3GPP LTE (3rd Generation Partnership Project Long-term Evolution, hereinafter referred to as “LTE”) uplink uses cyclic shift sequences, which are orthogonal sequences, as pilot signals to reduce interference among sequences. A cyclic shift sequence can be generated by cyclically shifting a pilot sequence by a cyclic shift amount on the time axis. For example, FIG. 1 shows a cyclic shift sequence (m=0) and a cyclic shift sequence (m=1) with pilot sequence length N=12 and cyclic shift amount A=6.
In FIG. 1, while the cyclic shift sequence (m=0) is configured in order of a(0) to a(11), the cyclic shift sequence (m=1) is configured, by cyclically shifting the cyclic shift sequence (m=0) by Δ(=6) samples, in order of a(6) to a(11), a(0) to a(5).
The cyclic shift amount is determined by a base station apparatus (hereinafter abbreviated to “base station”) and reported from the base station to a terminal station apparatus (hereinafter abbreviated to “terminal”) per scheduling (per subframe). Eight types “0, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 9, 10” (3 bits) are defined for reporting the cyclic shift amount. These correspond to a cyclic shift amount of “0, 2, 3, 4, 6, 8, 9, 10”×symbol length/12 (ms).
Since sequences can be separated with low inter-sequence interference by assigning cyclic shift sequences of different cyclic shift amounts to different terminals, cyclic shift sequences are used for pilot signal transmission in MU-MIMO (Multiple User-Multiple Input Multiple Output). In MU-MIMO, a plurality of terminals transmit data signals at the same time and the same frequency, spatially multiplex the data signals and thereby improve system throughput. At this time, it is also preferable that a plurality of terminals transmit pilot signals at the same time and the same frequency from the standpoint of frequency utilization efficiency. Therefore, cyclic shift sequences, which are orthogonal sequences, for pilot signals and the cyclic shift sequences are transmitted at the same time and the same frequency. The reception side can separate pilot signals using the nature of orthogonal sequences, and can thereby accurately estimate a channel state of each terminal.
On the other hand, in LTE-Advanced (hereinafter referred to as “LTE-A”) uplink, studies are being carried out on supporting SU-MIMO (Single User-Multiple Input Multiple Output) to improve throughput, whereby one terminal transmits data signals from a plurality of antenna ports at the same time and the same frequency and spatially multiplexes the data signals using virtual communication channels (hereinafter referred to as “streams”) in the space.
Here, the “antenna port” refers to a logical antenna (antenna group) made up of one or a plurality of physical antennas. That is, the antenna port does not always refer to one physical antenna, but may also refer to an array antenna made up of a plurality of antennas. For example, the antenna port may be made up of a plurality of physical antennas and defined as a minimum unit whereby a base station or terminal can transmit different pilot signals. Furthermore, the antenna port may also be defined as a minimum unit for multiplying a weight of a precoding vector. Hereinafter, a case will be described as an example where an “antenna port” and a physical antenna have a one-to-one correspondence for simplicity of explanation.
SU-MIMO requires pilot signals for each stream and studies are being carried out on code-multiplexing pilot signals of each stream using a cyclic shift sequence, which is an orthogonal sequence, for the purpose of reducing inter-sequence interference.
Here, in an ideal environment in which there is no channel variation, a cyclic shift sequence is an orthogonal sequence and no inter-sequence interference occurs. On the other hand, in a real environment with a channel variation, complete orthogonality is not established and a certain degree of inter-sequence interference occurs. Especially when the number of streams increases and the cyclic shift sequence multiplexing number increases, inter-sequence interference also increases. Therefore, in LTE-A, studies are being carried out on reducing inter-sequence interference using a Walsh sequence as well as cyclic shift sequences adopted in LTE.
In multiplexing using Walsh sequences, pilot signals of a first slot (slot #1) and a second slot (slot #2) making up a subframe are multiplied by Walsh sequence w1=[1 1] or Walsh sequence w2=[1 −1] (see FIG. 2). That is, Walsh sequence w1 uses pilot signals similar to those conventional ones in first and second slots and Walsh sequence w2 uses pilot signals similar to those conventional ones in the first slot and uses pilot signals with an inverted phase (180 degree rotation) in the second slot.
As a method of reporting a cyclic shift amount, in LTE, the base station reports in three bits using a control information channel (Physical Downlink Control Channel, PDCCH) to be reported to each terminal per scheduling. Furthermore, in LTE-A, studies are being carried out on adding one bit indicating whether a Walsh sequence of each terminal is w1 or w2 using a control information channel (PDCCH), the base station reporting the Walsh sequence to each terminal and each terminal switching between the Walsh sequences.
Furthermore, in order to reduce inter-sequence interference of cyclic shift sequences between streams in SU-MIMO, Walsh sequence w1 is used for pilot signals of odd-numbered streams and Walsh sequence w2 is used for pilot signals of even-numbered streams (see FIG. 3).
Here, the “stream number” is a number indicating order in which data is assigned. For example, when data is transmitted with only one stream, suppose a stream transmitted from one antenna port is stream #0 and when data is transmitted with two streams, the stream transmitted from an antenna port different from the above-described port is stream #1. By setting different Walsh sequences depending on whether a stream number is an odd number or even number, it is possible to reduce inter-sequence interference between pilot signals of neighboring streams (see Non-Patent Literature 1). Furthermore, since there is no need for reporting a bit indicating a Walsh sequence, which will be used in the second (stream #1) and subsequent streams, the amount of reporting the cyclic shift amount can be reduced.


The present invention relates to a molding lens with indentation for measuring eccentricity and a method for measuring eccentricity thereof, especially to a lens with at least one indentation that is concentric with optical surface and is arranged on the area outside the optical surface. The indentation is observed by a measuring microscope. Thus by eccentricity test function of the measuring microscope, the eccentricity of the lens is obtained and the eccentric direction is defined so as to modify the lens mould.
Refer to FIG. 1, a manufacturing process of a molding lens A1 includes following steps: Firstly design front and rear optical surfaces A2 of the lens A1. For example, the optical surfaces A2 are aspheric surfaces having a concave surface and a convex surface. For example, an ultra-precision machine in combination with numerical control (NC) programming is used to define toolpath. That means to set sag value (tool depth) so as to conduct precision machine processing of moulds. As to a curvature lens, the Z-axis is an optical axis of the lens and center of surface is as zero point of X-Y plane. On different positions of the surface of lens, the height difference between a line parallel to the Z-axis and the X-Y plane is the sag value. Moreover, the sag value can also be calculated by equations such as Anamorphic surface, First Type Toric surface or Second Type Toric surface. Then by process of injection molding or die-cast molding, lens are mass produced. After finishing the mould, firstly samples are made to run an eccentricity test for mould modification. Furthermore, each of lens produced needs to go through the test procedure to make sure they are good products.
Refer to FIG. 2, a conventional eccentricity test of the optical surfaces A2 of the lens A1 is disclosed. A transmission eccentric scale indicator A3 in combination with a rotatable jig A4 is used so as to make a parallel light A5 from a light source on the bottom penetrates through the optical surface of the lens A1 being detected to form an image on a screen A6. The transmission eccentric scale indicator A3 is quite expensive so that the manufacturing cost is increased. The jig A4 clips the lens A1 being detected and carries it to rotate while radius of rotation of a focus A7 on the screen A6 is used as criteria for checking eccentricity. Thus the requirement on eccentricity of the jig A4 itself is quite high and the eccentricity of the jig A4 is no more than 2 μm (10−6 m). Thus the cost for the jig A4 is also quite high due to operation error of the jig that affects the eccentricity test results. Moreover, except the test results, the error of the jig A4 also have effects on quality control of the lens A1. Furthermore, conventional technology can only check eccentric scale of the lens A1 on the screen A6. The eccentricity of the front and the rear optical surfaces A2 can't be distinguished. Therefore, the eccentricity of the lens A1 on the screen A6 can't be used as modification index directly.
In other words, it is difficult to decide the eccentricity of the lens A1 derived from errors of which optical surface. Thus the optical surface on the mould can't be modified precisely or efficiently and this leads to trouble on mould modification.


The present invention relates to a method for fabricating integrated circuits and in particular to a method for fabrication of data storage type integrated circuits for protection against errors induced by the bombardment of an ionizing radiation.
In the trend towards smaller components in integrated circuits to achieve higher density, an error causing mechanism, not previously considered a factor in larger component circuits, in the form of the passage of alpha particles into the integrated circuit, has become a major problem particularly in those circuits intended for memory storage. The passage of the alpha particles into the integrated circuit generates sufficient hole-electron pairs, by the dissipation of energy, to disrupt the integrity of stored data, as an example, in small memory storage cells requiring only a small number of electrons to be retained for the storage of a binary digit.
It has been shown that alpha particles are responsible for charge induced errors. These alpha particles originate from radioactive decay of radioactive impurities present in the materials used to fabricate the integrated circuit. A few parts per million or less of radioactive impurities present in the materials emit a sufficiency of alpha particles, as nuclear decay products, to cause an unacceptably high probability of the electrons generated by an alpha particle decay to change the charge stored in the integrated circuit.
Stated another way, soft errors in storage memories, such as MOS dynamic RAM's, are caused by their exposure to alpha particle radiation. Alpha particles are the natural product of the radioactive decay of uranium and thorium present in most materials used in the fabrication of RAM's and thus radiation produces an unwanted charged particle in the silicon semiconductor material which upsets the wanted charge during the normal device operation.
Accordingly, it is a prime object of this invention to provide a method of reducing alpha particle induced soft error sensitivity in integrated circuits.


