 region of non-high-oil, non-high-oleic acid maize plants. In some embodiments, the novel marker loci comprise coding sequence for a maize DGAT1-2 polypeptide or biologically active variant thereof. The marker loci of the invention, and suitable fragments thereof, are useful in methods of the invention for manipulating oil and/or oleic acid content and/or oleic acid/lineolic acid ratio of a plant or plant part thereof, for marker-assisted selection of a plant, for example, a maize plant, or plant part thereof, having an increased oil content and/or increased oleic acid content and/or an increased oleic acid/linoleic acid ratio, and for marker-assisted breeding of the high oil and/or high oleic acid trait.
US07981672B2
The purpose of the invention is to provide an antibody which recognizes OPN N-half but does not recognize the full-length OPN, and its use. A monoclonal antibody which is characterized in that it recognizes a protein or polypeptide in which the C-terminal amino acid sequence is YGLR (SEQ ID NO: 1) and it substantially does not recognize a protein or polypeptide which has an amino acid sequence of YGLR outside of the C-terminal, as well as a method for measuring OPN N-half utilizing the said antibody, a method for diagnosing diseases relating to OPN N-half, a method for judging the severity of said disease, and a method for treating said diseases, are provided.
US07981666B2
Provided are a sensing switch and a sensing method using the same. The sensing switch includes: a substrate; a supporter on the substrate; a sensing plate that is connected to a side of the supporter and is in parallel with the substrate by a predetermined distance; a receptor binding region on an upper surface of an end portion of the sensing plate; an electric or magnetic field generation device that induces deflection of the sensing plate when a receptor bound to the receptor binding region is selectively bound to an electrically or magnetically active ligand; and a pair of switching electrodes that are separated by a predetermined distance and is connected when the sensing plate contacts the substrate due to the deflection of the sensing plate. A target material need not be labelled, a signal processing of a fluorescent or electrical detection signal using an analysis apparatus is not required, and a signal can be directly decoded by confirming whether a current flows through the switch.
US07981661B2
The fluidic system of the preferred embodiment includes a sheath pump to pump sheath fluid from a sheath container into an interrogation zone, a sheath volume measurement device to measure the fluid in the sheath container, a waste pump to pump the sheath fluid and a sample fluid as waste fluid from the interrogation zone into a waste container, and a waste volume measurement device to measure the fluid in the waste container. The system also includes a controller connected to the sheath pump, the waste pump, and the volume measurement devices. The sheath pump and/or the waste pump draw sample fluid from a sample container into the interrogation zone, which functions to provide a location for the fluidic system and an optical system of the flow cytometer to cooperatively facilitate the analysis of the sample fluid.
US07981657B2
The present invention relates to the production of variants of lactic bacteria stems that produce, under standard fermentation conditions, at least about 1.2 times more K2 vitamin than the starting lactic bacteria stems cultured in the same conditions. The invention further relates to a method for preparing food products, including fermented products and/or fresh diary products, enriched with K2 vitamin, and to the food products thus obtained.
US07981654B2
The present invention provides novel cellulase fusion proteins, preparations of cellulase fusion proteins and compositions of cellulase fusion proteins. The present invention further provides cellulase expression vectors, host cells expressing cellulase and methods for preparing such vectors and cells. Uses of cellulases, cellulase preparations and cellulase compositions in the textile, detergent, pulp and paper industries are also provided.
US07981652B2
The present invention relates to modified cytochrome P450 monooxygenases with an altered substrate profile, to nucleic acid sequences coding therefor, to expression constructs and vectors, to recombinant microorganisms which comprise these vectors, and to processes for the microbiological production of terminally or subterminally hydroxylated aliphatic carboxylic acids.
US07981649B2
A device and methods for monitoring status of at least one cell, wherein the cell has a membrane forming a substantially enclosed structure and defining an intracellular space therein. In one embodiment of the present invention, the device includes a first substrate having a first surface and an opposite second surface, a second substrate supported by the first substrate, the second substrate having a first surface, an opposite second surface, a body portion between the first surface and the second surface, a first side surface and an opposite second side surface, wherein the body portion defines a first passage between the first side surface and the second side surface and an opening on the first surface of the second substrate and in fluid communication with the first passage, and sidewalls positioned above the first surface of the second substrate. In one operation mode, when a first medium is introduced into the first passage, the intracellular space of the cell is in fluid communication with the first passage with the first medium, a sensor measures the response of the cell to the first medium.
