US08843802B2
The present invention relates to coding method and coding device that allow Rate-Compatible LDPC (low-density parity-check) codes to have favorable BER performance both with a low code rate and with a high code rate. In coding of LDPC codes that have plural code rates and whose all parity check matrices are composed of plural cyclic matrices, a coder 121 performs the coding in such a way that 1
US08843796B2
With various implementations of the invention, unloading masking information for each of the scan patterns is first determined. A tester then applies the scan patterns to a circuit under test and collects test response data according to the unloading masking information. A profiling-based analysis is performed to determine failing scan cell information based on the test response data.
US08843791B2
A memory error management system connected to memory channels for managing errors detected in corresponding memory devices includes a reporting table including a list of historically reported errors, a binary value representing the current error status of the memory channels, a uniqueness check module for checking whether a historically reported error is reappearing as a current error, an error mask register for generating a masked binary value representing unique current errors in the memory channels, and a channel arbitration module for decoding the channel identifiers of corrupted memory channels from the masked binary value and storing the decoded channel identifiers into the reporting table.
US08843790B2
A method and apparatus for monitoring changes to a block of data is disclosed. A computer sets a first hardware watchpoint to monitor changes to the block of data at a current location of the block of data in memory and a second hardware watchpoint to monitor changes at a selected location in the memory where a reference to the block of data is located. Responsive to the second hardware watchpoint being triggered by a change at the selected location where the reference to the block of data is located, the computer identifies a new location of the block of data in the memory based on the change that triggered the second hardware watchpoint. Subsequent to identifying the new location of the block of data, the computer then resets the first hardware watchpoint to monitor changes to the block of data at the new location of the block of data.
US08843789B2
Systems and methods are provided for selecting a path for an I/O in a storage area network. In one embodiment, a method comprises receiving path configuration information for paths associated with a host device connected to the storage area network, a listing of components within the storage area network, and a notification of a component failure within the storage area network. The method may also comprise correlating the received path configuration information, the received listing of components, and the received notification of component failure to determine one determine one or more paths associated with the host device affected by the component failure. The method may further comprise transmitting to the host device an alert for the one or more affected paths.
US08843788B2
Systems for helping identify faults on a bus, as well as to determine the topology of a bus network, are disclosed. A system according to one embodiment includes a bus interface for connecting to a bus and a switch coupled to the bus interface, the switch configured to alternate between an open state and a closed state. The system is connected to the bus via the bus interface when the switch is in the closed state, and the system is disconnected from the bus via the bus interface when the switch is in the open state.
US08843787B1
Embodiments of systems and methods for archive verification are disclosed. More specifically, embodiments of this archive verification can comprise loading media into a drive and reading data from the media to verify that the media and data on the media can be read. In one embodiment, media can be loaded into a drive and read according to a verification policy. As part of verifying that media and data on media can be read, read errors or other verification data associated with media can be obtained. Using this verification data a result for the media may be determined.
US08843786B2
An apparatus comprising an initiator circuit and a target circuit. The initiator circuit may be configured to (i) communicate with a network through a first interface and (ii) generate testing sequences to be sent to the network. The target circuit may be configured to (i) receive the testing sequences from the network through a second network interface and (ii) respond to the testing sequences.
US08843782B2
Embodiments of the present invention provide a method and apparatus for reconstructing a RAID, and a system, when a first physical disk is faulty, finding DUs of other physical disks, where the DUs are located on a same LDS as a DU of the first physical disk, in each logic module of a pre-generated layout template, performing exclusive-OR on data read from the DUs of other physical disks, and writing the data into a hot spare DU of a second physical disk; and in the layout template, replacing a DU identifier of the first physical disk with a DU identifier of the second physical disk, where DUs corresponding to DU identifiers in each LDS in the layout template belong to different physical disks. The present invention can reduce time needed for writing the data, shorten time needed for RAID reconstruction and restoration, and improve a reconstruction speed.
US08843769B2
A secure environment is established within a system on a chip (SoC) without the use of a memory management unit. A set of security parameters is produced by a configuration program executed by a processor within the SoC that is read from a first non-volatile memory within the SoC. A set of stored parameters is created in a committable non-volatile memory within the SoC by writing the set of security parameters into the committable non-volatile memory. The committable non-volatile memory is sealed so that that it cannot be read or written by the processor after being sealed. The stored parameters can then be accessed only by control circuitry. Security circuitry within the SoC is configured using the stored parameters each time the SoC is initialized and thereby enforces the secure environment within the SoC.
