US07913315B2
A recording apparatus according to the present invention comprises converting means 15, 18, and 19 and recording means 23, 24, 32, and 33. The converting means 15, 18, and 19 convert the data structure of data into a file structure handled by software. The recording means 23, 24, 32, and 33 record data on a record medium. The file structure has a first data unit as entity data, a second data unit as a set of a plurality of first data units, and a data portion describing management information for managing the relation of the plurality of first data units and attributes of entity data of the first data units. The data portion contains security information for protecting intangible property rights of data.
US07913311B2
Techniques for providing pervasive security to digital assets are disclosed. According to one aspect of the techniques, a server is configured to provide access control (AC) management for a user (e.g., a single user, a group of users, software agents or devices) with a need to access secured data. Within the server module, various access rules for the secured data and/or access privileges for the user can be created, updated, and managed so that the user with the proper access privileges can access the secured documents if granted by the corresponding access rules in the secured data.
US07913306B2
A method for detecting intrusions in the operation of a computer system is disclosed which comprises gathering features from records of normal processes that access the files system of the computer, such as the Windows registry, and generating a probabilistic model of normal computer system usage based on occurrences of said features. The features of a record of a process that accesses the Windows registry are analyzed to determine whether said access to the Windows registry is an anomaly. A system is disclosed, comprising a registry auditing module configured to gather records regarding processes that access the Windows registry; a model generator configured to generate a probabilistic model of normal computer system usage based on records of a plurality of processes that access the Windows registry and that are indicative of normal computer system usage; and a model comparator configured to determine whether the access of the Windows registry is an anomaly.
US07913303B1
A dynamic protection system can analyze a computer system to determine its vulnerabilities to attack and generate a policy for protecting the computer system based on the identified vulnerabilities. Data received by the computer system can be analyzed to determine if it poses a threat to the system. This can prevent the data from entering the system or host based on a determination that the data poses a threat. Also, the dynamic protection system can receive policy updates to allow it to protect the system more efficiently and effectively. In other words, the dynamic protection system can protect an evolving computer system operating in an environment that is characterized by constantly changing methods of attack. Furthermore, by minimizing a need for manual intervention, attacks can be rapidly and accurately detected with a minimization of false positives, thereby lowering the cost of operation.
US07913298B2
One embodiment of the present invention provides a system that facilitates end-to-end identity propagation to a backend-tier application that is not single sign-on enabled. During operation, the system receives request from a user at a middle-tier application to access private data from the backend-tier application. Upon receiving this request, the system redirects the user to a single sign-on server that verifies authentication credentials of the user. The middle-tier application then receives a token from the single sign-on server authorizing access to a backend-tier application. Next, the middle-tier application uses the token to access the private data from the backend-tier application, and then provides the private data to the user.
US07913297B2
Techniques that facilitate pairing of wireless devices with other wireless devices are disclosed. According to one aspect, a pair of wireless devices can be paired for wireless data exchange using an available wired link. Advantageously, the wired link can be used to transport a pin code from one of the wireless devices to the other. Consequently, pairing of the wireless devices can be completed without necessitating user entry of a pin code so long as the wired link is available.
US07913281B2
This digital broadcast recording device includes a tuner unit, a channel table recording unit, an image output unit, an OSD generation unit, an actuation unit, and a channel presetting unit. The channel table recording unit records a channel table. An auto presetting unit sets virtual channels. If the number of a virtual channel is duplicated upon several physical channels, the channel presetting unit commands the OSD generation unit to display an OSD to the effect that this number is duplicated. And, when the actuation unit has received a predetermined actuation input, the channel presetting unit searches for a vacant channel.
US07913280B1
A system and method for creating and managing custom media channels within an Interactive Digital Program Guide (IDPG) of a device having a set-top box function associated with a cable or satellite television network. In general, a user interacts with the set-top box function to define a custom media channel. The custom media channel may be defined by a channel name and user preferences. Once the custom media channel is defined, an Internet search is performed based on the user preferences in order to identify media presentations for the custom media channel. Thereafter, when a user selects the custom media channel via the IDPG, the media presentations are played in a substantially continuous stream in either a predetermined or random sequence.
US07913277B1
A system, module and method is provided for metadata extraction and re-insertion. A module has a first input for receiving a compressed digital media stream having metadata such as DPI cues or content related information contained therein and an output for providing a first control signal including metadata information to an encoder. The metadata is extracted from the digital media stream by the module and generates a control signal including the metadata. The encoder module re-encodes the digital media contained in the digital media stream and re-inserts the metadata.
US07913270B2
A user-removable optical data storage system is provided. A rotatable first-surface medium is enveloped in a cartridge. The cartridge provides relatively large data capacity such as about 0.25 Gbytes or more despite a relatively small size such as about 35 mm×35 mm×3 mm. Preferably the cartridge substantially seals the data surfaces of the medium when the cartridge is withdrawn from a drive and at least a portion of one surface is automatically exposed to the objective of an optics arm when said cartridge is inserted in the drive. Tracking involves rotating an optic arm about an axis parallel to the disk rotation axis. Focus can involve pivoting the arm about an axis parallel to the disk surface.
US07913269B2
A motor used for a data storage disk drive is provided. The motor includes a rotor holder having a cylindrical portion. The cylindrical portion has a radially inner surface defining a through hole and an inner protruding section arranged at an axial end portion of the radially inner surface. The inner protruding section radially inwardly protrudes from the radially inner surface into the through hole. A shaft of the motor is inserted into the through hole and fixed to the radially inner surface of the cylindrical portion of the rotor holder with an adhesive. In the motor, a radially inner end of the inner protruding section of the rotor holder radially opposes an axially upper portion of the shaft. In addition, the portion of the axially lower surface of the inner protruding section of the rotor holder axially opposes the shaft while the axially upper portion of the shaft and the inner protruding portion are arranged in an axially vicinity manner.
US07913264B2
A remote customisation module for a logic engine, running upon a server remote from said logic engine, comprises a communication interface arranged to communicate with the logic engine and with an application running upon said server. The module also comprises a logic element arranged to receive an incoming request for data from the logic engine via the communication interface. The logic element is arranged to interrogate the application in order to extract data required to fulfill said request. The logic element is also arranged to process said extracted data to generate response data and to pass said response data to the logic engine.
US07913261B2
An information-processing method for application-specific processing of messages. A message is received. Whether the message is in a selected application format is ascertained. If not, the message is routed to a next location. If so, the message is routed to a selected application processor, processed by the processor, and routed to the next location.
US07913259B2
Systems and methods are disclosed for testing applications or code. In one exemplary embodiment, there is provided a method for testing an application on one or more different hosts on a processor using a task graph including a parent task and one or more child tasks. The task graph can also contain a single, parent task without child tasks. The method may include, for example, providing the parent task to initiate the task graph at the processor, the parent task including a task number unique to the task graph; providing the one or more child tasks, the child tasks each including a task number unique to the task graph and a command to be performed by the one or more child tasks; and enabling, at the processor, the parent task to initiate execution of the application at the processor. Moreover, the method may include processing user defined input values to define each task.
US07913258B2
A remote machine uses a process control unit to monitor a process for a Web browser program. When the process for the Web browser program starts to operate, an operating time therefor starts to be measured. When the operating time reaches a predetermined time, the process for the Web browser program is forcefully terminated. After that, unless the remote machine 2 is rebooted, that is, unless a RAM is cleared, the process for the Web browser program is forcefully terminated immediately after its start.
US07913252B2
A portable platform for executing software applications on a computing device without installing or configuring the applications on the computing device. Furthermore, the execution of the applications is performed without making any changes or modifications to the computing device's memory or file system. The portable platform can reside on, for example, a portable memory device, a portable storage device, or downloaded from a web site.
US07913243B2
A method, a computer program product, and a system for generating and applying patches to a computer program concurrently with its execution. It provides full support for function pointers, transparent to the programmer and nearly transparent to the concurrent loader. A reference to a function pointer is translated into a sequence of processor instructions called function descriptor instead of translating it into an address. The purpose of the function descriptor is to jump to the memory location of the sequence of instructions generated by the compiler for the procedure referenced by the function pointer. The function descriptor is masked as a static data variable and therefore preserved during the application of a concurrent patch. The address for the jump to the procedure is updated by the regular relocation process during the application of a concurrent patch.
US07913236B2
A method for managing a transaction includes determining that an optimistically immutable field in the transaction is written to. Invaliding a method in response to determining that the method in the transaction reads is the optimistically immutable field.Other embodiments are disclosed and claimed.
US07913234B2
Software, methods and devices for executing textually-defined instructions at a wireless communication device are disclosed. The instructions may be for performing a mathematical operation upon specified integer or floating-point operands, for performing one or more specified actions for each pass through a loop, for performing one of two sets of actions based on a user selection of one of two user interface controls, or for triggering a timer for delaying a subsequent action by a specified time interval. The instructions may be defined in a markup language such as Extensible Markup Language (XML). The software, methods and devices may form part of a system for allowing varied wireless communication devices to interact with server-side software applications.
US07913226B2
A virtual machine monitor is interposed between computer hardware and an operating system at runtime. Hardware that is already virtualized can be devirtualized at runtime.
US07913223B2
An extensive and powerful XML meta-data rule-based language and system for developing a use-interface for configuring, monitoring and provisioning a telecommunications system is provided. The language is based on rules that define configuration objects and relationships. The rules are organized into files that define the individual objects used to configure the telecommunications system. The rules are interpreted at run-time to instruct the system to present appropriate user-interface controls to create, edit, and manipulate the objects. The rules will direct the specific editor for objects' properties, sometimes consisting of edit controls, combo box controls, multiple selection controls, or dialog boxes for IP addresses, point codes, or dates. The rules can enforce dependencies and cardinalities, as well as display customized data tables across different objects. This powerful language has the capability of being updated while deployed to allow object definition updates without taking the telecommunications system down and re-compiling or re-installing software.
US07913219B2
In an orientation optimization, at least one signal chain path starting from a signal source and passing through a series of M 2-pin logic cells is located according to a netlist. An output of the Nth 2-pin logic cell in the series of M 2-pin logic cells, where N
US07913214B2
A design method for an LSI includes: generating a delay library for use in a statistical STA, wherein the delay library provides a delay function that expresses a cell delay value as a function of model parameters of a transistor; generating a layout data; and calculating a delay value of a target cell based on the delay library and the layout data. The calculating includes: referring to the layout data to extract a parameter specifying a layout pattern around a target transistor; modulating model parameters of the target transistor such that the characteristics corresponding to the extracted parameter is obtained in a circuit simulation; calculating, by using the delay function, a reference delay value of the target cell; and calculating, by using the delay function and the modulation amount of the model parameter, a delay variation from the reference delay value depending on the modulation amount.
US07913213B2
A design tool for automatically identifying minimum timing violation corrections in an integrated circuit (IC) design includes program instructions executable by a processor to identify locations to add a delay along each circuit path having a minimum timing violation. The tool may also sequentially try each of a plurality of circuit changes that add the delay and to evaluate a result of each circuit change until an acceptable percentage of the minimum timing violation has been corrected. In response to each circuit change, the design tool may update an internal node report, which includes a listing of circuit nodes and a maximum timing slack available at each node, by reducing a maximum slack value of each affected node by an amount of the added delay. The design tool may generate an output report that includes a listing of the circuit changes which correct the minimum timing violations.
US07913202B2
A design structure for a 3D chip having at least one I/O layer connected to other 3D chip layers by a vertical bus such that the I/O layer(s) may accommodate protection and off-chip device drive circuits, customization circuits, translation circuits, conversions circuits and/or built-in self-test circuits capable of comprehensive chip or wafer level testing wherein the I/O layers function as a testhead. Substitution of I/O circuits or structures may be performed using E-fuses or the like responsive to such testing.
US07913201B2
A design structure is embodied in a machine readable medium for designing, manufacturing, or testing integrated circuitry. The design structure includes first hardware for executing first software in response to macros that describe the integrated circuitry, and for generating a set of constants in response to the execution of the first software. Second hardware is for receiving the set of constants from the first hardware, and for executing second software in response to the macros and the set of constants, and for estimating a power consumption of the integrated circuitry in response to the execution of the second software.
US07913193B2
An integrated circuit and a design structure are disclosed. An integrated circuit may comprise: a data retaining device; a charge storing device coupled to the data retaining device such that a use of the data retaining device triggers a charging of the charge storing device by a charge source; and means for measuring a potential of the charge storing device, the measuring means being communicatively coupled to a calculating mean which determines a relative amount of usage of the data retaining device based on the measured potential.
US07913190B2
A combined viewer-spreadsheet application provides display of (i) a spreadsheet including a tree window for an extendable tree structure of an object and (ii) a three dimensional (3D) model of the object. A user of the application is able to add one or more columns or arrays to the tree structure and to reflect in the 3D model the values of elements of the columns or arrays added. The tree structure includes at least one assembly, a plurality of subassemblies forming the assembly, and a plurality of parts for each of the subassemblies.
US07913186B2
A control element for use in a graphical user interface, which combines the display features of the list box element and the pop-up menu element into a single GUI control element. The combined menu list control element is capable of displaying data in multiple states thereby allowing to it to optimally use the available display space for presenting data to the user. By allowing menu list control element to display data as either a list or a menu, it combines the advantages of lists and menus while avoiding their disadvantages.
US07913183B2
A system and method for managing software application windows in a graphical user interface having a desktop and taskbar display area are provided. Each instantiated program is represented as one or more graphical windows in the desktop and as a control tile in the taskbar. Control tiles are grouped into control tile groups that facilitate organization and single access control. Project control tile groups allow the grouping of multiple software applications. Additionally, minimized control tile group layout and state may be preserved and previewed prior to being restored.
US07913177B1
A system and method are described for managing instantiation of interface elements in a rich Internet application (RIA) that includes systematically creating a tree of descriptive nodes that describe the visual interface elements of the application. Only interface elements that are not stacked under other objects or not fully hidden on the screen are instantiated using the corresponding descriptive nodes. Detail objects corresponding to the descriptive nodes are then constructed and used by a rendering engine to render the visual interface elements of the declarative application. As the user moves to locations within the application that are stacked under other objects or are hidden, the descriptive nodes and detailed objects are created representing the interface elements of those locations for rendering by the rendering engine.
US07913171B2
A receiving unit receives user-specific identification data from a display processing device connected via a network. A transmitting unit transmits operation screen data to the display processing device, which is for displaying an operation screen for receiving an operation from a user specified by the user-specific identification data received by the receiving unit.
US07913157B1
A method and system is provided for the creation and playback of multiple independently produced and distributed media intended for synchronized playback. One embodiment of the invention overcomes variances in independently produced and distributed media that make accurate synchronization impossible today. The system utilizes both authoring and playback processes. During authoring, a relative virtual time code profile is generated based on the original source media in a defined associated media set. The system employs an extensible framework of multiple synchronization recognizers that analyze the source media to generate a relative virtual time code profile for the associated media set. During playback, the system's client can access the relative virtual time code profile to coordinate the synchronized playback of an associated media set. The system generates an absolute time code using the available associated media and the original relative virtual time code profile. The system can overcome significant variances between the available associated media and the original associated media such as missing content, added content, resolution differences, format differences, etc.
US07913151B1
Systems and methods correct multiplied errors generated by feedback taps in self-synchronous descramblers. The multiplication of errors degrades the performance of most linear cyclic error check codes. Disclosed techniques are general applicable to multiplied errors even when those errors are not confined to a single block. Disclosed techniques permit a reduction in the amount of forward error correction used. For example, in general, to correct t errors, a linear cyclic error correction code requires a Hamming distance of at least 1+(2t)[wt(s(x))]. Embodiments of the invention allow correcting the multiplied errors with a Hamming distance of only 1+(t)(1+wt(s(x))) over the block size n, wherein wt(s(x)) is the weight of the scrambler polynomial s(x).
US07913145B2
A re-transmission control method for a transmitting device that transmits a codeword generated based on a first parity-check matrix to a receiving device, and re-transmits a k-th additional parity generated based on a k-th parity-check matrix to the receiving device when receiving a NAK for the codeword or a (k−1)-th additional parity, comprising: generating a (k+1)-th parity-check matrix based on a k-th parity-check matrix; generating a generator matrix based on the (k+1)-th parity-check matrix; and generating the k-th additional parity based on the generator matrix.
US07913140B2
A method and circuits for monitoring and detecting an error in the static pervasive signals applied to input/output pins of an integrated circuit during functional operation of the integrated circuit. The method and circuits provide a signal signature of each of one or more groups of the static pervasive signals and then monitoring the signal signature for any change of logic level.
US07913139B2
An object of the present invention is to provide a semiconductor device capable of recognizing circuit malfunction in an actual operation and of specifying a point of the circuit malfunction, and the semiconductor device, which does not induce the malfunction in the circuit of a subsequent stage when restoring the malfunction. The present invention is the semiconductor device provided with a plurality of logic circuits and a plurality of judging circuits for judging malfunction based on data from the logic circuits, wherein each of the judging circuits is provided with a first register, delay unit, a second register, a comparator and scanning unit, which makes the second register a shift register to allow to transmit an error signal held in the second register to the subsequent stage, while allowing the comparator to hold a comparison result.
US07913138B2
A semiconductor integrated circuit, including a data input unit for receiving an input data signal to be supplied to an external data input terminal, a storage unit for storing the input data signal received by the data input unit, a timing generating unit for generating a timing signal in response to an output request signal, a data output unit for outputting, in synchronization with the timing signal, the input data signal stored in the storage unit as an output data signal, a test output control unit for outputting, in synchronization with the timing signal, and a data selector for outputting the output data signal supplied from the data output unit to the external data output terminal in a normal operation mode and outputting the input data signal supplied from the test output control unit to the external data output terminal in a test mode.
US07913135B2
A test architecture accesses IP core test wrappers within an IC using a Link Instruction Register (LIR). An IEEE P1500 standard is in development for providing test access to these individual cores via a test structure called a wrapper. The wrapper resides at the boundary of the core and provides a way to test the core and the interconnections between cores.-The test architecture enables each of the plural wrappers in the IC, including wrappers in cores embedded within other cores, with separate enable signals.
US07913124B2
Apparatus methods for capturing flow control errors in FIFO exchanges between producing and consuming circuits operating in different clock domains. Tag information at the start of an exchange is transferred to a synchronizing component before data of a transfer transaction is entered in the FIFO. The tag information is also associated with each unit of data transferred to the FIFO by the producing circuit. The synchronizing component verifies the each unit of data retrieved by the consuming circuit has the expected tag information associated therewith and signals an error is the tag information does not match. Thus an error by the producing circuit in entering too much or too little data for a transfer is detected before erroneous data is retrieved and processed by the consuming circuit.
US07913119B2
Disclosed is a method of verifying the integrity of data acquired from a device emulating a hard disk to a host computer over a data transfer pathway. A storage medium containing known data is connected to the data transfer pathway, the storage medium capable of emulating a hard disk. The known data is transferred from the storage medium to the host computer over the data transfer pathway for storage on the host computer. A characteristic of the data stored on the host computer is compared with a corresponding characteristic of said known data to determine whether data corruption has occurred during data transfer over said data transfer pathway. The characteristic could be a hash code value, such as a Message-Digest 5 (MD5) or Secure Hash Algorithm (SHA) value.
US07913112B2
This storage controller includes a port unit and multiple processing units for inputting and outputting data to and from a storage apparatus. The port unit sorts the data I/O requests given from a host system to the corresponding processing units according to a table pre-defining the storage apparatus or a storage area in the storage apparatus to perform data I/O processing allocated to each of the processing units. The processing unit inputs data in the corresponding storage apparatus or the corresponding storage area according to the data I/O request sorted to itself from the port unit and, upon detecting a blockage of the other processing unit due to a failure, updates the table retained in each of the port units so as to sort the storage apparatuses or the storage areas allocated to the other processing unit to the remaining unblocked processing units.
US07913108B1
Described are a system and method for improving the performance of a disk drive in a data storage system by enabling the disk drive to “ride through” events that can induce disk drive errors. In response to an error message received from a disk drive, a disk director temporarily places the disk drive into a wait state. While in the wait state, the disk drive is prevented from shutting down, despite the current error and any subsequent errors that the disk drive may experience. The disk drive may continue to service I/O requests while in the wait state, with the disk director monitoring the disk drive performance. After the disk drive exits the wait state, the disk director can determine from the monitored results whether to shut down the disk drive or to permit the disk drive to return to normal operation.
US07913106B2
A host enables any adapter of multiple adapters of the host to concurrently support any VIPA of the multiple VIPAs assigned to the host. Responsive to a failure of at least one particular adapter from among the multiple adapters, the host triggers the remaining, functioning adapters to broadcast a separate hardware address update for each VIPA over the network, such that for a failover in the host supporting the multiple VIPAs the host directs at least one other host accessible via the network to address any new packets for the multiple VIPAs to one of the separate hardware addresses of one of the remaining adapters.
US07913105B1
A system and method for detecting a state change of a resource in a high availability (HA) cluster are disclosed. The method comprises registering to receive notification when the resource changes state. The method further comprises receiving a notification of a state change of the resource and automatically performing one or more actions to ensure high availability of the first resource in response to the notification.
US07913103B2
A method for producing a plurality of clock signals. The method includes generating a reference clock signal using a phase locked loop (PLL). The reference clock signal is then provided to each of a plurality of clock divider units which each divide the received reference clock signal to produce a corresponding divided clock signal. The method then removes one or more clock cycles (per a given number of cycles) in order to produce a plurality of domain clock signals each having an effective frequency based on a frequency and a number of cycles removed from the correspondingly received divided clock signal.
US07913101B2
A method includes: delaying an excursion of at least one signal a first number of clock phases when the excursion departs from a value in a first direction; and delaying the excursion of the at least one signal a second number of the clock phases when the excursion departs toward the value in a second direction. The first number of clock phases is different from the second number of clock phases. The at least one signal effects a plurality of succeeding excursions in substantial synchrony with a clocked signal presenting succeeding clock cycles having a plurality of the clock phases in each respective clock cycle.
US07913099B2
A technique to adjust a processor's operating voltage dynamically while preventing a user from placing the processor into a harmful operating voltage state in relation to the core/bus frequency ratio of the processor. More particularly, embodiments of the invention relate to a technique to control the operating voltage of the processor as a function of the processor's bus and/or core clock frequency.
US07913095B2
A method and apparatus for managing use of protected content by providing a specific user interface to an application program used to render the content. The method includes identifying a user interface description associated with content, building a specific user interface based on the user interface description, and replacing the standard user interface of an application program used to render the content with the specific user interface. The specific user interface can be unique to the user, unique to a Web site, or otherwise customized.
US07913091B2
Upon receiving server side entity information and a principal confirmation profile request data from a server side entity device, a consolidation apparatus transmits an entity information transmission request to each of a plurality of client side entity devices and receives client side entity information from each of the client side entity devices. Then, it determines the principal confirmation profile ID in each piece of client side entity information and the principal confirmation profile ID in the server side entity information according to the principal confirmation profile ID request information having the highest priority in the principal confirmation profile request data and prepares a routing table information associating the processing capability IDs and the entity IDs corresponding to the determined principal confirmation profile ID, which routing table information is then stored in a memory.
US07913084B2
A credential security support provider (Cred SSP) is provided that enables any application to securely delegate a user's credentials from the client, via client side Security Support Provider (SSP) software, to a target server, via server side SSP software in a networked computing environment. The Cred SSP of the invention provides a secure solution that is based in part upon a set of policies, including a default policy that is secure against a broad range of attacks, which are used to control and restrict the delegation of user credentials from a client to a server. The policies can be for any type of user credentials and the different policies are designed to mitigate a broad range of attacks so that appropriate delegation can occur for given delegation circumstances, network conditions, trust levels, etc. Additionally, only a trusted subsystem, e.g., a trusted subsystem of the Local Security Authority (LSA), has access to the clear text credentials such that neither the calling application of the Cred SSP APIs on the server side nor the calling application of the Cred SSP APIs on the client side have access to clear text credentials.
US07913081B2
Embodiments of the present invention provide methods and systems for dynamically certifying components. Various entities may participate in the certification process. Operational data from live systems in use may also be collected and considered as part of the certification for a component. This information is then gathered into a database, which may be shared or made publicly available over a network, such as the Internet. In addition, in some embodiments, a proposed system may be certified. A proposed configuration may be submitted to a certification service. The certification service may then analyze the proposed system and determine whether there is a sufficient data to certify the proposed system.
US07913080B2
A setting information distribution apparatus belonging to a first network, comprises: authentication unit that receives and authenticates an authentication request from a user terminal which requires an access authentication by using a network access authentication procedure between the user terminal and the first network; transmitting unit that transmits an authentication cooperation request which requires setting data to be set to the user terminal to another, network by using the network access authentication procedure and an authentication cooperation procedure between a plurality of networks; and distribution unit that distributes a first response message added with setting data to the user terminal by producing the first response message corresponding to the authentication request by adding the setting data included in a second response message corresponding to the authentication cooperation request.
US07913079B2
A method, system, apparatus, and computer program product are presented for providing a user with the ability to limit the receipt of unwanted email messages. An encoded email identifier is generated by combining the user's local mailbox identifier along with encoded email acceptance parameter values that represent email acceptance criteria. The encoded email identifier is then used as the local-part portion of an email address in place of the user's local mailbox identifier. After receiving an incoming email message in which the encoded email identifier is a portion of the destination address of the incoming email message, an email server delivers the email message in accordance with the local mailbox identifier that is embedded in the encoded email identifier in response to a determination that one or more characteristics of the email message satisfy one or more email acceptance criteria that are encoded within the encoded email identifier.
US07913075B2
A method for provisioning a blade server is provided. The method includes creating a server boot image for a blade server, where the boot image includes an operating system image created from a donor server. Then, the method includes inserting the blade server into a chassis of an enclosure that is capable of receiving multiple blade servers. Then, staring the blade server from a pre-boot execution environment (PXE). The PXE loading an image that prompts a user to install a new operating system from a pre-existing target computer of the enclosure. The method then installs the new operating system. The installing includes creation of a new iSCSI target for the inserted blade server, and partitioning of the iSCSI target. The also includes restarting the inserted blade server. The restarting is configured to boot using the iSCSI target of the inserted blade server, so that the inserted blade server becomes a provisioned blade server. The provisioning is accomplished without a hardware iSCSI initiator for an iSCSI boot.
US07913071B2
Certain embodiments of the present invention provide a method for power management including determining at least one of an operating frequency and an operating voltage for a processor and configuring the processor based on the determined at least one of the operating frequency and the operating voltage. The operating frequency is determined based at least in part on direct user input. The operating voltage is determined based at least in part on an individual profile for processor.
US07913065B1
A custom processor is adapted for performing at least one predetermined application. The instruction sequence for the custom processor is compressed by performing at least one identification process on the instructions of the instruction sequence, in order to identify relationships between the contents of the bit positions in the instructions. A compressed instruction sequence then includes one compressed instruction corresponding to each instruction of the predetermined instruction sequence, with each compressed instruction comprising a reduced number of bits, based on the identified relationships between the contents of said bit positions in said instructions of said predetermined instruction sequence.
US07913059B2
The present invention has been conceived in view of the above described situation, and an object of the invention is to provide an information processing device, data transfer method and information storage medium that can commence data transfer to an I/O device immediately, and can stably exhibit data transfer performance. In an information processing device provided with hardware for sharing an address translation table, for translating logical addresses of a memory to physical addresses, between a main processor and a sub-processor, one of the sub-processors is caused to function as means for receiving a transfer request designating a logical address of the memory, means for translating the logical address that has been designated in the transfer request to a physical address using the shared address translation table, and means for executing transfer processing for data stored in the memory 14 according to the translated physical address.
US07913056B2
A clustered storage array consists of multiple nodes coupled to one or more storage systems. The nodes provide a LUN-device for access by a client. The LUN-device maps to a source logical unit corresponding to areas of storage on the one or more storage systems. A target logical unit corresponds to different areas of storage on the one or more storage systems. The source logical unit is migrated in parallel by the multiple nodes to the target logical unit. Data to be copied from the source logical unit to the target logical unit are grouped into data chunks. Two or more of the plurality of nodes concurrently attempt to acquire an exclusive lock for a set of data chunks. The node acquiring the exclusive lock migrates the set of data chunks from the source logical unit to the target logical unit, while the exclusive lock is used to prevent other nodes from migrating the set of data chunks.
US07913050B2
A method and apparatus for processing a write request at a storage device is provided. A write request that identifies a sender of the write request is received at a storage device. The write request is examined to determine the identity of the sender. A determination is made as to whether, within a hierarchical relationship, the sender is subordinate to any entity that has been designated as being unable to perform write requests at the storage device. Upon determining that (a) the sender is not subordinate to any entity that has been designated as being unable to perform write requests at the storage device, and (b) the sender has not been designated as being unable to perform write requests at the storage device, the sender is allowed to write to the storage device. Thereafter, the write request from the sender may be performed at the storage device.
US07913049B2
The various embodiments of the invention relate generally to semiconductors and memory technology. More specifically, the various embodiment and examples of the invention relate to memory devices, systems, and methods that protect data stored in one or more memory devices from unauthorized access. The memory device may include third dimension memory that is positioned on top of a logic layer that includes active circuitry in communication with the third dimension memory. The third dimension memory may include multiple layers of memory that are vertically stacked upon each other. Each layer of memory may include a plurality of two-terminal memory elements and the two-terminal memory elements can be arranged in a two-terminal cross-point array configuration. At least a portion of one or more of the multiple layers of memory may include an obfuscation layer configured to conceal data stored in one or more of the multiple layers of memory.
US07913025B1
Systems and methods for storage devices are presented. More specifically, in one embodiment a storage device may comprise an enclosure comprising an interface which may be coupled to an I/O bus of a computing system with which it is being utilized. Commands may be received through the interface and, invisibly to the computing system which issues the commands, translated into a set of commands configured to effectuate the received command in conjunction with one or more storage media coupled to the interface. These storage media may comprise different types of storage media such that data designated as critical may be stored on an appropriate storage media.
US07913022B1
Port Interface Modules (PIMs) are provided for ports of a Multi-Port Memory Controller. The PIMs include logic that is programmable to be compatible with different types of devices, processors or buses that can be connected to the ports. The PIMs can further include protocol bridges to enable one port PIM to connect to a device or another port PIM in a master/slave fashion.
US07913020B2
A base device meant to cooperate with one of a plurality of exchangeable docking adapters to enable the base device to cooperate with a personal portable device docked with the docking adapter to perform an audio/visual task. The base device incorporates a programmable logic that is programmed with a configuration data specifying a configuration of interconnections to enable the cooperation between the base device and the personal portable device, and may further incorporate a processor to execute a sequence of instructions of a routine causing the processor to cooperate with the personal portable device through the docking adapter to perform the task. The configuration data and/or the routine may be selected depending on which docking adapter is coupled to the base device, depending on a comparison of versions of configuration data and/or routine stored within one or both of the base device and the docking adapter, and/or depending on the identity of one or more of the base device, the docking adapter, the personal portable device, and the programmable logic.
US07913010B2
A network on chip (‘NOC’) and methods of data processing on the NOC, the NOC including integrated processor (‘IP’) blocks, a data communications bus (110), memory communications controllers (106), and bus interface controllers (108); each IP block adapted to the data communications bus through a memory communications controller and a bus interface controller; each memory communications controller, in conjunction with one of the bus interface controllers, controlling memory addressed communications between an IP block and memory; each memory communications controller, in conjunction with one of the bus interface controllers, controlling memory addressed communications between one of the IP blocks and other IP blocks; each IP block adapted to the data communications bus by a low latency, high bandwidth application messaging interconnect comprising an inbox and an outbox.
US07912998B2
Methods and systems for performing direct memory access (DMA) transfers are described. An invalidate queue (or other storage device) contains an entry associated with a DMA transfer in progress. If the invalidate queue detects an invalidation of a memory page associated with that entry, then it is marked invalid. If the entry is marked invalid during the DMA transfer, then that DMA transfer is aborted. This enables, among other things, DMA transfers to unpinned virtual memory.
US07912993B2
A method for managing interruption of an out of box experience for an information handling system (IHS) whereby the method includes writing a flag to storage device, wherein the storage device is coupled to a processor within the IHS and executing an interruption handling sequence at the processor within the IHS, wherein the processor is operable to read the flag in the storage device as an input to the interruption handling sequence.