US07981647B2
The present disclosure identifies pathways and mechanisms to confer production of carbon-based products of interest such as ethanol, ethylene, chemicals, polymers, n-alkanes, isoprenoids, pharmaceutical products or intermediates thereof in photoautotrophic organisms such that these organisms efficiently convert carbon dioxide and light into carbon-based products of interest, and in particular the use of such organisms for the commercial production of ethanol, ethylene, chemicals, polymers, alkanes, isoprenoids, pharmaceutical products or intermediates thereof.
US07981638B2
A molecule transfer and delivery system includes a loading zone (50) for loading a targeted cargo molecule (30) on a carrier molecule (20) making use of a hybridization nature of nucleotides, and an unloading zone (40) for unloading the targeted cargo molecule from the carrier molecule making use of the strand exchange nature of the nucleotides. Towing nucleotide chains including the first single-stranded nucleotides (21) with the first length are bound to the carrier molecule, and the second single-stranded nucleotides (31) with the second length longer than the first length are bound to the targeted cargo molecule. The third single-stranded nucleotides (41) with the same length as the second single-stranded nucleotides are bound to the unloading zone.
US07981634B2
Disclosed herein is a method of positively detecting toxic materials within a sample, the method including contacting sub-mitochondrial particles with an electron donor. The electron donor is reacted with an electron transfer system of the sub-mitochondrial particles to produce a reactant. A pH indicator has its pH adjusted to be in a range of 9 to 11. The pH indicator is added to each reactant. Color changes in the pH indicator permit the detection of toxins present in the sample.
US07981632B2
The present invention relates to sequentially arranged streptavidin-binding binding modules which may in particular be used as affinity tags. The affinity tags comprise at least two individual modules capable of mediating avidic binding to streptavidin.
US07981625B2
Disclosed are methods for probing the immunogenic sugar moieties of prostate cancer cells. The methods detect a number of glyco-epitopes that are highly and differentially expressed among prostate cancers of various Gleason grades. The glyco-epitopes exist on the surfaces of prostate cells. The methods also comprise the detection of autoantibodies in prostate cancer subjects. The antibodies bound to a glyco-motif of N-glycans that is normally “cryptic.” This target is highly expressed in prostate cancers. Lectins and antibodies that detect these glyco-epitopes that expressed in prostate cancer tissues include Euonymus europaeus lectin (EEL); Psophocarpus Tetragonolobus Lectin-I (PTL-I); Griffonia Simplicifolia Lectin-I-A4 (GSL-I-A4); Griffonia Simplicifolia Lectin-I-B4 (GSL-I-B4); Sambucus nigra I agglutinin (SNA-I; Phaseolus vulgaris-L (PHA-L; Galanthus nivalis agglutinin (GNA); Narcissus pseudonarcissus agglutinin (NPA); Artocarpus integrifolia agglutinin (Jacalin); and mAb TM10 (IgM).
US07981619B2
Composition for prevention, treatment, and diagnosis of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD)
The present invention provides a pharmaceutical composition for preventing or treating chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) comprising cytokeratin 18 protein as an active ingredient. The present invention also provides a diagnostic composition and a diagnostic kit for diagnosing COPD comprising cytokeratin 18 protein. The present invention further provides a composition for screening a therapeutic agent for COPD, comprising one or more of cytokeratin 18 protein or autoantibodies to cytokeratin 18 obtained from patients with COPD and a method for screening a therapeutic agent for COPD using this composition. The present invention still further provides methods for diagnosing, preventing or treating COPD using cytokeratin 18 protein.
US07981608B2
Disclosed are a method, device kit, and automated system for simple, reproducible, and high-throughput quantification of mRNA from whole blood. More particularly, the method, device, kit and automated system involve combinations of leukocyte filters attached to oligo(dT)-immobilized multi-well plates.