US08843766B2
A method for the protection against access to a machine code of a device, has the steps: (a) encrypting a machine code by a device-specific key, which is provided by a TPM (Trusted Platform Module) module present in the device, (b) storing the encrypted machine code in a memory of the device, (c) wherein the device-specific key can no longer be read from the TPM module after a manipulation of the device.
US08843759B2
A method for generating an input key for authenticating access to a resource, the method including obtaining an input media; determining a reference point in the input media; sampling the input media in response to determining the reference point to define an input media sample; generating cell data from the input media sample; and generating the input key using the cell data.
US08843758B2
Techniques involving migrating authenticated content on a network towards the consumer of the content. One representative technique includes a network node receiving an encrypted seed having at least a location of the user data at a network service that stores the user data, and a cryptographic key to access the user data. The seed is received in response to a user login attempt to the network service. The user data is requested from the location using at least the received cryptographic key. The method further includes receiving and storing the user data at the network node, where the network node is physically closer to a location of the user than is the location of the network service. If the user is successfully authenticated, user access is provided to the stored user data at the network node rather than from the network service.
US08843755B2
An apparatus lets a user to determine a pool of images and then forms from the pool of images a set of images for user authentication and divides the set of images into two mutually exclusive subsets: a key image subset comprising images referred to as key images and a decoy image subset comprising images referred to as decoy images. The apparatus displays the key images to the user to teach the key images to the user. Then, to authenticate the user, the apparatus produces an assortment of decoy images and key images, and displays the assortment to the user. The apparatus receives from the user identification of images held as key images and verifies whether the identification of key images matched with the key images selected by the processor.
US08843745B2
A system and method of authorizing a product including transmitting from an end user device a character string, including a Transaction ID, to a licensing authority. The licensing authority encrypts the Transaction ID using an encryption key associated with a product for which the end user is seeking authorization to produce an Authorization number. Each product is associated with a different encryption key resulting in a different Authorization number being produced for each product based on the same Transaction ID. The licensing authority then returns the Authorization number to the end user device. A decryption processor associated with the end user device decrypts the Authorization number using an unchangeable decryption key and compares the decrypted Authorization number with the Transaction ID. If the decrypted Authorization number matches the Transaction ID the product is authorized.
US08843744B2
A method of distributing media content over networks where content is shared includes coupling downloading metadata, which is accessed to start downloading media contents from the network, with semantic metadata representative of the semantic information associated with at least one of the content, and with source metadata indicative of the source of the media content. At least one of the semantic and the source metadata may be made accessible without downloading, even partially, the media content. A digital signature may also be applied to the metadata to enable the verification that, at reception, the metadata is intact and has not been subjected to malicious tampering.
US08843741B2
Provided is a system and method for providing a certificate, and more specifically a certificate for network access upon a second system. The method includes receiving from a user a request made with a first device for network access, the request including a voucher. At least one characteristic of the first device is also determined. Upon verification of the voucher and in response to the first device having at least one characteristic corresponding to at least one predefined device criteria, the user is provided with a certificate with at least one characteristic for network access. An associated system for providing a Certificate is also provided.
US08843739B2
An anti-tamper hardware security device that communicates with a host machine, including a host interface coupled to the host machine and configured to receive an access request from the host machine, the access request being associated with an application; a key manager configured to manage cryptographic keys; a whitelist manager configured to manage application validation information; and a controller configured to receive the access request from the host interface, validate the application using the application validation information, retrieve a cryptographic key associated with the application, and transmit a response to the host machine through the host interface if the controller determines that the application is valid.
US08843738B2
A method, system and computer program product related to an authentication security protocol, which associates a unique Abbreviated Session Identifier (ASI) with some application data packets transmitted, for example, from a client to a server. The present technology can be a modified version of the Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocol. A method of authentication comprises an initial setup comprising negotiating a secure network connection between client and server using TLS, providing a unique ASI by the server, associating the ASI with a TLS protocol session identifier, transmitting the unique ASI and the TLS protocol session identifier to the client, and establishing the secure network connection between the client and server. Subsequent data packets transferred between the client and server may include the unique ASI.
US08843718B2
A method, apparatus, and system of presentation of a read-only clone Logical Unit Number (LUN) to a host device as a snapshot of a parent LUN are disclosed. In one embodiment, a method includes generating a read-write clone LUN of a parent LUN and coalescing an identical data instance of the read-write clone LUN and the parent LUN in a data block of a volume of a storage system. A block transfer protocol layer is modified to refer the read-write clone LUN as a read-only clone LUN, according to the embodiment. Furthermore, according to the embodiment, the read-only clone LUN is presented to a host device as a snapshot of the parent LUN.