US07912982B2
A technique involves untethered access points (UAPs) that can broadcast estimated transmission time (ETT) that represents an estimated time it would take for a packet to be transmitted from the first UAP to an AP that is wire coupled to a network. The proposed system can offer, among other advantages, accurate ETT values for use by UAPs of a wireless network.
US07912976B2
A method is presented for throttling data transmissions within a data processing system. Information about a data transfer from a server to a client is received within the application layer of a server, which stores the information about the data transfer along with information about a number of recent data transfers from the server to the client to create a sliding window of historical information about data transfers. The data transfer from the application layer of the server is delayed within the application layer of the server for an amount of time that is approximately equal to a computed delay time value in response to a determination that an average data transfer rate over the number of recent data transfers from the server to the client may exceed a data transfer rate threshold parameter.
US07912967B2
Network nodes engage in an asymmetric transactional session. The nodes negotiate transactional role reversal and further communication under a reversed asymmetric transactional session.
US07912960B2
Publicly accessible linking information is to establish a trusted relationship between reciprocally linked entities controlling web resources, such as websites or web logs. A method of establishing a trust relationship between two entities identifying a user-installed link to a second web resource in a first web resource. Next, the method determines when a reciprocal link is made in the second web resource directed to the first web resource and creates a trust relationship between the entities based on the reciprocal link.
US07912945B2
A message addressed to an application operating on a destination machine is received at an intermediate machine. Management information is attached to the message, the management information including operating statistics of the intermediate machine. The message is forwarded to the destination machine.
US07912936B2
Systems and methods for managing interworking protocols are provided. According to one embodiment, a policy-based provisioning methodology is used by a service management system (SMS) to provision subscriber interfaces of service processing switches based upon parameters of a predefined policy. The subscriber interfaces communicate data in accordance with a first protocol. The parameters include a window size, a window timeout, a number of allowed bad events, an event window size and/or a keep-alive interval. Transport network interfaces, which communicate in accordance with a second protocol, are provisioned to provide a transport between the subscriber interfaces. A first-protocol-over-second-protocol (FPoSP) Virtual Private Network (VPN) is created through which the subscriber sites securely exchange data by establishing a virtual router (VR) corresponding to each subscriber interface. The VRs encapsulate packets received from the subscriber sites within packets of the second protocol and transmit the encapsulated packets through the transport network interfaces.
US07912935B2
A computer program product embodied in a computer-readable medium is configurable to accomplish execution of an application that is specified and encoded in a markup-based descriptor language. The product includes client runtime computer code configured to cause a client computer device to process the markup-based descriptor language to deploy an application to accomplish execution of the application. The client runtime computer code is further configured to process the markup-based descriptor language to selectively configure the client computer device to deploy the application so as to accomplish execution of the application by the client computer device stand-alone or by the client computer device in cooperation with a server to which the device is connectable via a network connection.
US07912933B2
Management related data is provided to a user. Tags are attached to the provided management related data upon user instruction. A tag is way to identify a piece of management. The tags that correspond with the management related data are stored in a database of the management system.
US07912924B1
In general, one aspect of the subject matter described in this specification can be embodied in a method that includes loading one or more web pages from a remote server site using a web rendering engine on a local computer, wherein the one or more web pages are confined to a sandbox within the local computer; retrieving data from outside the sandbox within the local computer; and adding functionality, with respect to the one or more web pages, to a user interface by translating the data from a first data format employed by the local computer and sending the translated data to the web rendering engine. Other embodiments of this aspect include corresponding systems, apparatus, and computer program products.
US07912923B2
A solution is presented to keep track of the URLs that have been visited within an HTML file, identify the location or exit point of the last line that was displayed on a screen in a multi-screen HTML file, and return to the exact exit point location upon reentry to the web page by computing which section of the HTML file to display on the screen, and then displaying this section. The identification of whether a web page has changed after it has been visited by a user is also presented. A cyclic redundancy check is performed, comparing the current cyclic redundancy number with the last cyclic redundancy number obtained when the screen of exited multi-screen HTML file was last visited. If the web page has changed, the user has the option of viewing the web page at the top screen or going to the screen that contains the last exit position of the HTML file that was previously viewed.
US07912920B2
The stream sourcing content delivery system goes to a database and builds a physical stream, based on a schedule. The stream source content delivery system works at a station ID (SID), finds the order of the delivery of content for the station based upon the schedule, and downloads a plurality of music files to its hard drive to enable play back. The stream source content delivery system then concatenates the files, to create stream, and awaits the request of one or more stream recipients. Some preferred system embodiments further comprise a fail-safe mode, whereby a loop of music is generated from the downloaded stream, and is delivered to one or more users when further access to content is interrupted, such that recipients experience an uninterrupted delivery of a plurality of files, e.g. songs.
US07912919B2
A computer system comprises a plurality of processing modules, each operable to provide a service to an external entity. Each processing module has a processor and a memory. A storage module is provided, operable to store information required by the processing modules to provide the service. A switching module is also provided, operable to provide a switching service between the processing module and storage module and between the processing module and an external entity.
US07912916B2
A user of multiple client devices (clients) makes application configuration changes on the clients from time to time. The configuration changes are stored in a local event log on each client, as well as in a synchronization server. When one of the clients connects to the synchronization server, for example when the user logs into the synchronization server while using a respective client, the configuration information in the server and client is synchronized. Conflicts, if any, in the configuration changes for a respective application are resolved in accordance with a conflict resolution procedure or conflict resolution rules associated with that application.
US07912901B2
A programmatic event related to a meeting can be detected. At least one previous meeting similar to the meeting can be determined. A pattern relating to an application state of a set of at least one computing devices can be ascertained for at least one previous meeting. A difference between a current application state of the set of computing devices and an application state indicated by the ascertained pattern can be determined. The current application state of the set of computing devices can be automatically adjusted to lessen the determined difference.
US07912899B2
A computer-implemented method for sending a message. The computer-implemented method also includes monitoring, using a first set of rules, for an event that triggers a message to be transmitted. The computer-implemented method further includes ascertaining, using a set of notification rules and at least one of a first present parameter and a first status parameter, whether a first user is capable of reviewing the message substantially immediately after the message is transmitted to the first user if the message is transmitted to the first user, the first present parameter indicating whether a first instant messaging client associated with the first user is currently online, the first status parameter indicating whether the first user is available for the reviewing. The computer-implemented method also includes transmitting the message to the first instant messaging client associated with first user if the first user is ascertained to be capable of reviewing the message substantially immediately after the message is transmitted to the first user.
US07912895B2
A system and method for managing service interactions launches a process that is defined by a programming abstraction based on a syntax of a general purpose programming language. Interaction with a service, such as a web-based service, is initiated and the process requests the service to perform an action. Execution of the process is suspended until a response is received from the service. Execution of the process continues after receiving a response from the service.
US07912889B1
The present invention enables efficient matrix multiplication operations on parallel processing devices. One embodiment is a method for mapping CTAs to result matrix tiles for matrix multiplication operations. Another embodiment is a second method for mapping CTAs to result tiles. Yet other embodiments are methods for mapping the individual threads of a CTA to the elements of a tile for result tile computations, source tile copy operations, and source tile copy and transpose operations. The present invention advantageously enables result matrix elements to be computed on a tile-by-tile basis using multiple CTAs executing concurrently on different streaming multiprocessors, enables source tiles to be copied to local memory to reduce the number accesses from the global memory when computing a result tile, and enables coalesced read operations from the global memory as well as write operations to the local memory without bank conflicts.
US07912888B2
A computing device has a rounding processor that inputs therein a set of plural (K) input data IN1 through INK comprising z bits. The rounding processor selects an ensured bit field depending upon the state of usage of each of specific areas A of upper z/2 bits of the 32-bit input data IN1 through INK and rounds the corresponding input data to z/2. As a result of rounding processing, shift information SHIFT of lower (16−n) bits of each discarded non-specific area B is stored in a memory area. D10-1 through D10-K of the rounded respective 16 bits are subjected to multiplication by a multiplier. A digit adjuster shifts multiplication results to the left on the basis of the shift information SHIFT respectively stored in the memory areas to adjust digits.
US07912884B2
Method and apparatus for implementing finite impulse response filters without the use of multipliers
A finite impulse response filter is implemented as a sum of individual component, running-sum filters. The sum of all of the component filters required for a desired filter response is calculated in an accumulator and only the component filters' update terms, which are the difference between a new and an old discarded sample, is calculated for each component filter. A desired impulse response is decomposed into a sum of rectangular impulse responses of equal height, each of which implemented as a running sum requiring a subtraction and an addition. Using circuits running at a multiple of the sampling clock, multiple running sums may be implemented on the same hardware. A whole filter of arbitrary impulse response shapes and lengths may be implemented using memory and two arithmetic units. Two or more such filters may be cascaded to obtain a better approximation of the desired frequency characteristic. The invention saves significant chip resources and manufacturing costs.
US07912865B2
Embodiments of a system and method are described for determining whether an applicant is a multiple-business owner and for providing information related to multiple-business owners to a financial service provider or other client. According to one embodiment, a computing system is provided to collect and store business data and identify business owners associated with multiple business records.
US07912861B2
One or more embodiments of the invention enable a user to search for at least one value in layers of audience specific data comprising language, regional, regulatory and/or cultural specific values per layer. The word “audience” for the purposes of this specification means a group of document consumers such as people or computers that are associated with a language, country, region, regulation or culture. A search utilizing at least one embodiment of the invention occurs with respect to data that makes use of rule-based inheritance. For a three level inheritance embodiment, there are 8 permutations involving a NULL value in at least one of the layers, instead of making the user calculate the proper mask, the Current Audience Layer mask can be logical ORed with the Primary Audience Layer Mask or the Secondary Audience Layer Mask in order to create the desired search combination. In addition, predefined audience layer operators may also be used comprising “has value”, “is missing value”, “inherits primary”, “inherits secondary”, “inherits any” and “does not inherit”. These predefined masks save the user from generating a bit mask for searching by hand.
US07912851B2
A method, apparatus, system, and signal-bearing medium that in an embodiment track a history of statements that query data from a database. When a new statement is received, the history is searched for a correlation between the new statement and previous statements. The correlation is based on host variables in the history and the new statement. When a correlation is found, a prediction is made for the next statement to be received based on the previous statement in the history for which the correlation was found. The prediction is then used to retrieve pages from the database into a cache, which may be used by a subsequent statement.
US07912844B2
A system for navigating relationships between beans using filters and container managed relationships is provided. With the system, filters are specified in the relationship definition of a deployment descriptor of a bean. The filters generate additional predicates to the WHERE clauses in SQL SELECT statements generated based on the contents of the deployment descriptor. Moreover, these filters may be defined such that method parameters may be passed into the resulting deployed code to thereby make them more flexible. Therefore, with the system, rather than defining filters programmatically in methods of a bean's implementation class, filters are defined declaratively in the deployment descriptor of the bean. Since these filters are specified in the deployment descriptor of the bean, they are accessible to clients of the bean through the local interface.
US07912834B2
Techniques are provided for improving efficiency of database systems, and in particular, to refreshing materialized views maintained by database systems and rewriting queries to access the materialized views. According to the approaches, a ranked materialized view is incrementally refreshed, and during the incremental refresh operation, rows in the partitions of the materialized view are ranked within the partitions.
US07912829B1
A user interface (e.g., a browser window) includes a display area for displaying a content reference page. In some implementations, a content reference page is generated that includes information related to content. The content reference page includes sections for presenting keywords found in the content, reviews of the content, portions of content that are of interest to a user (or a class of users) and other useful references, etc.
US07912827B2
Disclosed is a system, method and computer-readable medium related to searching at least one text-based media presentation. Examples of such media include, but are not limited to, print media such as books, magazines, and newspapers. The method comprises receiving a query associated with words in a text-based media presentation and in response to the query, searching within a database organized as a plurality of content-based indexed segments associated with at least one text-based media presentation, each indexed segment further comprising text and a still image corresponding to an associated portion of the text-based media presentation. The method retrieves a plurality of indexed segments as a result of the search wherein the user may navigate forward to at least one following indexed segment and backward to at least one previous indexed segment from an indexed segment associated with the query. Media presentations organized, searched and navigated by this approach may also include movies, video and audio presentations.
US07912823B2
A data-driven, hierarchical information navigation system and method enable search of sets of documents or other materials by certain common attributes that characterize the materials. The invention includes several aspects of a data-driven, hierarchical navigation system that employs this navigation mode. The navigation system of the present invention includes features of an interface, a knowledge base and a taxonomy definition process and a classification process for generating the knowledge base, a graph-based navigable data structure and method for generating the data structure, World Wide Web-based applications of the system, and methods of implementing the system. Users are able to search or browse a particular collection of documents by selecting desired values for the attributes. A data-driven, hierarchical information navigation system and method enable this navigation mode by associating terms with the materials, defining a set of hierarchical relationships among the terms, and providing a guided search mechanism based on the relationship between the terms.
US07912821B2
A data management method includes a reference activation step, after generating a first time-series data for causing chronological relationship to be identifiable in a memory device at activation of a reference operation to a first record in a database, of referring to the first record; an update step, in response to an update request for the first record, of generating a second record corresponding to the first record in the database and updating the second record; a commit step of generating a second time-series data in the memory device at a commit operation for the updating; a reference termination step of deleting the first time-series data at completion of the reference operation; and a deletion step, if the first time-series data generated earlier than the second time-series data is not present as a result of the commit step or the reference termination step, of deleting the first record.
US07912810B2
Systems, methods and computer readable media are provided for integrating carrier services. In one implementation, carrier services are integrated into an Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system utilizing an integration platform. The integration platform may include a first, second, and third components. The first, second, and third components may interact to utilize within the integration platform services offered by ERP vendors and carriers by discovering, setting up, testing, running and updating these services. As result, typical business scenarios, such as a order-to-cash process, may be enhanced.
US07912806B2
According to an aspect of the invention, there is provided a content providing system, which is provided with a data acquisition unit configured to obtain data inputted and/or outputted through a user interface which is included in an information processing device, an interest estimation unit that generates interest information representing a user's interest by estimating the user's interest based on the data acquired by the data acquisition unit, and a latest estimation result saving unit that saves latest interest information generated by the interest estimation unit so that contents reflecting the latest interest information can be provided to a user.
US07912805B2
A pattern-based data matching system matches pattern-based data. The data matching system generates a regular expression pattern for input datasets and describes similarity measures between the generated patterns. The data matching system analyzes an input dataset in terms of symbol classes, generalizing input values into a general pattern to allow identification or extrapolation of overlap between input datasets, aiding in matching fields in databases that are being merged and in learning a pattern for an input dataset. For each sequence of data values, the present system computes a compact pattern describing the sequence. Embodiments of the data matching system comprise noise reduction and repetitive pattern discovery in the input dataset and calculation of recall and precision of the generated pattern.
US07912800B2
The present subject matter relates to configuring computer systems and, more particularly, to a computer system configuration deduction engine. Various systems, methods, and software are described. Some embodiments include determining a scoping question to ask as a function of a response to one or more other scoping questions, wherein possible responses to one or more scoping questions are associated with one or more application configuration packages. Some such embodiments further include selecting one or more application configuration packages for deployment as a function of one or more received scoping question responses.
US07912794B2
A method and system for computing a cost estimate for a company that may be the client of a supplier providing information system equipment and consulting. An estimate is calculated according to a model with input characterizing circumstances of the client. The program collects client profile information and costs that the client knows. Other costs that the client does not know are read from a local database storing costs known by other clients with similar profiles. A remote database accessible by any client is updated by cost estimate information at each new cost estimate execution by a client.
US07912786B2
An automated business process system and method for transferring money funds with a computer machine system that receives, processes and transmits account information data to effect money transfers from human sender's debit card accounts to human recipients debit card accounts. The system being accessed by a communication medium device, wherein the computer machine system receives sending and receiving account information data and transfer authorization data from the communication medium device, and processes and transmits the data in automated modes with appropriate data transmission language through transmission and electronic mediums, so that the computer system processes and effects money transfers from human sender's available and accessible funds debit card accounts to human recipient's receiving debit card accounts without the necessity of a pre-established relationship between the sender's account and the receiving account, and in which the computer system simultaneously repeats the computer system processes and effects simultaneous money transfers.
US07912767B1
A tax preparation application may initiate a tax preparation process for a user. The tax preparation process may detect that the user is having difficulty with the tax preparation process and present an option to the user to contact a tax preparation professional. If the user chooses to contact a tax preparation professional, the tax preparation application may present a list of tax preparation professionals to the user and request the user select one. Subsequent to the selection of a tax preparation professional, the tax preparation process may establish a communication channel between the tax preparation application and the tax preparation professional so that the tax preparation professional may assist the user. In some embodiments, the tax preparation process may be performed on a kiosk.
US07912766B2
Disclosed herein is a computer implemented method and system for rendering returns to users on an online platform. The online platform allows users to wager stakes for an event. The wagered stakes are pooled in a combined pot. Stake groups of users are created based on predetermined outcomes of the event. A winning stake group is determined out of stake groups at completion of a predetermined period of time. Time frame groups are identified from the winning stake group based on time of entry into the event. The time value appreciated returns to be rendered to the time frame groups are calculated. If the allotment of the time value appreciated return is possible, winning stakes and the time value appreciated returns are rendered to time frame groups. If the allotment of time value appreciated returns is not possible, the winning stakes are returned to the time frame groups.
US07912763B1
Techniques are described for assisting users in dynamically creating and using composite services that are based on other constituent services. In some situations, each constituent service is a Web service (“WS”), and each composite service is a new WS whose execution involves dynamically invoking multiple specified constituent WSes in a specified manner. Such techniques may be used, for example, in conjunction with an electronic WS marketplace via which third-party WS providers make their WSes available to third-party WS consumers who locate and purchase access to those WSes, such as to allow a user to dynamically create a new composite WS that is based on one or more WSes available from other WS providers and that reflects any constraints of the WS marketplace, with the composite WS available for use by other WS consumers. This abstract is not intended for use in interpreting or limiting the scope of the claims.
US07912755B2
A method and system is provided that in a fully automated manner crawls web sites and identifies specific types of web pages, then extracts targeted data from those web pages. One or more text nodes containing product-related information on a first web page are first identified, and the locations of those text nodes are described using one or more vectors. The vectors are then analyzed to identify one or more patterns and to generate a model from those patterns that discriminates between text nodes that contain product-related information and text nodes that do not contain product-related information on a second web page. The model can then be used to crawl web sites to identify and extract targeted data, or the model can be installed on a user's computer to identify and extract targeted information from web sites as the user is browsing.
US07912751B1
A system and method for a customer loyalty system utilizing referrals to generate a network of loyal customers for a business. A system and method for customers to join a customer loyalty program based on a multi-level marketing (MLM) referral program. Existing customers will receive incentives for purchases and addition incentives for referring new customers. Loyalty system customers will earn incentives every time someone within their referral network completes a purchase. Moreover, the present invention is adapted to improve the merchant's customer relationships, adapted to building referral networks by utilizing indirect referral incentives, and easily integrates with the existing point of sale system of a business.
US07912746B2
A method for determining a variance trend in schedule data includes retrieving schedule data comprising a task description of a task and a plurality of milestones associated with the task including a baseline milestone associated with a baseline deadline, a first updated milestone associated with a first updated deadline, and a second updated milestone associated with a second updated deadline. The method further includes calculating a first variance by comparing the first updated deadline to the baseline deadline, calculating a second variance by comparing the second updated deadline to the baseline deadline, automatically determining the variance trend in schedule data by comparing the first variance to the second variance, and automatically generating a display representing the variance trend.
US07912744B2
An automated service broker can include a Global Positioning System (GPS) data processor for processing GPS data associated with communicatively linked service providers wherein the GPS data corresponds to a geographic position. The automated service broker also can include an event handler for responding to maintenance and repair events received from communicatively linked systems. Finally, the automated service broker can include a service provider selector for selecting a particular service provider to respond to a particular received maintenance and repair event received from a particular communicatively linked system. More particularly, the service provider can be selected based on whether the selected service provider is suitable to perform required maintenance and repair on the particular communicatively linked system, and the geographic position of the particular service provider relative to the particular system as reported by GPS data associated with the particular service provider.
US07912743B2
Method for sourcing custom window coverings from multiple sources based upon price and delivery date
In a method of manufacturing and selling custom window coverings of the type which are made in sizes based upon dimensions provided by a customer, two sources of supply who can manufacture the same selected custom window coverings are established. The first source of supply is located closer to a point at which the custom window coverings are sold than the second source of supply. When the custom window covering is delivered by a delivery means not involving air transport, the delivery time from the first source of supply is at least one day longer than a delivery time from the second source of supply. The retailer offers each of the custom window coverings at a first price and a higher second price that is associated with an earlier delivery date. The custom window covering is made at the first source of supply if the customer selects the first price and first delivery schedule. If customer selects the second price and second delivery schedule the custom window covering is made at the second source of supply. Then the retailer delivers the custom window covering to the customer and receives payment.
US07912742B2
A method for visualizing airline flight schedules graphically simulates the effect of a program implemented in airline flight operations to reduce the effect of disruptions in scheduled airline flights. One or more disruptions are introduced into a pre-selected airline flight schedule, using frequency distributions of disruptions and disruption severities, resulting in a disrupted flight schedule that reflects both initial and propagated delays. The disrupted flight schedule is used to visually simulate flight operations in 4-D, allowing comparisons of “as is” and “what if” scenarios.
US07912732B1
A computer method is disclosed for calculating an approximate cost of multi-protocol label switching (MPLS)-based virtual private network (VPN) services. The method computes a lower bound and an upper bound for the bandwidth used in an MPLS-based VPN. These are then combined to produce an estimate for the cost of the bandwidth.
US07912723B2
A combination of a book and a voice phonation apparatus comprising a book having a plurality of pages, at least one of which is carrying a plurality of printed words and a plurality of specific codes associated with said words, said printed words being divided into a plurality of specific segments; and a voice phonation apparatus forming an integral part of said book and comprising (i) a housing with a plurality of switches and a plurality of keys, (ii) a voice output unit, and (iii) a control unit having a memory for storing data representing spoken words and connected to said switches, said keys, and said voice output unit.
US07912716B2
Generating words and/or names, comprising: receiving at least one corpus based on a given language; generating a plurality of N-grams of phonemes and a plurality of frequencies of occurrence using the corpus, such that each frequency of occurrence corresponds to a respective pair of phonemes and indicates the frequency of the second phoneme in the pair following the first phoneme in the pair; generating a phoneme tree using the plurality of N-grams of phonemes and the plurality of frequencies of occurrence; performing a random walk on the phoneme tree using the frequencies of occurrence to generate a sequence of phonemes; and mapping the sequence of phonemes into a sequence of graphemes.
US07912712B2
An encoding method includes extracting background noise characteristic parameters within a hangover period; for a first superframe after the hangover period, performing background noise encoding based on the extracted background noise characteristic parameters; for superframes after the first superframe, performing background noise characteristic parameter extraction and DTX decision for each frame in the superframes after the first superframe; and for the superframes after the first superframe, performing background noise encoding based on extracted background noise characteristic parameters of the current superframe, background noise characteristic parameters of a plurality of superframes previous to the current superframe, and a final DTX decision. Also, a decoding method and apparatus and an encoding apparatus are disclosed.
US07912705B2
A fact extraction tool set (“FEX”) finds and extracts targeted pieces of information from text using linguistic and pattern matching technologies, and in particular, text annotation and fact extraction. Text annotation tools break a text, such as a document, into its base tokens and annotate those tokens or patterns of tokens with orthographic, syntactic, semantic, pragmatic and other attributes. A user-defined “Annotation Configuration” controls which annotation tools are used in a given application. XML is used as the basis for representing the annotated text. A tag uncrossing tool resolves conflicting (crossed) annotation boundaries in an annotated text to produce well-formed XML from the results of the individual annotators. The fact extraction tool is a pattern matching language which is used to write scripts that find and match patterns of attributes that correspond to targeted pieces of information in the text, and extract that information.
US07912699B1
A system and method are disclosed for retrieving audio segments from a spoken document. The spoken document preferably is one having moderate word error rates such as telephone calls or teleconferences. The method comprises converting speech associated with a spoken document into a lattice representation and indexing the lattice representation of speech. These steps are performed typically off-line. Upon receiving a query from a user, the method further comprises searching the indexed lattice representation of speech and returning retrieved audio segments from the spoken document that match the user query.
US07912692B2
An analysis support system has an analysis purpose input section being able to input an analysis purpose, an analysis level designator designating an analysis level representing a range for analysis according to the inputted analysis purpose, a configuration information record section recording configuration information about other component to be combined with each component, in association with the analysis level, a purpose-specific component group generator generating a purpose-specific component group representing an analytic component that is to configure the purpose-specific analytic model on the basis of the analysis level and the configuration information, and an analytic model generator generating the purpose-specific analytic model on the basis of a basic analytic model having the analytic component corresponding to the analysis object and the purpose-specific component group. An analytic model according to an analysis purpose can be readily generated, which improves the serviceability.
US07912689B1
A method and a system are provided for enhancing structure diagram generation (“SDG”). In SDG, aesthetic two-dimensional (“2-D”) coordinates for use in a diagrammatic representation (“diagram”) of a molecule are derived from a connection table for the molecule. SDG may also improve the aesthetic qualities of a chemical structure diagram having existing coordinates, if available. SDG is enhanced by expressing the symmetry present in the molecule, by making use of symmetry in the 2-D dynamics used to lay out rings and chains, by construction of bridges using an open polygon method together with a potential function, and by an elegant approach to the relative positioning of molecules (“free rectangle method”).
US07912688B2
A system and method for predicting the effect of patient self-care actions on a disease control parameter. A future disease control parameter value X(tj) at time tj is determined from a prior disease control parameter value X(ti) at time ti based on an optimal control parameter value R(tj) at time tj, the difference between the prior disease control parameter value X(ti) and an optimal control parameter value R(ti) at time ti, and a set of differentials between patient self-care parameters having patient self-care values SM(ti) at time ti and optimal self-care parameters having optimal self-care values OM(ti) at time ti. The differentials are multiplied by corresponding scaling factors KM. The system includes an input device for entering the patient self-care values SM(ti). A memory stores the optimal control parameter values R(ti) and R(tj), the prior disease control parameter value X(ti), the optimal self-care values OM(ti), and the scaling factors KM. A processor in communication with the input device and memory calculates the future disease control parameter value X(tj). A display is connected to the processor to display the future disease control parameter value X(tj) to a patient.
US07912687B2
A method is provided for predicting the likelihood of cavitation damage occurring on a surface of a hydrodynamic component. The method may include creating a computational fluid dynamics (CFD) simulation of the hydrodynamic component, wherein creating the CFD simulation includes simulating fluid flowing relative to the hydrodynamic component. The method may also include selecting a location on the surface of the hydrodynamic component, wherein the selected location is exposed to the simulated fluid flow. The method may also include determining and analyzing at least one of a mean pressure and standard deviation, a standard deviation of the rate of change in pressure, a mean void percentage and standard deviation, and a standard deviation of the rate of change in void percentage for the flowing fluid at the selected surface location to predict the likelihood of cavitation damage occurring at the selected surface location.
US07912686B2
The method of the invention optimizes the development of a heterogeneous porous medium using enhanced recovery of a fluid by fast determination of position of a front separating a sweeping fluid and the fluid in the medium having application for development of oil reservoirs or gas. The velocity field of the front is determined only once with a flow simulator. A relation describing the position of the front in the heterogeneous medium is defined. Velocity fluctuations are accounted for in the direction of the front and the velocity fluctuations in the direction perpendicular to the direction of the front. For each time interval, the position of the front is reconstructed with a fast Fourier transform and injection of the sweeping fluid is optimized according to the position of the front.
US07912680B2
A direction-of-arrival estimation apparatus has a signal vector generation unit operable to generate a signal vector v composed of N baseband signals v1 to vN from arriving signals received from a target by N sensors. The direction-of-arrival estimation apparatus includes a Hankel matrix generation unit operable to preferentially set an order of a column of a matrix at a natural number M where 1≦M and M≦(N−1)/2 and generate an (N−M)×M matrix Rf1, Rf2, Rb1, or Rb2 from elements v1 to vN-1 of the signal vector. The direction-of-arrival estimation apparatus also includes an estimation unit operable to generate a matrix R using the matrices Rf1, Rf2, Rb1, or Rb2, divide the matrix R into two submatrices R1 and R2 by R=[R1|R2]T, and estimate a direction of arrival of the arriving signal based on the submatrices R1 and R2.
US07912678B2
A system for identifying a piece of oilfield equipment having an exterior surface, the system having an identifier assembly that includes an RFID tag storing a unique identifier, an enclosure receiving and retaining the RFID tag, and a reader.
US07912673B2
A system, apparatus and method for three-dimensional scanning and digitization of the surface geometry of objects are claimed. The system includes a hand-held apparatus that is auto-referenced. The system is auto-referenced since it does not need any positioning device to provide the 6 degree of freedom transformations that are necessary to integrate 3D measurements in a global coordinate system while the apparatus is manipulated to scan the surface. The system continuously calculates its own position and orientation from observation while scanning the surface geometry of an object. To do so, the system exploits a triangulation principle and integrates an apparatus that captures both surface points originating from the reflection of a projected laser pattern on an object's surface and 2D positioning features originating from the observation of target positioning features.
US07912670B2
Systems, methods and program codes are provided for testing multi-core processor chip structures. Individual processor core power supply voltages are provided through controlling individual power supplies for each core, in one aspect to ensure that one or more cores operate at clock rates in compliance with one or more performance specifications. In one example, a first power supply voltage supplied to a first processing core differs from a second core power supply voltage supplied to a second processing core, both cores operating in compliance with a reference clock rate specification. Core power supply voltages may be selected from ordered discrete supply voltages derived by progressively raising or lowering a first supply voltage, optionally wherein the selected supply voltage also enables the core to operate within another performance specification.
US07912667B2
An electrical test circuit is disclosed. In one embodiment, the electrical test circuit includes a first input for receiving a test signal of an integrated circuit, a second input for receiving a control signal and a third input for receiving a normalized reference signal, particularly one that is formed to be synchronous with the test signal. Using a control device of the electrical test circuit, the deviation and/or the amplitude and/or the phase of the reference signal and/or of the test signal can be varied. A measuring device generates, by subtracting the reference signal from the test signal, a difference signal which is output via an output.
US07912665B2
A system and method for detecting the absence of contact between the hands of a driver of a vehicle and a steering wheel of the vehicle that have particular application in ensuring the proper functioning of various components of the driver assist steering systems and maintaining driver attentiveness. The method for detecting a no-contact condition between the hands of the driver of the vehicle and the steering wheel includes generating a model of the no-contact condition using a second-order transfer function. The method further includes obtaining a set of model-generated steering dynamics by estimating a plurality of parameters of the second-order transfer function and a set of measured steering dynamics using a plurality of sensors. The set of model-generated steering dynamics and the set of measured steering dynamics are then compared and the no-contact condition is detected based on this comparison.
US07912660B2
System and method for detecting partial discharge arcing phenomena in a power network distribution system which employs a mobile receiving assemblage including a wideband antenna, a computer controllable wideband radio receiver deriving an amplitude detected output and a global positioning system providing system position data. The amplitude detected outputs are digitized and treated with a digital signal processor based analysis including fast Fourier transforms extracting narrowband signal frequencies that are harmonically related to the network fundamental frequency. The narrowband signal frequencies are analyzed for peak amplitudes which are summed to derive maintenance merit values related to the arcing phenomena.
US07912649B2
Joint processing of seismic and controlled source electromagnetic (CSEM) surface data is performed by using a common rock physics model which relates reservoir properties (such as porosity, lithology, saturation, and shaliness) to surface seismic AVO (or AVA) data. This allows one to determine how perturbations in the reservoir properties affect surface data. This can be carried out by systematically changing the reservoir properties and examining the effect on the synthetic data. This allows the hydrocarbon type of a reservoir to be established, e.g. oil or gas, as well as the saturation level of the hydrocarbon in the reservoir, which is useful for determining whether the reservoir has a non-commercial, low hydrocarbon saturation or a commercial, high hydrocarbon saturation.