The ultimate goal of a computer (application) program is to control the operation or processing of some form of data. More specifically, the goal of a machine vision system application program is to extract important features from image data from which a description, interpretation, or understanding of the objects in the image can be provided by the machine (computer) for the purpose of classification, reporting and decision making.
In a machine vision application, for example, a set of operations or steps are executed in sequence. A typical machine vision program flow diagram is shown in FIG. 1. The steps generally begin with the acquisition of an input image, which is captured by a camera and placed in memory, step 1. The image is optionally preprocessed, step 2, before the image is segmented and features are extracted from it. Segmentation and feature extraction, step 3, of the image into one or more distinct objects can be accomplished, for example by extracting their boundaries. Features can be any data that describes or identifies parts, features (holes, etc.) and objects in the camera scene, such as size, area, length, distance or like parameters.
Features are usually expressed in pixel units that describe the geometric position of a feature in the image relative to some fixed position in the image such as the top left corner of the image (also called an image coordinate system), or in physical units like "mm" or inches (also called a camera coordinate system) if the position of the camera in the scene is known or can be measured (usually referred to as calibrating the camera).
These features are typically checked against tolerances or classified into various categories, step 4, before a decision, step 5, can be made or pass/fail status and results obtained, step 6. Reports can also be generated, detailing the processing application, step 7. External control inputs, step 8, are used to activate the tolerance checking and to provide nominal tolerance values during execution for a particular feature.


1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a transmission power determination method, a communication device and a program.
2. Description of the Related Art
Discussions have been taking place recently regarding secondary usage of a spectrum assigned for primary usage to provide a secondary communication service depending on the use condition of the spectrum. For example, the standard specification for allowing an unused channel contained in a spectrum of the U.S. digital TV broadcast (TV white spaces) to be available for radio communication has been studied in the IEEE802.22 working group (cf. “IEEE802.22 WG on WRANs”, [online], [Searched on Jan. 5, 2009], Internet <URL:http://www.ieee802.org/22/>).
Further, according to the report from FCC (Federal Communications Commission) on November 2008, the discussions are directed toward permitting secondary usage of TV white spaces by using a communication device that fulfills a certain condition and has received an authorization. The FCC's report accepts the above-described standard specification of IEEE802.22 which is the pioneering work on the standardization of secondary usage of TV white spaces and further coverts the moves of a new study group in IEEE. Technically, because it is required to perform signal detection at the level of −114[dBm] (SNR is about −19[dB] when NF (Noise Figure) is 11[dB], for example) with use of existing technology, for example, an auxiliary function such as geo-location database access is expected to be necessary (cf. “SECOND REPORT AND ORDER AND MEMORANDUM OPINION AND ORDER”, [online], [Searched on Jul. 10, 2009], Internet <URL:http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-08-260A1.pdf>). Further, the FCC is searching for opening a 250 MHz band, which is a part of a 5 GHz band, as a new channel for secondary usage.
Furthermore, in the EU, there are moves afoot to universally allocate a dedicated control channel called CPC (Cognitive Pilot Channel) for making DSA (Dynamic Spectrum Access) under a long-term strategy. Allocation of CPC is incorporated in the agenda of ITU (International Telecommunication Union)-WP11 in 2011. Technological studies for a secondary usage system that makes DSA are also being progressed in IEEE SCC (Standards Coordinating Committee) 41.
In such a background, several research reports have been released recently concerning secondary usage of a spectrum in the case of assuming a broadcasting system, a satellite communication system, a mobile communication system or the like as a primary system. For example, Alan Bok et al., “Cognitive Radio System using IEEE802.11a over UHF TVWS”, Motorola, October 2008 proposes a system architecture in the case of operating a radio system with use of the IEEE802.22 standard on TV white spaces of UHF (Ultra High Frequency). Further, D.Gueny et al.,“Geo-location database technique for incumbent protection in the TV White space”, DySPAN, October 2008 also intends use of TV white spaces and proposes a form that utilizes positional information of a service area of a primary system as external information.
On the occasion of secondary usage of a spectrum, it is generally necessary for a system on the part of secondary usage (secondary system) to carry out the operation that does not degrade the communication quality of a primary system. Therefore, when transmitting a radio signal in the secondary system, it is desirable to control its transmission power so as to avoid interference on a node of the primary system.
Regarding such control of a transmission power, in the case of secondary usage of TV white spaces as proposed by Alan Bok et al. or D.Gueny et al., it can be confirmed beforehand that a channel for secondary usage is not used at all, and it is thus possible to determine in many cases that a transmission power at the maximum level can be used. On the other hand, H.Fujii and H.Yoshino (NTT docomo), “Spectrum sharing by adaptive transmit power control for low priority system and its achievable capacity”, CrownCom, May 2008 proposes a technique that protects a node of a high-priority system by adaptively controlling a transmission power in a low-priority system.
Further, Inage et al., “Spectrum Sharing Based on Capacity Conservation Ratio of Primary User”, IEICE Technical Report SR2009, May 2009 proposes a technique that, when a system such as a mobile communication system in which the receiving environment of a terminal varies depending on location due to fading or the like is the primary system, adopts the ratio of capacity (capacity conservation ratio) between before and after secondary usage in the primary system as a protection criterion and makes transmission power control for satisfying the capacity conservation ratio.


To establish new turf it is usually necessary to apply fertiliser and also to water regularly. A greater amount of fertiliser and water is required to establish new turf than to maintain existing turf. The type of fertiliser used and the manner of irrigation will affect the rate of turf growth, the structure of the soil and the root structure of the turf as it grows.
Appropriate fertilisers for turf advantageously comprise a source of nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium. These nutrients may be found in an inorganic or synthetic fertiliser, or in an organic fertiliser.
While inorganic or synthetic fertilisers are often utilised, over application of such fertilisers may be toxic to turf, due to their water solubility. This may also lead to damage to the environment, through leaching of the fertiliser into waterways.
In contrast, over application of organic fertilisers is not usually detrimental to turf, as the water soluble content of such fertilisers is normally quite low. Organic fertilisers may also biodegrade over an extended period of time, improve moisture retention and promote microbial and earthworm activity.
The water applied to turf may be lost through evaporation, transpiration (emission of water vapour from the leaves of the turf), infiltration and percolation of water through the soil, and water runoff. Due to variations in climate and soil structure, the exact amount of water that must be applied to establish or maintain turf will vary. If the consumer applies too little water, the turf may fail. However, excessive watering will lead to waste.
New turf should be watered each day for adequate establishment. The amount of water required may be substantial, and in some cases 4 mm of water may be required per day in the first five weeks after laying to establish new turf. Australian turf production per annum is 6500 hectares (65 million m2), and therefore to bed all of this turf would require on the order of 9.1 mega liters in the first five weeks after laying.
To decrease the amount of water required, products such as water absorbent polymers (water crystals) or soil wetting agents are often used. Soil wetting agents help soils to absorb water by decreasing their hydrophobicity. In contrast, water absorbent polymers absorb and retain water for the roots of turf to use. When these polymers are present in soil, it is not necessary to water as frequently as water loss is diminished.
Substantially more fertiliser is generally added to soil to establish new turf than other products, such as water absorbent polymers or soil wetting agents. Accordingly, it can be time consuming and difficult to apply the correct proportions of each product to the soil.
A traditional method of applying multiple products simultaneously would be to simply mix the products together to form a “salt and pepper” mixture. However, during the course of production, distribution and/or application, settling may occur, which in turn limits the ability of each product to be applied at the correct rates due to phase separation based on particle size.