US08843712B1
A method and system for performing sensed garbage collection in a memory is disclosed. In one embodiment, a method includes measuring arrival times of read/write commands received from a processor executing an application; transforming the arrival times from a time domain to frequency domain data; locking onto a phase of the read/write commands; determining predicted arrival times of future read/write commands; creating a real-time schedule of memory requests using the arrival times of the read/write commands and the predicted arrival times of the future read/write commands; using the real-time schedule to sense idle periods where the application will not make a request of the memory; and performing garbage collection in the memory during at least one of the idle periods.
US08843710B2
A method and device for maintaining data in a data storage system, comprising a plurality of data storage nodes, the method being employed in a storage node in the data storage system and comprising: monitoring and detecting, conditions in the data storage system that imply the need for replication of data between the nodes in the data storage system; initiating replication processes in case such a condition is detected, wherein the replication processes include sending multicast and unicast requests to other storage nodes, said requests including priority flags, receiving multicast and unicast requests from other storage nodes, wherein the received requests include priority flags, ordering the received requests in different queues depending on their priority flags, and dealing with requests in higher priority queues with higher frequency than requests in lower priority queues.
US08843709B2
A method for performing dynamic configuration includes: freezing a bus between a dynamic configurable cache and a plurality of cores/processors by rejecting a request from any of the cores/processors during a bus freeze period, wherein the dynamic configurable cache is implemented with an on-chip memory; and adjusting a size of a portion of the dynamic configurable cache, wherein the portion of the dynamic configurable cache is capable of caching/storing information for one of the cores/processors. An associated apparatus is also provided. In particular, the apparatus includes the plurality of cores/processors, the dynamic configurable cache, and a dynamic configurable cache controller, and can operate according to the method.
US08843706B2
Methods, apparatus, and product for memory management among levels of cache in a memory hierarchy in a computer with a processor operatively coupled through two or more levels of cache to a main random access memory, caches closer to the processor in the hierarchy characterized as higher in the hierarchy, including: identifying a line in a first cache that is preferably retained in the first cache, the first cache backed up by at least one cache lower in the memory hierarchy, the lower cache implementing an LRU-type cache line replacement policy; and updating LRU information for the lower cache to indicate that the line has been recently accessed.
US08843704B2
Compressed data is maintained in a plurality of strides of a redundant array of independent disks, wherein a stride is configurable to store a plurality of tracks. A request is received to write one or more tracks, and a determination is made as to whether all of the one or more tracks can be stored in one selected stride of the plurality of strides. In response to determining that all of the one or more tracks can be stored in the one selected stride, the one or more tracks are written in the one selected stride of the plurality of strides.
US08843688B2
Techniques are disclosed to perform an operation to facilitate concurrent repair of PCIe switch units in processing environments such as a tightly coupled, multi-switch, multi-adapter, multi-host distributed system. The operation, for an identified switch unit to be repaired, reconfigures all switch unit hardware in the switch fabric by removing all upstream to downstream connections utilizing the identified switch unit. Connections to hosts via the upstream ports are also removed by the operation. Once the switch unit is powered back on, the operation reconfigures all switch unit hardware in the switch fabric by adding all upstream to downstream connections utilizing the identified switch unit. The operation further restores connections to hosts via the upstream ports.
US08843684B2
A sample is generated based on an event. Further, an interrupt handler captures information for an interrupted thread on a current processor. In addition, an affinity of the interrupted thread is set such that the interrupted thread runs only on the current processor without being able to migrate to a different processor. A sampler thread that runs on the current processor retrieves a call stack associated with the interrupted thread after the affinity of the interrupted thread has been set to the current processor. The affinity of the interrupted thread is restored after the call stack has been retrieved.
US08843682B2
Described embodiments provide arbitration for a cache of a network processor. Processing modules of the network processor generate memory access requests including a requested address and an ID value corresponding to the requesting processing module. Each request is either a locked request or a simple request. An arbiter determines whether the received requests are locked requests. For each locked request, the arbiter determines whether two or more of the requests are conflicted based on the requested address of each received memory requests. If one or more of the requests are non-conflicted, the arbiter determines, for each non-conflicted request, whether the requested addresses are locked out by prior memory requests based on a lock table. If one or more of the non-conflicted memory requests are locked-out by prior memory requests, the arbiter queues the locked-out memory requests. The arbiter grants any non-conflicted memory access requests that are not locked-out.
US08843681B2
Method, system, bus arbitration device for accessing a memory are described. According to one embodiment, priorities of N function modules accessing the memory are compared to obtain location information of a function module with the highest priority. A bus of the function modules accessing the memory is switched to the function module with the highest priority by performing logic operation on the location information and bus information of each function module. Further, a bus arbitration device including a priority arbitration unit and a bus switching unit is described.