US07912643B1
A spoofer location system includes a number of receivers that receive positioning signals. A data engine receives information from the receivers and determines a location of a spoofer source signal. The location of the spoofer source signal is determined by determining a range from each of the number of receivers to the source. The system can be employed in a global positioning system. The spoofer location system can be utilized with guided munitions and other vehicles.
US07912641B2
A vehicular monitoring system is configured to acquire GPS position data and vehicular operating data, write the data to a file, and detect and utilize public wireless communication (e.g., 802.11x/WiFi) Internet access points to communicate the file containing the acquired GPS position data and vehicular operating data to a remote computer. Compressed diagnostic data sets and reduced latency wireless transmissions are utilized to facilitate communication.
US07912638B2
A method for operating a navigation system computes a pedestrian route for travel by a pedestrian. A request to calculate the pedestrian route from an origin to a destination and a walking preference for the pedestrian route identifying a feature of the pedestrian route are obtained. A geographic database associated with the navigation system is accessed for data representing at least one pedestrian path. The data representing the pedestrian path includes lighting level attribute information for the pedestrian path. A valid solution pedestrian route from the origin to the destination comprising a series of connected pedestrian paths that support the walking preference is determined.
US07912627B2
Techniques are described for assessing road traffic conditions in various ways based on obtained traffic-related data, such as data samples from vehicles and other mobile data sources traveling on the roads, as well as in some situations data from one or more other sources (such as physical sensors near to or embedded in the roads). The assessment of road traffic conditions based on obtained data samples may include various filtering and/or conditioning of the data samples, and various inferences and probabilistic determinations of traffic-related characteristics of interest from the data samples. In some situations, at least some of the mobile data sources are configured to frequently acquire and store data samples, and to occasionally make multiple such data samples available together for use in the road traffic condition assessment (e.g., by acquiring a data sample every minute and by transmitting a group of stored data samples every 15 minutes).
US07912620B2
A control system for controlling the supply of oil to a turbocharger fitted to an internal combustion comprises an oil supply valve (21) controlled by a controller (20) and at least one sensor (23-28) for monitoring a parameter associated with the existence or potential occurrence of a leak in the turbocharger oil supply, or of a condition potentially resulting in such a leak. The controller (20) is operable to determine the existence or possible occurrence of an oil leak in the turbocharger oil supply in response to a signal received from the sensor (23-28) and to close the oil supply control valve (21) in the event of said determination to cut off the oil supply to the turbocharger.
US07912614B2
An automatic transmission control apparatus is provided with a control scheme that focuses on the rotational speed differences of the frictional engaging elements and the distribution of torque transferred by the frictional engaging elements. When the automatic transmission is upshifted while in a power-off state, the individual torque capacity of a frictional engaging element being released and the individual torque capacity of a frictional engaging element being connected are corrected by adding a prescribed torque capacity amount to each of the individual torque capacities during an inertia phase of the shift control in which a compensation is executed for inertia related to changing the gear ratio. In this way, frictional losses are induced in the frictional engaging elements so as to absorb the inertia torque and lower the input rotational speed more quickly.
US07912599B2
An internal combustion engine control apparatus includes: a fuel injector; a cooling fan of a radiator that radiates the heat of coolant in a coolant passage in the internal combustion engine; a flow rate control mechanism that variably controls the flow rate of the coolant; an abnormality detector that detects an abnormality of the cooling fan; and a controller that controls the amount of fuel injected from the fuel injector to the internal combustion engine and the operation of the flow rate control mechanism in accordance with the result of the abnormality detector.
US07912588B2
The invention provides a regulator system for regulating the operation of an irrigation system which is responsive to user programmed information. It has a control element for issuing watering control signals to an irrigation system, having at least one of (i) a duration programming device for programming a minimum amount of time and a maximum amount of time for the suspension of watering by the irrigation system, and (ii) a user adjustable temperature programming device for programming a minimum allowed temperature for initiating a watering period by the irrigation system. It further has an irrigation system interface for connecting said control element with the irrigation system. It also has a switch for conveying the control signals from the control element to the irrigation system via the irrigation system interface, for either permitting or prohibiting watering by the irrigation system, responsive to the control signals generated by and received from the control element.
US07912584B2
A power consumption estimation apparatus comprising an execution part for executing an operation program of a robot, a velocity calculation part for each axis drive motor of the robot, a torque calculation part for each axis drive motor, a current value calculation part for calculating a current value of each axis drive motor; a mechanical work calculation part; a motor heat amount calculation part; and an amplifier heat amount calculation part for each axis drive motor, an output electric energy calculation part for the robot controller, a controller heat calculation part for the robot controller, and a power consumption calculation part for the robot system based on the mechanical work of each axis drive motor, the amount of heat of each axis drive motor, the amount of heat of the amplifier, and the amount of heat of the robot controller.
US07912576B2
In one aspect, a system is disclosed having a substrate carrier loader adapted to load substrate carriers onto a moving conveyor; and a controller coupled to the substrate carrier loader, the controller adapted to assist in at least one of alignment of the substrate carrier loader to the moving conveyor and calibration of the substrate carrier loader to the moving conveyor or a storage location. Numerous other aspects are provided.
US07912565B2
A method for creating a menu for audio content, e.g. music tracks, uses means for classifying the audio content into clusters of similar tracks, the similarity referring to physical, perceptual and psychological features of the tracks. The method comprises a means for automatic representative selection for clusters, and a means for generating thumbnail representations of audio tracks. Said audio thumbnails are associated to the menu. Advantageously, no graphical or textual display is required for navigation, since the user may listen to an audio thumbnail and then enter a command, e.g. by pressing an appropriate button, for either listening to the related track or a similar track belonging to the same cluster, or listening to another type of music by selecting another thumbnail representing another cluster.
US07912558B2
A PLC for distributed control includes a storage unit that stores common-data specifying information for specifying common data shared by a corresponding PLC and another PLC, a receiving unit that receives the common-data specifying information from another PLC, and a collating unit that collates the common-data specifying information stored in the storage unit with the common-data specifying information received by the receiving unit.
US07912553B2
An electromagnetic wave irradiation tool encompasses a narrow tube (endoscope probe) (7) defined by an outside diameter of 0.1 mm-20 mm, having an electromagnetic wave irradiation terminal (3) configured to irradiate an electromagnetic wave (2) having a frequency equal to a characteristic frequency of a microorganism (11) at the top of the narrow tube (7) and an electromagnetic wave generation unit (3) configured to generate the electromagnetic wave (2) and to supply the electromagnetic wave (2) to the electromagnetic wave irradiation terminal (3). The electromagnetic wave irradiation tool drives the microorganism (11) into a resonant vibration state selectively so that the microorganism (11) can be destroyed, without giving damages to biological body (1) for medically treating the disease induced by the microorganism (11).
US07912546B2
In a method and apparatus for determining the replacement time of an electric battery in an implantable medical device, the battery being a hybrid battery with a combination of at least two electrode materials, one of which having better properties for high current pulsing and the other of which being a high energy density material, an electrical pulse of a predetermined duration and predetermined amplitude is drawn from the battery. The pulse amplitude significantly exceeds a base current drawn from the battery. The difference between voltages measured across the battery terminals before the pulse is emitted and at an end of the pulse is determined. The battery replacement time is determined from the voltage difference according to a predetermined criterion.
US07912543B2
The connector between the patient electrode pads and the base unit of an automatic external defibrillator (AED) system can be formed by capturing a printed circuit board (PCB) within a connector housing. The PCB can have conductive metal traces that serve as the contact points between the wires from the patient electrodes and the electronics within the AED base unit. The PCB in combination with the conductive metal traces can be shaped similar to a conventional two-prong or two-blade connector. Employing such a PCB-based connector may result in AED pads which are less complex and less costly to manufacture. The PCB can also support a configuration circuit that is positioned between the conductive metal traces and that allows the AED to read and store information about the attached pads. For example, the AED can use this data storage feature to check the expiration date of the pads.
US07912538B2
Provided herein is a device for controlling the release of a substance at a site of interest in a biological membrane comprising a means of monitoring a physiological state at the site of interest; and a means of releasing a variable amount of the substance to the site of interest where the amount varies in response to the status of the monitored physiological state. Also provided are methods of using the device.
US07912532B2
The invention relates to a method for positional optimization in navigation, in particular neural navigation in surgery with an operation microscope and at least one optoelectronic image detector which may be connected to the microscope and also a computer system. The data obtained from the at least one image detector which lie in the microscope field-of-view for the operator, contain information on the position of an operation instrument, in particular the instrument tip. The actual position of the instrument in the x- and y-direction as well as in the z-direction of a three-dimensional coordinate system is continuously or intermittently determined from the relevant positional data. A separation determination is carried out for the positional determination in the z-direction by means of depth of focus evaluation and/or stereoscopic image analysis. The invention further relates to a navigation instrument, using marking, close to the instrument tip, lying within the field of view of the microscope during use thereof.
US07912529B2
A low-density sensor panel assembly system is provided for use with remote marker assemblies that generates a marker signal and for use with a radiation therapy source that generates a radiation beam during radiation therapy. The system includes a sensor array having a layer of sensor coils arranged in a selected pattern and configured to receive the marker signal from the remote marker. A support panel is connected to the sensor array and retains each of the sensor coils in a substantially fixed and unmoving position relative to the other sensor coils. The sensor panel and sensor array define a low-density panel structure configured to dwell in the radiation beam during the radiation therapy.
US07912522B2
A system for securing a hand-held phone having a base with a keypad to be suspended from a lanyard around a person's neck has a support panel having a length and a width, a front side and a back side, and an opening near one end of the length, an elongate strip of material joined to the support panel at two lateral edges, forming a loop, a pliable, transparent window substantially centered in the strip of material, and a lanyard attached to the opening in the support panel. The hand-held phone is suspended from the lanyard by inserting a base of the phone in the loop with the pliable, transparent window overlying the keypad of the phone.
US07912515B2
A battery pack is configured to reduce weight, enhance battery identification, ensure proper placement of a lid retaining the battery, and facilitate battery pack removal. The battery pack has one or more cells that lack an outer coverage except for a polymer sheathing. The battery pack includes a mating notch on a terminal plate and may include a fingernail notch and/or one or more guide rails. The fingernail notch may be a single depression formed to allow a fingernail to slip onto the battery pack, may be a single depression and a ledge that are side-by-side, or may be formed of multiple ledges and/or depressions. There may be a single guide rail or multiple guide rails. Each guide rail preferably has a hollow interior section that is crossed by one or more ribs or segments.
US07912511B2
An electronic device includes a microphone, a microphone holder holding the microphone therein, and a case encasing the microphone holder therein. The microphone holder has a first portion at which the microphone holder makes contact with a first inner surface of the case, and a second portion at which the microphone holder makes contact with one of a part of the electronic device and a second inner surface of the case facing the first inner surface, the microphone holder being sandwiched between the first inner surface and the part. At least one of the first and second portions of the microphone holder is disposed more outwardly than an outer edge of the microphone in a plane which is in parallel with the first inner surface.
US07912510B2
Disclosed is a method for controlling a terminal for a multimedia Ring Back Tone (RBT) service, which allows RBT sound sources previously set in a sound source-providing server by a called subscriber to be reproduced to an originating terminal by means of a Home Location Register (HLR) and the sound source-providing server for storing the RBT sound sources when a calling subscriber telephones the called subscriber, the HLR storing profile information including whether the subscriber has joined the RBT service. The method includes the steps of: (a) receiving a codec setup message including information (multimedia codec information) regarding a multimedia codec from a switching center; (b) deactivating a decoding function of a voice codec; (c) activating a decoding function of the multimedia codec; (d) receiving the RBT sound sources; and (e) decoding the RBT sound sources through the multimedia codec and reproducing the decoded RBT sound sources.
US07912502B2
A wireless operating system, which is used with a mobile telephone, for wirelessly operating an operated target, includes: an adapter including transmitting means for allowing operation information required for an operation of the operated target to be transmitted by short distance radio; a short distance wireless unit having receiving means for receiving the operation information and operating means for operating the operated target in accordance with the received operation information; and an operated target control unit. The adapter further includes: communication means capable of performing direct communication with the mobile telephone by being carried with the mobile telephone; and operation information generating means for generating operation information in accordance with portable communication terminal information acquired from the mobile telephone. Under the circumstances where a user carries the mobile telephone, it is possible to provide a wireless operating system in which various operated targets and the mobile telephone are wirelessly operated.
US07912490B2
A method of improved performance through channel quality prediction for communications systems employing link adaption techniques includes a receiver which makes selective measurements on downlink transmissions, and then stores one or more of the measurements or a channel quality indicator derived therefrom. The receiver then retrieves one or more of the past measurements (or the past channel quality estimates themselves), and combines it with current measurements (or the current channel quality estimate), to predict what the channel quality will be at some future time and derive a predictive channel quality indicator (CQI). This predictive CQI, derived from both current channel measurements and at least one past channel measurement, is then sent to the transmitter for use in updating transmission parameters.
US07912486B2
Methods, systems, and computer program products for surveillance of messaging service messages in a communications network are disclosed. According to one aspect, a system is provided for intercepting a messaging service message in a communications network. The system can include a communication module for receiving and sending messaging service messages from a communications network. Further, the system can include a subscriber surveillance database for maintaining a listing of subscribers that have been placed under surveillance. The system can also include a surveillance function for receiving a messaging service message, extracting a subscriber identifier from the messaging service message, performing a lookup in the surveillance database using the subscriber identifier, and performing a surveillance action in response to locating a matching entry in the database.
US07912481B2
An invention for estimating the first path of an arrival signal by a method and device with a simple structure and lower power consumption. In this method, the nominal pulse repetition frequency or its integer multiple are A/D converted at a frequency less than the multiplicative inverse of the pulse width, the AD conversion timing is offset by time resolution Δt and the receive signal measured, data stored in a RAM, and the first path output time is estimated based on sequentially rearranging of the stored waveform data.
US07912480B2
A system and method for handling electronic notes in a mobile environment, wherein the system includes a memory configured to store an electronic note, which electronic note includes location information, a location detector configured to detect location information for the mobile device, and a processor configured to: monitor the location information for the mobile device based on data from the location detector; compare the location information for the mobile device with the location information in the electronic note; and activate the electronic note when the location information for the mobile device is within a predetermined distance of the location information in the electronic note.
US07912458B2
In embodiments of the present invention improved capabilities are described for receiving interaction information relating to a mobile communication facility, weighting content based at least in part on the interaction information, and ordering the content for presentation on a mobile communication facility based at least in part on the weighting.
US07912451B2
A method and apparatus for limiting the use of one or more features and/or applications provided in electronic equipment based on identification information and location information associated with the electronic equipment is disclosed. Upon initiation of an application and/or feature, a request is made to a remote server. The request includes identification information and location information associated with a geographical location of the electronic equipment. A database maintained at the remote server determines whether the user has the necessary privileges to activate the application and/or feature and whether any limits (e.g., digital rights management) should be placed on the content created from the application and/or feature.
US07912446B2
An E-9-1-1 voice-over-IP (VoIP) solution is provided wherein a 911 call from a mobile VoIP device is routed directly to the correct Public Safety Answer Point (PSAP) via dedicated trunks, together with correct location information and call-back number. VoIP gateways are implemented locally, at least one per LATA, and accept VoIP packetized data inbound, and convert it to standard wireline voice calls. Calls are routed to an IP address at the VoIP gateway, which then egresses the call to a voice port at a selective router. Mid-call updating of location of a moving VoIP terminal is provided to a PSAP. The location of the VoIP is validated using HTTP based protocol by pushing location information to a VoIP location server, and comparing it against a geographic location database to confirm that a contained street address is valid.
US07912443B2
The present invention teaches a communications system comprising a first communications device for receiving data and a wake up signal. The first communications device comprises an active mode of operation and a sleep mode of operation for reducing power consumption. Further, the system comprises means for switching the first communications device to and from sleep mode in response to receiving the wake up signal. Further, the system comprises a second communications device for transmitting data to the first device during its active mode, while transmitting the wake up signal to the first device during its sleep mode.
US07912440B2
Apparatus (40) comprising a voltage input (49) for applying an unfiltered voltage (V_unfil) and a current input (48) for receiving a bias current (Ib) from a current source. The apparatus (40) further comprises a differential filtering resistive circuit with a first current mirror (44) and a second current mirror (43), being situated between a common output node (50) and said voltage input (49). A first mirror circuit (42) for mirroring the bias current (Ib) to said first current mirror (44), and a second mirror circuit (41) for mirroring a current (Ix) to said second current mirror (43) are employed. A filter capacitor (51) situated at the output side of the apparatus (40), said filter capacitor (51) being connected on one side to said common output node (50) and on the other side to ground. The apparatus (40) provides a filtered output voltage (V_fil) at said common output node (50).
US07912436B2
A Radio Frequency (RF) receiver includes a low noise amplifier (LNA) and a mixer coupled to the output of the LNA. The gain of the LNA is adjusted to maximize signal-to-noise ratio of the mixer and to force the mixer to operate well within its linear region when an intermodulation interference component is present. The RF receiver includes a first received signal strength indicator (RSSI_A) coupled to the output of the mixer that measures the strength of the wideband signal at that point. A second received signal strength indicator (RSSI_B) couples after the BPF and measures the strength of the narrowband signal. The LNA gain is set based upon these signal strengths. By altering the gain of the LNA by one step and measuring the difference between a prior RSSI_B reading and a subsequent RSSI_B′ reading will indicate whether intermodulation interference is present.
US07912435B2
A mobile wireless LAN communications device may include a portable, handheld housing, and a wireless LAN transceiver carried by the housing. A polarization diversity wireless LAN antenna may be included for cooperating with the wireless LAN transceiver to communicate over a wireless LAN. The polarization diversity wireless LAN antenna may include a first antenna element coupled to the wireless LAN transceiver having a first shape and a first polarization, and a second antenna element coupled to the wireless LAN transceiver having a second shape different from the first shape. The second antenna element may also have a second polarization different from the first polarization.
US07912434B2
To realize a receiving system that can excellently receive radio signals before and after a body insertable device, which is a radio signal source, is inserted into a subject, the receiving system has a first receiving antenna (1), a second receiving antenna (2), and a receiving apparatus (3). The first receiving antenna (1) is used when the body insertable device is outside the subject. The second receiving antenna (2) is used when the body insertable device is inserted into the subject. The receiving apparatus (3) performs a receiving processing on radio signals received through the first receiving antenna (1) or the second receiving antenna (2). In the receiving system, a receiving antenna connected to an antenna connector (13) provided in the receiving apparatus (3) is switched between the first receiving antenna (1) and the second receiving antenna (2) corresponding to a difference in propagation states of radio signals transmitted from the body insertable device before and after the body insertable device is inserted into the subject. Consequently, the receiving system that can excellently receive the radio signals before and after the body insertable device is inserted into the subject is realized.
US07912430B2
A circuit arrangement for wirelessly exchanging data with a reader device, including an antenna for converting electromagnetic radiation into an antenna voltage, an analogue circuit for demodulating an information signal based on the antenna voltage, and a digital circuit for processing of the information signal and for receiving power from the analogue circuit. The circuit arrangement also includes a decoupling circuit, which is interconnected between the analogue circuit and the digital circuit and provides a decoupling of both circuits.
US07912428B2
A system and method providing variable-frequency IF conversion in a multimode communication device. Various aspects of the present invention provide a multimode communication device comprising at least one RF signal receiver adapted to receive at least a first RF signal corresponding to a first communication protocol and a second RF signal corresponding to a second communication protocol. A controllable frequency source may, for example, be adapted to output a mixing signal characterized by one of a plurality of selectable frequencies. Such selectable frequencies may, for example, comprise a first frequency corresponding to the first communication protocol and a second frequency corresponding to the second communication protocol. A mixer may, for example, receive a received RF signal from the RF signal receiver, receive a mixing signal from the controllable frequency source, and convert the received RF signal to an IF signal utilizing the received mixing signal.
US07912416B2
A printing system comprises a paper path architecture for parallel printing using multiple marking engines. The media path configuration enables all the media feed trays to be located in one place, relative to the marking engines. A cross-over module is located between marking engines. The cross-over module can interleave media sheets that are being transported away from a first marking engine with the sheets being transported to the second marking engine. The cross-over module also includes a straight through path that enables media sheets to be transported directly to a finishing device without going through either marking engine. The marking engines include internal duplex loops such that media can be supplied to each engine in alternate groups. A merge module selectively merges the media which can then be further processed in a finishing transition module prior to communication to a finishing device.
US07912411B2
A developing roller includes an ultraviolet-curing type resin layer and using a carbon-based electrically conducting agent for giving an electrical conductivity to the resin layer, as well as an imaging apparatus using the same. The developing roller 1 includes a shaft member 2 including a hollow cylindrical body or a solid cylindrical body of a resin containing an electrically conducting agent and a resin layer 4. The resin layer 4 is made of a resin having fine particles dispersed therein, wherein a ratio a/b of average particle size of fine particles a to a total thickness of resin layers b is greater than 2.0 and less than or equal to 5.0.
US07912410B2
A developing device for a toner powder cloud development system, which can achieve high image quality and can be made compact. The developing device has a two-component development unit, a toner carrier, and an alternating current power source. The toner carrier, which is arranged opposing a latent image carrier, has a plurality of electrodes disposed in a line in a prescribed direction on the surface thereof, and mutually insulated. The alternating current power source supplies a voltage such that an electric field across the plurality of electrodes is temporally switched. The inter-electrode electric field causes the toner being carried on the surface of the toner carrier to carry out hopping, thereby forming a toner powder cloud and carrying out development. The movement speed of the latent image carrier and the linear velocity of the toner carrier are set at approximately equivalent speeds.
US07912405B2
An image forming apparatus includes a plurality of image forming units, each provided with an image bearing member, detachably mountable to a main assembly of the image forming apparatus; an opening, provided in a side surface of the main assembly, for permitting insertion of the plurality of image forming units into the opening; a guide portion for guiding the plurality of image forming units toward the opening; and a projected portion, provided on the guide portion, for positioning a part of an associated image forming unit outside the opening by contacting the associated image forming unit when the associated image forming unit is inserted into the opening with an attitude different from the attitude of the associated image forming unit at the time when the associated image forming unit is disposed in the main assembly.
US07912403B2
An image forming apparatus includes a main frame having a first driving force transmitting part, and a first electrode to supply power, a developing cartridge mounted to the main frame, and having a second driving force transmitting part engaged to the first driving force transmitting part to receive a driving force, and a second electrode electrically connected with the first electrode, and a pressing member disposed to the main frame to regulate a widthwise direction movement of the developing cartridge mounted to the main frame to guide an engagement between the first and second driving force transmitting parts, and an electrical connection between the first and second electrodes.
US07912400B2
The present application is directed to devices and methods for removing toner from a belt within an image forming apparatus. In one embodiment, the device includes a housing that forms an enclosed interior space. The housing may include an inlet that leads into the interior space. A blade may be positioned in proximity to the inlet to remove the toner from the belt and direct it into the inlet. An auger may be rotationally positioned within the interior space to move the toner along a longitudinal width of the device. An agitating member may be rotationally positioned within the interior space to move the toner from the inlet towards the auger. The agitating member may include a flexible arm that contacts against at least one of the blade and the auger during rotation.
US07912399B2
An apparatus (100) useful in printing for charging a photoconductor and for cleaning a scorotron grid is disclosed. The apparatus can include a scorotron frame (110) and a scorotron charge member (120) coupled to the scorotron frame, where the scorotron charge member can be configured to generate an electric field. The apparatus can include a scorotron charging grid (130) coupled to the scorotron frame, the scorotron charging grid having a length axis, a width axis, and a height axis, and the scorotron charging grid including a scorotron charging grid surface having a plurality of openings. The apparatus can include a scorotron charging grid cleaner (140) coupled to the scorotron charging grid, where the scorotron charging grid cleaner can be configured to travel along the scorotron charging grid length axis and clean the scorotron charging grid. The scorotron charging grid cleaner can include a scorotron charging grid cleaner center and scorotron charging grid cleaner ends at opposite ends from the scorotron charging grid cleaner center along the width axis. The scorotron charging grid cleaner can extend further in a direction of the height axis at the scorotron charging grid cleaner center than at the scorotron charging grid cleaner ends.
US07912396B2
A printer, including a printing unit to print print data on print medium. The printer includes a memory to temporarily store the print data supplied from a user terminal, a controller to temporarily cancel a duplex printing mode of the printer and to control the printing unit to print the print data in a normal printing mode, when the duplex printing mode is preset and a quantity of the print data temporarily stored in the memory is within a range of predetermined quantities, a printing path along which the print medium is provided to the printing unit so as to have an image printed on a first side thereof, an ejecting path along which the pieces of print media, having had the image printed on the first sides thereof, are ejected from the printer in the normal printing mode, or are partially ejected from the printer in the duplex printing mode, and a reversing path to convey the print medium from the partly ejected position of the ejecting path and toward a beginning of the printing path to position the print medium to be conveyed along the printing path so as to have another image printed on a second side thereof.
US07912395B2
A monitoring apparatus and a monitoring system monitor a person who removed an output sheet for a print job or a copy job from an image forming apparatus that can be used by a plurality of users. With the use of a job-start notification, a job-end notification, and a sheet-removal notification received from the image forming apparatus, a video image during a period including the time at which the sheet output from the image forming apparatus was removed by a person can be recorded, and the video image can be managed in association with job information.
US07912394B2
In a printing apparatus, a charged amount to be charged when printing is carried out under a predetermined condition is calculated in advance. If the charged amount is lower than an upper limit of the charged amount set by a user, printing is performed. Meanwhile, if the charged amount exceeds the upper limit, image processing for suppressing the charged amount or processing for changing a parameter is performed. Then, when the charged amount becomes lower than the upper limit, printing is performed.
US07912391B2
An image-heating device has a detector for detecting the state of a recording medium at a position between a first fixing unit and a second fixing unit along a conveying path of the recording medium and a controller for controlling a fixing condition of the second fixing unit on the basis of the information obtained by the detector.
US07912388B2
An apparatus operable to perform printing and connected to a control apparatus includes a storage unit configured to store paper information including paper identification information and paper attribute information, an identification unit configured to identify alternate paper information corresponding to paper information from the paper information stored in the storage unit based on paper attribute information included in the paper information corresponding to identification information transmitted from the control apparatus, and a transmission unit configured to transmit identification information included in the alternate paper information identified by the identification unit as alternate identification information to the control apparatus.
US07912385B2
An image forming apparatus and a developer level calculating method of the same. The image forming apparatus includes a developing unit which includes a developing roller to provide the developer onto a photosensitive body, a developing sensor to sense a developer level, and a supplying roller to supply the developer to the developing roller; a developer bottle which supplies the developer to the developing unit; and a controller which calculates a number of first printing dots of the developing unit, converts the amount of the developer supplied from the developer bottle sensed by the developer sensor into a number of second printing dots, calculates a number of third printing dots on the basis of the number of the first printing dots and the second printing dots, and calculates total developer level of the developer bottle on the basis of the number of the third printing dots.
US07912370B2
An apparatus provides measurement of power of an optical signal transmitted in a wavelength multiplexing scheme, based on the optical spectrum and the information on the optical signal. A method provides measuring the power of an optical signal transmitted in a wavelength multiplexing scheme based on the optical spectrum of the optical signal and information acquired on the optical signal.
US07912345B2
There are provided an information storage medium capable of real-time recording/playback of digital moving picture information, and a digital information recording/playback system using this medium. In a medium that records/plays back data including video data and control information, the control information (DA21 in FIG. 4; RTR_VMG in FIG. 30) includes information (VOBU entry in FIG. 31) for accessing a specific portion (VOBU) of the video data.
US07912344B2
There are provided an information storage medium capable of real-time recording/playback of digital moving picture information, and a digital information recording/playback system using this medium. In a medium that records/plays back data including video data and control information, the control information (DA21 in FIG. 4; RTR_VMG in FIG. 30) includes information (VOBU entry in FIG. 31) for accessing a specific portion (VOBU) of the video data.
US07912340B2
A high speed data processing apparatus which is able to produce smooth reproduced pictures without lowering the quality of the reproduced picture. When the high speed reproduction is selected by a user, a system controller controls a media controller to cause a reproducing driver to read out a plural number of stamp video data from an optical disc to write the data in an associated memory space of the memory on the frame basis. The data processing apparatus reads out stamp video data written on the frame basis in a memory space of the memory portion-wise to display the plural number of frames of the picture information simultaneously on one picture frame in each output frame.
US07912334B2
A gasification distributed temperature sensing system is disclosed. The sensing system includes a gasification vessel and a harsh environment fiber sensing cable package disposed within the gasification vessel, the sensing cable package includes a thermally conductive enclosure and at least one sensor cable including a distributed array of high-temperature fiber Bragg grating sensors, wherein the sensors are disposed and hermetically sealed within the thermally conductive enclosure.
US07912325B2
There is provided an optical control element in which non-guided light is prevented from entering into an optical waveguide and which is excellent in optical properties, such as optical modulation properties. A media processor, such as a CD publisher, having a function as a media library.An optical control element includes: a substrate formed of a material having an electro-optical effect; and an optical waveguide formed on a top or bottom surface of the substrate. The optical waveguide has a modulation region b (s) and non-modulation regions a and c along the propagating direction of a light wave propagating through the optical waveguide. In the case when the modulation region is configured to include a single optical waveguide, propagation constants β0 to β3 of optical waveguides in the modulation region and the non-modulation region adjacent to each other are set to different values in the modulation region and the non-modulation region. In the case when the modulation region is configured to include a plurality of optical waveguides, a propagation constant of at least one of the optical waveguides in the modulation region is set to a value different from that in the non-modulation region.
US07912324B2
A method of transferring a code of a structured document including background and at least one set of foreground and mask, to an image reproducing unit which reproduces the structured document code into a document image, includes, for each set of the foreground and mask, performing control to give priority to code of the mask over code of the foreground.
US07912317B2
Some embodiments provide a method of editing images with distortion caused by a camera lens. The method identifies a set of geometries on a set of images taken by the camera lens. The method finds transformations for applying on the set of identified geometries to remove distortion on the geometries. The method applies the transformations to images taken by the camera lens to remove distortions. In some embodiments the identified geometries are curvilinear lines that correspond to straight lines in the scene being captured by the lens. Some embodiments provide a method of matching distortion for adding graphical objects to images. The method first removes the distortion on the images as described above. The method then adds the graphical objects to these images. Finally, the method applies inverse transformations on the images to restore them to their original form.
US07912312B2
An image processing circuit for processing at least one jagged edge in an image represented by an input video signal. The image processing circuit includes: a detection module for detecting an edge by labeling a specific portion within input data carried by the input video signal to indicate whether the specific portion corresponds to a specific edge and further generates a detection result; a line buffer for temporarily storing input data carried by the input video signal; and a processing unit, coupled to the detection module and the line buffer, for processing the input data according to the detection result to output an output video signal.
US07912311B2
A system, apparatus, method and article to filter media signals are described. The apparatus may include a media processor. The media processor may include an image signal processor having multiple processing elements to concurrently process a pixel matrix by executing single instruction stream, multiple data streams instructions to determine a matrix median pixel value, and replace a pixel value from said pixel matrix with said matrix median pixel value. Other embodiments are described and claimed.
US07912298B2
A frame rate is determined in accordance with the smoothness in movement of a video. An amount of change detection section extracts an amount of change based on a plurality of frame pictures included in an input video signal input as a moving picture signal from the outside and outputs an amount of change to an evaluation value calculation section. The evaluation value calculation section computes an amount of change in time between each of the frame pictures based on the amount of change and the time interval between frame pictures based on frame rate information and evaluates an evaluation value for evaluating the smoothness in movement of an input video based on the amount of change in time. The evaluation value is output to the outside as a factor for determining a frame rate.
US07912297B2
A method of hierarchical image indexing which extracts representative images of a TV program and generates a hierarchical index image guide of the representative images, and an apparatus therefor. Respective images at predetermined times are extracted from a predetermined program. A hierarchical index is allocated to each extracted image and the indexes are mapped to locations of transport stream packets. A tree of images having the allocated indexes is constructed as a hierarchically indexed Image guide (HIIG). When a stored program is to be reproduced, a location desired to be watched is selected in the HIIG, and from the selected location, reproducing and trick plays (FF, rewind) are enabled such that a user easily searches the program and begins viewing the program at the searched for location.