A computer keyboard and display are common devices for providing computer input and output, respectively. A keyboard is language-specific such that the keys on the keyboard can be pressed to directly input only those characters in the keyboard's language that are assigned to those keys. For inputting other characters, a user has to press a combination of keys on the keyboard.
Many languages have alphabets that are too large to accommodate on a keyboard. Many languages have modifiers, which when applied to a character in the language's alphabet produce additional characters in the language's alphabet. Furthermore, the alphabets of many languages do not use characters to form words in the manner of the English language, but have a collection of characters that represent words. Thus, providing computer input in many languages is not as simple as pressing the letter-keys on the keyboard but an indirect process of pressing a combination of keys to generate characters not available as keys on the keyboard.
A display is also language-specific. In order to display characters in certain languages, certain scripts, fonts, and rendering directions can be selected for proper rendering of the characters. Generally, for rendering characters of a given language, specific fonts are installed and presented on the computer display.
Text in digital content is encoded in a variety of ways for capturing from an input method, storage in a data storage system, and rendering on a user interface in a desirable manner. For example, Unicode is a common encoding standard for encoding and handling of text characters from a set of language scripts in digital textual content.
Presently, Unicode encodes or codifies over one hundred thousand characters from over one hundred languages. Generally, in Unicode and other character encoding standards, each character represented in the standard is assigned an encoded value called a code point. For example, in Unicode standard UTF-8 uses one byte—eight bits—to encode the code points of the characters represented in UTF-8. UTF-16 similarly uses two bytes for encoding the code points of the characters represented therein.
A code point in an encoding standard is unique to a specific character in a specific language represented in that encoding standard. For example, in Unicode, a code point comprises an alphanumeric string that can be generated on commonly used keyboard configurations, such as an English language QWERTY keyboard.
As an example, to provide a Unicode code point, the user or an application generally supplies an indication that the alphanumeric string following the indication is a Unicode code point and should be translated using a Unicode table to generate a character. For example, in some implementations, to provide a Unicode code point using a QWERTY keyboard, a user can press the ALT key, keep the ALT key depressed while entering the code point, and release the ALT key when the code point entry is complete.
An application called an input method application, or simply “input method” or “IMA”, intercepts the Unicode code point that the user enters. The IMA looks up a Unicode table to find the character that matches the code point that the user entered. The IMA supplies the character to a target application for which the user is supplying the input.
A character variant is an alternate representation of a character within the given encoding standard. There are two types of character variants—Variants with Different Code Points (VDCP) and Glyphs with Same Code Point (GSCP). A variant is a VDCP type variant when the original character and the variant have different code points, with the same or different language tags, within the encoding standard. A variant is a GSCP type variant when the glyph—a manner of scripting or otherwise visually representing the character—of the original character and the variant has the same code point but different language tags in the encoding standard.


In a communication network system such as the UMTS terrestrial radio access network (UTRAN), there are two potential bottlenecks, namely, the air interface and the transport network (transport link) connecting the radio network controller (RNC) and Node B. The transport link between the RNC and Node B is a potential bottleneck when its capacity is smaller then the available maximal capacity of the Uu interface. For example, a typical scenario is that the Node B is connected to the RNC through an E1 link with a capacity of approximately 2 Mbps, and in this case the available Uu capacity for the high speed downlink packet access (HSDPA) may be significantly larger that 2 Mbps. This means that a single user equipment (UE) with good radio conditions can overload the transport network (TN).
The fair sharing of Uu resources is the task of the Uu scheduler, but the Uu scheduler can not cope with the TN bottleneck, i.e. the transport link bottleneck. In order to deal with the TN bottleneck a flow-control (FC) mechanism has been introduced. FIG. 2 shows the location of the FC in the protocol stack. The goal of the FC is to efficiently use the TN in a fair manner.
Lack of FC causes serious performance degradation when the transport network is the bottleneck. In this case the TN buffer is typically full, causing high TN delay and loss ratio. This causes exhaustive radio link control (RLC) retransmissions which results in a much lower throughput. In addition to this, an RLC reset and a consequent transmission control protocol (TCP) timeout may also occur.
The flow control operates per-flow basis, i.e. each HSDPA flow has its own (i) congestion detection, (ii) bitrate calculation and (iii) shaper part. The main tasks of these three parts are the following:
1) Congestion Detection Part in the Node B
Based on the arrived packets from the RNC there is an attempt to determine the congestion level of the transport network. If TN congestion is detected, the bitrate calculation part is informed. A gap in sequence numbers of arriving packets is interpreted as “hard” congestion, because with a very high probability this event is due to packet loss in the TN caused by serious congestion. In addition to this, the variation of the one-way packet delay between RNC and Node B is also measured, i.e. a given fraction of packets have a time-stamp. If this delay starts to increase, probably due to queue build up in the TN, then it is interpreted as “soft” congestion, but if this delay build up is getting too large, e.g. larger than 60 ms, it is interpreted as “hard” congestion. The bitrate calculation part will react on hard and soft congestions in different ways.
2) Bitrate Calculation Part in the Node B
This part of the flow control calculates the current maximum bitrate of the flow. This bitrate is allowed by the transport network for that flow. The applied algorithm is conformed with the additive increase multiplicative decrease (AIMD) property that guarantees convergence to fairness; all flows converge to an equal share of resources in steady state, where no flows join or leave. The FC maintains an internal variable for the maximum bitrate of the flow. This bitrate is increased linearly if there is no TN congestion, i.e. no reported congestion from congestion detection part. If congestion is reported, the bitrate is reduced by 50% in case of hard congestion and reduced by 10% in case of soft congestion. When a new flow arrives, in this way a new FC entity is created, a slow-start like mechanism is used to find out the proper starting bitrate of the flow. After the first congestion, the FC behaves the above described AIMD manner. If the calculated bitrate of the flow changes significantly, then the shaper is informed about the new bitrate through a control frame called a capacity allocation (CA). To avoid too high processing load, this part of the FC is executed periodically with a 100-ms period, i.e. the bitrate calculation part is executed every 100 ms.
3) Flow Shaper in the RNC
The task of the shaper is to shape the flow according to the signalled maximum flow bitrate. This bitrate is coming from the latest received CA control frame.
The current HSDPA flow control solution provides fairness only in long term due to the convergence of AIMD property in case of a TN bottleneck. Fairness is provided only among flows sharing the same TN bottleneck. The initial shaping rate calculated by the FC has significant effect of the fairness and the time of the convergence. If a new flow arrives into the cell, e.g. due to handover, the existing algorithm operates as follows:
Firstly, it estimates maximum achievable bandwidth on the transport network (maxHsRate) and the maximum achievable peak rate for HS in the given cell (maxUuRate).
Secondly, it counts the number of active flows belonging to the Node B (nPqsRbs) and to the cell (nPqsCell). Noticeable is that the new flow also is counted in these counters.
Finally, it calculates the average bitrate on the transport network and in the cell by dividing the bitrates by the number of ongoing flows respectively. Then it chooses the minimum of them as initial shaping rate of the new flow. Additionally, there is an upper limit (hsSsStartPointMax) for the initial shaping rate to avoid too high initial rates.
In another words, this calculation estimates the theoretical fair bandwidth share from the estimated maximum available bandwidth assuming the system is fully utilized and the flows share it equally. Then it sets this as the starting point of the new flow. For instance, if the maximum achievable bandwidth on the transport network is 2 Mbps, the maximum achievable peak rate in the cell is 3.6 Mbps, on the transport there are 5 parallel flows, but on the cell there are only 3 flows and the hsSsStartPointMax is 500 kbps then, the initial shaping rate of the new flow is:CAinitial=min(2 Mbps/6; 3.6 Mbps/4; 500 kbps)=333 kbps  (1)
Noticeable is that this calculation contradicts the per-flow manner, since the number of flows is aggregated information about the system. In case of steady state, when the HSDPA flow control entities have enough time to find the fair share of the flows, and there is unused capacity neither in the transport network nor in the cell, the above introduced methodology provides good estimation of the fair share, so the convergence will be very fast.
However, the above described solution requires an estimation of the maximum achievable transport network bitrate. One option for this estimate is a parameter configured based on knowledge about the transport network architecture.
Further, the initial bitrate calculation relies on rough estimations and, the initial bitrate calculation does not take fairness into account.
If the estimation of the maximum achievable bandwidth on transport network (maxHsRate) or the maximum achievable peak cell rate (maxUuRate) is not accurate, they typically overestimates the real ones, the initial shaping rate will be quite far from the optimal and also in terms of fairness. Typically the actual available bitrate for HSDPA is smaller than the maximum, due to the bitrate used by higher priority traffic.


Spectroscopy is a common technique for measuring the concentration of organic and some inorganic constituents of a solution. The theoretical basis of this technique is the Beer-Lambert law, which states that the concentration ci of an absorbent in solution can be determined by the intensity of light transmitted through the solution, knowing the pathlength dλ, the intensity of the incident light I0,λ, and the extinction coefficient εi,λ, at a particular wavelength λ. In generalized form, the Beer-Lambert law is expressed as:
                              I          λ                =                              I                          0              ,              λ                                                      ⅇ                                          -                                  d                  λ                                            ·                              μ                                  a                  ,                  λ                                                                                (        1        )                                          μ                      a            ,            λ                          =                              ∑                          i              =              1                        n                                                        ɛ                              i                ,                λ                                      ·                          c              i                                                          (        2        )            where μα,λ is the bulk absorption coefficient and represents the probability of absorption per unit length. The minimum number of discrete wavelengths that are required to solve EQS. 1-2 are the number of significant absorbers that are present in the solution.
A practical application of this technique is pulse oximetry, which utilizes a noninvasive sensor to measure oxygen saturation (SpO2) and pulse rate. In general, the sensor has light emitting diodes (LEDs) that transmit optical radiation of red and infrared wavelengths into a tissue site and a detector that responds to the intensity of the optical radiation after absorption (e.g., by transmission or transreflectance) by pulsatile arterial blood flowing within the tissue site. Based on this response, a processor determines measurements for SpO2, pulse rate, and can output representative plethysmographic waveforms. Thus, “pulse oximetry” as used herein encompasses its broad ordinary meaning known to one of skill in the art, which includes at least those noninvasive procedures for measuring parameters of circulating blood through spectroscopy. Moreover, “plethysmograph” as used herein (commonly referred to as “photoplethysmograph”), encompasses its broad ordinary meaning known to one of skill in the art, which includes at least data representative of a change in the absorption of particular wavelengths of light as a function of the changes in body tissue resulting from pulsing blood. Pulse oximeters capable of reading through motion induced noise are available from Masimo Corporation (“Masimo”) of Irvine, Calif. Moreover, portable and other oximeters capable of reading through motion induced noise are disclosed in at least U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,770,028, 6,658,276, 6,157,850, 6,002,952 5,769,785, and 5,758,644, which are owned by Masimo and are incorporated by reference herein. Such reading through motion oximeters have gained rapid acceptance in a wide variety of medical applications, including surgical wards, intensive care and neonatal units, general wards, home care, physical training, and virtually all types of monitoring scenarios.