US07981597B2
The present invention relates to a method for preparing agglutinatable platelet fragments, in which native platelets are treated with ultrasound and a fixative. The platelet fragments are suitable for use in diagnostic assay methods which include an agglutination reaction, such as, for example, in a method for determining VWF activity.
US07981590B2
Method for producing a base material (25) for screen printing, which comprises a protective film (10), a screen (5) and an intermediate resist layer (13) comprising photosensitive material, the method comprising the steps of applying a first resist layer (15) to one side of the protective film (10), drying the first resist layer (15), applying an additional resist layer (17) to the first resist layer (15), and then applying a screen (5) to the additional resist layer (17) under pressure, with that side of the additional resist layer (17) to which the screen (5) is applied being wet. The invention also describes a base material (25) for screen printing, which comprises a protective film (10), an electroformed screen (5) and an intermediate resist layer (13) comprising photosensitive material.
US07981586B2
An electrophotographic image forming method is disclosed. The method includes steps of conveying a developer comprising a toner to a developing zone by a developing roller, and developing an electrostatic latent image formed on an electrostatic latent image carrying member by the developer, and the developing roller has an electroconductive shaft and a resin layer provided around the shaft, the resin layer comprises a surface layer containing silicone copolymer resin as the principal component and a layer containing resin-silica hybrid composite as a principal component provided directly under the surface layer.
US07981581B2
A phthalocyanine composite with high sensitivity and low environmental dependence is provided.It comprises both at least one phthalocyanine compound expressed by general formula (1) and at least one phthalocyanine compound expressed by general formula (2): where, in the general formulae (1) and (2),M1 represents at least one arbitrary atom or atomic group that is capable of binding to a phthalocyanine,M2 represents an atom, or an atomic group containing an atom, selected from the second and subsequent periods of the periodic table and capable of binding to a phthalocyanine, M1 and M2 being different in kind from each other,X1-X4 represent, independently of each other, a halogen atom, anda, b, c, and d represent, independently of each other, an integer between 0 and 4 and satisfy a+b+c+d≧1.
US07981579B2
A photoconductor that includes, for example, a supporting substrate, a photogenerating layer, and at least one, charge transport layer, such as 1, 2, 3, or 4 layers, and more specifically, 2 layers, and wherein the photogenerating layer contains a thiadiazole.
US07981574B2
Provided is a reticle used for forming a plurality of vias for connecting first wirings provided in a first wiring layer and second wirings provided in a second wiring layer formed above the first wiring layer. The first wirings and the second wirings are provided along one of a first direction and a second direction, and the first direction and the second direction perpendicularly cross each other. The reticle includes a plurality of via opening patterns for forming the plurality of vias. Each of the plurality of via opening patterns has a rectangular shape, and is arranged to cause each side of each of the via opening patterns to be diagonal with respect to the first direction and the second direction.
US07981569B2
A fuel cell in which protrusion of an adhesive agent into a gas communication path is suppressed. The fuel cell has a gas passage in a power generation region, a manifold in a non power generation region, and the gas communication path interconnecting the gas passage and the manifold. The adhesive agent is used near at least the gas communication path. An adhesive agent accumulation section for suppressing inflow of the adhesive agent into the gas communication path is located near the gas communication path.
US07981566B2
A membrane electrode assembly for a polymer electrolyte fuel cell has superior power generation characteristics under low humidity conditions and superior starting characteristics under low temperature conditions. In the membrane electrode assembly for a polymer electrolyte fuel cell in which a polymer electrolyte membrane is disposed between a pair of electrodes containing a catalyst, the polymer electrolyte membrane has a polymer segment A having an ion conductive component and a polymer segment B not having an ion conductive component. Furthermore, in the case in which the polymer electrolyte membrane is immersed in water at 90° C. for 30 minutes, absorbed water which exhibits a thawing temperature of from −30 to 0° C. is in a range from 0.01 to 3.0 g per 1 g of the polymer.