US07912296B1
A computer-implemented method is described. The method includes generating a coarse resolution image from a finer resolution image, generating a coarse coverage mask that identifies valid and non-valid data in the coarse resolution image, and determining whether data in the finer resolution image is valid or non-valid data based on whether corresponding data identified by the coarse coverage mask is valid or non-valid data. In certain embodiments, generating a coarse resolution image can include segmenting the finer resolution image into tiles and compressing each tile. Compressing each tile can be preformed using a lossless compression, and at least two tiles can be transmitted to separate computing devices and compressed in parallel.
US07912295B1
The present invention provides a method for dynamically refine the threshold values of R (Red), G (Green), B (Blue) colors for determining a borderline pixel in response to the values of a background image, thereby to precisely determine the borderlines of the Area of Interest (AOI). The method of the invention first searches the borderline pixels of a scanned image according to the standard differences of the R, G, B values of the pixels. Then, approximate the R, G, B threshold values of the borderline pixels by repeatedly averaging the current R, G, B values of the borderline pixels and the previous R, G, B threshold values until the difference is less than a predetermined value. The approximated R, G, B threshold values are set for the new R, G, B threshold values for determining the attribute of a pixel for subsequent prescanned images. Accordingly, the AOI can be automatically selected by reading the image circumscribed by the borderline pixels.
US07912284B2
A method of filtering video packets for video stream monitoring is provided. A video packet of a video stream is received. One or more features are extracted from a specified frame of the video packet via one or more histograms and frequency domain coefficients of the specified frame. One or more concept detectors are implemented on the one or more features creating one or more confidence values. The confidence values are transmitted to a display module for filtering of video packets.
US07912283B1
The identification of a specific object in a visual image compromised by the addition of noise, too little or too much light, cluttered with other objects that confuse the user, or having other image defects and using novel techniques that make the image appear more salient to a human operator. Novel techniques include representing both the object to be identified and an appropriate sample of the given data image that has been selected as matrices and comparing the two.
US07912275B2
A method of evaluating a photo mask, includes measuring each dimension of a plurality of pattern portions of a mask pattern formed on a photo mask, obtaining an inter-pattern distance between the pattern portion and a pattern different from the pattern portion with respect to each of the pattern portions, obtaining a dimensional difference between the measured dimension of the pattern portion and a target dimension of the pattern portion with respect to each of the pattern portions, grouping the dimensional difference obtained for each pattern portion into a plurality of groups in accordance with the inter-pattern distance obtained for each pattern portion, obtaining an evaluation value based on the dimensional difference in each group with respect to each of the groups, and evaluating the photo mask based on the evaluation value.
US07912274B2
The present invention relates to a method and device for measuring dynamic parameters of particles comprises applying time correlation analysis on fluctuation of the particles with respect to a detection area of a digital picture.
US07912272B2
A currency genuineness detection system using plurality of opto-electronic sensors with both transmission and reflective (including fluorescence) properties of security documents is developed. Both detection sensing strategies utilize integrated response of the wide optical band sensed under UV visible along with optional near infra red light illumination. A security document is examined under static condition. A window signal signature is thus possible from photodetectors responses for various kinds of documents of different denominations, kinds and country of origin. A programmable technique for checking the genuineness of a security document is possible by feeding a unique code of the currency under examination.
US07912268B2
The present invention provides an image processing device and method for effectively generating a difference image from plural images. The plural images generated by an image generation unit are first associated with radiography date and hour information and stored in a storage unit, at least one reference image and one comparison image are designated by an image designation unit from the stored images, the date and hour information of the designated reference image is compared with that of the designated comparison image by an image comparison unit, a difference process is executed by a difference processing unit based on an operation determined based on the comparison result, and the processed difference image is displayed on a display unit under the control of a display control unit.
US07912263B2
A method for detecting clipped anatomy in a radiographic image obtains image data for the radiographic image and arranges the image data according to a predetermined image orientation. A set is formed having one or more regions of interest that are located near the borders of the image. Image content is analyzed in each region of interest in the set and one or more regions with clipped anatomy are identified.
US07912261B2
In order to ensure the preparation of an undistorted X-ray image of an examination image by an X-ray detector including an active pixel matrix with at least two detector plates, a method is provided. In at least one embodiment, a method for correcting a raw X-ray image includes changing, as a function of a deviation between correction values from pixel readout elements of a first detector plate and correction values from pixel readout elements of at least one further detector plate, the correction values of pixel readout elements of at least one detector plate, or preparing new correction values for the pixel readout elements of at least one detector plate. Further, the method in at least one embodiment includes carrying out a correction of the raw X-ray image with the changed correction values, or a carrying out a correction with the original correction values and the new correction values.
US07912258B2
A clinical and training apparatus that collects and processes physical space data while performing an image-guided procedure on an anatomical area of interest includes a calibration probe, a tracked ultrasonic probe, a wireless tracking device that tracks the ultrasonic probe in space and an image data processor. The physical space data provides three-dimensional coordinates for each of the physical points. The image data processor includes a memory holding instructions. The instructions include determining registrations used to indicate position in image space and physical space; using the registrations to map into image space, image data describing the physical space of the tracked ultrasonic probe and the anatomical area of interest; and constructing a three-dimensional (3D) volume based on ultrasonic image data. The apparatus includes a storage medium that stores a plurality of 3D volumes acquired by the image data processor for later retrieval.
US07912250B2
A device for acquiring images of a print of at least a portion of a user's hand, the device comprising a stand defining an acquisition zone extending substantially in a plane, an optical acquisition member that is fastened to the stand to have a field of view covering the acquisition zone, and a processor unit connected to the acquisition member to process an image signal coming therefrom, wherein: the stand is arranged to provide an empty space zone containing the acquisition zone and forming a passage for said portion of the hand while moving parallel to the plane; the device includes at least one projector member for projecting a light test pattern of at least two colors into the acquisition zone; the optical acquisition member has a depth of field extending on either side of the acquisition zone and it possesses a color sensor having an acquisition speed that is sufficient to capture at least one color image of said portion of the hand moving at a predetermined maximum speed of movement; and the processor unit is arranged to extract from the color image signal a monochrome image in each of the projected colors, to reconstitute a texture of said portion of the hand from at least one of the monochrome images, and to reconstitute a shape from at least one of the monochromic images.
US07912246B1
The present invention is a system and method for performing age classification or age estimation based on the facial images of people, using multi-category decomposition architecture of classifiers. In the multi-category decomposition architecture, which is a hybrid multi-classifier architecture specialized to age classification, the task of learning the concept of age against significant within-class variations, is handled by decomposing the set of facial images into auxiliary demographics classes, and the age classification is performed by an array of classifiers where each classifier, called an auxiliary class machine, is specialized to the given auxiliary class. The facial image data is annotated to assign the gender and ethnicity labels as well as the age labels. Each auxiliary class machine is trained to output both the given auxiliary class membership likelihood and the age group likelihoods. Faces are detected from the input image and individually tracked. Age sensitive feature vectors are extracted from the tracked faces and are fed to all of the auxiliary class machines to compute the desired likelihood outputs. The outputs from all of the auxiliary class machines are combined in a manner to make a final decision on the age of the given face.
US07912240B2
The present invention relates to dual-diaphragm electroacoustic transducers wherein a common magnetic flux path comprises first and second magnetic gaps and a magnet assembly. The invention may provide a miniature transducer with a compact magnetic flux path of improved performance. Electroacoustic transducers in accordance with the invention may comprise a small number of separate parts and provide good acoustic conversion efficiency in a miniature or compact housing.
US07912239B2
A flat speaker comprising a vibrating plate including a spiral voice coil, a lead portion extracted from the vice coil and reinforced by the reinforcing member, and an electric supply line; an edge portion supporting the vibrating plate; and a yoke, supporting the edge portion, on which the permanent magnet arranged to face the voice coil. The flat speaker 1 of the invention includes a vibrating membrane 2 of an insulating base film 3 with a spiral or meandering voice coil 4 formed on one or both faces thereof, a permanent magnet 5 arranged on corresponding location facing the voice coil 4; and a yoke 6 on which the permanent magnet 5 is arranged. The vibrating membrane 2 is avoided from hitting the permanent magnet by providing a perforated sheet on the back face of the yoke to control acoustic resistance.
US07912233B2
A speaker system for a musical instrument that detects the displacement of a voice coil of a speaker and provides feedback processing. The speaker system has a preamp that alters the frequency characteristics of the an electrical signal that has been input to an input terminal, and a power amplifier that amplifies the electrical signal. A speaker is driven by the power amplifier and a feedback unit detects the displacement of the speaker and provides a feedback signal to the power amplifier. The power amplifier amplifies the electrical signal in conformance with the output of the preamp and the feedback signal.
US07912229B2
Power amplifies are provided to correspond with a plurality of speaker units constituting a speaker array. Driving signals from the power amplifies are supplied to one terminals of the speaker units, and other terminals are connected a common line. Inverters are provided at preceding stages of the power amplifies such that the driving signals supplied to the speaker units being arranged adjacently have an opposite phase respectively. Since a correlation between the driving signals of the adjacent speaker units is high, a current flowing through the common line can be very reduced. An LED display panel can be driven by the similar method.
US07912227B2
A sound reproducing screen for an ultrasonic converting and reproducing method wherein a sound signal is carried on the ultrasonic wave which is transmitted via the screen which has a lattice structure in which a plurality of cells is continuously arranged. Using the screen, the sound signal can be divided from the ultrasonic wave, so that the sound signal can be reproduced. A cell structure of the screen is thus provided for converting the ultrasonic wave into the sound signal by ultrasonic conversion and reproduction which is simple to make and which has a maximum conversion efficiency. Accordingly, an efficiency of reproducing the sound source in a low frequency band as well as a high frequency band is superior, and a realistic three-dimensional sound system can be implemented.
US07912221B2
This invention enhances the security strength of wireless communications in the ad-hoc mode. To this end, it is checked if the communication apparatus and a terminal of a communication partner can concurrently use different encryption keys in correspondence with a plurality of communication destinations. When at least one of the communication apparatus and the terminal of the communication partner cannot concurrently use different encryption keys in correspondence with the plurality of communication destinations, an encryption key uniquely set in the wireless network is set as an encryption key for a communication with the terminal of the communication partner.
US07912212B2
A symmetric cryptosystem uses cascaded chaotic maps to encrypt plaintext and decrypt ciphertext. Received plaintext is encrypted using the cascaded chaotic maps to generate a ciphertext. The ciphertext can then be decrypted using the same cascaded chaotic maps in order to retrieve the plaintext.
US07912211B1
Disclosed herein are portable teleconferencing products that implement a doubletalk detector in a low frequency range or in a frequency range commensurate with the frequencies through which sound may be efficiently transferred between a speaker and a microphone through an enclosure. Also disclosed herein are teleconferencing systems that implement a secondary doubletalk detector, a non-presumptive doubletalk detector, a confirmatory doubletalk detector, and/or a false doubletalk detector, whereby echo cancellation coefficients may be better adapted after echo path changing events through the use of accelerated coefficient adaptation or half-duplex operation until adaptation is restored. Further disclosed herein are teleconferencing products that include more than one port for communicating with distant parties or a single party and a local source of audio material, whereby one distant party is prevented from being transmitted to it private audio from another party or another audio signal while permitting a local participant to hear the private audio. Detailed information on various example embodiments of the inventions are provided in the Detailed Description below, and the inventions are defined by the appended claims.
US07912210B2
A system for improving the attenuation of an undesired signal found in a differential signal path through the use of inductive coupling. The system includes a primary inductor, a secondary inductor, and a filter. The primary inductor and the secondary inductor operably couple an input differential signal pair to an output differential signal pair, and the filter attenuates an undesired signal in the output differential signal pair.
US07912204B1
A route manager queries a new network element to identify egress routes coupled to the network element and to identify external nodes coupled to the egress routes. The route manager queries a database with identifiers for the external nodes to identify associated telephone numbers. For each telephone number associated with an external node, the route manager associates the telephone number with the egress routes coupled to the external node and with the new network element. The route manager receives a call request to one of the telephone numbers, and in response, selects the new network element and one of the egress routes associated with the telephone number.
US07912199B2
Methods and systems are described for remote establishment of a call from a first device to a second device. In said methods and systems the information is retrieved from the first device regarding the second device along with information associating the user with a device associated with the user. The call is then transferred to a switch associated with the user's device. The switch then forwards the call to the second device.
US07912195B2
A method for provisioning subscribers, products, and services in a broadband network includes establishing a directory system for storing information about a plurality of subscribers. The directory system includes a subscriber namespace and a device namespace. A subscriber is added by instantiating a subscriber object for the subscriber in the subscriber namespace. Each available service has its own state in the directory system to provide a multi-state provisioning system that permits granular management services.
US07912193B2
Methods and systems for managing a call in real-time are disclosed. Methods and systems consistent with the present invention manage a call in real-time based on input from a user. A service center receives information pertaining to a call to the user from a service control point and sends a notification of the call to a device associated with the user. The service center receives a response to the notification from the user. Thereafter, the service center instructs the service control point to connect the call based on the response.
US07912192B2
Trust ratings are embedded in certificates of calling devices in a Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) communications system. A method of managing trust ratings involves automatically accumulating complaints concerning VoIP calls initiated from calling devices, and comparing respective quantities of accumulated complaints associated with each calling device. When a quantity of accumulated complaints associated with a given calling device exceeds a given threshold, a trust rating of the given calling device is reduced. In subsequent VoIP calls the given calling device attempts to place, the reduced trust rating is included in the call request so that the subsequent calls are subject to more austere call screening operations than calls having the unreduced trust rating. Call recipients thus affect the calling device's trust rating simply by entering complaints associated with received calls. The method effectively combats spam over Internet telephony (SPIT) through participation of called parties.
US07912185B2
The present invention relates to providing precise location data to a 911 operator of a cell phone operator who initiates a 9-1-1 call and, more particularly, to the interaction of transmitting circuitry in a cellular telephone and complementary receiving circuitry in a landline telephone or stand-alone unit. When a cellular 9-1-1 call is made within proximity of a landline telephone or a stand-alone unit, an interaction takes place between the enabled cell phone and the landline telephone. Upon receiving and decoding the cellular transmission, the landline telephone or stand-alone unit transmits a 9-1-1 call which provides more precise location data (in the form of the landline telephone's subscriber's identification) to a 911 operator than if the 9-1-1 call was simply connected to the operator from the cell phone. The present invention has further applications for locating a 9-1-1 call from a landline telephone connected through a PBX-type master switching box.
US07912178B2
A radiosurgery system is described that delivers a therapeutic dose of radiation to a target structure in a patient. In some embodiments, inflammatory ocular disorders are treated, specifically macular degeneration. In some embodiments, ocular structures are placed in a global coordinate system, based on ocular imaging, which leads to direction of an automated positioning system. In some embodiments, the position of an ocular structure is tracked and related to a radiosurgery system. In some embodiments, a treatment plan is utilized for a specific disease to be treated and/or structures to be avoided. In some embodiments, a fiducial aids in positioning the system. In some embodiments, a reflection off the eye is used to aid in positioning. In some embodiments, radiodynamic therapy is described in which radiosurgery is used in combination with other treatments and can be delivered concomitant with, prior to, or following other treatments.
US07912168B2
A wireless communication apparatus for performing reception processing while tracking a symbol timing obtained by synchronization, the wireless communication apparatus includes a resampler for performing resampling to oversample a received symbol in a plurality of phases by using a sampling rate higher than a symbol rate, a phase-error detector for obtaining a phase error in a time sequence at each of sampling points where the resampling is performed, an error-signal generator for generating an error signal on the basis of the phase error detected at each of the sampling points where the resampling is performed, and a sampling point controller for detecting an offset direction at each of the sampling points on the basis of the error signal and for controlling an offset direction of each of the sampling points of the received symbol.
US07912167B2
A clock and data recovery circuit includes a four-phase generation circuit that generates four-phase clock signals with phases thereof being equally spaced by 90 degrees, a first interpolator and a second interpolator, each of which receives two of the clocks with phases thereof separated to each other by 180 degrees, performs phase interpolation, and outputs a signal obtained by the interpolation and a signal with a phase reverse to a phase of the interpolated signal. A four-phase to eight-phase conversion circuit receives the four-phase clocks from the first and second interpolators, buffers the four-phase clock signals output from the first interpolator and the second interpolator and outputs the buffered four-phase clock signals without alteration, and generates four-phase clocks each obtained by interpolation of two of the clock signals with the mutually adjacent phases among the four-phase clock signals output from the first interpolator and the second interpolator.
US07912166B2
A jitter measurement circuit and a method for calibrating the jitter measurement circuit are disclosed. The jitter measurement circuit includes a synchronous dual-phase detector and a decision circuit. In a test mode, a probability distribution function (PDF) of the jitter of a clock signal output by a circuit under test is obtained. In a calibration mode, a random clock, which is externally generated or generated by a free-run oscillator in the circuit under test, is used to calibrate the synchronous dual-phase detector. The decision circuit performs logic operations, data latching and counting on a phase relationship detected by the synchronous dual-phase detector in order to obtain a counting value and a PDF relative to the jitter of the clock signal.
US07912163B2
The A/D converter changes sampling timing of a received signal in a synchronization acquisition mode and a synchronization tracking mode. The A/D converter generates an internal clock of a sampling frequency eight times a symbol rate under the control of the clock control unit in the synchronization acquisition mode. On the other hand, in the synchronization tracking mode, the A/D converter generates an internal clock with a symbol point and one each point before and after the symbol point as sampling timing under the control of the clock control unit. The A/D converter further corrects the sampling timing of the symbol point based on the squares of the maximum value of a correlation value between the received signal and a reference signal and the absolute values of correlation values before and after the maximum value.
US07912157B2
Timing and frequency offset processing in sub-carriers is performed in an Integrated Services Digital Broadcasting-Terrestrial (ISDB-T) receiver system. Sub-carriers are divided into two sub-sets, where the sub-sets contain an equal number of sub-carriers. Subsequently bad sub-carriers are removed, if present, from first sub-set of the sub-sets, and corresponding sub-carriers from a second sub-set of the sub-sets are also removed. Further, a phase difference on each sub-carrier from each sub-set is computed, and mean phase differences of each of the sub-sets are computed. Furthermore, frequency offset is computed by averaging the mean phase differences of the sets.
US07912142B2
Double layer maximum ratio combining for an OFDM receiver with inter-carrier-interference cancelling
An apparatus, method, and system for reducing a C/N in an OFDM receiver using diversity combining techniques in the presence of ICI, wherein the apparatus comprises an encoded data estimator adapted to estimate data received in the OFDM receiver; a pair of ICI estimators operatively connected to the encoded data estimator and adapted to calculate an inter-carrier-interference term of the data; and a pair of diversity combining equalizers adapted to compensate multi-path interference of the data, wherein a first one of the diversity combining equalizers is operatively connected to the encoded data estimator, and a second one of the diversity combining equalizers is operatively connected to the pair of ICI estimators. The diversity combining equalizer may comprise a MRC diversity combining equalizer. Preferably, the encoded data estimator, the pair of ICI estimators, and the pair of diversity combining equalizers are implemented on a DVB-T/H diversity SoC.
US07912139B2
Provided is a multi-carrier communication apparatus, power line communication circuit, and multi-carrier communication method capable of decreasing omission of carrier detection even when a plurality of communication apparatuses are simultaneously transmitting signals at the state of time discord. Digital signals transmitted from a digital signal-processing unit 1 are converted into analog signals by an analog circuit unit 2 and then transmitted from a pair of lines 61 and 62 via a communication transformer 3. The digital signal-processing unit 1 has a frequency carrier detecting unit 10 which detects the existence of a carrier on the basis of a frequency characteristic of the received signal and the frequency carrier detecting unit 10 detects the carrier by taking correlation between sub-carriers adjacent to each other at every other interval.
US07912131B2
There are provided selective prediction encoding and decoding methods and selective prediction encoding and decoding devices. The selective prediction encoding device selects and performs one of an AC/DC prediction encoding method and an intra prediction encoding method which corresponds to the smaller of code amount from AC/DC prediction and an amount of AVC intra coding, records information indicating the selected encoding method in a header of a bit stream, and transmits the bit stream to the selective prediction decoding device. The selective prediction decoding device decodes the transmitted bit stream by the use of a decoding process corresponding to the information recorded in the header. Accordingly, it is possible to improve compression ratio and image quality by using the selective prediction encoding and decoding methods.
US07912130B2
While accuracy of motion compensated prediction is kept high, reduction in processing amount is made possible. When motion compensated prediction is performed on inputted image data by a motion vector detection section, first, reference is made to past three reference frames stored in a reference image storage section, integer search is performed on the image data for each macroblock, and a motion prediction vector is detected by this. Based on the detection result of the motion prediction vector, a reference frame most appropriate for execution of motion compensated prediction is determined for each blocks. Next, based on the determination result, it is judged whether or not reference frames regarded as most appropriate for all blocks (nine blocks) are coincident to each other. As a result of the judgment, when the same reference frame is selected for all candidate blocks, only the reference frame regarded as most appropriate is made the object of sub-pel search, and the motion prediction vector is detected with sub-pel pixel accuracy.
US07912118B2
The invention provides a method and device for iterative hybrid time-frequency domain block equalization of signals received via a communication channel subject to multipath interference. The equalization method includes frequency-domain equalization of blocks of received signals in a forward path, and time-domain inter-block echo correction and intra-block cyclic echo addition in the feedback path. The invention can be used for equalizing signals transmitted without cyclic prefix and subjected to multi-path interference with long delay spread.
US07912115B2
A method and system processes reference signals (115) for an uplink channel (103) between a transmitter, such as user equipment, and a receiver such as a base station, in a wireless communication network. A sequence of symbols to be transmitted is converted to a sequence of sub frames. The sequence of sub frames is grouped into groups of sub frames. Each sub frames includes at least two time-adjacent sub frames, and reference signals are inserted in a subset of the sub frames.
US07912113B2
A technique for determining a received signal strength indicator of a target base station at a subscriber station includes performing a discrete Fourier transform on a received signal to provide a transformed signal. In this case, the transformed signal occupies one or more segments of a channel and the one or more segments each include multiple subcarriers. A shift-n cross-correlation is calculated based on the transformed signal and a preamble sequence of the target base station to provide a coarse received signal strength indicator for the target base station.
US07912101B2
A method is provided for controlling second harmonic efficiency of laser beam interactions. A laser system generates two laser beams (e.g., a laser beam with two polarizations) for incidence on a nonlinear crystal having a preferred direction of propagation. Prior to incidence on the crystal, the beams are optically processed based on the crystal's beam separation characteristics to thereby control a position in the crystal along the preferred direction of propagation at which the beams interact.
US07912095B2
A data packet, comprising a preamble and the preamble comprising a plurality of synchronization bits, is received where the preamble may be of either a first preamble type or a second preamble type. Channel estimation is performed using at least a first portion of the plurality of synchronization bits. It is determined whether the preamble is of the first preamble type or of the second preamble type, where the determination overlaps in least in part with the channel estimation. The performance of the channel estimation is controlled such that: in the event it is determined the preamble is of the first preamble type, the performance of the channel estimation continues for a second portion of the plurality of synchronization bits, adjacent to the first portion of the plurality of synchronization bits, after the processing of the first portion of the plurality of synchronization bits; in the event it is determined the preamble is of the second preamble type, the performance of the channel estimation ends after processing the first portion of the plurality of synchronization bits.
US07912093B2
A method and apparatus of providing a piggybacked positive acknowledgement/negative acknowledgement (ACK/NACK) (PAN) field indicator (PANI) and a polling indicator are disclosed. A combined field of a PANI bit, a relative reserved block period (RRBP) bit and an EGPRS supplementary polling (ES/P) field may indicate a polling scheme and a presence of a PAN field. Alternatively, the presence of the PAN field in the data block may be indicated by using a specific training sequence. Alternatively, a forward error correction (FEC) coding may be performed on the data block including the header, and the presence of the PAN field may be indicated by scrambling the encoded bits corresponding the header with a specific scrambling sequence. Alternatively, a header check sequence (HCS) may be generated and the presence of the PAN field is indicated by mixing a predetermined sequence with the HCS.
US07912084B2
The invention relates to a method of transmitting data over a wireless link, comprising the insertion of the data into packets according to a format corresponding to at least certain layers of a first protocol for data transmission over a wireless network, as well as the use of these packets to form a frame in accordance with a second protocol for data transmission over a wireless network, different from the first protocol, and the transmission over the wireless network according to the second protocol. The invention also relates to the apparatus implementing the method.
US07912081B2
Approaches scheduling and allocation of communication bandwidth across a communication channel provide the opportunity for improved network utilization. A network device is configured to allocating its bandwidth utilization within a communication network, wherein bandwidth allocation is governed by a utilization policy. The network device conducts communication activities within the communication network. When the network device deviates from the utilization policy in scheduling or conducting network activities, a penalty can be imposed on the network device for deviating from the utilization policy. Where one or more network conditions exceed predetermined tolerance levels, the offending network device can be required to reallocate its scheduled activities.
US07912064B2
A system for handling out-of-order frames may include one or more processors that enable receiving of an out-of-order frame via a network subsystem. The one or more processors may enable placing data of the out-of-order frame in a host memory, and managing information relating to one or more holes resulting from the out-of-order frame in a receive window. The one or more processors may enable setting a programmable limit with respect to a number of holes allowed in the receive window. The out-of-order frame is received via a TCP offload engine (TOE) of the network subsystem or a TCP-enabled Ethernet controller (TEEC) of the network subsystem. The network subsystem may not store the out-of-order frame on an onboard memory, and may not store one or more missing frames relating to the out-of-order frame. The network subsystem may include a network interface card (NIC).
US07912060B1
In some examples, a protocol accelerator extracts a queue identifier from an incoming packet, for identifying a first buffer queue in which the packet is to be stored for transport layer processing. A packet having an error or condition is identified, such that the accelerator cannot perform the processing on that packet. A processor is interrupted. The identified packet is stored in a second buffer queue. The processor performs transport layer processing in response to the interrupt, while the accelerator continues transport layer processing of packets in the first buffer queue. In some examples, a TCP congestion window size is adjusted. A programmable congestion window increment value is provided. The window size is set to an initial value at the beginning of a TCP data transmission. The window size is increased by the increment value when an acknowledgement is received.
US07912049B2
The disclosed embodiments relate to a system and method for selecting a multicast IP address. More specifically, there is provided a method comprising selecting a first IP address from a plurality of IP addresses, hashing the first IP address to create a first hash value corresponding to the first IP address, determining whether the first hash value corresponds to a second IP address that is in use, and allocating the first IP address if the first hash value does not correspond to the second IP address that is in use.
US07912047B2
Prioritization of fragmented messages in an ORB is achieved by intercepting the flow of message data within the ORB, marking the current data stream location and issuing sufficient read commands to gather the message header and control area information. Then classification for priority can be performed using the data in the control area to classify the request. The classification information is stored for the message for later use by queuing and prioritization processes and the data stream marker is reset to the original location. When the queuing and prioritization processes are ready to dispatch the message, the message can be sent on to the higher levels of processing within the ORB where the higher levels of message processing code will process the message, totally unaware of the fact that the message has been classified and/or queued or prioritized prior to delivery to the higher level.
US07912046B2
The subject invention relates to systems and methods that facilitate direct network communications between peers that operate behind Network Address Translators. In one aspect, a network communications system is provided. The system includes one or more Network Address Translators (NAT) to communicate data across a network between peers. A protocol selection component that automatically selects among a plurality of protocols according to one or more NAT types in order to determine a subset of the protocols that facilitate communications between the peers.
US07912038B2
A system and method for utilizing circuit switched and packet switched resources are disclosed. A voice communication system configured for routing calls from multiple users to circuit switched or packet switched resources generally comprises a hub in communication with at least one circuit switched channel, at least one packet switched channel, and a plurality of user devices. The system further includes a controller operable to select the circuit switched channel or the packet switched channel for connection with one of the user devices when a call is placed to or from the user device and a routing device operable to route the call from the user device to the selected channel.
US07912037B2
A method of providing messaging services for GSM or 3G mobile stations is provided. A gateway detects a mobile network registration from a mobile station, and performs a location area update procedure with previous support nodes from its home public land mobile network. The gateway then receives data for the mobile station from a packet switched radio network and transmits the data for the mobile station through the mobile network.
US07912028B2
In one embodiment, a method for determining whether an encoded message in a shared channel is not intended for a communications device. The method includes: (a) decoding the message to recover a multi-bit codeword; (b) determining whether the codeword is valid or invalid, wherein, if the codeword is determined to be invalid, then the encoded message is not intended for the communications device; and (c) if the codeword is determined to be valid, then performing one or more other steps of the method to determine whether the encoded message in the shared channel is not intended for the communications device.
US07912025B2
A radio modem includes a serial interface adapted for connection to a host device via a wired serial link; a router coupled to the serial interface; a server coupled to the router; and RF transceiver coupled to the router. The router is configured receive data packets from the host device; identify whether an IP address of the packets match an IP address of the server; identify whether a cookie which identifies the predetermined type of protocol is contained in a cookie field of the packets; in response to identifying a mismatch between the IP addresses, or that the cookie is not contained in the cookie field, cause the packets to be routed to a server via the attachment with the cellular network; and in response to identifying a match between the IP addresses, cause the packets to be routed to the server.
US07912022B2
A network having distribution of access point loading includes access points to which mobile stations can associate themselves based upon access point beacon signal levels and loading levels for the various access points. A mobile station receives beacon signals from various access points and determines a signal strength for the received beacon signals. The mobile station also receives access point loading information from the access points. The mobile station associates with an access point based upon the access point beacon signal strengths and the access point loading information.
US07912015B2
In the mobile radio communication system where the UMTS and an another system coexist an idle slot for observing the frequency component of another system is inserted in one superframe of UMTS. The duration of this idle slot is at most half of the duration of one frame that form the superframe and it is inserted at an interval of a specified number of frames. Therefore, the frequency component of the another system can be observed securely from the UMTS. Further, the deterioration of interleaving performance of the compressed mode frames during such observation can be suppressed.
US07912013B2
Embodiments of methods and apparatus for providing a roaming support system are generally described herein. Other embodiments may be described and claimed.
US07912008B2
A mobile communication method includes: a step for transmitting a binding update message for notification of a care-of-address of the network where the mobile network has gone, from a mobile router to a home agent, which can be used after the network has moved; and a step performed upon reception of the binding update message, for notification by the home agent of routing information concerning the route to the mobile network managed by the mobile router to the home network. Thus, the routing information from a mobile node is given to a gateway and the router on the home network without delay after movement, and it is possible to prevent loss of data sent to the mobile node belonging to the network to which the mobile network is connected after the movement.
US07912007B2
The present invention relates to radio communications and discloses a method and apparatus for feeding back and receiving acknowledgment (ACK) information of semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) data packets. The method for feeding back ACK information of SPS data packets includes receiving an uplink downlink assignment index (UL DAI) from a base station (BS), wherein the UL DAI indicates a number (N) of downlink data packets, mapping acknowledgements/negative acknowledgements (ACKs/NAKs) of k SPS data packets of the downlink data packets to positions from the (N−k+1)th ACK/NAK to the Nth ACK/NAK, and feeding back N ACKs/NAKs to the BS.
US07912006B2
A digital broadcast receiving system and a method for controlling the same are disclosed. The method a method for controlling a digital broadcast receiving system includes the steps of receiving a broadcast signal having mobile service data and main service data multiplexed therein, extracting transmission parameter channel (TPC) signaling information and fast information channel (FIC) signaling information from a data group within the received mobile service data, acquiring a program table, by using the IP signaling channel within an ensemble included in the received broadcast signal, and controlling the system to create a list of channels mapped with all ensembles transmitted through at least one physical frequency, by using the acquired program table.
US07912005B2
A method and apparatus for configuring a downlink frame in a communication system is provided. The method and apparatus includes determining a first transmission Protocol Data Unit/Packet Data Unit (PDU) to be transmitted according to a scheduling priority, variably determining an amount of a data burst by calculating a sub-channel axis size of a first sub-region and a number of slots to be allocated in the first sub-region in an accumulated manner when the first PDU is allocated in the first sub-region, determining a size of a MAP region according to an amount of the data burst; setting up the MAP region in a downlink frame region according to the determined size of the MAP region including allocation information of a data burst, and transmitting the data burst over a data burst allocation region set up in a remaining region except for the MAP region in the downlink frame region, wherein the data burst includes at least one PDU having the same Modulation and Coding Scheme (MCS) level, or is a data burst generated by concatenating PDUs of a same Mobile Station (MS), wherein the data burst allocation region includes a non-Hybrid Automatic Retransmit reQuest (non-HARQ) region and HARQ region, the non-HARQ region is used for transmitting non-HARQ data bursts, the HARQ region is used for transmitting non-HARQ data bursts, and the first sub-region is non-HARQ region or HARQ region.