US08843676B2
An embodiment of the invention pertains to a method that includes an operating system, program components running on the operating system, and a file system associated with one or more files. Responsive to a write request sent from a specified program component to the operating system, in order to write specified data content to a given file, the method determines whether the write request meets a criterion, which is derived from the identity of at least one of the specified program component, and the given file. If the criterion is met, a message is immediately sent to release the specified program component from a wait state. Data portions of the specified data content are then selectively written to a storage buffer, and subsequently written from the buffer to the given file.
US08843675B2
A method and system to transfer data from one or more data sources to one or more data sinks using a pipelined buffer interconnect fabric is described. The method comprises receiving a request for a data transfer from the data source to the data sink, assigning a first buffer and a first bus to the data source, locking the first buffer and the first bus so as to enable only the data source to transfer data to the first buffer via the first bus, receiving a signal from the data source indicating completion of data transfer to the first buffer, unlocking the first buffer and the first bus, assigning the first buffer and the first bus to the data sink, assigning a second buffer and a second bus to the data source, locking the second buffer and the second bus so as to enable only the data source to transfer data to the second buffer via the second bus and enabling the data sink to read data from the first buffer via the first bus while the data source writes to the second buffer via the second bus, thereby pipelining the data transfer from the data source to the data sink. The transfer of data from data source to data sink is controlled by programming the pipelined buffer interconnect via one or more of software, control registers and control signals.
US08843668B2
To add an unpackaged interface without adding a new connector to an information processing device. An information processing device includes: a first control device connected, when first equipment is attached, to the equipment via a terminal train containing a first detection terminal; a second control device; and a connection control device detecting, when the second equipment is attached, a detection signal of the second equipment via the first detection terminal and connecting the second equipment to the second control device based on the detection signal.
US08843656B2
A method is provided in one example embodiment and includes generating a bandwidth estimation for an adaptive bitrate (ABR) client; evaluating a current state of a buffer of the ABR client; and determining an encoding rate to be used for the ABR client based, at least, on the bandwidth estimation and the current state of the buffer. A fetch interval for the ABR client increases as the buffer becomes more full, while not reaching a level at which the ABR client is consuming data at a same rate at which it is downloading the data.
US08843652B2
A distributed control system and methods of operating such a control system are disclosed. In one embodiment, the distributed control system is operated in a manner in which interrupts are at least temporarily inhibited from being processed to avoid excessive delays in the processing of non-interrupt tasks. In another embodiment, the distributed control system is operated in a manner in which tasks are queued based upon relative timing constraints that they have been assigned. In a further embodiment, application programs that are executed on the distributed control system are operated in accordance with high-level and/or low-level requirements allocated to resources of the distributed control system.
US08843639B2
A method of transparently transferring data between a network application running on a first processor and a target service running on a second processor through a tunnel server running on a third processor, the method comprising: connecting a target program running on the second processor to the tunnel server; connecting a client program running on the first processor to the tunnel server; connecting the network application to the client program through a network adapter running on the first processor; sending data from network application to the tunnel server through the client program; connecting the target program to the target service through a network adapter running on the second processor; and relaying data from the tunnel server to the target service through the target program.
US08843634B2
Partition configuration and creation mechanisms for network traffic management devices. In some implementations, the present invention enhances the predictability of partition hierarchies that use weighting values and fixed rate guarantees. In some implementations, the present invention includes a configuration interface that constrains the manner in which partitions can be configured to achieve predictable and efficient results. In some implementations, the present invention includes a partition creation and deletion layer that operates to dynamically create partitions based on one or more partition patterns.
US08843631B2
A dynamic local function binding apparatus and method are provided. In an application virtualization environment, a terminal may register local services associated with local functions of the terminal, and a remote server may call the serviced local functions to be used while the server is executing an application for the terminal. The local functions may be unique functions of various local devices installed in the terminal. The servicing of the local functions may include creating service descriptions of the functions that are provided by the individual local devices and publishing the service descriptions.
US08843630B1
Systems and methods provide logic for decentralized request routing. In one implementation, a computer-implemented method routes a request. The method includes receiving, by a client server, the request. The client server evaluates feedback information received by the client server from at least one of a plurality of host servers. The client server selects one of the plurality of host servers to process the request, based on the evaluation, and transmits the request to the selected one of the plurality of host servers.
US08843628B2
A system and method is provided for capacity management of network connectivity between endpoints coupled to one another via a circuit. An inventory of network elements may be maintained in a database. A circuit designer may be presented with network elements that may be selected when designing the circuit between endpoints.