The invention relates to a coupler for a pipe or hose section.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,407,532 discloses a coupler with a hose section having a coupling body with a coupling piece integrally formed therewith and a pressing sleeve which can be pre-assembled to the coupling body. When using this coupler, a connectable hose end is introduced in an annular gap between the coupling piece and the pressing sleeve and connected by concentrically pressing the pressing sleeve together with the coupler.
The desired pre-assembly between the coupling body and the pressing sleeve is achieved with known couplers by inserting the pressing sleeve with its front end over the area of the coupling body adjacent to the coupling piece and pressing a stop projection projecting inwardly from the pressing sleeve through a plastic deformation in an annular stop groove in the coupling body. Since the inside diameter of the stop projection of the pressing sleeve is larger than the outside diameter of the annular projection, in order to be able to insert the same over the annular projection formed between the stop groove and the coupling piece, prior to achieving the pre-assembly, substantial pressure must be applied to the plastic deformation to achieve the pre-assembly and a special tool is required for this. The rejection rate with couplers is relatively high in the production of such pre-assembly. The above-mentioned pre-assembly between the coupling body and the pressing sleeve is not suitable for the use of coupling bodies made of plastic since they would not withstand the pressures exerted upon them when producing the pre-assembly. The use of coupling bodies of plastic is, however, advantageous with regard to use for coupling for pipes or hoses carrying water.
The invention therefore relates to a generic coupling in which the coupling body and the pressing sleeve can be pre-assembled in a simple manner that is favorable in terms of production costs.
Through the use of a locking or interlocking connection, the pre-assembly of the coupling body and pressing sleeve can be achieved rapidly and simply without tools and without risk of damage.
When selecting a locking connection, it is preferable that the front end be designed in an elastically deformable manner with the pressing sleeve where the front end of the pressing sleeve preferably locks with the coupling body upon spring-back.
The inventive coupler is advantageously suited for the use of plastic, particularly polymers such as polysulfone or polyphenylene sulfone, as the material of the coupling body where the pressing sleeve can consist of stainless steel.
With such a coupler, pipe or hose sections can be connected with as many additional connections as desirable such as additional pipe or hose sections. Other arrangements such as Ts, reducers, elbows, transitions to sections with internal or external threads or similar types are possible with the inventive coupler. Further advantages and details of the invention are shown in the accompanying drawings. In the Figures:


The invention generally relates to systems and methods for guiding or locating diagnostic or therapeutic electrode elements in the interior regions of the body. More particularly, the invention relates to guiding or locating diagnostic or therapeutic electrode elements inside the heart for treatment of cardiac conditions.
Physicians make use of catheters today in medical procedures to gain access into interior regions of the body f or diagnostic and therapeutic purposes. It is important for the physician to be able to precisely position the catheter within the body to gain contact with a desired tissue location.
The need for precise control over the catheter is especially critical during procedures that ablate myocardial tissue from within the heart. These procedures, called ablation therapy, are used to treat cardiac rhythm disturbances.
During these procedures, a physician steers a catheter through a main vein or artery into the interior region of the heart that is to be treated. The physician then further manipulates a steering mechanism to place the electrode carried on the distal tip of the catheter into direct contact with the endocardial tissue. The physician directs energy from the electrode through myocardial tissue either to an indifferent electrode (in a uni-polar electrode arrangement) or to an adjacent electrode (in a bipolar electrode arrangement) to ablate the tissue.
Before ablating heart tissue, physicians often examine the propagation of electrical impulses in heart tissue to locate aberrant conductive pathways and to identify the arrhythmia foci, which are ablated. The techniques used to analyze these pathways and locate foci are commonly called xe2x80x9cmapping.xe2x80x9d
Conventional cardiac tissue mapping techniques use multiple-electrodes positioned in contact with heart tissue to obtain multiple electrograms. These conventional mapping techniques require invasive open-heart surgical techniques to position the electrodes on the interior or exterior surfaces of the heart.
An alternative technique of introducing multiple-electrode arrays into the. heart through venous or arterial accesses to map myocardial tissue is known. Compared to conventional, open heart mapping techniques, endocardial mapping techniques, being comparatively noninvasive, hold great promise. Multiple electrogram signals obtained from within the heart can be externally processed to detect local electrical events and identify likely foci.
Once mapping identifies the foci, an ablation electrode is steered into position in contact with a focus site. At least, in theory, this is the goal sought to be achieved. In actuality, though, the task of remotely guiding an ablation element within the blood pool of a beating heart to a particular focus site can be, at best, problematic.
There is the need to provide simple, yet reliable, ways of guiding electrode elements within the, heart, or within other interior parts of the body, to precise locations targeted for diagnosis or treatments.
This invention has as its principal objective the realization of safe and efficacious systems and methods for remotely locating electrode elements at precise locations within the body.
One aspect of the invention provides a system and related method for guiding a movable electrode within an array of multiple-electrodes located within the body. The system and method couple an emitting electrode to an electrical energy-generating element. The emitting electrode comprises either the movable electrode or at least one of the electrodes in the array. The generating element conditions the emitting electrode to emit electrical energy while the movable electrode is located within the array.
According to this aspect of the invention, the system and method couple a sensing electrode to a sensing element. The sensing electrode comprises either the movable electrode or at least one of the electrodes in the array. The sensing element conditions the sensing electrode to sense electrical energy emitted by the emitting electrode.
Further in accordance with this aspect of the invention, the system and method couple a processing element to the sensing element. The processing element analyzes sensed electrical energy and generates, based upon its analysis, an output that locates the movable electrode within the array.
Another aspect of the invention provides a system and method for ablating tissue within the heart. The system and method are usable in conjunction with an array of multiple-electrodes located within the heart to locate foci appropriate for ablation and an ablation electrode that is movable within the array for applying ablating energy to the foci.
According to this aspect of the invention, the system and method condition an emitting electrode to emit electrical energy while the ablation electrode is present within the array. The emitting electrode comprises either the ablation electrode or at least one of the electrodes in the array. While the ablation electrode is present within the array, the system and method also sense the emitted electrical energy with a sensing electrode. The sensing electrode comprises either the ablation electrode or at least one of the electrodes in the array. The system and method process the sensed electrical energy to generate an output locating the ablation electrode relative to the multiple-electrodes on the array.
In a preferred embodiment, the system and method continuously generate the location indicating output while the physician moves the ablation electrode within the array. In this way, the system and method aid the physician in guiding the ablation electrode to the targeted ablation site.
In a preferred embodiment, the systems and methods that incorporate either aspect of the invention generate an electric field within the array, while sensing electrode electric potentials in the electric field. In this embodiment, the processing element generates the output by analyzing spatial variations in the electrical potentials within the array. The variations can comprise variations in phase, variations in amplitude, or both. Alternatively, the processing element generates the output by analyzing spatial variations in impedances between the emitting and sensing electrodes.
In a preferred embodiment, the systems and methods that incorporate either aspect of the invention inject electrical energy into body tissue, while sensing tissue response to the injected electrical energy. In. this embodiment, the processing element generates the output by analyzing differences in the sensed tissue response. In one implementation, the processing element analyzes time differences in the sensed tissue response. In another implementation, the sensing element senses the depolarization of myocardial tissue, and the processing element analyses time differences in sensed tissue depolarization.
Yet another aspect of the invention provides a system and method for ablating tissue within the heart. The system and method locate an array of multiple-electrodes in contact with tissue within the heart to sense electrical activity in heart tissue to locate foci appropriate for ablation. The system and method also locates a movable ablation electrode within the array. The system and method condition an emitting electrode comprising either the ablation electrode or at least one of the electrodes in the array to emit ultrasonic energy while the ablation electrode is located within the array. While the ablation electrode is located within the array, the system and method also sense the emitted ultrasonic energy with a sensing electrode. The sensing electrode comprises the ablation electrode, if the ablation electrode is not the emitting electrode, or, otherwise, at least one of the electrodes in the array. The system and method process the sensed ultrasonic energy to generate an output locating the ablation electrode relative to the multiple-electrodes in the array.
In a preferred embodiment of this aspect of the invention, the system and method move the ablation electrode within the array while repeating the emitting, sensing, and processing steps just described. The result is an output that continuously locates the ablation electrode as it moves within the array.
Other features and advantages of the inventions are set forth in the following Description and Drawings, as well as in the appended Claims.