US07911993B2
Method and apparatus for base stations and subscriber units allows soft handoff of a CDMA reverse link utilizing an orthogonal channel structure. Subscriber units transmit an orthogonally coded signal over a reverse link to the base stations. A given base station provides timing control of the timing offset of the reverse link signal. Based on at least one criterion, an alignment controller determines that the given base station should hand off timing control to another base station, and a soft handoff process ensues. In response to a command or message for soft handoff of the subscriber unit from the given base station to another base station, the subscriber unit makes a coarse timing adjustment to the timing of the coded signal. The subscriber unit may make fine timing adjustments based on feedback from the base station controlling timing. Multiple base stations may provide power control feedback to the subscriber unit.
US07911989B2
An information processing system includes a plurality of information processing units wirelessly communicating with each other, each of which includes a distribution data receiving section for receiving distribution data to be distributed to each of the information processing units from an information processing unit that has received the distribution data among the plurality of information processing units, a destination selection section for selecting an information processing unit that has not received the distribution data as a destination information processing unit for the distribution data from among the plurality of information processing units, and a distribution data sending section for sending the distribution data to the information processing unit selected by the destination selection section using a frequency band that is not used by another information processing unit while the other information processing unit is sending the distribution data to still another information processing unit.
US07911980B1
In a communication system using multicasting, multicast packets are forwarded through a switch by destination ports after these ports receive the packets. A source node sends the multicast packet to a subset of nodes within the multicast group, which in turn, forward the multicast packet to other subsets of packets within the multicast group that have yet to receive the information. This is continued until all ports within the multicast group have received the information.
US07911976B2
A system that incorporates teachings of the present disclosure may include, for example, a server in communication with a first network element where the server includes a controller to determine routing values associated with a plurality of second network elements where the second network elements are interfaced with the first network elements where the first network elements and the second network elements utilize Interior Gateway Routing Protocol and where the routing values include at least one of routing algorithm constants, service provider routing identifiers, and size of largest deliverable packets, detect a mismatch among the routing values, determine a target routing value when the mismatch is detected and transmit the target routing value to at least one of the second network elements, where the routing values are adjusted in response to the transmitted routing value to match each other. Other embodiments are disclosed.
US07911975B2
A system and method for monitoring packetized traffic flow in a network and enabling approximation of the rate information of a network flow. The method for monitoring network traffic flow includes receiving, at a network packet flow collector device, packetized traffic flow signals to be monitored; sampling said received packetized traffic flow signals in time to form an approximation of the packet flow rate in time; generating packet flow activity data comprising data representing the sampled traffic flow signals sampled in time; communicating the packet flow activity data to a network packet flow analyzer device and processing the flow activity data to form signals representing an approximate version of the network traffic flow in the network, the analyzer processing the traffic flow signals for reconstructing the rate of the netflow as a function of time. The flow analyzer then generates a compressed version of the network traffic flow signals in the network, the compressed network traffic flow signals comprising relevant approximation of the packet flow rate in time.
US07911958B2
Various example embodiments are disclosed. According to an example embodiment, a method may include receiving a token count units instruction, periodically increasing or decreasing a token count based at least in part on a refresh rate, and in response to receiving a packet, decreasing or increasing the token count based at least in part on a size of the packet and the instruction.
US07911954B2
Apparatus, and an associated method, for a frame-formatted radio communication system. Coordination is provided between MAC and RLP layers of a sending station through use of apparatus embodied at the MAC layer of the sending station. Also, apparatus is provided at a receiving station to reduce the generation of RLP layer NAK during segmented RLP frame retransmissions.
US07911953B1
A method for performing multilink communications may include applying a quality-of-service (QoS) policy to incoming traffic, where the QoS policy operates to identify a first portion and a second portion of the incoming traffic. The method may include fragmenting the first portion of the incoming traffic into a group of fragments. The method may include sequencing the group of fragments and the second portion of the incoming traffic into a sequenced flow, where the sequencing causes the second portion to be interleaved among the group of fragments so that the sequenced flow can be made available to a first link and a second link as multilink traffic, where the first link carries a first portion of the multilink traffic and the second link carries a second portion of the multilink traffic.
US07911943B2
In a mechanism for controlling a communication connection with policy control, after the communication connection with policy control is established in a communication network between a user equipment and service providing network element via a network control element on the basis of an initial packet data protocol context, a modification of the initial packet data protocol context for the communication connection is requested or initiated at the network control element. When the modification is authorized, relevant resources for a modified packet data protocol context usable for signalling traffic and transmission of media stream data are set up.
US07911940B2
A redundancy protection scheme comprises sending a protection packet from the primary network interface to the secondary network interface, the protection packet having a hardware address of the primary network interface as a source address and a hardware address of the secondary network interface as a destination address. The scheme further comprises determining whether the secondary network interface receives the protection packet from the primary network interface, operating the primary and secondary network interface as active and standby network interface in response to the secondary network interface receiving the protection packet, or operating both the primary and secondary network interface as active network interface in response to the secondary network interface not receiving the protection packet, and providing the hardware address of the active secondary network interface to devices coupled thereto.
US07911937B1
A communication network architecture comprises an access tier including access packet switches coupled to users, a backbone tier including hub packet switches coupled to one another, and a transit tier including transit packet switches coupling the access tier to the backbone tier. The access packet switches are coupled to the transit tier by physically diverse access communication trunks. The transit packet switches are coupled to the backbone tier by physically diverse transit communication trunks. OSI layer one protection is disabled between the access tier and the transit tier and is disabled between the transit tier and the backbone tier. OSI layer two protection is enabled between the access tier and the transit tier and is enabled between the transit tier and the backbone tier. In some examples, a control system selects protection schemes for selected communication trunks and directs the network elements to implement the selected protection schemes on the selected communication trunks.
US07911933B2
An optical disk includes a substrate covered with an information recording layer. The information recording layer includes a recording material and a dispersion material dispersed in the recording material. The recording material absorbs recording light for recording information, and then generates heat. As the light refraction index of the recording material changes due to the heat generation, information is recorded on the recording material. The dispersion material has lower absorptance of the recording light and lower thermal conductivity than the recording material, and an external dimension smaller than a diffraction limit of reading light for reading information.
US07911932B2
An optical disk includes a substrate covered with an information recording layer. The information recording layer includes a recording material and an exothermic material dispersed in the recording material. The exothermic material absorbs recording light for recording information, and then generates heat. An external dimension of the exothermic material is smaller than the diffraction limit of reading light for reading information. The recording material has absorptance of a wavelength of the recording light lower than that of the exothermic material. Information is recorded on the recording material as the light refraction index of the recording material changes due to heating.
US07911920B2
An optical pick-up apparatus including an optical source module having a CD optical source and a DVD optical source, a diffracting grating dividing a light beam from the optical source module to at least three divided light beams, a first optical divider changing a path of the divided light beams to an optical disk, a second optical divider reflecting and forwarding the divided light beams reflected from the optical disk in a predetermined ratio, a first optical detector including a single optical sensor receiving reflected light from the second optical divider, and a second optical detector including at least three optical detection sensors receiving forwarded light from the second optical divider. Embodiments of the present invention can provide support for multi-type optical disks with a simple optical structure.
US07911919B2
An information recording/reproducing device irradiates a signal light beam containing arbitrary two-dimensional information and a reference beam emitted from the same light source as the signal light beam to an arbitrary region of a hologram recording medium to record a first hologram. After the first hologram is recorded, the device changes the incident angle of the signal light beam with respect to the hologram recording medium and multiplex-records a second hologram, which is different from the first hologram, in the same region as the region in which the first hologram is recorded by irradiating a signal light beam whose incident angle has been changed and a reference beam substantially the same as the reference beam used when recording the first hologram while the device obtains at least a part of a diffracted beam from the first hologram simultaneously.
US07911914B2
An optical read/write apparatus causes a read/write light beam from illuminating means to strike only one side of an optical storage medium including stacked data storage layers each of which is readable/writeable separately from the other layers. In this case, the optical read/write apparatus operates so that data is read/written from/into a second data storage layer after fully recording a recordable area of a first data storage layer. Thus, light can be shone with uniform intensity across the substantially entire recordable area of the second data storage layer without using a complex read/write system even under such conditions that the transmittance to light of the first data storage layer in the recordable area may vary depending on whether any data is recorded in the recordable area.
US07911904B2
A recording medium, and a method and apparatus for recording and/or reproducing management information on/from the recording medium are discussed. According to an embodiment, the invention provides an apparatus includes components so that the apparatus finalizes the recording medium when receiving request of an external host or when a temporary defect management area located in at least one of a non-data area and a non-user data area becomes full, where a controller is configured to control the components so that the apparatus records the latest defect list information written in the temporary defect management area onto a final defect management area when finalizing the recording medium.
US07911900B2
A write-once optical disc and a method and apparatus for recording management information of the write-once optical disc, are provided. The method includes sequentially recording data in the at least one recording-unit in the direction of increasing address; padding, with padding data, a remaining non-recorded part of a last recording-unit when terminating the sequential recording of the data; and recording padding identification information on the recording medium, the padding identification information identifying which part of the at least one recording-unit is padded.
US07911896B2
An apparatus for reproducing a recording medium having a recorded defect management area. The apparatus includes a pickup reading data from a recording medium and a controller controlling the pickup to read data on the recording medium and determining whether the recording medium contains predetermined data, recorded in response to a finalization command, to prevent recording with respect to the recording medium. The controller determines whether an area of a temporary defect management area not having defect management data includes the predetermined data by checking whether the temporary defect management data is filled with repetitions of a predetermined value.
US07911894B2
A recording medium having a spare area for defect management and the management information of the spare area, a spare area allocation method, and a defect management method. When a primary spare area is allocated for slipping replacement and linear replacement upon initialization, and a remaining portion of the primary spare area after slipping replacement and allocated for linear replacement after initialization are insufficient, a supplementary spare area is allocated.
US07911891B2
The invention provides an apparatus for controlling servo signal gains of an optical disc drive. The apparatus adjusts the gains of a plurality of servo signals controlling a servo system of the optical disc drive according to a closed-loop mode or a state-reloading mode whenever the optical disk drive encounters an operating state transition. In closed-loop mode, at least one AGC loop of the apparatus compensates the gains of the servo signals with a selectable bandwidth during a specific period after the operating state transition to accelerate the convergence of the servo signals. In state-reloading mode, at least one AGC loop of the apparatus reloads the previously saved convergence values or pre-determined values as the initial values according to the current operating state immediately after the operating state transition to accelerate the convergence of the servo signals.
US07911883B2
A near-field light generating element accommodated in a groove of an encasing layer has an outer surface that includes a first end face including a near-field light generating part, a second end face opposite to the first end face, and a coupling portion that couples the first and second end faces. The coupling portion includes a top surface, and first and second side surfaces that decrease in distance from each other with increasing distance from the top surface. The first end face includes a first side located at an end of the first side surface, and a second side located at an end of the second side surface. Each of the first and second sides includes an upper part and a lower part continuous with each other. An angle formed between the respective lower parts of the first and second sides is smaller than that formed between the respective upper parts of the first and second sides.
US07911882B2
A thin-film magnetic head that has a configuration in which the element-formed surface and the opposed-to-medium surface are perpendicular to each other, and a light source is sufficiently distanced from the medium surface is provided. The head comprises at least one near-field-light-generating layer for heating a part of a magnetic medium during write operation by generating a near-field light, having a shape tapered toward a head end surface on the opposed-to-medium surface side, and comprising a near-field-light-generating portion having a light-received surface and a tip reaching the head end surface on the opposed-to-medium surface side, and the light-received surface being sloped in respect to the element-formed surface and being provided in a position where an incident light propagating from a head end surface opposite to the opposed-to-medium surface can reach at least a part of the light-received surface.
US07911872B2
A scheme for defective memory column or row substitution is disclosed which uses a programmable look-up table to store new addresses for column selection when certain column or row addresses are received. The new addresses are loaded into a programmable fuse latch each time an address transition is detected in the input address.
US07911865B2
A temperature sensor generates a digital representation of the temperature of the integrated circuit. A logic circuit reads the digital temperature and generates a multiple bit digital representation of an operational voltage and a multiple bit digital representation of a timing signal, both being functions of the integrated circuit temperature. A voltage generator converts the digital representation of the operational voltage to an analog voltage that biases portions of the integrated circuit requiring temperature compensated voltages. In one embodiment, the temperature compensated voltages bias memory cells. A timing generator converts the multiple bit digital representation of the timing signal to a logic signal.
US07911862B2
A latency control circuit and method thereof and auto-precharge control circuit and method thereof are provided. The example latency control circuit may include a master unit activating at least one master signal based on a reference signal and an internal clock signal and a plurality of slave units receiving the at least one master signal, each of the plurality of slave units receiving a plurality of signals and outputting an output signal based at least in part upon one of the received plurality of signals. The example method of latency control may include receiving at least one master signal, the received at least one master signal activated based on a reference signal and an internal clock signal and receiving a plurality of signals and outputting an output signal based at least in part upon one of the received plurality of signals and latency information. The example auto-precharge control circuit may include a precharge command delay unit generating a plurality of first precharge command delay signals in response to an internal clock signal and a write auto-precharge command signal, at least one bank address delay unit outputting a delayed bank address signal and a precharge main signal generator outputting a precharge main signal to banks based on the delayed bank address signal. The method of performing a precharging operation with the auto-precharge control circuit may include delaying a bank address signal based on a minimum time interval between executed memory commands and outputting a precharge main signal to one or more memory banks based on the delayed bank address signal.
US07911859B2
A delay line includes at least one delay cell, wherein the delay line utilizes at least one of the at least one delay cell to delay an input signal for generating an output signal, and the at least one delay cell is implemented by a Pseudo NMOS transistor. In addition, a memory control circuit includes a delay locked loop (DLL) having at least one delay cell. The delay locked loop utilizes at least one of the at least one delay cell to delay an input signal for generating an output signal, and the at least one delay cell is implemented by a Pseudo NMOS transistor.
US07911851B2
Memory states of a multi-bit memory cell are demarcated by generating read reference signals having levels that constitute boundaries of the memory states. The read reference signals may be dependent upon the levels of programming reference signals used for controlling the programming of the memory cell. The memory cell can thus be programmed without reading out its memory state during the programming process, with programming margins being assured by the dependence of the read reference signals on the programming reference signals. Both sets of reference signals may be generated by reference cells which track variations in the operating characteristics of the memory cell with changes in conditions, such as temperature and system voltages, to enhance the reliability of memory programming and readout.
US07911847B2
A method of programming data in a NAND flash memory device including at least one even bitline and at least one odd bitline, the method including programming N-bit data into first cells coupled to the at least one even bitline or the at least one odd bitline and programming M-bit data into second cells coupled to the other of the at least one even bitline and the at least one odd bitline, where N is a natural number greater than one and M is a natural number greater than N.
US07911842B2
Provided are a memory cell programming method and a semiconductor device which may be capable of simultaneously writing a bit of data and then another bit of the data to a plurality of memory blocks. The memory programming method, in which M bits of data are written to a plurality of memory blocks, may include a data division operation and a data writing operation where M may be a natural number. In the data division operation, the plurality of memory blocks may be divided into a plurality of memory block groups. In the data writing operation, an ith bit of the data may be simultaneously written to two or more memory block groups from among the plurality memory block groups, and then an i+1th bit of the data may be simultaneously written to the two or more memory block groups from among the plurality memory block groups, where i is a natural number less than M.
US07911841B2
A non-volatile memory may include a flag cell array, wherein each flag cell is arranged in the memory cell array interspersed among the plurality of memory cells. The flag cell array may include a plurality of flag cells indicating whether a corresponding row is MSB programmed. The non-volatile memory device performs an algorithm to read out data stored in the memory cell based on whether the memory cells of a row are MSB programmed. When determining whether the corresponding row is MSB programmed, a flag cell that is not normally operated may be replaced by a redundancy flag cell or data of the flag cell that is not normally operated may be excluded. Thus, the reliability in reading out of data and the production yield of the non-volatile memory may be improved.
US07911832B2
A high speed and low power method to control and switch the magnetization direction and/or helicity of a magnetic region in a magnetic device for memory cells using spin polarized electrical current. The magnetic device comprises a reference magnetic layer with a fixed magnetic helicity and/or magnetization direction and a free magnetic layer with a changeable magnetic helicity and/or magnetization direction. The fixed magnetic layer and the free magnetic layer are preferably separated by a non-magnetic layer. The fixed and free magnetic layers may have magnetization directions at a substantially non-zero angle relative to the layer normal. A current can be applied to the device to induce a torque that alters the magnetic state of the device so that it can act as a magnetic memory for writing information. The resistance, which depends on the magnetic state of the device, is measured to read out the information stored in the device.
US07911830B2
Various magnetoresistive memory cells and architectures are included which enable nonvolatile memories having high information density.
US07911821B2
A ferroelectric memory is provided with a voltage generating circuit configured to generate prescribed driving potential, a driving interconnection to which the driving potential is applied, a plurality of memory cells connected to the driving interconnections and an internal voltage comparison circuit configured to compare inputted potential and to output results thereof. A plurality of voltage monitoring interconnections are provided to connect between a portion of the driving interconnection disposed at a position distant from the voltage generating circuit on the substrate and the internal voltage comparison circuit. The internal voltage comparison circuit compares potential inputted through the voltage monitoring interconnection with the driving potential.
US07911819B2
A layout for simultaneously sub-accessible memory modules is disclosed. In one embodiment, a memory module includes a printed circuit board having a plurality of sectors, each sector being electrically isolated from the other sectors and having a multi-layer structure. At least one memory device is attached to each sector, the memory devices being organized into a plurality of memory ranks. A driver is attached to the printed circuit board and is operatively coupled to the memory ranks. The driver is adapted to be coupled to a memory interface of the computer system. Because the sectors are electrically-isolated from adjacent sectors, the memory ranks are either individually or simultaneously, or both individually and simultaneously accessible by the driver so that one or more memory devices on a particular sector may be accessed at one time. In an alternate embodiment, the printed circuit board includes a driver sector electrically isolated from the other sectors and having a multi-layer structure, the driver being attached to the driver sector.
US07911815B2
A primary-side feedback control device for a power converter includes a control unit for generating a pulse signal according to a feedback signal for controlling on and off states of a switching transistor of the power converter, a comparator coupled to an auxiliary winding of a primary side of the power converter for generating at least one control signal according to a voltage on the auxiliary winding and a reference voltage, a sample-and-hold unit coupled to the auxiliary winding, the comparator, and the control unit for generating the feedback signal according to the voltage on the auxiliary winding and the at least one control signal, and a voltage generator coupled to the control unit, the comparator, and the sample-and-hold unit for generating the reference voltage according to the feedback signal.
US07911814B2
A flyback converter includes a controller integrated circuit (IC) housed in an IC package with only three terminals. An inexpensive TO-92 transistor package can be used. A switch terminal is coupled to an inductor switch that is turned on by a switch control signal having a frequency and a pulse width. The inductor switch controls the current that flows through a primary inductor of the flyback converter. The controller IC adjusts the frequency in a constant current mode such that output current remains constant and adjusts the pulse width in a constant voltage mode such that output voltage remains constant. A power terminal receives a feedback signal that is derived from a voltage across an auxiliary inductor of the flyback converter. The feedback signal provides power to the controller IC and is also used to generate the switch control signal. The controller IC is grounded through a ground terminal.
US07911809B2
A switching power supply circuit includes a direct current (DC) power supply input terminal, a first transformer including a first primary winding, a second transformer, and a pulse generating circuit, and a startup circuit. The pulse generating circuit includes first and second first switching units connected in series and two voltage division resistors connected in series between the DC power supply input terminal and ground, and two capacitors connected in parallel with one of the two voltage division resistors. The second transformer includes a second primary winding connected between control terminal and second conducting terminal of the first switching unit, a second secondary winding; and an assistant winding connected between the control terminal of the second switching unit and ground. The second conducting terminal of the first switching unit is grounded via the second secondary winding, the first primary winding and a capacitor in series.
US07911807B2
A display device includes a panel assembly which forms an image, an accommodating member which accommodates the panel assembly, at least one printed circuit board (“PCB”) installed on a back side of the accommodating member, and an electromagnetic wave shielding member disposed between the accommodating member and the PCB, and including a plurality of protrusions.
US07911806B2
A power inverter for a hybrid automotive vehicle having a case with an interior and at least one electrical port mounted on the case to electrically connect electrical signals from the interior of the case to an exterior device. A cable connector is associated with each electrical port while a non-electrical sensing conductor extends serially through each electrical port and its associated cable connector. A circuit is provided which detects a break in the continuity of the sensing conductor and generates a signal representative of that break in continuity. The non-electrical sensing conductor thus minimizes the emission of EMI from the inverter. Additionally, a circuit board is mounted within the interior of the case by fasteners which minimize the spacing between the circuit board and the case to further reduce EMI emissions.
US07911804B2
The present invention provides a circuit board and a method for manufacturing the circuit board, the circuit board and method allowing a further shorter connection distance between electrodes of a semiconductor device, and also allowing a sufficient thickness of a solder pre-coat in a soldering process. The circuit board comprises bonding pads for being connected with bumps of a semiconductor element, which act as connection terminals, the bonding pads being arrayed in parallel lines on a surface of the circuit board, and, on the adjacent parallel lines, the bonding pads being positioned to form a zigzag pattern along the parallel lines longitudinally.
US07911802B2
An interposer including: a substrate including a first layer and second layer, wherein the first layer and second layer are positioned parallel to each other; electrodes each having a concave-convex structure formed on each facing surface of the first layer and second layer of the substrate; a dielectric layer sandwiched between the electrodes which are formed on each facing surface of the first layer and second layer of the substrate; a first conductive part which vertically passes through the first layer of the substrate from a first outer surface of the substrate and is electrically connected to an electrode formed on a surface of the second layer of the substrate that faces the first layer of the substrate; and a second conductive part which vertically passes through the second layer of the substrate from a second outer surface of the substrate and is electrically connected to an electrode formed on a surface of the first layer of the substrate that faces the second layer of the substrate.
US07911799B2
The present invention provides an electronic control unit which is capable of suppressing harmful effects caused by liquid while suppressing increase in the size thereof. The electronic control unit includes an electronic component in which a circuit element coated with an anti-splash agent is implemented, a casing, and a liquid discharge portion. The casing includes a base on which the electronic component is mounted, a cover which is connected to the base in the state where the electronic component is covered with the cover, and a connector which electrically connects the electronic component to the outside. The liquid discharge portion includes a flow passage in which liquid which has intruded into an internal space in the casing formed by the base, the cover and the connector for housing the electronic component flows, and an opening portion which discharges the liquid to the outside of the internal space via the flow passage.
US07911793B2
A liquid submersion cooling system that is suitable for cooling a number of electronic devices in parallel using a plurality of cases connected to a rack system. The system cools heat-generating components in server computers and other devices that use electronic, heat-generating components and are connected in parallel systems. The system includes a housing having an interior space, a dielectric cooling liquid in the interior space, a heat-generating electronic component disposed within the space and submerged in the dielectric cooling liquid. The rack system contains a manifold system to engage and allow liquid transfer for multiple cases and IO connectors to engage electrically with multiple cases/electronic devices. The rack system can be connected to a pump system for pumping the liquid into and out of the rack, to and from external heat exchangers, heat pumps, or other thermal dissipation/recovery devices.
US07911791B2
Various heat sinks, method of use and manufacture thereof are disclosed. In one aspect, a method of providing thermal management for a circuit device is provided. The method includes placing a heat sink in thermal contact with the circuit device wherein the heat sink includes a base member in thermal contact with the circuit device, a first shell coupled to the base member that includes a first inclined internal surface, a lower end and first plurality of orifices at the lower end to enable a fluid to transit the first shell, and at least one additional shell coupled to the base member and nested within the first shell. The at least one additional shell includes a second inclined internal surface and a second plurality of orifices to enable the fluid to transit the at least one additional shell. The fluid is moved through the first shell and the at least one additional shell.
US07911787B2
An electronic assembly includes a casing structure defining an interior space for receiving at least one electronic component, an exterior space isolated from the interior space and a heat dissipating path along which heat generated by the electronic component is expelled from the interior space to the exterior space. The casing structure includes a first casing part and a would-be coupling unit. The first casing part includes an engagement unit having a bottom seat extending into the interior space and defining at least one flow passage along the heat dissipating path and a first coupling member projecting from the bottom seat. The would-be coupling unit includes a second coupling member coupled to the first coupling member within the interior space.
US07911786B2
An electronic apparatus that includes a circuit substrate being installed in a casing. The electronic apparatus has first and second groove portions that are formed on a first surface and a second surface of a heat sink, respectively. The heat sink discharges heat from a heat element on the circuit substrate to the outside of the casing. The electronic apparatus has a through-hole portion that is formed at an intersection point of the first groove portion formed on the first surface of the heat sink and the second groove portion formed on the second surface of the heat sink.
US07911776B2
A disk device includes a disk unit housing a disk-shaped storage medium, a case holding the disk unit, a bracket holding the case, and a guide member guiding sliding movement of the case in and out from the bracket. The disk device also includes spring members on one of the bracket and the case, distributed in the direction of the relative movement. Each of the spring members extends longitudinally in the direction of the movement. Distal ends of the spring members face and press against the other of the bracket and the case. Base portions of the spring members are integral with the one of the bracket and the case. The spring members inhibit lateral vibration of the case by pressing against small projections on the case. Other spring members inhibit vertical vibration of the case by pressing against sliding support rails of the case. A face plate of the case absorbs vibration in the longitudinal direction.
US07911774B2
An electro-optical device is provided which includes an electro-optical panel; and a metal frame configured to accommodate the electro-optical panel therein. The metal frame includes a plurality of side walls and corner portions provided between the side walls. A distal end of at least a portion of at least one of the side walls has a folding portion having a structure that inner surfaces are opposed to each other. At least one of the corner portions adjacent to the side wall having the folding portion has a seamless curved shape.
US07911763B2
The present invention relates to a semiconductor device, and more particularly to a method for forming a metal/insulator/metal (MIM). The method comprises the steps of: forming a metal wiring surrounded by the inter-metal dielectric film; forming a plurality of insulating film on the metal wiring in sequence; and forming a metal barrier film on the insulating film, whereby the insulating film functioning as a buffer film can mitigate the stress between the films.
US07911757B2
A travel outlet device is for connecting between an adapter and a power cable. The travel outlet device includes a case, a PCB and at least one power outlet unit. The case is connected with a power input portion and a power output portion. The PCB has a surge-protected circuit and is disposed inside the case. The PCB is electrically connected with the power input portion and the power output portion. The power outlet unit is disposed with the case and electrically connected with the PCB. Accordingly, the travel outlet device can provide the adapter surge-protected function so that users can get more power outlet units to connect to other electric equipments for convenient use.
US07911756B2
Provided are a low-voltage noise preventing circuit using an abrupt metal-insulator transition (MIT) device which can effectively remove a noise signal with a voltage less than a rated signal voltage. The abrupt MIT device is serially connected to the electrical and/or electronic system to be protected from the noise signal, and is subject to abrupt MIT at a predetermined voltage. Accordingly, low-voltage noise can be effectively removed.
US07911755B2
A circuit that electrically controls power includes at least one power control device and at least one heat extraction device. The at least one extraction device is in thermal contact with the at least one power control device. The heat extraction device is arranged such that it can be clamped to a fixed predefined electric potential and electrically insulated by the at least one power control device.
US07911752B1
An electrostatic discharge (ESD) protection circuit is electrically connected to a core circuit for preventing ESD charges from reaching the core circuit. The ESD protection circuit includes a pad, a pass transistor, a transistor, a capacitor, a resistor, and a delay trigger unit. The pass transistor controls passage of charges from the pad to the core circuit. The transistor sinks ESD charges during an ESD zapping event. The capacitor and the resistor couple voltage at the pad to a control electrode of the transistor for turning on the transistor during the ESD zapping event. The delay trigger unit retards transmission of low voltage to a control electrode of the pass transistor for keeping the pass transistor turned off during the ESD zapping event.
US07911740B2
Apparatus for receiving and positioning a read/write head to a disk in a test apparatus has a deck and a spindle on the deck and on which a disk can be mounted for rotation of the disk. A gripper is provided for holding a head during testing, the gripper being movable over a surface of the deck. A precisor receives a head and accurately aligns the head, the precisor being movable over a surface of the deck. A pick is operable to pick up and place down a head. The precisor is movable to a position where the pick can pick up a head from the precisor and place down a head on the precisor. The gripper is movable to a position where the pick can pick up a head from the gripper and place down a head on the gripper.
US07911736B2
A storage device and method use a head that is fabricated using photolithography, and the head is purposely powered up during a material removal process, such as lapping, so that the head's expansion (that would be formed on being powered up during normal usage in a drive) is planarized. On being cooled to room temperature, the head has a concave shape in a pole tip region, the concavity indicative of a volume occupied by material that formed the head expansion, and that has been removed by planarization. Thereafter, the head is powered up in a storage device and method, so that the head has a surface other than flat but within a predetermined range, and the head supplies a signal through the surface to a recording medium.
US07911734B2
A disc driving motor of the invention includes a base, a hub having a ring-shaped disc receiving face on which a disc is placed, a hydrodynamic bearing rotatably supporting the hub, a motor unit mounted on the base, the motor unit having an outer diameter larger than that of the disc receiving face and applying a rotational force to the hub, and a magnetic shield plate disposed on an axial clearance formed between the disc and the motor unit when the disc is placed on the disc receiving face. The magnetic shield plate has an opposed face opposed to the disc when the disc is placed on the receiving face, the opposed face being inclined toward the disc receiving face.
US07911732B2
A sealed head disk assembly has a base casting for providing attachment points for the major components of the head disk assembly. The base casting has a semi-hermetic seal encompassing an outer perimeter of the base casting and allows the semi-hermetic seal to be juxtaposed to at least one complementary surface on the cover. The cover for enclosing the major components of the head disk assembly has a hermetic seal outside a perimeter of the complementary surface for the semi-hermetic seal thus allowing the hermetic seal to be juxtaposed to at least one complementary surface on the base casting.
US07911730B2
A magnetic head is provided for reading and writing data on a data storage media. A first writer and a first reader write and read data of a first format. A second reader reads data of a second format having different read channels than the first format. A third reader has a width greater than that of the of the first and second readers, and reads data of a third format wider than that of the first and second formats. A tape drive is disclosed with the magnetic head and control circuitry having read channels for each of the readers. A method for fabricating a magnetic head is disclosed by providing first and second bumps each with a reader and writer of a first format, and a third bump with a reader of a second format and a reader of a third format.
US07911721B2
The present invention includes: a taking lens including a lens group; a distance ring that is operated to rotate around the taking lens; an LD roller capable of rotating in conjunction with the rotational operation of the distance ring; a transducer that is in contact with the LD roller and capable of moving around the taking lens relative to the LD roller; and a rotatable frame member that is capable of moving around the taking lens within a predetermined angle range and supports the transducer, upon the distance ring being rotated manually, the rotatable frame member being rotated via the LD roller and the transducer, and upon the transducer being driven by a drive signal, the transducer moving relative to the LD roller, thereby the rotatable frame member being rotated around the taking lens to move a focusing lens in the taking lens to move in an optical axis direction.
US07911718B2
Provided is a lens transfer device including a housing; a coil that is installed on the circumference of the housing; a lens barrel that is installed inside the housing and has a lens group embedded therein; and an actuator that is installed in one side of a direction where the lens barrel is linearly transferred, and of which the shape is recovered by a magnetic field generated through the coil so as to linearly transfer the lens barrel.
US07911714B2
Disclosed is an imaging lens having both high heat resistance that enables the imaging lens to be mounted on a printed circuit board by a reflow mounting method and a high optical performance. The imaging lens includes: a first positive lens group; a second negative lens group; a third positive lens group; and a fourth positive or negative lens group. Each of the first to fourth lens groups includes a parallel plane glass plate and a resin lens that has heat resistance and is arranged on the parallel plane glass plate so as to be integrated with the parallel plane glass plate.