US08843622B1
A method is provided in one example and includes establishing a plurality of persistent connections with a plurality of devices at a server; receiving presence data associated with the plurality of devices; responding to heartbeat messages provided by the plurality of devices; receiving a status change notification from a particular one of the devices; and updating status data and heartbeat data for the particular one of the devices. In more particular embodiments, the method includes encoding messages communicated on the persistent connections using an extensible messaging and presence protocol (XMPP). The method may also include communicating script configuration data over a particular one of the persistent connections for execution by the particular device. The persistent connections may be secured using transport layer security (TLS).
US08843619B2
Methods and systems for monitoring visits to a target site are provided. A list of one or more origin sites is embedded in the target site. A determination is made whether any entry in the list of origin sites has been previously visited.
US08843614B2
An apparatus for distributing mobile resources in a cloud computing environment includes: a resource register configured to analyze, when a request for mobile resource registration is inputted by a user, the requested resource and confirm if the resource is registerable; a provisioning manager configured to create a MVO, when the mobile resource is a registerable resource, and register the mobile resource; a metadata repository configured to store metadata information regarding the registered mobile resource; and a resource manager configured to control the provisioning manager, when the resource register receives a request for the resource registration, so as to create a MVO, register the resource, and store metadata regarding the registered mobile resource information.
US08843612B2
Domain Name Service (DNS) requests are used as the reporting vehicle for ensuring that security-related information can be transferred from a network. As one possibility, a central facility for a security provider may maintain a data collection capability that is based upon receiving the DNS requests containing the information being reported. In an email application, if a data block is embedded within or attached to an email message, an algorithm is applied to the data block to generate an indicator that is specifically related to the contents of the data block. As one possibility, the algorithm may generate a hash that provides a “digital fingerprint” having a reasonable likelihood that the hash is unique to the data block. By embedding the hash within a DNS request, the request becomes a report that the data block has been accessed.
US08843610B2
Methods and a system for exploiting the secondary traffic generated by social networking sites are disclosed. Traffic on a commercial website is constantly monitored by a web analytics tool, which collects traffic measurements of hits, button presses, enquiries, purchases etc., as well as the referrer URL of a site such as a social networking site through which the commercial website is accessed. The collected measurements are forwarded to a Referred Traffic Analysis System. Concurrently, the Referred Traffic Analysis System crawls the Internet and collects a large number of social networking sites, analyses their content by extracting insight terms and phrases from them. In a third step, the collected traffic measurements are correlated with the collected insights from the social networking sites, and the top insights that reoccur frequently enough to appear to be a driver for the measurements observed, are presented to the client. A corresponding system is also provided.
US08843596B2
In response to receiving a request from a client device, a determination may be made that the request corresponds to an HLS playlist related to a media asset. Information regarding a time segment for the media asset may be determined based on at least one HDS file corresponding with the media asset. An HLS playlist may be generated based at least in part on the determined information. The HLS playlist may be sent to the client device. In response to receiving a request from a client device, a determination may be made that the request corresponds to an HLS media segment of a media asset. At least one HDS media file corresponding to the HLS media segment may be determined. At least a portion of the determined HDS media file(s) may be converted into an HLS media segment. The HLS media segment may be sent to the client device.
US08843589B2
A method for remotely determining the configuration of a computer of a multimedia content user includes sending player detection code the user's computer and receiving configuration information regarding the user's computer. A method of determining a connection speed of a computer includes determining a size of a timing block based on an estimated bandwidth and retrieving the timing block. The connection speed is determined based on the timing block size and the times at which transfer begins and ends.
US08843579B1
Technologies are described herein for managing the IP addresses of outbound e-mail messages based on sender reputation. A range of reputation scores is divided into a number of reputation segments, each covering a span of the reputation scores. The available IP addresses are distributed evenly among the reputation segments. The span of reputation scores for each of the reputation segments may be periodically adjusted based on historical data regarding a volume of e-mail messages sent by sender reputation score. In order to select a source IP address for a particular outbound e-mail message, the reputation segment encompassing a sender reputation score regarding the sender of the e-mail message is determined. An IP address is selected from the IP addresses assigned to the reputation segment and returned to be utilized as the source IP address in sending the outbound e-mail message.
US08843568B2
Email tags are described. In embodiments, email messages are received for distribution to client devices that correspond to respective recipients of the email messages. Email routing decisions are applied to route an email message to an email folder for a recipient of the email message, where the email folder may include an email inbox, a junk folder, or a user-created folder. The email message is then tagged with an email tag to generate a tagged email message. The email tag includes a routing description that indicates why the email message was routed to the particular email folder.