1. Field of the Disclosure
This disclosure relates to tightening systems for use in fitting a wearable article, such as a helmet.
2. Description of the Related Art
Helmets and other wearable articles are commonly used to provide protection to the head or other body parts of a wearer, such as during sporting activities and other activities. Some helmets comprise a hard shell of plastic or Kevlar® or the like, and various pads, straps and bladders to position the helmet on a wearer's head. Heads come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes. Helmet shells, on the other hand, come in a very limited number of sizes. If a helmet does not fit properly to the wearer's head, it can cause discomfort and may not provide sufficient protection in some cases. For example, if a helmet is worn that is too large for the wearer's head, the helmet can shift positions during use and may even fall off. Helmets can be made to fit a variety of head sizes and shapes, but existing helmets suffer from various drawbacks. For example, some existing helmets do not provide sufficient adjustability to comfortably fit to a wide variety of head shapes and sizes. Some existing helmets apply pressure unevenly across the head of the wearer, which can cause discomfort.


A flash or block erase memory (flash memory), such as, Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory (Flash EEPROM), includes an array of cells which can be independently programmed and read. The size of each cell and thereby the memory as a whole are made smaller by eliminating the independent nature of each of the cells. As such, all of the cells are erased together as a block.
A memory of this type includes individual Metal-Oxide Semiconductor (MOS) memory cells that are field effect transistors (FETs). Each FET, or flash memory cell includes a source, drain, floating gate and control gate to which various voltages are applied to program the cell with a binary 1 or 0, or erase all of the cells as a block. The flash memory cell provides for nonvolatile data storage.
A typical configuration of a dual bit flash memory cell consists of an oxide-nitride-oxide (ONO) layer, within which the storage element is contained. The ONO layer is sandwiched between a control gate and a crystalline silicon semiconductor substrate. The substrate includes selectable source/drain regions.
In a dual bit flash memory cell, the flash memory cell stores data by holding charge in the ONO layer. The charge storage element within the ONO layer allows electrons to be stored on either side of the flash memory cell. That is, charge is stored within the ONO layer on either side of the mirror bit memory cell. As a result, the basic memory cell behaves as two independent conventional memory cells. In a typical dual bit flash memory cell, a program operation is done by injecting hot electrons into the ONO layer and an erase operation is done by injecting hot holes into the ONO layer.
A typical configuration of a floating gate flash memory cell consists of a thin, high-quality tunnel oxide layer sandwiched between a conducting polysilicon floating gate and a crystalline silicon semiconductor substrate. The tunnel oxide layer is typically composed of silicon oxide (SiO). The substrate includes a source region and a drain region that can be separated by an underlying channel region. A control gate is provided adjacent to the floating gate, and is separated by an interpoly dielectric. Typically, the interpoly dielectric can be composed of an oxide-nitride-oxide (ONO) structure.
The flash memory cell stores data by holding charge within the floating gate. In a write operation, charge can be placed on the floating gate through hot electron injection, or Fowler-Nordheim (F-N) tunneling. In addition, F-N tunneling can be typically used for erasing the flash memory cell through the removal of charge on the floating gate.
A typical configuration of an array of dual bit or floating gate flash memory cells includes rows and columns of flash memory cells. The array is supported by word lines and bit lines, wherein the word lines are coupled to gates of flash memory cells, and the bit lines are coupled to source and/or drains.
As the flash memory cells within an array are scaled to higher values, the size of structures within the array are decreased. For example, the bit lines become narrower and narrower within the array of memory cells. However, as the bit lines become narrower, misalignment issues between bit line contacts and the bit lines become more pronounced. As a result, the alignment margin when forming the contact to the bit lines becomes very small, thereby limiting the scaling increase of the array of memory cells.
In addition, in the conventional art, the bit lines can not be silicided, such that, a cobalt silicide (CoSi) layer cannot be formed on the bit lines. The CoSi layer provides for better conductivity, for example between the contact and the bit line. That is, the CoSi layer lowers the bit line contact resistance. However, in conventional manufacturing techniques forming the CoSi layer would electrically couple all the bit lines together in the array of memory cells. In that case, individual cells could not be isolated for reading or programming, since any bit line is coupled to all of the memory cells in the array.
As a remedy for the CoSi short, ONO layers are not removed between the word lines and in the bit lines contact regions. As such, when a CoSi layer is deposited for the gates of the memory cells and for the source/drain regions of the periphery, the ONO acts to block CoSi formation between the bit lines of the array of memory cells. However, keeping the ONO layer between the word lines also can induce a leakage current. As a result, a leakage current would cause an entire column of memory cells to malfunction. In particular, with the leakage current, the total current read from a column of memory cells will include the current from the programmed memory cell being read and the leakage current. This may result in the programmed cell appearing to be erased.


The present invention relates to a liquid crystal panel type projection display More particularly, the present invention is directed to a compact, high definition, rear projection type display liquid crystal panel display with an improved lens or liquid crystal panel control system.
The construction of a conventional liquid crystal panel type rear projection display is shown in FIG. 2 wherein the numeral 1 denotes a light source such as a halogen lamp or a xenon lamp, numeral 2 denotes a condenser mirror, numeral 3 denotes a dichroic mirror having the property of reflecting red color and transmitting green and blue colors (red, green and blue colors will hereinafter be referred to simply as R, G and B, respectively), and numeral 4 denotes a dichroic mirror for reflecting B and transmitting R and G. Numerals 5, 6, 7 and 8 denote mirrors, and numerals 9, 10 and 11 denote liquid crystal panels for R, G and B, respectively. The liquid crystal panels may be so-called TFT (Thin Film Transistor) type nematic liquid crystal panels. Numerals 12, 1 3 and 20 denote a dichroic prism, a projection lens and a screen, respectively.
In the construction shown in FIG. 2, color images can be projected onto the screen 20 by inputting image signals to the liquid crystal panels 9, 10 and 11. Such prior art construction is described in '86 Television Society Report IPD 109-5, pp. 23-28. Further, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 19834/87 describes the use of a Fresnel lens for a liquid crystal panel for controlling light input or output therefrom, but is not concerned with viewing angle of a projection system.
The above-noted prior art is advantageous in that the use of only one projection lens suffices On the other hand, however, it has the drawback that it is structurally difficult to set the value of an image projection field angle, .alpha., shown in FIG. 2 at 25.degree. or more. The value .alpha. in the prior art is about 23.degree..
For a front projector, a field angle of 23.degree. or so is appropriate, but for constituting a compact, rear projection type display it is considered necessary to use an optical system having a field angle of about 25.degree. or more, preferably 35.degree. or more. There are two reasons why it is difficult to obtain a field angle of 25.degree. or more in the conventional one-lens, three-panel type construction shown in FIG. 2. The first reason is based upon a physical restriction with regard to the presence of the dichroic prism 12. The second reason is that since the electrooptical conversion characteristic per se of the liquid crystal panels depend on the direction of exit light from the panels, there occurs unevenness in luminance and in color, causing the image quality to be impaired, at diagonal corners on the screen in an optical system having a large field angle of 25.degree. or more.


1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a system on chip (SOC), and more particularly, to isolation circuits in a level shifter.
2. Description of the Related Art
FIG. 1 shows a conventional system on chip (SOC) utilizing a level shifter 100. Signals passed between the first voltage domain 110 and the second voltage domain 120 are converted by the level shifter 100 to adapt to the corresponding voltage domain. There are various known techniques for implementing level shifter 100, thus, a detailed description thereof is omitted. In an 500, however, the first voltage domain 110 or second voltage domain 120 may be selectively or occasionally powered down, switching the corresponding terminal on level shifter 100 to a floating state. For example, when the first terminal V1 is floating, the level shifter 100 may output an indeterminable signal to the second terminal V2. If the second voltage domain 120 receives the indeterminable signal, unexpected application errors may occur.


This invention relates to antennas and more particularly to a low physical profile antenna that can be arrayed to provide near isotropic radiation patterns.
In the past, numerous attempts have been made using stripline antennas to provide an antenna having ruggedness, low physical profile, simplicity, low cost, and conformal arraying capability. However, problems in reproducibility and prohibitive expense made the use of such antennas undesirable. Older type antennas could not be flush mounted on a missile or airfoil surface. Slot type antennas required more cavity space, and standard dipole or monopole antennas could not be flush mounted.