US07911711B1
This invention provides a photographing optical lens assembly including, in order from an object side toward an image side: a first lens element with positive refractive power having a convex object-side surface, a second lens element with negative refractive power having a concave object-side surface and a concave image-side surface, a third lens element with positive refractive power, a fourth lens element with negative refractive power having a convex object-side surface and a concave image-side surface, and at least one of surfaces thereof being aspheric, a plastic fifth lens element having a convex object-side surface and a concave image-side surface with at least one inflection point. An aperture stop is positioned between an imaged object and the third lens element. The photographing optical lens assembly further comprises an electronic sensor on which the object is imaged.
US07911709B2
At least one exemplary embodiment is directed to a detection aperture that varies the effective aperture index of refraction or provides scattering structures to improve the detected resolution and/or intensity of a sampled image. In at least one exemplary embodiment a medium is inserted into the aperture, to match transmittance of polarization through the aperture, and to control the relative transmittance of polarizations through the aperture. In yet another exemplary embodiment structures are provided to scatter or redirect diffracted aperture light to improve detection resolution and/or intensity.
US07911707B2
A zoom lens includes, in order from an object side to an image side, a first lens unit having a negative refractive power, a second lens unit having a positive refractive power, a third lens unit having a negative refractive power, and a fourth lens unit having a positive refractive power. In the zoom lens, an interval between every adjacent ones of the first through fourth lens units varies during zooming, the second lens unit includes at least one negative lens, and the third lens unit includes at least one positive lens. An Abbe number and a relative partial dispersion of a material of the at least one negative lens (νd2N, θgF2N) and an Abbe number and a relative partial dispersion of a material of the at least one positive lens (νd3P, θgF3P) are appropriately set.
US07911691B2
Binoculars include first and second lens barrels. A bridge interconnects the lens barrels. First and second optical systems are accommodated in respectively the lens barrels. First and second focus lenses are included in respectively the first and second optical systems, for focus adjustment by moving in an optical axis direction. An operation barrel is secured to the bridge, and externally rotatable and movable in the optical axis direction between a focus adjusting position and a diopter adjusting position. A focus adjuster with gear teeth and screw threads moves the first and second focus lenses simultaneously in the optical axis direction when the operation barrel is rotated in the focus adjusting position. A diopter adjuster, including gear teeth, an intermediate rod and screw threads, moves the second focus lens in the optical axis direction when the operation barrel is rotated in the diopter adjusting position.
US07911681B2
A display system is built up of at least one display cell comprising an assembly which has at least a first electrode and a second electrode and in which there are mutually non-miscible first and second liquids filled, wherein either one of the first and second electrodes is electrically insulated from the first and second liquids, the first liquid has electrical conductivity or polarity, and voltage is applied to one or both of the first and second electrodes, whereby the first liquid and the second liquid can vary in position to produce a display. Even after an applied voltage is shut off at a position to which the first and second liquids have migrated, the positions of the first and second liquids that have migrated are retained to keep memory capability going on.
US07911676B2
Provided is a photochromic optical articleincluding: (a) an optical substrate; (b) a thermally reversible photochromic material; and (c) reversible thermochromic material capable of at least partially filtering UV/visible light at or below room temperature and becoming less capable of filtering UV/visible light at temperatures greater than room temperature.
US07911674B2
Varying the optical absorption of an electrochromic device in situ allows optimal control over the depth and quality of laser patterning lines when patterning electrochromic devices. Accordingly, an electrochromic device comprises a target conductive layer, an absorbing electrochromic layer formed below the target layer, and an electrolyte layer formed below the absorbing electrochromic layer. The absorbing electrochromic layer is placed in a darkened state, and the target layer is laser ablated using a wavelength that is minimally absorbed in the target layer and a fluence level that does not ablate layers of the electrochromic device that are below the absorbing electrochromic layer. The absorbing electrochromic layer is placed in the darkened state by applying a predetermined control voltage to the electrochromic device, forming the electrochromic device by dark-state deposition, or forming an electrochromic device that is in its darkened state in an equilibrium state.
US07911672B2
A micro-electro-mechanical-system (MEMS) micromirror for use in high fill factor arrays which includes at least one stationary body and a movable body. The movable body has opposed ends and is secured to the stationary body at each of the opposed ends by a resilient primary axis pivot. A mirror support is supported by and movable with the movable body. The mirror support has a first unfettered side and a second unfettered side. A primary axis actuator is provided including a fixed portion connected to the stationary body, and a movable portion corrected to the movable body. The movable portion is adapted to move away from the fixed portion in response to an electrical potential difference between the fixed portion and the movable portion, such that the movable body rotates about the primary axis resilient pivot. A mirror is supported by the mirror support.
US07911661B2
There is provided an image reading device, which comprises an illumination unit configured to diffuse light from light sources in a predetermined scanning direction to illuminate an object with diffused light, a reading unit having photoreceptors aligned in the predetermined scanning direction to receive light reflected from the object, a detection unit configured to detect lighting status of the light sources; and a controller that obtains an image of the object by using a normal one of the light sources as a main light source if at least one of the light sources is in an abnormal state.
US07911651B2
To improve the rendering of a printing, a halftone rendering method is applied. This method optimally comprises a step for the adaptive tiling of the image. This tiling is based on a subdivision of the image by self-similar structures. These subdivisions are locally limited by the local intensity of the image. These local limitations make the tiling adaptive. The result of this tiling is a cloud of sampling structures, each of these structures being associated with a pixel of the image and a label produced during the tiling. The intensity of the pixel, and the label, enable the reading, in a table of correction vectors, of a correction vector corresponding to a shift to be applied to the pixel before it is printed. The table of the correction vectors is pre-computed in using a relaxation algorithm.
US07911648B2
A printer operates under a first set of conditions to create a first set of M of samples and under a target set of conditions to create a second set of K samples. Each sample is produced using the same colorant(s). The actual spectral reflectance for each sample is measured. The actual reflectances for corresponding samples in the first and second sets are used to create a cross-validated, partial-least-squares transform that maps a reflectance from a sample produced under the first set of conditions to a reflectance from a sample produced under the target set of conditions.The transform and reflectances produce a set of predicted reflectances, each representing a sample producible under the target set of conditions using one colorant. The predicted reflectances and the colorant(s) are used to generate a table predicting a color value when the printer operates under the target set of conditions.
US07911625B2
Techniques, systems, and computer program products that facilitate image printing. A technique may include receiving an image to be printed, using a first software component to selectively pre-process the image depending on a format of the image, and using a second software component to generate image queues from the pre-processed image. In that technique, each image queue includes at least one portion of image data associated with an association of print elements that corresponds to a configuration of print elements at a printing device. The technique may be implemented in a scalable system, by having multiple first software components and multiple second software components, where each of the first and/or second components can reside on a separate computer system.
US07911621B2
Exemplary embodiments of an apparatus are provided. For example, the exemplary apparatus can include at least one first arrangement providing at least one first electro-magnetic radiation to a sample, at least one second electro-magnetic radiation to a first reference and at least one third electro-magnetic radiation to a second reference. A frequency of radiation provided by the first arrangement generally varies over time. The exemplary apparatus may also include at least one second arrangement which is configured to detect a first interference between at least one fourth electro-magnetic radiation associated with the first electro-magnetic radiation and at least one fifth electro-magnetic radiation associated with the second radiation. The second arrangement is also configured to detect a second interference between at least one sixth electro-magnetic radiation associated with the first electro-magnetic radiation and at least one seventh electro-magnetic radiation associated with the third radiation.
US07911620B2
An optical sensor includes an optical coupler. The optical sensor further includes a photonic bandgap fiber having a hollow core and an inner cladding generally surrounding the core. The photonic bandgap fiber is in optical communication with the optical coupler. Light signals counterpropagate through the photonic bandgap fiber and return to the optical coupler. The photonic bandgap fiber has a phase thermal constant S less than 8 parts-per-million per degree Celsius.
US07911612B2
An overlay target on a substrate is disclosed, the overlay target including a periodic array of structures wherein every nth structure is different from the rest of the structures. The periodic array is desirably made of two interlaced gratings, one of the gratings having a different pitch from the other grating in order to create an asymmetry in the array. This asymmetry can then be measured by measuring the diffraction spectra of radiation reflected from the overlay target. Variation in the asymmetry indicates the presence of an overlay error in layers on the substrate, where overlay targets are printed on subsequent layers.
US07911611B2
An optical system of an atomic oscillator that regulates an oscillation frequency by using an optical absorption property by one of a double resonance method utilizing light and micro waves and a coherent population trapping (CPT) method utilizing a quantum interference effect produced by two kinds of resonance light, includes: a light source emitting the resonance light; a gas cell disposed at an emitting side of the light source, sealing a gaseous metal atom therein and transmitting the resonance light through a metal atom gas; a light detecting unit detecting the transmitted light that is transmitted through the metal atom gas; and a fluorescence blocking unit blocking at least a part of fluorescence, which is emitted from the metal atom gas to the light detecting unit, and disposed between the metal atom gas and the light detecting unit.
US07911601B2
A method and apparatus for inspecting defects includes emitting an ultraviolet light from an ultraviolet light source, illuminating a specimen with the ultraviolet light in which a polarization condition of the ultraviolet light is controlled, controlling a polarization condition of light reflected from the specimen which is illuminated by the polarization condition controlled ultraviolet light, detecting the light reflected from the specimen, processing the detected light so as to detect defects, and outputting information about the defects. The ultraviolet light source is disposed in a clean environment supplied with clean gas and separated from outside.
US07911590B2
The invention relates to a method for measuring the speed of a particle such as a red blood cell moving inside a flow such as a flow of the blood, using a light scanning microscope. The inventive method comprises the following steps: acquisition of an image by x and y light scanning on a plane containing the object; detection on the plane (x, y) of a mark on the plane (x, y); estimation of the speed vg of the object from the gradient thus determined.
US07911580B2
Methods of and equipment for converting existing standard motion picture theatres to one having highly immersive, large fields of view are addressed. Aspects of the methods including moving motion picture screens closer to the audience and employing different projection equipment to avoid or minimize appearance of unrealistic or non-natural image artifacts. Alternative sound systems too are detailed.
US07911579B2
This invention discloses a photo spacer material arrangement method. The method is used for a flat display apparatus that comprises at least one photo spacer, a panel, and a substrate. The photo spacer material provides a fixed distance between the panel and the substrate. The photo spacer material arrangement method comprises providing an area unit composed of N×N sub-area units with multiple columns and multiple rows. In order to provide P photo spacers for uniform distributing on sub-area units with an arrangement mode, there is only one photo spacer in each column, and there is only one photo spacer in each row in sub-area units.
US07911574B2
In a display device forming a board for mounting a connector which allows inputting of video data thereon and a board for mounting a display control circuit to be connected to the connector thereon on a surface of a display module opposite to an observation side, the board for mounting the connector thereon and the board for mounting the display control circuit thereon are physically separated from each other and, further, an area of the board for mounting the display control circuit thereon is set smaller than an area of the board for mounting the connector thereon.
US07911567B2
A reflective liquid crystal display (LCD) is provided for efficiently preventing white coordinates from being yellowish. The LCD includes a substrate having red color filters, green color filters, and blue color filters. The blue color filters have an overall area smaller than that of the red color filters and the green color filters while blocking green light better than the red color filters and blocking red light better than the green color filters.
US07911561B2
A display apparatus includes a main display panel and a sub-display panel. The main display panel includes a first main display substrate and a second main display substrate disposed opposite the first main display substrate to overlap the first main display substrate. The sub-display panel includes a first sub-display substrate and a second sub-display substrate disposed opposite the first sub-display substrate to overlap the first sub-display substrate. The first main display substrate includes a first alignment mark and a second alignment mark, the second main display substrate includes a third alignment mark corresponding to the second alignment mark, the first sub-display substrate includes a fourth alignment mark, and the second sub-display substrate includes a fifth alignment mark corresponding to the fourth alignment mark and a sixth alignment mark corresponding to the first alignment mark.
US07911557B2
The present invention relates to a liquid crystal display panel with improved image contrast comprising an array of pixel regions and a sequence of a recycling backlight structure comprising broadband rear interference polar (RI-Polar) having a transmission axis AB with preset orientation, a spatial intensity modulation structure comprising a broadband front interference polar (FI-Polar) having a transmission axis approximately parallel to the transmission axis AB, a spectral filtering structure, and antireflection means. Each said pixel region spatially encompasses a plurality of subpixel regions. The RI-Polar and FI-Polar are multilayer structures of stacked layers. At least one layer of each structure is optically anisotropic, made by means of Cascade Crystallization Process and characterized by a globally ordered biaxial crystalline structure with an intermolecular spacing of 3.4±0.3 Å in the direction approximately parallel to the transmission axis AB. Said layer is transparent in the wavelength band of visible light, and is formed by rodlike supramolecules, which represent at least one polycyclic organic compound with a conjugated π-system and ionogenic groups.
US07911556B2
A backlight module having replaceable lamp module is provided. The backlight module includes a replaceable lamp module, a light-guiding plate, a frame and a positioning and protecting mechanism. The light-guiding plate is disposed over the bottom surface among four sides of the frame, wherein one side of the light-guiding plate and a corresponding side of the frame form a sliding groove. The replaceable lamp module is set in the sliding groove and slidably along the sliding groove. The positioning and protecting mechanism comprises a protecting device set on the replaceable lamp module and a positioning device set on the frame. The protecting device is capable of forming a gap between the replaceable lamp module and the bottom of the sliding groove in order to protect the replaceable lamp module from scraped by the structures of the backlight module while the replaceable lamp module is inserting into the sliding groove. The protecting device and the positioning device are capable of positioning and holding the replaceable lamp module in the sliding groove while the replaceable lamp module reaches the predetermined position in the backlight module, and meantime the gap is disappeared.
US07911528B2
At least one exemplary embodiment is directed to an image pickup apparatus that has an external sensor for detecting brightness separately from an image sensor for obtaining an image pickup signal and controls the insertion and removal of a filter into and from an image pickup optical system in accordance with the brightness of the subject, using brightness information obtained from the external sensor and the image pickup signal.
US07911519B2
A solid-state image pickup device includes a pixel array including pixels arranged in a matrix, a pixel signal readout unit, and a timing control unit for controlling processing of the pixel signal readout unit by using a timing signal. The pixel signal readout unit includes: a plurality of comparators for comparing a readout signal potential with a reference voltage to generate a determination signal and outputting the determination signal, and a plurality of counters. Each counter counts a comparison time of each corresponding one of the comparators. The timing control unit (a) divides a predetermined processing period into at least a first-time readout period, a first comparison period, a second-time readout period, and a second-time comparison period, (b) classifies the periods into two periods, and (c) generates a timing signal of processing of each divided period by counting for each divided period in the counter.
US07911517B1
A charge-coupled-device (CCD) camera system for detecting near-infrared (NIR) wavelengths, involving (a) a color CCD camera having a multitude of channels including red and near-infrared responsive channels, green responsive channels, and blue responsive channels, and (b) filter means which allow near-infrared light to pass and which block red light; wherein the CCD camera system does not include filter means which block near-infrared light.
US07911512B2
An image sensor has an array of pixels. Each column has a first and a second column line connected to a read-reset amplifier/comparator which acts in a first mode as a unity gain buffer amplifier to reset the pixels via the first lines, and in a second mode acts as a comparator and AD converter to produce digitized reset and signal values. The reset and signal values are read out a line at a time in interleaved fashion. Reset values are stored in a memory and subsequently subtracted from the corresponding signal values. The arrangement reduces both fixed pattern and kT/C noise.
US07911501B2
Systems and methods include optics having one or more phase modifying elements that modify wavefront phase to introduce image attributes into an optical image. A detector converts the optical image to electronic data while maintaining the image attributes. A signal processor subdivides the electronic data into one or more data sets, classifies the data sets, and independently processes the data sets to form processed electronic data. The processing may optionally be nonlinear. Other imaging systems and methods include optics having one or more phase modifying elements that modify wavefront phase to form an optical image. A detector generates electronic data having one or more image attributes that are dependent on characteristics of the phase modifying elements and/or the detector. A signal processor subdivides the electronic data into one or more data sets, classifies the data sets and independently processes the data sets to form processed electronic data.
US07911498B2
Disclosed is a digital signal processing architecture for a flat panel display having non-uniform regions, which is not by means of materials, optical films or fabrication processes. Therefore, the manufacturing cost and complexity of the flat panel display are not negatively affected. In the digital signal processing architecture, a test is performed on the panel for identifying all pixel locations in non-uniform regions and non-uniform types. Then, input video signals are compared with data about the relative non-uniform regions for determining whether the video signal falls in a normal-region pixel or a non-uniform region pixel. Then the non-uniform compensation on the video signal falling in the non-uniform region pixel is based on the non-uniform type, so that the video signals displayed on the panel are not negatively affected.
US07911496B2
According to an aspect of the invention, since two range images (first and second range images) are individually generated by a first range image generating device and a second range image generating device by different methods, and one range image (a third range image) is generated on the basis of those range images, highly accurate range images are generated. Furthermore, as the first range image generating device and the second range image generating device commonly use image sensors, the increase in hardware size and in cost due to the use of two devices for generating range images can be restrained.
US07911490B2
A printer comprises a transfer assembly 56 for transferring a print image formed on an intermediate transfer sheet 42 to a print surface of a print medium 100, a print tray 12 on which the print medium 100 is placed, and a retaining roller 70 installed slightly downstream of the transfer assembly 56. The retaining roller 70 which is biased downward pushes the print medium 100 from above, to thereby prevent the print medium 100 from being lifted up.
US07911489B2
A thermal print head A includes a substrate 1, a heat generating resistor 3 supported by the substrate 1, and a protective layer 4 which covers the heat generating resistor 3. The protective layer 4 includes a first inner layer 41 which is in contact with the heat generating resistor 3, a second inner layer 42 formed on the first inner layer 41, and an outer layer 43. Part of the second inner layer 42 is formed as a rough surface 42a which has a surface roughness of Ra 0.1 through 0.3. The rough surface 42a is disposed at a position corresponding to the heat generating resistor 3. The outer layer 43 is made of a metal nitride or a chemical compound containing a metal nitride, and has a thickness of 0.1 through 0.5 μm.
US07911481B1
Disclosed are various approaches for allowing the selection of graphical objects in a graphical user interface. In one embodiment, selection overlays are generated for each of a plurality of graphical objects. The selection overlays are sorted into layers over the layers of the graphical objects, with the sorting based in part of a characteristic of the associated graphical objects other than the layers to which those objects are assigned. The plurality of objects and the selections overlays (which may be transparent) are displayed. In response to user input (e.g., mouse click or mouse motion) relative to a screen region associated with one selection overlay, the state of the overlay and the associated graphical object are updated and displayed accordingly.
US07911480B2
Provided is a system for compressing multiple-sample-anti-aliasing (MSAA) tile data in a computer graphics pipeline. The system includes a plurality of pixels configured as a tile, where the tile has a plurality of samples of descriptor data for the pixels. Multiple graphics data processing units configured to receive the plurality of samples contain a plurality of coverage masks, which correspond to covered subtiles and compression logic encodes the tile descriptor data for receipt by a buffer.
US07911479B2
A mapping technique is disclosed that maps color image data of an image displayed on a first image display device to output color image data for display on a second image display device. This mapping technique maps the color gamut of the first image display device to the color gamut of the second image display device while controlling one or more characteristics of the color image data, and generates one or more lookup tables that correspond to the gamut mapping, for example. The color image data is then mapped to the output color image data based on the lookup tables.
US07911478B2
A display device includes a wavelet transform unit for transforming an original image into wavelet coefficients using a Harr wavelet transform formula, a level obtaining unit for obtaining a mipmap level of a mipmap image. The display device also includes an inverse wavelet transform unit for receiving and subjecting at least a portion of the wavelet coefficients obtained by the transformation by the wavelet transform unit, to an inverse transform using an inverse Harr wavelet transform formula until an order having a value equal to the mipmap level is obtained, and outputting an image represented by at least a portion of a low-frequency component of wavelet coefficients having the order having the value equal to the mipmap level. Additionally, the display device includes a polygon drawing unit for drawing the image output by the inverse wavelet transform unit, as a mipmap image, on the polygon image.
US07911469B1
Methods and an apparatus allow animators to control the extent by which scripted character motions affect simulated objects' motions. The simulated objects are connected to the character or non-simulated object, such as clothing or hair, and the motion of the simulated objects is simulated based on the motion of the character or non-simulated object. Pose-based collision flypapering is employed to yield the proper behavior of simulated objects when those objects are pinched by surface regions of the character and/or other collision objects. In response to the pinching, a surface region is selected from the surface regions causing the pinching. Motion and position of the simulated object may be constrained to the selected surface region.
US07911463B2
A method according to one embodiment may include generating, by a controller, a plurality of control signals to control operations of inverter circuitry to generate an AC signal from a DC signal. The method of this embodiment may also include using the control signals generated by the controller to also control operations of power factor correction (PFC) circuitry, via the inverter circuitry, to enable the PFC circuitry to generate power factor correction of an input source coupled to the PFC circuitry and the inverter circuitry. Of course, many alternatives, variations, and modifications are possible without departing from this embodiment.
US07911462B2
A soft-start high driving method and device to drive display panels are provided. The driving method includes the following steps. First, a display signal is provided for driving a display panel and displaying images. If no predetermined event happens, then, a high-driving mode is used for dynamically adjusting the driving capacity of the display signal. Finally, if a predetermined event happens, the soft-start high-driving mode is performed to dynamically adjust the driving capacity of the display signal.
US07911457B2
Apparatus and method for handwriting recognition including a hand-held device including at least one accelerometer providing an acceleration indicating output, computation circuitry receiving the acceleration indicating output and providing a velocity indicating output and a handwritten multiple character recognizer receiving the velocity indicating output and providing a multiple character recognition output indication.
US07911456B2
A method of generating a signal comprising providing a capacitive touch sensor pad including a matrix of X and Y conductors, developing capacitance profiles in one of an X direction and a Y direction from the matrix of X and Y conductors, determining an occurrence of a single gesture through an examination of the capacitance profiles, the single gesture including an application of at least two objects on the capacitive touch sensor pad, and generating a signal indicating the occurrence of the single gesture.
US07911455B2
There are provided a design sheet attached to the surface of an upper electrode film of a touch panel such that the design sheet is protruded at its periphery from the touch panel and a touch-panel-unit casing which is integrally molded with the design sheet such that the casing is covered at its surface with the design sheet and surrounds the side surfaces of the touch panel.
US07911454B2
An information processing apparatus includes a casing, an operation surface disposed at a predetermined location of the casing and being operable from outside the casing, a first sense unit disposed under the operation surface to electrically detect contact on the operation surface, and a second sense unit disposed under the operation surface and the first sense unit to detect a position of an external position pointing device with respect to the operation surface based on electromagnetic interaction generated between said second sense unit and said external position pointing device, and an auxiliary conductor disposed between the first sense unit and the second sense unit, the auxiliary conductor including a flat surface portion and a slit portion extending from one end of said flat surface portion to an inside of the flat surface portion.
US07911450B2
An improved input apparatus and method of enabling input improve handheld electronic devices having a housing and a processor apparatus disposed on the housing. The processor apparatus comprises a processor and a memory. The input apparatus includes an input assembly with an input device for providing input to the processor, a plurality of input members, and at least a first actuating element movable between a first position and a second position. In the second position, the actuating element actuates the input device. Each input member of the portion of input members is movable among an unactuated position and an actuated position. Each of a plurality of input members of the portion of input members, in the actuated position, is engageable with the actuating element to move it toward the second position. The input apparatus enables close arrangement of the input members to provide, for example, a compact keyboard layout.
US07911447B2
An information processing device includes: detection means for detecting an area having motion from a mirror moving picture from a player; control means for creating a computer image containing an object too be moved; and display control means for causing a display device to display a superimposed moving image obtained by superimposing the mirror moving picture and the computer image. The control means sets a plurality of areas to be detected for the object to be moved and controls the movement mode of the object according to the detection result of the motion of the mirror moving picture in the area corresponding to the respective areas to be detected. Thus, in the information processing system using a player image acquired by a camera as the input interface, it is possible to improve the game entertainment.
US07911445B2
A display system for a handheld computing device is disclosed. The display system includes a processing unit having a first communication port, and a visual display unit separable from the processing unit. The visual display unit further includes a visual display, and a second communication port. The display unit can be expanded from an initial or storage state to present a larger visual display size. Further, the first communication port providing communication with the second communication port.
US07911438B2
The invention relates to an area lighting device using an LED as a light source and a liquid crystals display having the same. An object is to provide an area lighting device which can provide stable display quality and a liquid crystal display device having the same. An area lighting device is configured to have a light source part provided with a plurality of LEDs; a dummy liquid crystal panel which has a pair of substrates and a liquid crystal layer encapsulated between the substrates, and to which light from the light source part partially enters; a chromaticity sensor which senses a chromaticity of light transmitted through the dummy liquid crystal panel; and an LED control part which compares the sensed chromaticity with a set target value, and controls the plurality of the LEDs so that the chromaticity becomes close to the target value.
US07911428B2
Embodiments include methods and devices for controlling the spectral profile and color gamut of light produced by an interferometric display. Such devices include illuminating a display with selected wavelengths of light. Embodiments also include a display comprising separate sections that output different predetermined colors of light. Other embodiments include methods of making the aforementioned devices.
US07911420B2
A plasma display apparatus comprises a plasma display panel and a scan driver. The plasma display panel comprising a first scan electrode, a second scan electrode, and a sustain electrode. The scan driver supplies the first scan electrode with a first scan signal, supplies the first scan electrode and the second electrode with a first signal for emitting light, and then supplies the second scan electrode with a second scan signal that falls down from a scan reference voltage, and supplies the first scan electrode with a voltage that is different from the scan reference voltage while the second scan signal is supplied.
US07911409B1
Systems and techniques to display an electronic document to multiple display devices simultaneously. In general, in one implementation, the technique includes: identifying, by a software application in a computing system, display characteristics of multiple display devices, and generating, by the software application in the computing system, simultaneous independent views of an electronic document on the display devices by separately rendering the electronic document to each of the display devices based on the identified display characteristics of the device. A system can include one or more peripheral display devices, and a data processing system including a primary display device and a software application that generates simultaneous independent views of an electronic document on the display devices based on display characteristics of the display device as identified by the software application.
US07911400B2
Antenna and satellite communications assemblies and associated satellite tracking systems that may include a low profile two-way antenna arrangement, tracking systems, and applications thereof. Applications for the system include military, civilian, and domestic emergency response applications. The antenna arrangements may be configured to form a spatial multi-element array able to track a satellite in an elevation plane by electronically dynamically targeting the antenna arrangement and/or mechanically dynamically rotating the antenna arrangements about transverse axes giving rise to generation of respective elevation angles and dynamically changing the respective distances between the axes whilst maintaining a predefined relationship between said distances and the respective elevation angles. The system provides autonomous dynamic tracking of satellite signals and can be used for satellite communications on moving vehicles in a variety of frequency bands for military and civilian applications.
US07911382B2
A system and method for exchanging location assistance information between electronic devices using a near field communication (NFC) interface. Positioning satellite signals are received from one or more position satellites. Location assistance information is generated based at least in part on the received positioning satellite signals and/or navigation information. The location assistance information is transferred through a near field communication interface from the first electronic device to another electronic device, wherein the location assistance information includes one or more contemporaneous positioning satellite signals received by the first electronic device.
US07911381B2
Method and apparatus to implement a “virtual” real-time clock at a terminal based on time information from multiple communication systems. At least one system (e.g., GPS) provides “absolute” time information for the virtual real-time clock, and at least one other system (e.g., a cellular system) provides “relative” time information. The virtual real-time clock is “time-stamped” with absolute time as it becomes available from the first system. Relative time (which may be received from multiple asynchronous transmitters) is mapped to the timeline of the virtual real-time clock as it is received from the second system. Absolute time at any arbitrary time instant on the timeline may then be estimated based on the absolute time from the first system and the relative time from the second system. Absolute times from the first system for two or more time instants may also be used to calibrate the relative time from the second system.
US07911377B2
A method for obtaining a precise tracking frequency of a global positioning system (GPS) signal is described, which includes the following steps. A plurality of data from a satellite is continuously received. Each data has a tracking frequency. A plurality of phase differences of the received data is calculated. A phase difference average of the obtained phase differences is calculated. A frequency difference is calculated by the calculated phase difference average and a constant frequency parameter. A new tracking frequency is calculated by the frequency difference and a tracking frequency of the last data among the plurality of received data. A next data is received by the calculated new tracking frequency. A new tracking frequency is obtained by repeatedly calculating the average phase differences of the plurality of data received from the satellite and a constant frequency parameter, so as to obtain the most precise tracking frequency.
US07911376B2
Antenna arrays are calibrated by providing one or more test signals from the antenna array to be calibrated to a receiving sensor while varying ambient operating conditions over some predetermined range of ambient operating conditions. The signal properties of these test signals may be measured by the receiving sensor or associated spectrum analyzer, and the ambient operating conditions under which the test signals are provided may be similarly measured. Thereafter, signal offsets for each of the antenna array's elements may be determined as a function of the measured ambient operating condition. Calibration information corresponding to these signal offsets may then be stored in a memory of the antenna array for use during operation of the antenna array. This calibration information may be in the form of a lookup table or a curve-fitting equation.
US07911375B2
Systems and methods for Doppler beam sharpening in a radar altimeter are provided. In one embodiment, a method comprises receiving a return signal at a radar altimeter receiver and applying a first gate to the return signal to select at least a first component of the return signal. Spectral analysis is performed on the first component of the return signal to generate a plurality of frequency bins, wherein each frequency bin is centered around a different frequency across a Doppler shift frequency spectrum for the first component of the return signal. The method further comprises tracking the first component of the return signal, selecting a first frequency bin of the plurality of frequency bins based on the Doppler shift frequency of the first component of the return signal, and outputting a portion of the first component of the return signal falling within the first frequency bin for further processing.
US07911371B2
Systems and methods are provided for extracting relative signal parameters representing two closely spaced targets from monopulse scan data. A maximum quadrature angle value from the scan data is compared with a threshold quadrature value representing a noise level. A linear polynomial model is utilized if the maximum quadrature angle exceeds the threshold value. The linear polynomial model fits a function of the azimuth angle values and quadrature angle values to a linear function of an exponential parameter derived from the boresight angles to produce polynomial coefficients and determines the relative signal parameters from the polynomial coefficients. A cubic polynomial model is utilized if the maximum quadrature angle fails to exceed the threshold value. The cubic polynomial model fits azimuth angle values to a cubic function of corresponding boresight angles to produce a set of polynomial coefficients and determines the relative signal parameters from the set of polynomial coefficients.
US07911365B2
An analog-to-digital converter (ADC) is provided. The ADC includes a reference voltage generator configured to generate reference voltages, an analog to digital converter core configured to receive an input signal and the reference voltages and to generate a digital signal representative of the input signal, the digital signal having a number of bits, and a controller configured to determine a quality of the input signal, and, based on a quality of the input signal, to control the number of bits of the digital signal and values of the reference voltages.
US07911364B1
A plurality of “local” interleavers replaces a single global interleaver for processing encoded data. If the encoded data may be represented as a matrix of data blocks, or “circulants,” each local interleaver can be the size of one or a small number of circulants. Thus, for example, if the matrix has a certain number of rows and columns, the number of local interleavers may be equal to the number of columns. Each local interleaver is small so latency is low.
US07911359B2
A light management system having networked intelligent luminaire managers. A plurality of networked luminaire managers, each collocated with a respective luminaire, monitor the status of their respective luminaires. The luminaire managers include transmitters for transmitting status information about their respective luminaires and third-party devices to a network server. The network server forwards the received status information from the networked luminaire managers to a computer of an owner/operator of the plurality of luminaires and/or a third-party user. The luminaire managers communicate with each other, whereby they form a network.