US08843560B2
A mobile device, system, and method are directed towards enabling an integrated display of live views. The integrated live views are generated by employing social networking information, including moods of a person, avatars, status of a member's activities including whether they are in an IM session, or the like. Integrated live views may include a live contact list, a group view, a friend view, an activity oriented view, a list of content, or the like, based on the mobile user's social networking information. By providing the mobile user with integrated live views of their social network, the mobile user may be able communicate with other members within the mobile social networking context, to obtain, and respond to invites from a social network member, provide opportunities for activities to other members, to grow their social network, and to consume content that is displayed relative to their social network.
US08843556B2
A method for detection of spam in a tagging system can include assigning negative points to each tag in the tagging system responsive to the tag matching at least one spam filter criteria, assigning trust points to a tagger responsive to the tagger's behavior matching at least one tagger filter criteria, wherein the at least one tagger filter criteria depends upon tags assigned by the tagger that are assigned negative points, and restricting a tagging functionality of the tagging system for a tagger if a first predefined threshold of negative trust points is exceeded.
US08843552B2
A transaction system and method is provided that ensures a high degree of non-repudiation. The transaction system may include a media conferencing terminal and a client computer on each end of the transaction. The system may be linked via a network such as the Internet so that transactions may be conducted between remote locations. The media conferencing terminal ensures that each party to the transaction may be satisfied as to the identity of the other parties. The method includes recording the pressure, speed and acceleration of annotations made to digital documents that are used for conducting transactions. The system is operable to store all media conferencing information, digital document information, and annotation information such that the information can be later recovered to reproduce the transaction, proving a high degree of non-repudiation.
US08843551B2
A mobile device, system, and method are directed towards enabling an integrated display of live views. The integrated live views are generated by employing social networking information, including moods of a person, avatars, status of a member's activities including whether they are in an IM session, or the like. Integrated live views may include a live contact list, a group view, a friend view, an activity oriented view, a list of content, or the like, based on the mobile user's social networking information. By providing the mobile user with integrated live views of their social network, the mobile user may be able communicate with other members within the mobile social networking context, to obtain, and respond to invites from a social network member, provide opportunities for activities to other members, to grow their social network, and to consume content that is displayed relative to their social network.
US08843532B2
A system and method for a block based differencing algorithm which includes the ability to limit memory requirements regardless of source file sizes by splitting the source file into optimally sized blocks. The invention allows the blocks to be processed in any order allowing in-place operation. Further, the present invention allows a second stage compressor to match the compressor blocks to those used by the differencing algorithm to optimize compressor and decompressor performance.
US08843517B1
A high speed data storage system including a logical disk that is implemented from disk systems (i.e., physical disk storage devices and associated controllers) that operate at speed lower than the input data rate. The logical disk supports the input data rate by multiplexing streaming data onto multiple physical disk storage devices. The resulting system has a logical read/write speed that is the sum of each of the disks participated in the storage system. Data written onto the data storage system can be retrieved directly, sequentially, or by means of advanced search techniques such as binary search or skip sequential search.
US08843515B2
One or more systems, devices, methods, and/or processes described can apply searches and/or filters to data of social networks with respect to one or more geographical locations, geospatial references, location-based contexts, and/or map-based references. One or more social networks can be queried with search and/or filter parameters and one or more geographic locations, and results received from the social network(s) can be based on the search and/or filter parameter(s) and the geographic location(s) and presented to a user on a map or other user interface. A size of a search region can be changed to a second size, and/or a position of the search region can be changed to a second position. One or more queries can be saved with their geospatial references and their search and/or filter parameter(s) (e.g. saved queries) can continue to run and/or execute over one or more periods of time transpiring to provide continual and/or periodic reporting.
US08843513B1
Building and maintaining an accurate and up-to-date global inventory of hardware, software, and telecommunications assets deployed throughout an organization is described. A global inventory warehouse (GIW) receives an identification and physical location of these assets from multiple source systems. Some of these source systems contain information pertaining to the assets that has been manually entered into the source system by a human administrator. Other source systems, meanwhile, contain information that has been automatically collected by the source systems without human intervention. The GIW receives this information from the source systems and stores it within a GIW database. The GIW database may thus contain a global inventory of all or nearly all of the hardware, software, and telecommunications assets distributed throughout the organization. This database may also contain an identification of physical locations within the organization of all or substantially all of these assets.
US08843509B2
A method and system for modelling atomic or molecular level structures, or the atomic or molecular energies or forces in such structures. The method and system use a Gaussian Process to estimate properties at the atom or molecular level in such structures.