The invention relates to improved mechanisms for the communication of network messages between two network nodes on a physical connection being established between those nodes at a physical layer switch.
It is common practice for the release of news bulletins relating to certain events to be tightly controlled such that the bulletins are released not before a scheduled time. This is particularly well known in finance where there can be significant value in being the first to have access to information that could affect the markets. For example, news bulletins carrying the details of governmental budgets or interest rate changes by central banks are often embargoed until a predetermined time, at which point the news agencies that have been permitted to report on the event simultaneously release their bulletins into the public domain.
News bulletins are typically embargoed until a predetermined time by providing press reporters with access to the news information only within a “lock-up room” that is isolated from the outside world, with no communications being permitted from the room. Within the lock-up room, the news reporters are free to draft bulletins reporting the news event on computers provided for that purpose. However, those computers are physically isolated from public communication networks by an “air gap”. Network messages carrying the news bulletins are therefore queued for delivery at the transmit queues of the computers until, at the predetermined time, a switch is thrown and a physical connection to the news distribution network is established. Such press lock-ups are used by the Australian and Canadian governments so as to provide for a scheduled release of Federal Budget information (see http:(slash)(slash)www2b.abc.net.au/guestbookcentral/entry.asp?GuestbookID=389&EntryID=7 55777 and http:(slash)(slash)www.cbc.ca/news/background/budget2006/blog.html), as well as by the US Department of Labor.
On a connection being made from the computer to the news distribution network, the physical and logical links appropriate to the communication protocols in use at the computer must be established so as to permit the transmission of the queued messages onto the network. For example, when a computer in the lock-up room is reconnected to the outside world, the computer would typically establish a connection with a server located outside of the lock-up room and configured to provide a gateway onto the respective news provider's network. If the connection were an Ethernet connection, then a physical layer link must first be established between the computer and server, over which a logical data link can subsequently be established to the intended endpoint receiver of the messages from that computer. For 100BASE-T Ethernet, the time required to establish such a data link layer connection can be 100 ms or more.
The advent of high speed trading has meant that significant profits can be made by traders who are able to exploit microsecond advantages in the receipt of financial information. Delays of tens of milliseconds therefore represent a significant length of time. Furthermore, the physical switch by which the computers of a lock-up room are isolated from the public networks will not close all of its ports simultaneously. There is typically a random distribution in its port closure timings with millisecond order standard deviation such that the time between a given pair of ports closing can be significant. This inadvertently causes the news bulletins from the lock-up computers allocated to some news providers to be released prior to the bulletins of other providers.
There is therefore a need for an improved mechanism for the scheduled release of embargoed news bulletins, particularly those bulletins carrying financial news.


1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to the design of electrical/electronic circuits, and more specifically to a method and apparatus for attaining a bandwidth limited sampling circuit of high linearity.
2. Related Art
A sampling circuit generally refers to a component which samples a signal level of an input signal (e.g., analog signal) at a particular instant of time and provides an output signal having the signal level to other components for a long duration. In general, a sampling circuit samples an input analog signal at a time point specified by a clock signal, and provides an output signal with the sampled strength to other components for further processing for a long time.
An input signal generally contains a source signal and a noise signal/component. It is generally desirable that the sampled output generated by a sampling circuit contain only the source signal component, which is generally referred to as providing a high signal to noise ratio (SNR).
A prior approach may remove the noise component by eliminating high frequency components from an input signal as the noise component is generally present at high frequencies. One problem with such an approach is that some of the components performing such removal may have non_linear characteristics, which results in a non_linear response in terms of the overall sampling operation. The non_linearity is undesirable in several environments. Accordingly, what is needed is a bandwidth limited sampling circuit of high linearity providing high SNR.
In the drawings, like reference numbers generally indicate identical, functionally similar, and/or structurally similar elements. The drawing in which an element first appears is indicated by the leftmost digit(s) in the corresponding reference number.


The present invention relates to the preparation of novel diamine antiviral agents containing an aromatic nucleus and their use as prophylactic and therapeutic agents in vertebrates. It is believed that these compounds function as endogeneous interferon inducers though the observed activity of these compounds is in no way predictated on this mechanistic interpretation. A discussion of the background of this art is given in the commonly assigned application, Ser. No. 330,042, filed Feb. 6, 1973 now U.S. Pat. No. 3,872,171 the disclosure of which is incorporated here by reference.


1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a gate driver for driving a thyristor, such as a GCT (gate commutated turn-off) thyristor, a GTO (gate turn-off) thyristor, a static inductive thyristor (SITH), or a power transistor, in a stable condition.
2. Prior Art
GCT and GTO have similar turn-on and on-state gate current requirements. The gate driver provides a turn-on pulse with high dI/dt and peak current, and thereafter provides a steady state DC on-state sustaining current. The gate driver sometimes receives negative gate voltage during on-state of the GCT/GTO.
A new situation, unlike in the case of the GTO, is introduced for driving the GCT. The gate driver for the GCT has its feature in the amount of turn-on peak current and its shape. The turn-on current increase (dI/dt) for a GCT is 10 times to 50 times higher than that of typical GTOs, and trigger peak currents also are selected 5 to 10 times higher in order to reduce turn-on loss. A 6 inch GCT thus may require dI/dt=500A/us and a peak current of 300A.
While such a sharp high pulse safely turns on the GCT accompanying a high rate of rise of anode current, a long pulse duration must be provided after the sharp high pulse to maintain the GCT in on-state, if GCT operation accompanies a small rate of rise of anode current. Thereafter, on-state gate current similar to the GTO""s (approximately 10A for a 4 inch or 6 inch device) is to be applied.
If no protection circuit, such as a current limiter, is provided, the gate driver may be damaged when the GCT""s or GTO""s load current changes its flow direction from a forward direction to a reverse direction. When the load current flows in the reverse direction, the load current will flow through a freewheel diode provided in parallel to the GCT. Thus, the GCT""s anode turns negative with respect to its cathode. A parasitic diode in the GCT allows a negative potential to appear at the gate of the GCT.
Thereafter when the load current changes its flow direction again from the reverse direction to the forward direction, the load current may flow again through the GCT. Then, a safe GCT on-condition has to be established again.
Basically such requirements also are well known from GTO operation. GCT circuits are designed for higher switching frequency, and, as a consequence, freewheel diodes must respond to a considerably higher forward voltage drop, resulting in GCT gate voltage as low as xe2x88x925V during normal converter operation.
The peak current is created from a voltage source by a resistor and capacitor circuit. In order to produce a high shooting pulse with a steep and rapid rising (dI/dt=500A/us), and a relatively long down slope pulse (10 us to 40 us) after the shooting pulse, requires several RC combinations with complicated adjustments. In such a design the total loss may exceed 50W for a 6 inch GCT drive.
A German Patent Laid-open publication No. DE3709150 and a PCT International Publication No. WO9407309 disclose the GTO driver using switched current sources. Inductors are fed to create the sources, and excessive energy is fed back to the power supply.
Basically in such way, very low loss can be achieved. But four high current switching devices and three diodes are required for generating a turn-on pulse and an on-state current. And the high turn-off peak current has to pass through a series connection of a switching element and an additional diode. Such a circuit cannot be used for a gate driver of GCT.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,791,350 discloses a gate driver which uses a switch-mode step down current regulator as a source for the GTO""s steady state gate current. The regulator incorporates a switch and a freewheel diode, it""s output is directly coupled to the GTO""s gate, and a high current pulse is generated by a separate circuit having a switch and a resistor.
In this way, U.S. Pat. No. 4,791,350 suggests reducing gate driver losses. But if a negative GCT gate voltage should appear, the regulator""s output current will increase without control. Moreover considerable losses are generated in the regulator""s freewheel diode, when gate currents exceeding 5A are required. Also, high losses will result from the high current pulse resistor.
Japanese Patent laid-open publication No. H3-97315 and EP Patent publication No. 0 416 933 discloses a circuit to solve the problem with negative gate potential. The freewheel diode is connected to the negative supply line. The inductor is charged by the positive supply source. Upon freewheel, the charge in the inductor will be discharged to the negative supply. In this way the circuit can operate stably under all positive and negative GTO gate voltage conditions.
Such circuit is applicable for the generation of a small gate current. With high gate current, however, a lot of energy is transferred from the positive supply source to the negative supply source, and it must be transferred back to the positive supply by an appropriate power returning circuit. In the case of GCT, for example, a gate current Ig may be about 10A and a gate voltage Vg is about xe2x88x9220V. Then, a circulating power would be approximately 200W. In contrast to this, the active gate power according to this reference may be as small as Vgxc3x97Ig 0.6Vxc3x9710A=6W. As a result, a tremendous over design of gate current generator and power supply is required, and a loss (approximately 20W-40W) is generated even with high-performance switch-mode circuits.
EP Patent publication 893883 discloses a gate driver which handles the GCT""s freewheel situation in another way. A bipolar transistor, implemented as emitter follower, is to limit the GCT""s gate current at negative gate voltage. The current is generated from voltage pulses with high efficiency.
For gate current Ig up to 2A, a circuit can be designed with appropriate components. At a higher gate current, the bipolar transistor gain will decrease below 20. Then, high base current is required, and loss will increase due to higher VCEsat (saturation of voltage Vce). At Ig=10A, Ib greater than 0.5A will be required, and VCEsat will amount to approximately 1V with the known PNP transistors.
Moreover, a high base current must be maintained with a GCT gate voltage being maintained not lower than 0.4V. Then, for higher GCT gate voltage and for open circuit condition (no GCT installed), a severe trade-off must be handled, complicating design and limiting the performance of the gate driver.
A circuit must be found which is appropriate to realize high current GCT drive. It has to generate a sharp, high trigger current pulse for GCT turn-on, a long trigger current tail and high gate current with low loss, and it has to be safe under all gate voltage operating conditions.
Moreover the circuit has to be such that it can be realized mainly with SMD components and technology in order to allow very compact and cost effective solutions.
One aspect of the invention includes a gate driver for driving a thyristor having an anode, a cathode, and a gate by providing a gate current to the gate of the thyristor during an on-command signal, the gate driver comprising:
a turn-on pulse generator for generating a turn-on pulse in response to a leading edge of the on-command signal;
a down converter for producing a down slope current immediately following the firing pulse; and
a current limiter having a MOSFET connected to the gate of the thyristor for supplying current from the down converter to the gate of the thyristor, the current limiter monitoring the gate voltage at the gate of the thyristor and increasing an internal resistance of the MOSFET relative to the negative voltage increase of the gate voltage.
According to the invention, the down converter comprises:
a pattern generator for generating a pattern of a current to be produced from the down converter;
a conduction pulse generator for generating conduction pulses in accordance with the pattern;
a switching element for conducting a current from a power source in response to the conduction pulses and producing a pulse current; and
an inductor for smoothing the pulse current;
the pattern generator generating a pattern having a rising edge and down slope portion after the rising edge, so that the down slope current produced from the down converter decreases relative to the pattern.
In a gate driver, the down converter further comprises:
another conduction pulse generator for generating other conduction pulses in accordance with the pattern;
another switching element for conducting a current from the power source in response to the other conduction pulses and producing another pulse current; and
another inductor for smoothing the other another pulse current so that the down slope current is increased.
In a gate driver, the down converter further comprises:
an additional inductor in parallel with the inductor; and
an additional switching element in series with the additional inductor to produce a greater down slope current.
In a gate driver, the down converter further comprises:
an additional inductor in parallel with the inductor; and
a saturating reactor element in series with the additional inductor to produce a greater down slope current.
In a gate driver, the current limiter comprises:
a comparator for comparing an output voltage at the output of the down converter with a predetermined voltage and producing an adjust signal relative to a difference between the output voltage and the predetermined voltage when the output voltage falls below the predetermined voltage, and
the MOSFET receiving the adjust signal to change its internal resistance relative to the adjust signal.
A gate driver according to the invention has as the comparator an operational amplifier.
In a gate driver, the comparator comprises bipolar transistors.
A gate driver according to the invention includes in the current limiter a freewheel diode connected parallel to the MOSFET.
In the gate driver, the turn-on pulse generator comprises a capacitor, a diode connected parallel to the capacitor, a switching element, and a reactor to produce a sharp high pulse.
The gate driver may comprise a bias current generator to provide a low level bias current to the gate of the thyristor.
A gate driver according to the invention is a GCT.