US07911356B2
A rain sensor is provided for fastening on an inner side of a windscreen of a motor vehicle. The rain sensor includes a holding frame for fastening to the inner side of the windscreen, a sensor element, a housing part for housing the sensor element such that the sensor element is arranged in the housing part, and a holding device for engaging the holding frame, the holding device being fastened to the housing part, wherein the holding device is brought into engagement with the holding frame in a pre-mounted state, and the holding device presses the housing part with the sensor element onto the windscreen in a final mounted state.
US07911353B2
The patent discloses a method of verifying that a dialysis machine audio alarm has been sounded. The method senses a waveform of electric power, such as a waveform of the current or voltage that drives a speaker. When the speaker produces sound, power consumption changes the waveform in a manner that is detectable by electrical and electronic sensors. The amplitude envelope and frequency or period of the waveform is specific to the electrical and mechanical characteristics of the speaker. The waveform may be detected by a current-sensing resistor in series with the speaker power source, by a non-contact current transformer or hall-effect sensor, or may be sampled by an ADC. A computer program then compares this resulting signal to an expected signal or waveform and verify the speaker is working. If the speaker is not working, the machine sends a visual alarm or places itself in a safe state.
US07911347B2
A housing for mounting an identification tag to a shopping carrier is disclosed. An example housing includes a base for mounting the housing to the shopping carrier and a guard cover for protecting the identification tag. The guard cover includes a plurality of sidewalls extending from the base plate and a top wall extending between the sidewalls, the sidewalls and the top wall bounding an interior having an opening. The identification tag is mounted at least partially inside the interior of the guard cover.
US07911340B2
A network device includes a processor configured to i) assign status information indicative of the network device to a plurality of classes, wherein each of the plurality of classes is associated with a different characteristic of the network device, and ii) combine the status information in the plurality of classes into at least one group of status information in response to user inputs. A display includes a plurality of individually controllable light emitters. The light emitters are configured to display at least one group of status information based on the user inputs. The processor is configured to provide at least one group of status information to the display.
US07911316B2
A sensor array for a pressure transducer having a diaphragm with an active region, and capable of deflecting when a force is applied to the diaphragm. The sensor array disposed on a single substrate, the substrate secured to the diaphragm. The sensor array having a first outer sensor near an edge of the diaphragm at a first location and on the active region, a second outer sensor near an edge of the diaphragm at a second location and on the active region, and at least one center sensor substantially overlying a center of the diaphragm. The sensors connected in a bridge array to provide an output voltage proportional to the force applied to the diaphragm. The sensors dielectrically isolated from the substrate.
US07911306B2
A transformer board is disclosed. In some embodiments, the transformer board includes a base, a circuit board, a transformer having a first and second winding, a first and a second connector, a ribbon cable and a nonconductive fill material. The base has a recess within which the circuit board is positioned. The transformer is mechanically coupled to the circuit board. The first connector is configured to electrically couple to transducers within a pressure boundary of an ultrasonic flow meter and is electrically coupled to the second winding of the transformer. The ribbon cable is electrically coupled between the first winding of the transformer and the second connector. The nonconductive fill material is contained by the recess and encases the circuit board, the transformer, the coupling of the first connector to the second winding of the transformer, and the coupling of the ribbon cable to the first winding of the transformer.
US07911305B2
An ignition coil of an ignition system in an internal combustion engine has a housing, a magnetically active core, a first coil winding connected to a supply voltage, and a second coil winding connected to a high-voltage terminal. At least one electrically conductive component is provided, at least in some areas, with a means for an electrically effective evening out of its surface.
US07911298B2
A trip actuator assembly is provided for an electrical switching apparatus, such as a circuit breaker. The trip actuator assembly includes a trip actuator with an actuating element, which is movable among unactuated and actuated positions corresponding to separable contacts of the circuit breaker being closeable and tripped opened in response to a trip condition, respectively. The trip actuator is disposed at a mounting portion of a frame. An interface assembly is movably coupled to the frame and includes an interface element disposed between the actuating element of the trip actuator and a portion of the circuit breaker operating mechanism. When the actuating element moves from the unactuated position toward the actuated position, it engages and moves the interface element, thereby moving the operating mechanism to trip open the separable contacts. The frame secures the trip actuator assembly in a desired orientation within a corresponding one of the housing compartments.
US07911297B2
A filter device having a frame made of plated steel sheet generates a smaller insertion loss and is excellent in productivity. Resonant elements are shaped into a cylindrical form by bending the steel sheet, whose both sides are plated, before they are placed in a filter housing. A gap formed on a lateral face of each resonant element is brazed with solder, and an outer plated face of each resonant element is brazed with solder to an inner plated face of the frame.
US07911283B1
A low noise oscillator includes a resonator 102 that is excited with a pulsed signal (i.e., an impulse of energy) to replace energy lost to parasitic resistive losses once every Nth period (where N=1, 2, 3 . . . ). The resonating signal is monitored by a level detector and when the signal falls below a predetermined threshold, the pulse generator outputs a pulse or adjusts pulse width, pulse amplitude (or both) of a pulsed signal to create the necessary impulse for application to the resonator to recoup losses resulting from resonator operation. A phase shifting circuit may be provided to ensure the pulses are time aligned with the resonating signal to reduce noise.
US07911277B2
An adaptively tuned RF power amplifier includes at least one power amplifier stage that has one or more active elements. A tunable output network is coupled to the power amplifier stage and includes one or more adjustable reactive elements. A mismatch detector detects a tuning mismatch based, at least in part, on one or more signals present within the tunable output network, and supplies one or more mismatch signals indicative of a detected tuning mismatch. A tuning controller, responsive to the one or more mismatch signals, controls one or more of the one or more adjustable reactive elements in the tunable output network so as to control the detected mismatch.
US07911272B2
Embodiments of the present invention enable a blended control approach to generate a desired output waveform in an outphasing-based system. Embodiments of blended control according to the present invention combine outphasing with bias and/or amplitude control to yield an accurate, practical, and producible system with substantially comparable performance to that of a theoretical ideal outphasing system, but without the isolation and accuracy requirements of outphasing alone.
US07911271B1
A hybrid broadband power amplifier module design is disclosed. In a power amplifier design, low impedance transmission lines are typically needed at the input and output of the transistor to match for its optimum source and load impedance. The peripheral of the GaN (Gallium Nitride) transistor is very small due to the high power density of the GaN transistor. The transmission line, for example a microstrip line, needs to be very wide to achieve low impedance on ceramic substrates such as Alumina. The dimensional mismatch from the low impedance transmission line to the transistor causes additional parasitic effect to the matching networks and limits the bandwidth of the amplifier. Capacitor materials are typically very high in dielectric constant; hence a single layer capacitor with small dimensions equalizes to a low impedance transmission line. Selected capacitors with proper dimensions can be used as the low impedance transmission lines in the matching networks. They will have comparable width to the GaN transistor and minimize the parasitic effect. The wavelength inside the capacitor will also be very short due to the high dielectric constant; hence the matching network can be much shorter. A compact hybrid amplifier module has been built in a small package with the GaN transistor, capacitor matching networks and other necessary circuits inside. More than an octave bandwidth can be achieved with this new scheme.
US07911270B2
The invention relates to a broadband microwave device with switchable gain comprising a microwave signal input E and output S, a distributed amplifier with a plurality of amplifying cells comprising an input transmission line for an input signal applied to the microwave signal input E, said input transmission line having one of its two ends linked to the microwave signal input E, an output transmission line for said amplified input signal having an output end of the distributed amplifier, the cells of the distributed amplifier settable either to an amplifying state or to a blocked state. A switch switches the microwave signal output S either to a non-amplification position linked to the other end of the input transmission line, or to an amplification position linked to the output end of the distributed amplifier. A control unit supplies switch position control and amplifying cell status control signals.
US07911263B2
A dormant mode target semiconductor device within a leakage current target unit is identified for mitigating leakage current to prevent it from reaching catastrophic runaway. A leakage current shift monitor unit is electrically connected to the output node of the leakage current target unit and collects leakage current from the selected target semiconductor device for two consecutive predefined temporal periods and measures the difference between the collected leakage currents. A comparator receives and compares the outputs of the current shift monitor unit and a reference voltage generator. The comparator propagates an alert signal to the leakage current target unit when the leakage voltage output from the leakage current shift monitor unit exceeds the reference voltage, a condition that indicates that the leakage current is about to approach catastrophic runaway levels. This alert signal switches the target semiconductor device to an active mode for leakage mitigation, which includes a repair voltage from a repair voltage generator applied to the gate of the target semiconductor device.
US07911255B2
Methods, systems, and devices are described for providing voltage level shifting that may operate reliably and at low power, even at high voltages and/or high switching frequencies. Embodiments receive an input signal representing input information, and effectively generate two voltage responses as a function of the input signal. Each voltage response includes exponential terms as a function of resistive and capacitive loading effects of components of the embodiments. A combined response signal is generated substantially as a superposition of the first response signal and the second response signal. A high-side driver signal is then generated as a function of the combined response signal, such that the high-side driver signal substantially preserves the input information represented by the input signal, and such that the first exponential response and the second exponential response are substantially absent from the high-side driver signal.
US07911252B2
A clock signal generation apparatus includes a clock signal generation circuit generating a plurality of clock signals, and a self-test circuit measuring a phase difference of one pair of clock signals. The self-test circuit includes a clock signal selection circuit selecting the pair of clock signals among the plurality of clock signals, a phase detection circuit generating a phase difference pulse signal, a test signal generation circuit generating a test signal having a frequency which is lower than the phase difference pulse signal, and a counter circuit counting the pulse number of the test signal.
US07911250B2
A delay circuit includes a ring oscillator and a control circuit. The control circuit includes an edge detector that outputs a first control signal in response to a rising edge or a falling edge of an input signal, and a counter that counts the number of pulses of an output pulse signal output from the ring oscillator and outputs a second control signal upon reaching a predetermined count number. The control circuit performs control to make the ring oscillator oscillate in response to the first control signal and to output the input signal in response to the second control signal.
US07911247B2
The clock signal supplied to the delta-sigma modulator in a fractional-N phase-locked loop is dithered. In one example, the PLL includes a novel programmable clock dithering circuit. The programmable clock dithering circuit is controllable via a serial bus to dither the phase of the clock signal in a selected one of several ways. If the clock signal is dithered in a first way (pseudo-random phase dithering), then the power of digital noise generated by the delta-sigma modulator is spread over a frequency band, thereby reducing the degree to which the noise interferes with other circuitry. If the clock signal is dithered in a second way (rotational phase dithering), then the power of digital noise is frequency shifted such that the degree to which the noise interferes with the other circuitry is reduced. The programmable clock dithering circuit can be controlled in other ways. For example, dithering can be programmably disabled.
US07911240B1
Clock switch-over circuits and methods provide clock signals to clock routing networks. According to one embodiment, a multiplexer selects between a first clock signal and a second clock signal in response to a switch select signal received from a control circuit. A storage circuit stores an enable signal in response to an output clock signal of the multiplexer. A logic circuit transmits the output clock signal of the multiplexer to a clock routing network in response to the enable signal from the storage circuit. At least one signal is transmitted from the clock switch-over circuit to the control circuit.
US07911239B2
Techniques for the design and use of a digital signal processor, including for processing transmissions in a communications system. Reduced glitch occurs in switching from a first clock input to a second clock input driving a clock multiplexer. The clock multiplexer receives a first clock input and provides a clock output and determines a low phase output level in the clock output. For a limited period of time, a low phase output level is forced. The clock multiplexer receives a second clock input and determines a low phase input level in the second clock input signal. Switching to providing the clock output in response to the second clock input occurs during the low phase input level in the second clock input signal. Then, the output of the clock multiplexer follows the phase level of the second clock signal.
US07911237B2
A comparator comprises a differential amplifier (T1, T2, T8, T9) having differential inputs (IN1, IN2) forming the comparator inputs, and a first and a second amplifier output (f1, f2) forming the comparator outputs of a first comparator stage, wherein the differential amplifier has first (T1, T8) and second (T2, T9) parallel branches. The comparator has a first current source circuit (32) defines a current to be driven through the differential amplifier, a second current source circuit (34) comprising a load driven by the first branch and a third current source circuit (36), comprising a load driven by the second branch. Circuitry (T6,T7) is provided for defining the voltage difference between the first and second amplifier outputs when the differential amplifier is in a stable state providing a differential output. This arrangement drives current through the two branches independently, so that the main transistors in each branch can be kept on to enable rapid response times. By fixing the voltage difference between the outputs, it is possible to remove dependency on the duty cycle on the common voltage mode of the differential amplifier.
US07911235B2
Disclosed is a logarithmic detector comprising: an amplifier element; means for setting a frequency of operation of the detector; and a controller, wherein an input signal to the amplifier element is arranged to cause an oscillation in the amplifier element, and the controller is operable to sense a pre-determined threshold, indicative of oscillation and, in response to sensing said threshold, to interrupt the oscillation of the amplifier such that the frequency of said interruption is proportional to the logarithm of the power of the input signal.
US07911230B1
Disclosed is a logic element (LE) that can provide a number of advantageous features. For example, the LE can be configured to implement register packing and/or a fracturable look up table.
US07911227B2
Provided is a programmable logic block of a field-programmable gate array (FPGA). The programmable logic block includes a pull-up access transistor connected to a power source, an up-phase-change memory device connected to the pull-up access transistor, a down-phase-change memory device connected to the up-phase-change memory device, an output terminal between the up-phase-change memory device and the down-phase-change memory device, and a pull-down access transistor connected to the down-phase-change memory device and a ground. The resistance values of the up-phase-change memory device and the down-phase-change memory device are individually programmed.
US07911218B2
A device and a method are provided for the analysis of a sample plate on which at least two material samples are situated. In the method, one impedance spectrum is measured for each of the material samples. As a function of the respectively measured impedance spectrum, a configuration of a circuit equivalent is determined which includes at least one electronic component. Then, for an error minimization computation, starting values for the components of the respective circuit equivalents are determined. In the error minimization computation, a theoretical impedance spectrum is calculated for at least one of the material samples, based on the impedance spectrum measured for the material sample, as well as the starting values for the components of the respective circuit equivalent, and fit values are determined for the components of the respective circuit equivalent. Subsequently, a validation variable is determined for the calculated, theoretical impedance spectrum, and an evaluation variable is ascertained by comparison of at least one of the fit values for the components to a reference value.
US07911217B2
A liquid crystal which self-generates a high voltage for a high voltage stress test, a connector for testing the liquid crystal display and a method of testing the liquid crystal display include an internal connector having an input pin which receives a power supply voltage from an outside source, a no-connect pin, a ground pin and a power supply unit connected to the no-connect pin and the ground pin. The power supply unit receives the power supply voltage and outputs a gate-on voltage and a gate-off voltage whose levels are adjusted according to whether there is an electrical connection between the no-connect pin and the ground pin. Agate driving unit receives the gate-on voltage and the gate-off voltage and outputs a gate signal and a liquid crystal panel having a plurality of pixels receives the gate signal and displays images in response to the gate signal.
US07911216B2
A main functional structure executes continuous predetermined operations to continuously generate events associated with the operations. A debug/trace circuit compares an event occurring at the main functional structure with detection condition indicating information of one entry in a control information list, and executes the operation designated by operation indicating information paired with the detection condition indicating information in accordance with the result of the comparison. The debug/trace circuit continuously performs this in accordance with the control information list to identify the event.
US07911215B2
A test system for taking a sample of a constituent on a surface utilizing a fluid source includes a transition region having a capillary layer for delivering a fluid from said fluid source, an extraction region having a collection material in contact with said surface, and a collection region having a sensor reservoir therein for collecting the fluid for analysis.
US07911205B2
A method of inspecting a test part is provided. The method includes positioning a coil on a surface of the test part and exciting the coil at a resonance frequency. The method also includes determining at least one of a resonance frequency shift and a quality factor of the coil and estimating an electrical conductivity of the test part based on at least one of the resonance frequency shift and the quality factor of the coil. The method further includes obtaining depth profile of residual stress using conductivity measurements at various resonance frequencies.
US07911193B2
In a circuit, a high side driver control circuit outputs gating signals to a high side driver of a synchronous converter responsive to a pulse width modulated input signal. A synchronous rectifier driver circuit outputs a gating signal to a synchronous rectifier of the synchronous converter responsive to the pulse width modulated input signal. An inhibit circuit inhibits the gating signal to the synchronous rectifier upon detection of a zero crossing condition. A circuit detects the zero crossing condition respective to comparing a measured value to a nominal value adjusted by a delta value. A duty cycle observer circuit determines the average duty cycle of the pulse width modulated input signal and varies the reference value.
US07911191B2
A voltage regulator has a device for regulating an output voltage, having an input to receive an input voltage and an output to deliver an output voltage of a constant level, and a device for correcting a drop-out voltage violation, coupled to the device for regulating, to determine an occurrence of a drop-out voltage violation and to cause the device for regulating to change the level of the output voltage upon detection of the drop-out voltage violation. A method for regulating an output voltage has the steps of receiving an input voltage, generating and outputting a regulated output voltage of a constant level, monitoring occurrence of a drop-out voltage violation, and causing a change of the level of the output voltage upon detection of the drop-out voltage violation.
US07911189B2
A method of scavenging power in a circuit having a power source generating electric current includes connecting a power scavenging device having an input terminal pair and an output terminal pair to the circuit via the input terminal pair, dynamically regulating a voltage drop across the input terminal pair of the power scavenging device, harvesting electrical energy available at the regulated voltage drop from the electric current flowing through the first input terminal pair of the power scavenging device, and providing the harvested electrical energy at the output terminal pair of the power scavenging device.
US07911186B1
The present invention is a method for transmitting a RFID signal while conserving battery power of a circuit. The method comprises charging a capacitor using a battery. The battery is in electrical communication with a resistor and the resistor is in electrical communication with a capacitor and a load switch. The load switch is in electrical communication with an enabler and a microprocessor. The microprocessor is in electrical communication with a radiofrequency component. The load switch is closed, allowing power drawn from the capacitor to flow to the radiofrequency component.
US07911180B2
Apparatus for charging an electric vehicle or a hybrid vehicle are provided. Particularly, apparatus for charging a hybrid vehicle from a single-phase standard (110 volt, single-phase, 60 Hz in the U.S.) are provided. In one implementation, a single-phase phase locked loop (PLL) receives a single-phase power gird voltage and delays it by one-quarter cycle to create an orthogonal imaginary second power signal. These signals are then applied to a transform matrix within a PLL to phase lock an output signal to the incoming power grid voltage.
US07911177B2
An overmodulation PWM controller includes a voltage instruction calculation unit which calculates a d axis voltage instruction and a q axis voltage instruction in which a voltage amplitude exceeds a peak value of a triangular wave carrier; a voltage instruction correction unit which corrects the d axis voltage instruction and the q axis voltage instruction so that a pulse width modulation voltage applied to an AC motor has a fundamental wave amplitude corresponding to the voltage instruction amplitude, according to the synchronization value K which is the number of the triangular carriers per one cycle of the phase voltage instruction; and a voltage instruction conversion unit which converts the corrected d axis voltage instruction and the q axis voltage instruction into a phase voltage instruction. The pulse width modulation voltage is controlled according to the result of comparison between the phase voltage instruction and the triangular wave carrier.
US07911175B2
A six lead, two speed, consequent wound, single phase induction motor with a tapped auxiliary winding having a 2-pole high speed mode and 4-pole low speed mode. A portion of the auxiliary winding is connected in series with the four pole main winding. The 4-pole low speed mode has an efficiency of over 80%.
US07911174B1
A method and system are provided for sensing the position of a rotor in a hybrid stepper motor. First and second Hall sensors are positioned in a spaced-apart relationship with the first and second armatures of the rotor such that the first and second Hall sensors generate electrical outputs that are 90° out of phase with one another as the rotor rotates. The electrical outputs are adjusted relative to a reference, and the amplitude of the electrical outputs is further adjusted to account for spacing differences between the rotor and each of the first and second Hall sensors.
US07911166B2
A machine comprising a rotor, a stator (12), a control bridge (10) with controlled switches, and a control device (20, 30) supplying control signals (C) to the control bridge (10), wherein the control device comprises means (30) for applying to at least one switch of the control bridge a control signal with a phase-lead relative to a signal representing the position of the rotor relative to the stator. According to the invention, the applying means comprise means (30) for adjusting the phase lead (d) from a plurality of values for a given rotational speed of the rotor.
US07911165B2
A device for controlling an electromechanical actuator includes an electric motor and an actuator operated by the electric motor. It also includes a digital signal processor (DSP) providing data of reference voltages (Ud—ffw, Uq—ffw) on the basis of an decoupled electrical model of the motor. The processor has at least one Park transformation module receiving measurement data for the currents of at least two supply phases of the motor (i_mot—2, i_mot—3) and a datum for the estimated angle of the motor (θestimated) and transforming them into data regarding the component of current with stator current axis (id) and the component of current in quadrature with the stator current (iq).
US07911160B2
An oscillation device capable of generating a drive signal waveform with a sufficiently small number of harmonic components is provided. The oscillation device includes an oscillation system, a supporting unit configured to support the oscillation system, a drive unit configured to drive the oscillation system, and a drive control unit configured to control the drive unit by supplying a drive signal. The oscillation system includes a torsion spring and an oscillator. The drive control unit includes a drive-signal generating circuit configured to generate the drive signal using an address generator configured to generate an address to which a predetermined variable is added at a frequency higher than a frequency of the drive signal and using a trigonometric-function table indexed by an output of the address generator. The frequency of the drive signal is adjusted by adjusting the predetermined variable.
US07911155B2
Provided is a display apparatus including: a display panel; a light source which includes a plurality of light source modules and supplies light to the display panel; a light source driver which drives the light source modules; a power source which supplies power to the light source driver; a current detector which detects a current of the power supplied from the power source to the light source driver; and a controller which controls the light source driver to sequentially drive the plurality of light source modules and compares the detected current with a range to detect errors from the respective light source modules.
US07911151B2
A LED driver circuit (70, 80) employs a power source (IS, VS) for providing power at a power conversion frequency to a switching LED cell (30-32, 40-42). The switching LED cell (30-32, 40-42) switches between a radiating mode and a disabled mode at a LED driving frequency. In the radiating mode, the switching LED cell (30-32, 40-42) controls a flow of a LED current from the power source (IS, VS) through one or more LEDs (L11-LXY) to radiate a color of light from the LEDs (L11-LXY). In the disabled mode, the switching LED cell (30-32, 40-42) impedes the flow of the LED current from the power source (IS, VS) through the LEDs (L11-LXY).
US07911145B2
An electronic transmitter or receiver employing electromagnetic radiation as a coded signal carrier is described. In the transmitter, the electromagnetic radiation is emitted from ultra-small resonant structures when an electron beam passes proximate the structures. In the receiver, the electron beam passes near ultra-small resonant structures and is altered in path or velocity by the effect of the electromagnetic radiation on structures. The electron beam is accelerated within a series of spiral-shaped anodes to an appropriate current density without the use of a high power supply. Instead, a sequence of low power levels is supplied to the sequence of anodes in the electron beam path. The electron beam is thereby accelerated to a desired current density appropriate for the transmitter or receiver application without the need for a high-level power source.
US07911142B2
Disclosed are an electron emission thin-film with improved secondary electron emission characteristics compared with conventional ones, a plasma display panel including the electron emission thin-film, and their manufacturing methods. Using a vacuum deposition system, a protective layer that is an MgO thin-film is formed on a dielectric layer formed on a front glass substrate. At the time of deposition, angles that lines linking the central point of a target material for the protective layer respectively with the central point and both ends points of the front glass substrate form with the front glass substrate are exclusively in a range of 30 to 80°. This enables at least some of MgO columnar crystals constituting the protective layer to have flat planes that are inclined with respect to the surface of the thin-film.
US07911140B2
A plasma display panel adapted to minimize noise/vibration as well as a heat generated therefrom. In the plasma display panel, a display panel displays a picture while a porous pad is provided behind the display panel to prevent the transfer of noise/vibration to an associated heat proof panel. When the PDP is mounted within a case, a second porous pad can be provided on an inner surface of the case opposite the display panel and adjacent to an associated printed circuit board for additional noise/vibration damping.
US07911130B2
Evaporated receptacles for inkjet deposited polymeric light-emitting diode (PLED)/organic light-emitting diode (OLED) and a method of making the same. The evaporated receptacles are formed via a shadow mask vacuum deposition process. The method of forming a light-emitting display includes forming an electrode on a substrate, forming a receptacle structure over the electrode via a shadow mask vacuum deposition process, and delivering a quantity of polymeric solution, which contains a light-emitting material, into the receptacle via a standard inkjet deposition process.
US07911125B2
An electron emission device having a high electron emitting rate and a display including the device are provided. The electron emission device using abrupt metal-insulator transition, the device including: a board; a metal-insulator transition (MIT) material layer disposed on the board and divided by a predetermined gap with portions of the divided MIT material layer facing one another; and electrodes connected to each of the portions of the divided metal-insulator transition material layer for emitting electrons to the gap between the portions of the divided metal-insulator transition material layer.
US07911110B2
The present invention relates to motors, and more particularly, to a double rotor type motor applicable to a washing machine or the like. The double rotor type motor includes an outer rotor having first base, and a first extension extended from a circumference of the first base substantially perpendicular thereto, the first extension having outer magnets mounted on an inside circumferential surface, an inner rotor having a second base mounted on an upper surface of the first base concentric to the first base, and a second extension extended from a circumference of the second base so as to be opposite to the first extension with a predetermined gap toward an inner side of the first extension, the second extension having inner magnets mounted on an outside circumferential surface, and a bushing at a center of the first base and the second base, for transmission of rotation force both from the outer rotor and the inner rotor to a rotating shaft.
US07911108B2
The stator of an electric rotating machine includes a stator core constituted of a plurality of core pieces joined to one another in a ring, a plurality of phase windings wound around the stator core, the stator core and the phase windings constituting a core assembly body, and an outer casing into which the core assembly body is fitted. Gaps are provided between an outer periphery of the core assembly body and an inner periphery of the outer casing.
US07911107B2
A motor is provided, which includes: a rotor having rotor pole groups, in which N-poles and S-poles are alternately arranged in the circumferential direction; an N number (N is a positive integer) of stator pole groups, in which a plurality of stator poles are arranged for individual phases along or in the vicinity of the respective circumferences so as to be positioned at substantially the same rotational phase position in terms of electrical angle; and an (N−1) number of loop windings axially arranged between the stator pole groups, with the same phase being arranged at axial ends, wherein each of the loop windings is arranged radially inner than the outer diameter of each rotor pole group. This simplified winding structure can enhance productivity, reduce size, enhance efficiency and reduce cost.
US07911093B2
In a converter motor, the converter unit and the electric motor together form a mechatronic unit. The converter unit is located behind the electric motor and is thermally coupled with the rear bearing shield. The converter unit includes a through hole, through which the rear end of the motor shaft passes. A contactless position detector is located in the region of this through hole.
US07911084B2
A parasitic power supply provides for drawing power for an auxiliary device from a set of sequentially driven loads. A typical source of power is a traffic signal wherein the power may be sequentially applied to red, green and yellow lamps. The design provides isolation between loads so no two loads will be powered through any single-point failure of the power supply. The device may further contain control elements such as time delays to make the system compatible with requirements of safety devices used in traffic control systems to sense burned-out bulbs, and to sense conflicts between lighting patterns that are supposed to be mutually exclusive. The device may be configured as a separate component, or it may be integrated into a traffic signal head or into any selected device intended for connecting to a traffic signal head. The invention is particularly suitable for standard systems operating nominally at 115 VAC, though other AC voltages, and direct-current supplies, can also be used.
US07911083B2
A power supply system includes an AC power line with an uninterruptible power supply (UPS) device coupled to receive power from the AC power line. The UPS includes control circuitry that couples power conversion circuitry of the UPS to the AC power line when the available AC power is acceptable. The power supply system also includes a second UPS device coupled to receive power from the AC power line. The second UPS includes a timer delay, such that the control circuitry is configured to couple power conversion circuitry to the AC power line when the available AC power is acceptable, and upon expiration of the timer.
US07911082B2
The invention provides a solar cell device having a plurality of solar cell modules Z1, Z2, Z3, . . . , Zn, whose voltage outputs (UE1, UE2, UE3, . . . , UEn) are each coupled via a switching element (T1, T2, T3, . . . , Tn) to a switched voltage converter (12) preferably designed as inverting flyback converter or as step-up converter. Losses due to partial switching off of individual solar cell modules are avoided, the modules being operated independently one from the other. Using the voltage converter (12), the output voltage can be adjusted within wide limits. Using a microprocessor control (16) optimum energy yield of the entire system can be achieved (FIG. 1).
US07911069B2
A semiconductor device and a layout method thereof are provided, each of which contributes to a reduction in layout area and appropriately adjusts an inter-wiring capacitance even where wiring widths and intervals in a plurality of wiring layers differ at a bus wiring comprised of the wiring layers. In the semiconductor device, a first functional block and a second functional block are connected to each other, and a plurality of wirings formed over their corresponding wiring layers are provided. The wiring layers have constant wiring widths and wiring intervals for every wiring layer. The number of wirings on each wiring layer is determined, at least in part, by multiplying (a) the total number of required wirings (for all wiring layers) by (b) a ratio of (i) a rate of wirings per unit length on the given layer versus (ii) the sum of the rates of wirings per unit length for each of the plurality of wiring layers. Where the rate of wirings per unit length on a given layer is an inverse of the sum of (x) the desired or predetermined constant wiring width for that layer and (y) the desired or predetermined constant wiring interval for that layer.
US07911067B2
A semiconductor package system includes: providing a lead frame with a lead; making a die support pad separately from the lead frame; attaching a semiconductor die to the die support pad through a die attach adhesive, the semiconductor die being spaced from the lead; and connecting a bonding pad on the semiconductor die to the lead using a bonding wire.
US07911060B2
A multilayer wiring structure of a semiconductor device having a stacked structure is arranged to restrain reliability degradation due to stress applied to the region of wiring between opposite upper and lower plugs. The rate of overlap of contact surface between upper plug and wiring on contact surface between lower plug and wiring, is small to the extent that no void is generated. The multilayer wiring structure is produced such that no grain boundary is contained in the region of wiring between upper and lower plugs. The difference in thermal expansion coefficient between the material of wiring and the material of upper and lower plugs, is small to the extent that no void is generated.
US07911056B2
A substrate structure having non-solder mask design (N-SMD) ball pads. The substrate structure includes a substrate and a solder mask. The substrate has a first surface, a trace layer and at least one ball pad. The ball pad and the trace layer are disposed on the first surface. The trace layer has a plurality of traces, and at least one trace electrically connects to the ball pad. The solder mask has at least one opening corresponding to the ball pad. The size of the opening is larger than that of the ball pad. The solder mask covers the trace connecting to the ball pad. The problem of non-alignment of the solder ball can thus be solved, and the hole in the solder ball can be prevented when the substrate structure is welded with a PCB so that the reliability of solder ball welding can be improved.
US07911047B2
A semiconductor device includes: a package substrate that includes a recessed portion, with electrode pads that are electrically connected to electrodes of the semiconductor chip being formed inside the recessed portion; a semiconductor chip that is housed in the recessed portion; terminal-use wires that are formed on the surface of the package substrate and are electrically connected to the electrode pads; external connection pads that are formed on a back surface of the package substrate and are electrically connected to the electrode pads; a sealing resin portion that includes a grinded surface that is parallel to the surface of the package substrate, and seals at least the semiconductor chip by a sealing resin; rewiring pads that are formed on the grinded surface; and connecting wires that are formed on the grinded surface and electrically interconnect the terminal-use wires and the rewiring pads.
US07911043B2
Provided are wafer level package with a sealing line that seals a device and includes electroconductive patterns as an electrical connection structure for the device, and a method of packaging the same. In the wafer level package, a device substrate includes a device region, where a device is mounted, on the top surface. A sealing line includes a plurality of non-electroconductive patterns and a plurality of electroconductive patterns, and seals the device region. A cap substrate includes a plurality of vias respectively connected to the electroconductive patterns and is attached to the device substrate by the sealing line. Therefore, a simplified wafer level package structure that accomplishes electric connection through electroconductive patterns of a sealing line can be formed without providing an electrode pad for electric connection with a device.
US07911041B2
A semiconductor device (7) has gold coatings (1 to 5) which are applied to metallic or ceramic components (6) of the semiconductor device (7). The gold coatings (1 to 4) have a multifunctional multilayer metal coating (8) with a minimal gold layer (9). The gold layer has a thickness dG where dG≦0.5 μm. Moreover, at least one metallic interlayer (10) is arranged between the gold layer (9) and the metallic or ceramic components (6).