US08843502B2
A method of sorting a dataset includes incrementally receiving data from the dataset, and incrementally storing the received data as individual input data subsets as the data is received, thereby sequentially generating a plurality of filled data subsets of unsorted data. The method includes individually sorting each filled data subset of unsorted data concurrently with receiving data for a next one of the individual input data subsets, thereby sequentially generating a plurality of sorted input data subsets, and performing a merge sort on the plurality of sorted input data subsets, thereby incrementally generating a sorted version of the dataset.
US08843492B2
Some implementations disclosed herein provide techniques and arrangements to train a blocking scheme using both labeled data and unlabeled data. For example, training the blocking scheme may include iteratively: learning a conjunction, identifying first matches in the labeled data and the unlabeled data that are uncovered by the conjunction, and identifying second matches in the labeled data and the unlabeled data that are covered by the conjunction. The conjunction learned in each iteration may be combined using a disjunction. A search engine may use the search engine when searching for records that match an entity.
US08843491B1
Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for identifying a plurality of items to be displayed to a user, each item including digital content and being associated with a respective timestamp, receiving a plurality of scores, each score being associated with an item of the plurality of items, determining a subset of items to be displayed to the user based on the plurality of scores, the subset of items including items of the plurality of items, grouping items in the subset of items based on respective timestamps to provide a plurality of item groups, for each item group, determining an order of items based on respective scores, and transmitting instructions to display items to the user based on the plurality of item groups and in the order within each item group.
US08843484B2
Content recommendation includes: determining a plurality of user behavior categories pertaining to a plurality of user behaviors by a plurality of users within a period of time, and a plurality of user behavior frequencies corresponding to the plurality of user behavior categories; determining whether the number of user behavior categories exceeds a preset category threshold; in the event that the number of user behavior categories exceeds the preset threshold, excluding one or more user behavior categories such that the number of remaining user behavior categories does not exceed the preset threshold; determining, based at least on the remaining user behavior categories and corresponding user behavior frequencies, user preference data comprising frequency distribution information of a plurality of pieces of content information targeted by user behaviors in the remaining user behavior categories; and recommending content information to a user based on the user preference data.
US08843483B2
For filtering web search results, a method includes extracting metadata attributes and associated attribute values from web search results from a web search engine. The web search results organized into a results list with web page data grouped as an entry in the results list. The metadata attributes and associated attribute values extracted from the results list. The method includes presenting the extracted metadata attributes and receiving input from the user indicating one or more selected metadata attributes and a position indication for each selected metadata attribute. Each position indication indicates where in a custom report that attribute values for each selected metadata attribute are to appear. The method includes filtering the received results list based on the selected metadata attributes and displaying the filtered results list to the user in a custom report arranged by the selected position indication for each selected metadata attribute.
US08843481B1
A method for creating a virtual community of users is disclosed The method includes the steps of providing a community server operable to create a virtual community based upon an action performed by a user, and rendering community services to the virtual community of users based on the action. In another aspect of the invention, a method of searching based on an action based virtual community includes the steps of providing a community server operable to create a virtual community based upon a search action performed by a user, and rendering community services to the virtual community of users based on the search action, the rendered community services including information related to returned search results and search result relevance based on other user's actions.
US08843477B1
Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for ranking search results. One method includes ranking web objects in response to a search query to generate a global ranking based on a relevance of each web object to the search query and a relative authority of each web object compared to other web objects in the plurality of web objects, each web object including a web page in a corresponding website that includes a plurality of web pages; ranking the plurality of web pages corresponding to each website based on onsite ranking criteria to generate an onsite ranking; generating a combined ranking for each web page based on a combination of the global ranking of the web object that includes the web page and the onsite ranking of the web page; and presenting web pages responsive to the search query based on the combined rankings.
US08843470B2
Systems and methods are provided for classifying a search query. A first group of query classifiers can be used to evaluate a query relative to various subject matter domains. The evaluation results from the first group of domain classifiers can then be used by a second group of meta-classifiers. The meta-classifiers are based on non-linear classification models. The meta-classifiers are associated with meta-classifier categories that may correspond to a domain or that may correspond to a plurality of domains. The assigned meta-classifier category for a query can be used in any convenient manner, such as by triggering additional uses of the search query to match images or other alternative types of documents, or such as by allowing a subject matter domain to be assigned to the query.
US08843466B1
Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for identifying entities using search results. One of the methods includes determining that a search query includes a respective text reference to each of one or more predetermined attributes, wherein each attribute is associated with an entity type; obtaining search results for the search query from a search engine, each search result identifying a respective resource; for each of a plurality of the obtained search results, determining an initial score for each of a plurality of entities of the entity type based on occurrences of names of the entity in the resource identified by the search result; generating a final score for each of the entities based on the initial scores; and selecting one or more names of entities of the entity type to include in a response to the search query based on the final scores.