1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a nozzle or head of the type mounted on the ends of flexible hoses and used for the cleaning of pipes, ducts and waste water conduits using high velocity streams of liquid, and more particularly to such a nozzle which produces a pulsating flow.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Waste conduits containing caked or loosely adherent sludge, sediment, stone and other solid articles have been cleaned with the aid of a self-propelled nozzle or head affixed to the end of a flexible hose and having a plurality of rearwardly directed jets of high velocity fluid, usually water. In these systems, the reaction force upon the nozzle propels it through the conduit while entraining the attached length of flexible hose therealong. The fluid jets concurrently loosen adherent materials and carry them back through the conduit. When the nozzle is retracted in the direction of the advance of the nozzle by drawing upon the hose or a cable affixed to the nozzle, the rearwardly directed streams of fluid act to scoop sediment and contaminants away from the walls of the waste conduit and thereby provide an additional loosening and cleansing effect. Examples of prior art self-propelled nozzles are shown in U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,176,518 issued to Burns, 1,628,070 issued to Sladden, 3,080,265 issued to Maasberg, and 3,321,184, issued to Goss.
The flow rate of fluid emitted by the nozzle and the pressure of the fluid are limited by the output of the pump supplying fluid to the nozzle and the capacity of the flexible hose which connects the pump to the nozzle. The pressure and flow rate of the fluid are regulated in the nozzle by the size and number of the jets or orifices in the nozzle through which the fluid flows. With the pump producing a maximum flow rate at maximum pressure of the pump outlet, the pressure and flow rate of fluid through the nozzle are limited by the capacities of the pump and the connecting hose.
While the cleaning effect produced by these prior art nozzles has been sufficient where the degree of sedimentation is not excessive and where the walls of the conduit are coated with a loosely adherent layer of sludge, these nozzles have encountered difficulty in removing heavy accumulations of adherent sludge or caked-on material even when the water dispensed by the nozzle is at high velocity with the maximum pressure and volume possible.
It has been proposed to produce a pulsating jet of fluid from the nozzle in order to increase the effectiveness of the nozzle in removing caked sludge from the walls of the conduit. Such a pulsating jet has been produced by using a pump which produces a pulsating flow of fluid through the flexible hose to the nozzle. This pulsating system requires a specially adapted pump which can be quite expensive. In addition, the effectiveness of this pulsating system has been limited by the capacity of the pump and the capacity of the flexible hose to carry a given maximum rate of fluid through the hose from the pump to the nozzle. Thus, when the pulsating flow from the pump reaches its maximum flow rate, this maximum flow rate cannot be any greater than the maximum flow rate produced by a continuous flow because it reaches the maximum capacity of the hose. The effectiveness of this pulsating spray is, therefore, not much greater than a continuous spray. Another problem with this pulsating system is that the pump is often a considerable distance away from the nozzle and this pulsating flow produced by the pump loses some of its effectiveness as the fluid travels through the flexible hose to the nozzle.


1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an immersion microscope objective for use in a laser scanning microscope that uses multi-photon excitation.
2. Description of the Related Art
A known microscopic fluorescence observation means uses multiphoton excitation in fluorescence observation. During multiphoton excitation, a fluorescent object is illuminated with a light beam having wavelengths of integral multiples of an inherent absorption wavelength so as to cause excitation nearly equivalent to that caused by light having a wavelength equal to the inherent absorption wavelength. Multiphoton excitation is a non-linear phenomenon. For example, in the case of two-photon excitation, the excitation occurs at a probability proportional to the square of the intensity of the excitation light.
On the other hand, excitation light collected by a microscope objective lens has a light intensity that is inversely proportional to the square of the distance from the focal plane. Microscope multiphoton excitation occurs only in the vicinity of the focal point and thus fluorescence is emitted only from the focal plane.
Because of the above, a confocal pinhole, which is provided in the detection system of a common confocal microscope in order to shield the detector from fluorescence emitted anywhere other than at the focal plane, is unnecessary when using a multiphoton excitation laser scanning microscope. Advantageously, fluorescence in samples is subject to less discoloration because the excitation occurs only at the focal plane.
In multiphoton excitation, infrared light (that has longer wavelengths than light ordinarily used for excitation) is generally used as the excitation light. Generally speaking, light having longer wavelengths tends to scatter less (i.e., Rayleigh scattering). On the other hand, infrared excitation light reaches deep inside scattering samples such as living samples. This allows the deep parts of a living body to be made observable, as those parts are otherwise impossible to observe using only visible light. Furthermore, infrared light is less photo toxic than ultraviolet and visible light. This allows for observation of living samples with minimum damage.
For example, serotonin (a substance found in the brain) is self fluorescent, having absorption wavelengths in the ultraviolet range. However, ultraviolet light is highly photo toxic and does not reach deep inside the brain. In such circumstances, multiphoton excitation laser scanning microscopes work effectively. The ultraviolet light and infrared light differ in wavelength by a factor of approximately three. Thus, the infrared light can be used to excite serotonin by three-photon excitation.
As described above, multiphoton excitation fluorescence observation has significant merits and currently is a very effective type of microscopic observation.
However, microscopic observation using multiphoton excitation has some technical difficulties. For example, for multiphoton excitation to occur, two or more photons at a time must collide with a molecule of the fluorescent object and be absorbed. In order for this to occur, a significantly high photon density must be created at the focal point of the microscope objective lens. In other words, a microscope objective lens having a large numerical aperture with aberrations that are properly corrected must be used. As the excitation light is infrared light, it is important that aberrations of the microscope objective lens be favorably corrected for the infrared light.
For observation of the deep parts of a sample, aberrations resulting from the refractive index of the sample cannot be ignored. In order to avoid a deterioration of the fluorescence efficiency due to such aberrations, it is desirable that a correction collar be provided that corrects for aberrations that vary according to the depth of observation in the sample.
On the other hand, even though the excitation light is strong, only a small intensity of fluorescent light emerges from a sample. Therefore, the emerging fluorescent light has to be detected with a minimum loss. Thus, the microscope objective lens should be composed of a minimum number of lens elements and lens groups so as to optimize the optical path to the detector.
Furthermore, ultraviolet light should be detected in the case of three-photon excitation. However, conventional optical glass has a low transmittance to ultraviolet light. Therefore, the microscope objective lens should be constituted by specific types of optical glass that have a high transmittance to ultraviolet light.
A microscope that uses multiphoton excitation is often used in conjunction with a technique known as patch clamping that is widely used in cellular biology studies. When used in this manner, a sufficient working distance has to be reserved between the leading end of the immersion microscope objective and the sample. In other words, a large working distance and a sufficient access angle at the leading end of the immersion microscope objective need to be provided.
The excitation light is infrared light and the emerging fluorescence lies within the visible and ultraviolet ranges. Therefore, the fluorescence to be detected is likely to be subject to Rayleigh scattering by the sample. Consequently, light emerging from one point may become diffused before it enters the immersion microscope objective. Therefore, it is desirable that the immersion microscope objective be provided with a large field of view so as to collect the scattered fluorescence without loss.
When the field of view of the immersion microscope objective is extended, the pupil diameter of the immersion microscope objective increases proportional to it. Even if it is assumed that an immersion microscope objective having a very large input pupil diameter is developed, the performance cannot be displayed unless the input laser beams of the confocal microscope device fill the pupil diameter in the input pupil position of the immersion microscope objective. Therefore, Japanese Laid-Open Patent Application No. 2008-040154 proposes a technique for adjusting the input beam diameter in such a way as to approximately match the pupil diameter of the immersion microscope objective with an input beam diameter. According to this technique, the confocal microscope device can adjust the input beam diameter in such a way as to approximately coincide with the pupil diameter of the immersion microscope objective. However, since the input beam diameter is adjusted before beams enter a laser beam deflection means (a two-dimensional scanning means), the maximum input beam diameter is defined by the laser deflection means.
In order to expand this, it is necessary to increase the device size of the laser beam deflection means such as a galvano-mirror and the like. However, the larger the size of the galvano-mirror becomes, the larger a deflection angle for scanning the specimen range becomes to reduce the scanning speed. In a resonant galvano-mirror provided with two galvano-mirrors near a position conjugate with the aperture position and capable of two-dimensional scanning, the distance must be extended in order to avoid the interference between the two galvano-mirrors. Thus, it deviates from the ideal position to increase illumination unevenness.
Therefore, it is important to combine an optimum immersion microscope objective with the maximum input beam diameter defined by the laser beam deflection means of the confocal microscope device.