US07981561B2
Various embodiments relate to interconnects for solid oxide fuel cells (“SOFCs”) comprising ferritic stainless steel and having at least one via that when subjected to an oxidizing atmosphere at an elevated temperature develops a scale comprising a manganese-chromate spinel on at least a portion of a surface thereof, and at least one gas flow channel that when subjected to an oxidizing atmosphere at an elevated temperature develops an aluminum-rich oxide scale on at least a portion of a surface thereof. Other embodiments relate to interconnects comprising a ferritic stainless steel and having a fuel side comprising metallic material that resists oxidation during operation of the SOFCs, and optionally include a nickel-base superalloy on the oxidant side thereof. Still other embodiments relate to ferritic stainless steels adapted for use as interconnects comprising ≦0.1 weight percent aluminum and/or silicon, and >1 up to 2 weight percent manganese. Methods of making interconnects are also disclosed.
US07981556B2
A regenerative fuel cell power system has a plurality of fuel cell power modules, a plurality of electrolysis modules, a water management system and a master controller. The master controller manages the temperature within the electrolysis system to prevent freezing through circulation of water from the water management system.
US07981555B2
A method for operating a fuel cell system having a fuel cell equipped with an anode and a cathode includes the steps of generating electric power by allowing hydrogen gas supplied to the anode and oxygen gas supplied to the cathode to react electrochemically with each other, recovering water from water vapor discharged from at least one of the anode and cathode, storing recovered water in a water storing portion equipped with a tank having a closable drain opening, through which opening water stored in the tank is dischargeable to outside the fuel cell system, supplying water stored in the tank to a water utilizing means by a water supply portion, and making a decision whether or not to discharge the stored water to outside the fuel cell system through the drain opening in view of an increase in an amount of undesirable germs contained in water stored in the water storing portion.
US07981554B2
A fuel cell system includes a fuel cell stack, a gas liquid separator, a first drain channel, and a second drain channel. The gas liquid separator is connected to a fuel gas discharge passage of the fuel cell stack through a fuel gas discharge channel. The first drain channel is connected to the fuel gas discharge passage separately from the fuel gas discharge channel, and connected to the gas liquid separator through a valve unit. The second drain channel chiefly discharges liquid droplets from the gas liquid separator.
US07981552B2
The sudden generation of heat being frequently caused in the case of the overcharge of a lithium secondary cell which have a positive electrode comprising a composite metal oxide of lithium and cobalt or a composite metal oxide of lithium and nickel, a negative electrode comprising metallic lithium, a lithium alloy or a material capable of occluding and releasing lithium, and a nonaqueous electrolyte solution comprising a nonaqueous solvent and an electrolyte dissolved therein can be efficiently prevented by the addition, to the nonaqueous electrolyte solution, of an organic compound which, when the lithium secondary cell is overcharged, decomposes into a decomposition product capable of dissolving out the cobalt or nickel contained in the positive electrode and depositing it ion the negative electrode (for example, a tert-alkylbenzene derivative).
US07981550B2
A primary cell having an anode comprising lithium and a cathode comprising iron disulfide (FeS2) and carbon particles. The cell can be in the configuration of a coin cell or the anode and cathode can be spirally wound with separator therebetween and inserted into the cell casing with electrolyte then added. The electrolyte comprises a lithium salt dissolved in a nonaqueous solvent mixture which may include an organic cyclic carbonate such as ethylene carbonate and propylene carbon. The cell after assembly is subjected to a two step preconditioning (predischarge) protocol involving at least two distinct discharge steps having at lease one cycle of pulsed current drain in each step and at least one rest period (step rest) between said two steps, wherein said step rest period is carried out for a period of time at above ambient temperature. The preconditioning improves cell performance.
US07981548B2
A multilayer secondary battery including a positive electrode having an active substance layer formed on a flat sheet-form collector and a negative electrode having an active substance layer formed on a flat sheet-form collector stacked together in opposite relation via a separator. The positive electrode active substance layer differs in area from the negative electrode active substance layer. Active substance-free portions with no active substance layer coated thereon are formed on sides of the outer periphery of a collector of the electrode having the smaller active substance layer. The surface of the collectors at the active substance-free portions is covered with an insulating layer. The end face of the insulating layer facing away from a side contiguous to an active substance layer and the end face of the electrode having a larger active substance layer area are stacked together on the same plane that intersects vertically an electrode plane.