US07911035B2
Nanowhiskers are grown in a non-preferential growth direction by regulation of nucleation conditions to inhibit growth in a preferential direction. In a preferred implementation, <001> III-V semiconductor nanowhiskers are grown on an (001) III-V semiconductor substrate surface by effectively inhibiting growth in the preferential <111>B direction. As one example, <001> InP nano-wires were grown by metal-organic vapor phase epitaxy directly on (001) InP substrates. Characterization by scanning electron microscopy and transmission electron microscopy revealed wires with nearly square cross sections and a perfect zincblende crystalline structure that is free of stacking faults.
US07911034B2
A method for patterning CNTs on a wafer wherein a CNT layer is provided on a substrate, a hard mask film is deposited on the CNT layer, a BARC layer (optional) is coated on the hard mask film, and a resist is patterned on the BARC layer (or directly on the hard mask film if the BARC layer is not included). Then, the resist pattern is effectively transferred to the hard mask film by etching the BARC layer (if provided) and etching partly into, but not entirely through, the hard mask film (i.e., etching is stopped before reaching the CNT layer). Then, the resist and the BARC layer (if provided) is stripped, and the hard mask pattern is effectively transferred to the CNTs by etching away (preferably by using C1, F plasma) the portions of the hard mask which have been already partially etched away.
US07911024B2
The present invention provides a “collector-less” silicon-on-insulator (SOI) bipolar junction transistor (BJT) that has no impurity-doped collector. Instead, the inventive vertical SOI BJT uses a back gate-induced, minority carrier inversion layer as the intrinsic collector when it operates. In accordance with the present invention, the SOI substrate is biased such that an inversion layer is formed at the bottom of the base region serving as the collector. The advantage of such a device is its CMOS-like process. Therefore, the integration scheme can be simplified and the manufacturing cost can be significantly reduced. The present invention also provides a method of fabricating BJTs on selected areas of a very thin BOX using a conventional SOI starting wafer with a thick BOX. The reduced BOX thickness underneath the bipolar devices allows for a significantly reduced substrate bias compatible with the CMOS to be applied while maintaining the advantages of a thick BOX underneath the CMOS.
US07911020B2
A semiconductor device has an active portion having at least one well region in a semiconductor layer, and a breakdown voltage maintaining structure surrounding the active portion. The maintaining structure includes a conductor layer over each of a plurality of guard rings with an insulating film interposed in between and connected to the respective guard ring. An inner side end portion of each conductor layer projects over the immediate adjacent inner side guard ring. The impurity concentration of the guard rings is set between the impurity concentrations of the semiconductor layer and the well regions. A field plate can extend over the innermost conductor layer with the insulating film interposed in between. The field plate is in contact with the outermost well region and is in contact with the first conductor layer. The outer side end of the field plate extends outwardly beyond an outer side end of the innermost conductor layer. With these arrangements, the guard rings can be shortened and the chip size can be reduced. Furthermore, the device can be made less susceptible to external charge.
US07911010B2
A universal microelectromechanical MEMS nano-sensor platform having a substrate and conductive layer deposited in a pattern on the surface to make several devices at the same time, a patterned insulation layer, wherein the insulation layer is configured to expose one or more portions of the conductive layer, and one or more functionalization layers deposited on the exposed portions of the conductive layer. The functionalization layers are adapted to provide one or more transducer sensor classes selected from the group consisting of: radiant, electrochemical, electronic, mechanical, magnetic, and thermal sensors for chemical and physical variables.
US07911007B2
A semiconductor device including a silicon substrate and a field effect transistor including a gate insulating film on the silicon substrate, a gate electrode on the gate insulating film, and source/drain regions formed in the substrate on opposite sides of the gate electrode, wherein the gate electrode includes a silicide layer containing an Ni3Si crystal phase, at least in a portion of the gate electrode, the portion including a lower surface thereof, and the transistor includes an adhesion layer containing a metal oxide component, between the gate insulating film and the gate electrode.
US07911002B2
A semiconductor device is provided which comprises a semiconductor layer (109), a dielectric layer (111), first and second gate electrodes (129, 131) having first and second respective work functions associated therewith, and a layer of hafnium oxide (113) disposed between said dielectric layer and said first and second gate electrodes.
US07910996B2
A semiconductor device is disclosed having a conductive gate structure overlying a semiconductor layer having a major surface. An isolation material is recessed within a trench region below the major surface of the semiconductor layer. An epitaxial layer is formed overlying a portion of the major surface and on an active region forming a sidewall of the trench.
US07910991B2
A disclosed power transistor, suitable for use in a switch mode converter that is operable with a switching frequency exceeding, for example, 5 MHz or more, includes a gate dielectric layer overlying an upper surface of a semiconductor substrate and first and second gate electrodes overlying the gate dielectric layer. The first gate electrode is laterally positioned overlying a first region of the substrate. The first substrate region has a first type of doping, which may be either n-type or p-type. A second gate electrode of the power transistor overlies the gate dielectric and is laterally positioned over a second region of the substrate. The second substrate region has a second doping type that is different than the first type. The transistor further includes a drift region located within the substrate in close proximity to an upper surface of the substrate and laterally positioned between the first and second substrate regions.
US07910982B2
In order to provide a highly integrated semiconductor apparatus and a production method thereof which can avoid the floating of a channel portion that causes a problem when constituting a memory cell from three-dimensional transistors, a semiconductor apparatus includes: multiple three-dimensional transistors each of which includes: a first pillar; a channel portion provided at the first pillar; diffused layers formed at both an upper portion and a lower portion of the channel portion; and a gate electrode provided around the channel portion via a gate insulation film; and a second pillar which is electrically conductive, wherein the multiple three-dimensional transistors are arranged on a well area while surrounding the second pillar, the multiple three dimensional transistors share the second pillar, and the channel portions of the multiple three dimensional transistors are each connected to the second pillar by a channel connection portion. In addition, six three-dimensional transistors preferably share the second pillar which is a single pillar.
US07910977B2
A semiconductor storage element includes: a semiconductor layer constituted of a line pattern with a predetermined width formed on a substrate; a quantum dot forming an electric charge storage layer formed on the semiconductor layer through a first insulating film serving as a tunnel insulating film; an impurity diffusion layer formed in a surface layer of the semiconductor layer so as to sandwich the quantum dot therebetween; and a control electrode formed on the quantum dot through a second insulating film.
US07910976B2
In one embodiment of the invention, a memory includes wordline jogs and adjacent spacers. Spacers from different wordlines may contact one another on either side of a drain contact and consequently isolate and self-align the contact in the horizontal and vertical directions.
US07910973B2
A non-volatile semiconductor storage device has: a plurality of memory strings with a plurality of electrically rewritable memory cells connected in series; and a capacitor element area including capacitor elements. Each of the memory strings includes: a plurality of first conductive layers laminated on a substrate; and a plurality of first interlayer insulation layers formed between the plurality of first conductive layers. The capacitor element area includes: a plurality of second conductive layers laminated on a substrate and formed in the same layer as the first conductive layers; and a plurality of second interlayer insulation layers formed between the plurality of second conductive layers and formed in the same layer as the first interlayer insulation layers. A group of the adjacently-laminated second conductive layers is connected to a first potential, while another group thereof is connected to a second potential.
US07910968B2
A ferroelectric capacitor (42) is formed over a semiconductor substrate (10), and thereafter, a barrier film (46) directly covering the ferroelectric capacitor (42) is formed. Then, an interlayer insulating film (48) is formed and flattened. Then, an inclined groove is formed in the interlayer insulating film (48), and a barrier film (50) is formed over the entire surface.
US07910966B2
A solid state imaging device including a pixel region where a plurality of pixel cells 10r1, 10g1-10g3, 10b1-10b2 . . . have been formed. When focusing on a red pixel cell whose color filter has the longer transmission peak wavelength and a blue pixel cell whose color filter has the shorter transmission peak wavelength, the distribution of substrate contacts is denser in a region in the vicinity of a photodiode in the red pixel cell than a region in the vicinity of a photodiode in the blue pixel cell.
US07910957B2
A semiconductor device has a first and a second active regions of a first conductivity type disposed on a semiconductor substrate, a third and a fourth active regions of a second conductivity type disposed on the semiconductor substrate, the second and the fourth active regions having sizes larger than those of the first and the third active regions respectively, a first electroconductive pattern disposed adjacent to the first active region and having a first width, a second electroconductive pattern disposed adjacent to the second active region and having a second width larger than the first width, a third electroconductive pattern disposed adjacent to the third active region and having a third width; and a fourth electroconductive pattern disposed adjacent to the fourth active region and having a fourth width smaller than the third width.
US07910955B2
A channel layer (11) made of compound semiconductor and a barrier layer (12) made of compound semiconductor having a band gap wider than the channel layer are formed over a substrate. A gate insulating film (13) made of first insulating material is formed on the barrier layer over the channel region. A gate electrode (23) is formed on a partial area of the gate insulating film. A protective film is disposed on the gate insulating film on both sides of the gate electrode. The protective film comprises a lower protective film (14) made of second insulating material whose etching resistance is different from the first insulating material and an upper protective film (15) made of third insulating film whose etching resistance is different from the second insulating material. A source electrode and a drain electrode are electrically connected to the channel layer on both sides of the gate electrode.
US07910948B2
A light emitting diode package is provided including: a lead frame that includes an electrode pad and an electrode lead that are integrally formed to each other; and a housing, wherein the electrode pad is exposed in a first direction through a window formed by inner walls of the housing, and the electrode lead is exposed in a second direction through a through-hole, wherein the housing includes a step jaw prepared by sinking the housing inner walls.
US07910942B2
Disclosed are a semiconductor light emitting device and a method for manufacturing the same. The semiconductor light emitting device comprises a substrate, in which concave-convex patterns are in at least a portion of a backside of the substrate, and a light emitting structure on the substrate and comprising a first conductive semiconductor layer, an active layer and a second conductive semiconductor layer.
US07910935B2
Disclosed is a group-III nitride-based light emitting diode. The group-III nitride-based light emitting diode includes a substrate, an n-type nitride-based cladding layer formed on the substrate, a nitride-based active layer formed on the n-type nitride-based cladding layer, a p-type nitride-based cladding layer formed on the nitride-based active layer, and a p-type multi-layered ohmic contact layer formed on the p-type nitride-based cladding layer and including thermally decomposed nitride. The thermally decomposed nitride is obtained by combining nitrogen (N) with at least one metal component selected from the group consisting of nickel (Ni), copper (Cu), zinc (Zn), indium (In) and tin (Sn). An ohmic contact characteristic is enhanced at the interfacial surface of the p-type nitride-based cladding layer of the group-III nitride-based light emitting device, thereby improving the current-voltage characteristics. In addition, since the light transmittance of the transparent electrode is improved, light efficiency and brightness of the group-III nitride-based light emitting device are also improved.
US07910933B2
A dual gate layout of a thin film transistor of liquid crystal display to alleviate dark current leakage is disclosed. The layout includes (1) a polysilicon on a substrate having a L-shaped or a snake shaped from top-view, which has a heavily doped source region, a first lightly doped region, a first gate channel, a second lightly doped region, a second gate channel, a third lightly doped region and a heavily doped drain region formed in order therein; (2) a gate oxide layer formed on the polysilicon layer and the substrate, (3) a gate metal layer then formed on the gate oxide layer having a scanning line and an extension portion with a L-shaped or an I-shaped. The gate metal intersects with the polysilicon layer thereto define the forgoing gate channels. Among of gate channels, at least one is along the signal line, which is connected to the source region through a source contact.
US07910917B2
A microelectronic device provided with one or more quantum wires, able to form one or more transistor channels, and optimized in terms of arrangement, shape, and/or composition. A method for fabricating the device includes forming, in one or more thin layers resting on a support, a first block and a second block in which at least one transistor drain region and at least one transistor source region are respectively intended to be formed, forming a structure connecting the first block to the second block, and forming, on the surface of the structure, wires connecting a first region of the first block with another region of the second block that faces the first region.
US07910910B2
A memory cell (and method of fabricating the memory cell) includes a stencil layer having a first opening, a phase-change material layer formed on a first electrode layer, and an electrically conductive layer formed on the first electrode layer, the electrically conductive layer having a pillar-shaped portion which is formed on the phase-change material layer and fills the first opening.
US07910892B2
A first protective layer is formed on the surface of a photoelectric conversion substrate on which photoelectric transducers have been provided, and then, a scintillator layer is formed thereon, whereby degradation of the photoelectric transducers due to the contact with the scintillator layer is prevented. A second protective layer covering the surface of the scintillator is formed. A peripheral part of the first protective layer is allowed to be in close contact with a peripheral part of the second protective layer to seal the scintillator layer between the first protective layer and the second protective layer, whereby degradation of the scintillator layer due to the moisture in the atmospheric air is prevented.
US07910888B2
Provided is an X-ray analyzer capable of significantly suppressing an influence of an external magnetic field on a transition edge sensor (TES). The X-ray analyzer includes: a TES (7) for detecting energy of a received X-ray as a temperature change and outputting the temperature change as a current signal; a superconducting magnetic shield (8) which contains the TES (7) and enters a superconducting state; and a room temperature magnetic shield (9) which covers the superconducting magnetic shield (8) and performs external magnetic field shielding until the superconducting magnetic shield (8) enters the superconducting state, in which the superconducting magnetic shield (8) and the room temperature magnetic shield (9) are concentrically arranged to have a cylindrical shape.
US07910877B2
The present invention provides, inter alia, methods of analyzing mass spectral data based on charge states of analyte ions. In some embodiments, the methods can be used for differential profiling of samples, such as comparing a sample comprising a given compound and a sample comprising metabolites of the same compound. The methods can also be used to identify and isolate biomarkers. Systems for performing the methods, as well as computer-readable media for performing the methods, are also described.
US07910872B2
A sensor includes a substrate, a floating diffusion node in the substrate, a photodiode in the substrate laterally spaced apart from the floating diffusion region and a transfer transistor coupling the photodiode and the floating diffusion region. The sensor further includes a photodiode control electrode disposed on the photodiode and configured to control a carrier distribution of the photodiode responsive to a control signal applied thereto. The photodiode may include a first semiconductor region of a first conductivity type disposed on a second semiconductor region of a second conductivity type, the floating diffusion region may have the second conductivity type and the photodiode control electrode may be disposed on the first semiconductor region. The photodiode may be configured to receive incident light from a side of the substrate opposite the photodiode control electrode. The transfer transistor may include a gate electrode on a channel region in the substrate and the photodiode control electrode and the transfer transistor gate electrode may be separately controllable. In further embodiments, the photodiode control electrode comprises an extension of the transfer transistor gate electrode.
US07910869B2
A laser processing apparatus includes a laser source (11), a spatial phase modulator (13) configured to modulate a phase of a laser beam emitted from the laser source, a synthetic data generator (17) configured to generate synthetic data by combining hologram image data representing a pattern image to be processed with position displacement hologram data for shifting the pattern image to a prescribed position, the synthetic data being input to the spatial phase modulator for the phase modulation of the laser beams, and a focusing optical unit (14) configured to guide the phase-modulated laser beam onto a surface to be processed to reproduce the pattern image on the processed surface.
US07910864B2
The present invention relates to a PTC heating element with at least one PTC resistance element which is arranged between two electrically conductive plates in a housing opening of a housing and, with at least one of the electrically conductive plates as an intermediate layer, which is pressed with an initial tension against a heat-emitting element which is held at the housing. With the present invention, a PTC heating element of the type mentioned at the beginning that can be manufactured easily and economically is to be specified. To solve this problem, the present invention further develops the PTC heating element mentioned at the beginning in such a way that attachment tabs arranged on the edge of the housing opening protrude beyond the housing opening and in such a way that the heat-emitting element has tab cuts, behind which the tabs engage.
US07910863B2
A thermal plate of a PEB unit is divided into a plurality of thermal plate regions, and a temperature is settable for each of the thermal plate regions. A temperature correction value for adjusting the temperature within the thermal plate is settable for each of the thermal plate regions of the thermal plate. The line widths within the substrate for which a photolithography process has been finished are measured. The in-plane tendency of the measured line widths is decomposed into a plurality of in-plane tendency components using a Zernike polynomial. Then, in-plane tendency components improvable by setting the temperature correction values are extracted from the calculated plurality of in-plane tendency components and added to calculate an improvable in-plane tendency in the measured line widths. Then, the improvable in-plane tendency is subtracted from the in-plane tendency Z of the current processing states to calculate an after-improvement in-plane tendency.
US07910860B2
A heat exchange apparatus including a heat exchanging portion capable of conforming to the outer surface of a heat exchange target.
US07910857B2
A laser machine tool for carrying out cutting or welding operations includes a laser head carried by a moving member which is displaceable with respect to a workpiece along two horizontal cartesian axes in a relatively wide space with movements involving relatively low accelerations. The laser head is displaceable on the moving member, along a pair of horizontal cartesian axes in a relatively restricted space with high speeds and accelerations, via a pair of slides to which respective balancing weights are operatively associated.
US07910853B2
A method and apparatus for controlling power output of a capacitatively-coupled plasma are provided. A detector is disposed on the power delivery conduit carrying power to one electrode to detect fluctuations in power output to the electrode. The detector is coupled to a signal generator, which converts the RF input signal to a constant control signal. A controller adjusts power input to the RF generator by comparing the control signal to a reference.
US07910852B2
A medium voltage circuit interrupter includes a circuit interrupter housing and a plurality of poles. Each of the poles includes an encapsulated pole unit. The encapsulated pole unit includes a first unit having a first conductor, a second conductor, a vacuum interrupter electrically connected between the first conductor and the second conductor, and a first housing housing the vacuum interrupter. A removable second unit includes a third conductor, a fourth conductor having a first portion electrically connected to the third conductor and a second portion removably electrically connected to one of the first conductor and the second conductor, an electronic device structured to sense a characteristic of the pole, and a second insulative housing encapsulating the third conductor, the first portion of the fourth conductor and the electronic device. An operating mechanism is structured to open and close the vacuum interrupter of each of the poles.
US07910847B2
A switchgear apparatus is provided in which an impact induced by a close operation is mitigated, featuring space saving and high reliability with low costs.The switchgear apparatus includes a switching unit 3 that is composed of a fixed electrode 1 and a movable electrode 2; a movable shaft 4 that is extended from the movable electrode 2; an operating mechanism 5 that produces driving force and transfers the driving force to the movable shaft 4; a switching-unit holder 6 that holds the switching unit 3 and the movable shaft 4 thereinside; and a holder supporting unit 7 that has a fixing plane so as to fix the switching-unit holder 6 thereonto. The switchgear apparatus is arranged in such a manner that the holder supporting unit 7 serving as the fixing plane is constituted of a plurality of plates layered in the axial direction along the movable shaft 4. In a case of the close operation, because kinetic energy in the overall system is consumed by the friction generated between the layered plates owing to distortion of the layered plates, energy that allows the movable electrode 2 to bounce back and forth is lowered, so that it is possible to shorten a chattering time.
US07910843B2
Compact input devices formed on flexible substrates are disclosed. The input devices may be formed using three or more conducting layers. By including three or more conducting layers, the diameter of the input device may be minimized. In addition, to improve the flexibility of portions of the input device mounted, some portions of the input device may be made to have fewer layers than other portions of the input device.
US07910841B2
A foot assembly for a weighing scale comprises a base, a ring arranged in coaxial spaced relation to the base; and a plurality of deformable compensation beams projecting outwardly from a portion of the base so as to support the ring.
US07910834B2
An embodiment of the present invention is direct to a cable assembly for use with any power cable for an electrical device. The cable assembly includes a remotely locatable switch for connecting or disconnecting the electrical device from power draw. Another embodiment of the present invention is directed to a cable assembly for a power device, such as a charger, for providing output power to an electronic device. The cable assembly includes two pairs of wires, wherein a first pair provides output power for the electronic device and a second pair includes a switch for turning off the charger. The cable assembly allows the switch to be located remotely from a charger housing for the converter circuitry and remotely from a power source such as an outlet, and allows the switch to be generally co-located with and operable at the connector for connecting the power device with the electronic device.
US07910833B2
An embodiment of the present invention is directed to a power device for an electronic device, such as a charger for a portable rechargeable device and/or an AC adapter. The power device includes switching circuitry for de-powering at least a portion of the power device when the electronic device is either not drawing power or is disconnected from the power device.
US07910831B2
A cable management unit having a base section and a top section, the base section and the top section defining a space therebetween, a plurality of distribution walls coupled between the base section and the top section and having a front surface facing the space and a back surface facing away from the space, an electronic device disposed within the space, and a plurality of ports disposed on the back surface of the contiguous section of the plurality of distribution walls and each having a port surface extending beyond the back surface of the contiguous section.
US07910830B2
In one embodiment, the disclosure relates to a cable management unit having a base section for supporting a plurality of distribution walls. The distribution walls support several ports and can form a contiguous section or several discontinuous segments. A first mounting bracket and a second mounting bracket are integrated with the base section for securing the base to a receiving structure. Some of the distribution walls can be arranged at an angle with relation to each other in order to expand the number of ports that are formed on the base.
US07910827B2
The present invention generally discloses a weatherproof flush adapter plate assembly. In one embodiment, the adapter plate assembly includes a plate. The plate includes a front side, a back side, an outer edge, at least one inner edge, at least one mounting member for receiving a back box and at least one mounting member for receiving a notification appliance. The adapter plate assembly also includes a first gasket coupled to the front side of the plate and a second gasket coupled to the back side of the plate.
US07910817B1
A drum comprises a drum body made of at least one fiber layer. The drum body is provided with a drumhead at each of two opposite ends thereof. The drumheads are positioned on two reinforced frames disposed at both ends of the drum body by two drum hoops, so that the contact area between the drumheads and the drum body can be reduced through the reinforced frames. In addition, the reinforced frames reinforce the structure and maintain the shape of the drum body. Plural positioning screws are inserted through the periphery of the respective drum hoops, and the drum body is provided with plural fixing members to be screwed with the positioning screws. By such arrangements, the drum not only has the advantages of reinforced structure, light weight and easy production but exert a better resonance effect, making the sound produced by the drum more robust and powerful.
US07910816B2
A percussion instrument incorporates a case with an inner surface having a substantially circular profile. Multiple high precision spherical balls are contained with the case for acceleration on the inner surface in uniform circular motion along the profile to produce a persistent sustained sound. In one exemplary embodiment the case is cylindrical and incorporates two end plates. In a second embodiment the percussion instrument case is torroidal. In a third embodiment the percussion instrument case is spherical. Use of varying materials in the case or differing surface textures on the inner surface allows timbre of the instrument to be modified. Motion of the instrument lateral or perpendicular to the circular profile allows the creation of pulsed percussion sounds.
US07910805B2
Compositions and methods for conferring herbicide resistance to and improving nitrogen utilization of bacteria, plants, plant cells, tissues and seeds are provided. Compositions comprising a coding sequence for a polypeptide that confers resistance or tolerance to herbicidal glutamine synthetase inhibitors are provided. The coding sequences can be used in DNA constructs or expression cassettes for transformation and expression in plants. Compositions also comprise transformed bacteria, plants, plant cells, tissues, and seeds. In particular, isolated polynucleotides corresponding to herbicidal glutamine synthetase inhibitor-resistant polynucleotides are provided. Additionally, polypeptides corresponding to the polynucleotides are encompassed. In particular, the present invention provides for isolated polynucleotides comprising a variant of SEQ ID NO:1, wherein the variant polynucleotide encodes a polypeptide that is resistant to inhibition by herbicidal glutamine synthetase inhibitor.
US07910790B2
The present invention provides medical articles having a fluid control film component which comprise a sheet having microchannels that permit directional flow of a liquid. Articles incorporating the fluid control film include: wound dressings, wound drains, tympanostomy fluid wicks, intravenous access site dressings, drug delivery dressings, and sweat collection patches.
US07910786B2
Isobutene is prepared by a process in which a) an MTBE-containing stream I is separated by distillation into an MTBE-containing overhead stream II and a bottom stream III which comprises compounds having boiling points higher than that of MTBE; and b) the MTBE present in the overhead stream II is dissociated over a catalyst to give a dissociation product IV; wherein the stream I has a proportion of 2-methoxybutane (MSBE) of greater than 1000 ppm by mass, based on MTBE, and wherein the separation by distillation in step a) and/or the dissociation in step b) is carried out so that the dissociation product IV has a concentration of less than 1000 ppm by mass of linear butenes, based on a C4-olefin fraction.
US07910777B2
The present invention provides a method for producing cycloalkanol and/or cycloalkanone, which comprises reacting cycloalkane with molecular oxygen in the presence of mesoporous silica, (1) the mesoporous silica containing at least one transition metal; (2) the mesoporous silica having such pore distribution that the ratio of a total pore volume of mesoporous silica particles having a pore size of 3 to 50 nm to a total pore volume of mesoporous silica particles having a pore size of 2 to 50 nm is 50% or more; and (3) the mesoporous silica being modified by an organic silicon compound.
US07910771B2
The invention relates to a method for producing acrylic acid in one step by an oxydehydration reaction of glycerol in the presence of molecular oxygen. The reaction preferably carried out in gaseous phase in the presence of a suitable catalyst.
US07910770B2
The present invention provides compounds capable of binding to an Fc receptor and modulating Fc receptor activity comprising a core lipophilic group in the form of an Aryl ring substituted with a group rich in p-electrons. The invention further provides for a method of treating an autoimmune disease involving Fc receptor activity using such compounds. A method for obtaining a compound which modulates Fc receptor activity is also provided, the method comprising: (a) providing or designing compounds having structural characteristics to fit in the groove of the FcγRIIa structure; and (b) screening the compounds for modulating activity on the Fc receptor.
US07910769B2
Disclosed is an optimized process and apparatus for more efficiently and economically carrying out the liquid-phase oxidation of an oxidizable compound. Such liquid-phase oxidation is carried out in a bubble column reactor that provides for a highly efficient reaction at relatively low temperatures. When the oxidized compound is para-xylene and the product from the oxidation reaction is crude terephthalic acid (CTA), such CTA product can be purified and separated by more economical techniques than could be employed if the CTA were formed by a conventional high-temperature oxidation process.
US07910768B2
This invention relates to iodonium salts, acetal copolymers and polymer binders comprising functional groups capable of undergoing cationic or radical polymerization, their method of preparation and their use in the preparation of coating solutions and coatings. This invention also relates to coatings containing the iodonium salts, acetal copolymers and/or polymer binders and to negative working lithographic printing plates comprising these coatings.
US07910760B2
The invention relates to a process for producing a complex for use in olefin polymerization and oligomerization of the general formula (III): wherein Mt is a group 3 to 12 element in a +2 to +6 oxidation state with between 1 to 4 additional ligands (anionic and/or neutral) coordinated, wherein R1 and R2 are hydrogen, halogen, alkoxy, or a hydrocarbon group containing between 1 to 12 carbon atoms; E is a group 16 element, preferably O; Z is a direct bond between carbon atoms of the adjacent aromatic rings or a —CR3R4— or —SiR3R4— bridge between those carbon atoms, where R3 and R4 are hydrogen or a hydrocarbon groups with 1 to 10 carbons, R5, R6, R7 and R8 are hydrogen, halogen, alkoxy, or a hydrocarbon group containing between 1 to 10 carbon atoms and J1 and J2 are —NR9R10 or —PR9R10, where R9 is H or SiMe3 group and R10 is selected from a group consisting of alkyl, aryl, substituted aryl, heteroalkyl, and heteroaryl containing between 1 to 30 non-hydrogen atoms through a route involving novel precursors such as compounds represented by the general formula (I) where the various substitution options are adapted to produce the substituents shown for formula (III) above.
US07910754B2
A compound of the formula wherein R1, R2, R3, R4, R5, R6, R′, R″, Y, CA+, and A− each, independently of the others are as defined herein.
US07910750B2
The invention provides a type of artemisinin derivatives having following structure I, its preparation method and use, as well as a pharmaceutical composition containing such artemisinin derivatives and its use. The arteminsinin derivatives of the present invention and their pharmaceutical composition containing the artemisinin derivatives. have immunosuppressive activities and can be used more safely. The composition which comprises the artemisinin derivatives can be formulated into long-term dosage forms such as tablet, pellet and the like, and have wider productive and use value.
US07910749B2
A method oxidizes an organic compound with oxygen in the presence of a catalyst, in which the catalyst contains a N-hydroxy- or N-(substituted oxy)-imide compound derivable from at least one selected from a target product, a reaction intermediate, and a reaction byproduct, and the catalyst is produced from at least one component selected from the target product, reaction intermediate, and reaction byproduct each formed as a result of the reaction and is used in the oxidation reaction so as to make up for a loss of the catalyst due to denaturation in the reaction. The method can easily and inexpensively make up for a loss of the catalyst denaturated in the course of reaction.
US07910748B2
An organic electroluminescent device with a pair of electrodes having an anode and a cathode, and one or more organic compound layers disposed therebetween. One of the anode or the cathode is transparent or semitransparent. One of the organic compound layers includes a charge-transporting polyester having a repeating structure containing at least one structure selected from the structures represented by the following formulae as a partial structure: Ar represents an unsubstituted monovalent phenyl group, an unsubstituted monovalent polynuclear aromatic hydrocarbon having 2 to 10 aromatic rings, an unsubstituted monovalent fused aromatic hydrocarbon having 2 to 10 aromatic rings, or an unsubstituted monovalent fused aromatic hydrocarbon having 2 to 10 aromatic rings, or an unsubstituted monovalent aromatic heterocyclic ring; X represents a group represented by the following formula (II); T represents a bivalent straight-chain hydrocarbon group having 1 to 6 carbon atoms; k represents O; and l represents 1: R1 and R2 each represent a hydrogen atom, a substituted or unsubstituted alkyl group, a substituted or unsubstituted aryl group, or a substituted or unsubstituted aralkyl group; and n represents an integer of 1 to 10.
US07910747B2
Pyrazoloamides are provided which are phosphonate and phosphinate glucokinase activators that are useful in treating diabetes and related diseases and have the structure wherein is a pyrazoyl ring; R4 is —(CH2)n—Z—(CH2)m—PO(OR7)(OR8), —(CH2)nZ—(CH2)m—PO(OR7)R9, or —(CH2)nZ—(CH2)m—PO(R9)(R10); R5 and R6 are independently selected from H, alkyl and halogen; Y is R3(CH2)s, wherein R3 is aryl , s is 0, X is a bond; and n, Z, m, R4, R5, R6, and R7 are as defined herein; or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof.
US07910737B2
The invention discloses the preparation method of 7-ethyl-10-hydroxycamptothecin from 4-ethyl-7,8-dihydro-4-hydroxy-1H-pyrano[3,4-f]indolizine-3,6,10(4H)-trione and 1-(2-amino-5-hydroxyphenyl)-propan-1-one using higher reaction temperature and faster heating to that temperature.
US07910735B2
Substituted pyrazinecarboxylic acid anilide derivatives represented by the general formula (I) or salts thereof; intermediates of them; pesticides (such as insecticides and acaricides) for agricultural and horticultural use, containing the compounds as the active ingredient; and usage thereof: wherein R1 is H, C1-6 alkyl, halo C1-6 alkyl, or the like; R2 is halogeno, C1-6 alkyl, or the like; G is C2-10 alkyl or the like; Z is oxygen or sulfur; X's are each independently H, halogeno, or the like; Y's are each independently H, halogeno, cyano, or the like; and m and n are each an integer of 1 to 3.
US07910726B2
The disclosure provides an excellent amidite for synthesizing a modified nucleic acid, which enables a protective group therein to be removed under a moderate condition, thereby stably producing a hydroxyl group-containing modified nucleic acid. The disclosure also provides a method for synthesizing a modified nucleic acid using the amidite. Specifically, an amidite for synthesizing the modified nucleic acid is expressed by General Formula (I): where X represents a base, Y represents a substituent, Z represents a protective group for protecting a hydroxyl group in the substituent, and Q represents one of a hydrogen atom, a hydroxyl group and a hydroxyl group protected by a protective group, wherein the protective group can be removed in an aprotic solvent, and when the protective group is removed, the hydroxyl group emerges in the substituent.