Mobile devices such as wireless devices, including, for example, cellular telephones, smart phones, laptop computers, notebook computers, tablet devices (e.g., iPad by Apple®) are ubiquitous in modern society. Use of such mobile devices while operating a vehicle, however, can be hazardous. The problem is exacerbated for inexperienced operators of the vehicle, such as youngsters just learning how to drive. Rates of vehicular accidents where mobile devices are involved are rising, especially with teenagers. Text messaging while operating a moving vehicle can be dangerous and has been linked with causing accidents. More generally, operating any keyboard or other interactive device while operating a vehicle can be dangerous.
Thus, the widespread adoption of mobile devices and common use of the devices while driving has raised concerns about the distraction of drivers. A driver speaking, text messaging, or using a software application on a mobile telephone may become mentally distracted from driving and lose control of the vehicle that he or she is driving. Thus, it is not uncommon to see an individual involved in an accident who was speaking or text messaging on a mobile device rather than paying attention to the road. Studies now suggest that individuals speaking on mobile telephones while driving a car may be as impaired as a person who drives while intoxicated. Not only is the driver mentally distracted, but eyes of the driver are diverted for dialing, looking to see who an incoming call is from.
It would be highly desirable to detect the presence of a mobile device, such as a wireless device, within a vehicle and control or inhibit the operation of the mobile device.


Atherosclerosis, the clogging of arteries with plaque, is often a cause of coronary heart disease or vascular problems in other regions of the body. Plaque is made up of fat, cholesterol, calcium, and other substances found in the blood. Over time, the plaque hardens and narrows the arteries. This limits the flow of oxygen-rich blood to organs and other parts of the body.
Blood flow through the peripheral arteries (e.g., carotid, iliac, femoral, renal etc.), can be similarly affected by the development of atherosclerotic blockages. Peripheral artery disease (PAD) can be serious because without adequate blood flow, the kidneys, legs, arms, and feet may suffer irreversible damage. Left untreated, the tissue can die or harbor infection.
One method of removing or reducing such blockages in blood vessels is known as rotational atherectomy. In some implementations, a drive shaft carrying an abrasive burr or other abrasive surface (e.g., formed from diamond grit or diamond particles) rotates at a high speed within the vessel, and the clinician operator slowly advances the atherectomy device distally so that the abrasive burr scrapes against the occluding lesion and disintegrates it, reducing the occlusion and improving the blood flow through the vessel.


1. Field of the Invention
The present invention belongs to a technical field related to a display device in which a semiconductor device (typically, a transistor) is used as a device, in particular, a light emitting device represented by an electroluminescence display device, and to a technical field related to an electronic apparatus equipped with the display device in an image display portion.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, development of liquid crystal display devices and electroluminescence display devices in which transistors (particularly, thin film transistors) are integrated on a substrate have progressed. Such display devices are respectively characterized in that the transistors are formed on a glass substrate by using a thin film formation technique, and the transistors thus formed are disposed in pixels each arranged in matrix and made to function as a display device for image display.
A variety of specifications are conceivable, which are required for areas (hereinafter, referred to as pixel portions), in which the image display is performed in the display device. However, the following are given as examples thereof: a large number of dots and high definition are ensured; an area of an effective display region in each pixel is large and bright image display is possible; and the pixel portion involves no defects that may induce point defects or line defects in its entirety. In order to achieve those specifications, not only the performance of the transistors arranged in each pixel should be satisfactory but also a technique of forming the transistors while increasing yield through a stable process is necessary.
Further, in an organic electroluminescence display device among the electroluminescence display devices, an organic compound is used for a light emitting element serving as a light emitting source. Accordingly, a measure for suppressing deterioration of the organic compound is most highly required in ensuring its reliability. In other words, in order to achieve a highly reliable display device, attention must be paid not only to an influence of an accumulated damage in the process during manufacturing the device but also to the subsequent deterioration with time, which results from the accumulated damage.
In the above-mentioned circumstances of development, the applicants of the present invention are most concerned, in the present conditions, with problems such as variation and shift of a threshold voltage in the transistors, which arise due to the accumulation of plasma damages on an insulating film etc. in an etching process.


1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to grips or handles for office, industrial or household devices, which have an anti-microbial treatment so that the transfer of germs and bacterium from one handler to another is reduced or eliminated.
2. Description of the Related Art
It is very common for people to share hand held products such as office products, industrial and household tools. This is especially true in manufacturing facilities where multiple workers share the same tools. For instance, in a circuit board fabrication facility, soldering irons for soldering or desoldering components to circuit boards arc often shared by workers in subsequent shifts. One of the problems of sharing such tools is that germs and bacterium may pass from the hands of one person to the tool and from the tool to another person. This may lead to workers becoming sick and unable to work, which lowers the productivity of the workers. Therefore, there is a need for reducing the chance of spreading germs through people's hand as they share things such as office or industrial products and tools.


Cartridge case trimmers, as contemplated herein, are of the mini-lathe variety, i.e. a selected cartridge case is locked in place and a blade is mounted on, or is an integral part of, a rotating shaft that is designed for controlled movement toward the mouth of the cartridge to engage and trim the case back to a desired length. Trimmers such as described above are used for refurbishing cartridge cases, i.e. where the cartridge has been fired and the spent cartridge case is cleaned, reshaped and reloaded. Such reloading of cartridge cases is popular among users of large numbers of cartridges, e.g., hunters, target shooters etc. There is a substantial savings to the reloader and he can, in effect, customize his own cartridges.
The trimming operation is made necessary because the explosion that takes place in the cartridge causes some expansion and elongation of the material of the cartridge case. The cartridges are designed to precisely fit the chamber of a specific type of firearm and thus the need for the trimmer.
The problem that is addressed by the present invention concerns the necessity of trimming cartridge cases to different lengths, i.e., different caliber cartridges (for different firearms) have different lengths. The enthusiast who loads his own cartridges is very likely to have a number of firearms and thus a number of different caliber cartridge cases that must be accommodated by the trimmer.
The trimmers presently in common use are equipped with an adjustable stop member that can be set so that the movement of the cutter into the cartridge case mouth is stopped at precisely the desired length of the cartridge. However, every time a different cartridge is to be trimmed, the reloader must readjust the stop member. Readjustment is a time consuming and tedious trial and error process.


1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates in general to a bumper structure of a motor vehicle, and more particularly to a bumper structure including a bumper fascia.
2. Description of the Prior Art
Some of light duty motor vehicles are equipped with bumper structures of a type having a plastic bumper fascia.
An example of prior art bumper structure of the above described type is shown in FIGS. 4-7 of the accompanying drawings. As is shown in FIG. 4, some of conventional bumper fascias 10 are integrally molded so as to have openings 12 and 14 into which head lamps and a radiater grille are fitted. As is seen from FIG. 5, the bumper fascia 10 is fastened, at its rear end vertical flanges 16, to front end vertical flanges 22 of a front fender panel 24 through bolts 18, nuts 20 and retainers 26.
However, the bumper structures of he above-mentioned type has the following drawbacks.
As the size of the bumper fascia 10 becomes increased, the same tends to be distorted in shape due to inevitable thermal contraction at its molding process.
Thus, if the bumper fascia 10 having been outwardly distorted is mounted onto the front fender panel 24, it tends to occur that, as is seen from FIG. 7, a rear upper end of the bumper fascia 10 mismates with a front upper end of the front fender panel 24 leaving a considerable gap "A" therebetween. Designated by numeral 28 in FIG. 7 is a hood panel for the engine room. Furthermore, as is seen from FIG. 6, because of the thermal contraction of the bumper fascia 10, it tends to have an undesirable gap "B" betwen a rear outer end of the bumper fascia 10 and a front outer end of the front fender panel 24. These gaps "A" and "B" lower the external appearance of the front face of the motor vehicle.