US08843465B2
Contextually relevant pieces of alternative content, including advertisements, are selected for display with requested content based on documents or other second content sources that are referenced by or in the requested content.
US08843456B2
Embodiments relate to table compression in a database. The database is organized in tables including rows and columns An aspect includes defining a range partition of a table of the database according to a first attribute of the table. Internal ranges of the table of the database are defined according to a second attribute of the table. A target internal range of the internal ranges is determined to insert a row as a new entry into the table. A determination is made as to whether an internal range compression directory exists for the target internal range. Based on determining that no internal range compression directory exists for the target internal range and a predefined threshold value of a number of rows is exceeded in the target internal range, the internal range compression directory for the target internal range is created.
US08843439B2
A non-transitory, computer-readable medium storing a program that causes a computer that controls data storage apparatuses respectively storing plural data, and a storing apparatus storing metadata that includes for each of the data, attribute information and storage location information, the process includes receiving a snapshot collection request for a given data group having specified attribute information; determining with respect to the data storage apparatuses and when the collection request is received, whether any of the data of the given data group is stored therein, based on the attribute information and the storage location information; and generating, with respect to each of the data storage apparatuses storing data of the given data group, a snapshot of the plural data stored therein, by controlling the data storage apparatus and further generating a snapshot of the metadata by controlling the storing apparatus.
US08843429B2
User behavior modeling can include determining actions performed by various users. From the mined user actions, future actions can be predicted. Certain implementations include providing information and/or services based on the predicted future actions. Some implementations, include providing relevant information, services, and/or goods regarding the predicted future action.
US08843425B2
Hierarchical routing for two-way information flow and structural plasticity in a neural network is provided. In one embodiment the network includes multiple core modules, wherein each core module has a plurality of incoming connections with predetermined addresses. Each core module also has a plurality of outgoing connections such that each outgoing connection targets an incoming connection in a core module among the multiple core modules. The network also has a routing system that selectively routes signals among the core modules based on a reconfigurable hierarchical organization of the core modules. The network approximates a fully connected network such that each outgoing connection on any core module can target and reach any incoming connection on any core module without requiring a fully connected network. The routing system provides two-way information flow between neurons utilizing hierarchical routing.
US08843417B2
A method for using a secondary PAN is disclosed. The method includes providing a secondary PAN associated with a primary PAN, where the secondary PAN has at least one end portion that is the same as the primary PAN, but has a middle portion of that is different than the primary PAN.
US08843412B2
Techniques are described for checking whether system properties meet the requirements of a software application. These checks are performed by executing validation checks associated with the application, which often include validation checks associated with other applications with which the application integrates. A validation engine takes several inputs that drive the validation checking that is performed in conjunction with an operation associated with the application. In one aspect, a modular approach to integrating an application's validation checks with other applications' validation checks is provided via a properties file that contains metadata for all the files in an application's validation module. In another aspect, conditional logic is introduced into a knowledge source so that similar logic does not need to be in the validation test code. In another aspect, the validation test identifiers input is extended to support multiple modes of operations.
US08843407B2
A multiuse redemption card enables a purchaser to provide the multiuse redemption card to a recipient for a defined amount and delay payment until the recipient uses the redemption card. The delayed payment can be incremental up to the defined amount so that the recipient can use the card multiple times.
US08843404B2
Joint pricing and replenishment of freshness inventory or products having different qualities determines the joint pricing and inventory strategies to optimize the retailer's benefits from product freshness, employing a dynamic programming formulation that incorporates a demand model that captures consumer choice based on both the freshness and price.
US08843402B2
A system for generating a virtual clothing experience has a display for mounting with a wall, one or more digital cameras for capturing first images of the person standing in front of the display, an image processing module for synthesizing the first images and for generating a display image on the display that substantially appears, to the person, like a reflection of the person in a mirror positioned at the display. The cameras capture second images of a garment with the person; the module synthesizes the second images with the first images to generate the image that substantially appears, to the person, that the reflection wears the garment. A home version of the system may be formed with a home computer and a database storing garment images in cooperation with a manufacturer.
US08843399B1
Techniques are described for automatically identifying and inhibiting suspect electronic communications between users, such as for electronic communications that may reflect fraudulent activities by one or more of the users or that are otherwise inappropriate for one or more reasons. In some situations, the communications may relate to transactions in which the users are involved, such as for users that are buyers and sellers of items interacting via one or more electronic marketplaces. The communications may occur via a communication mechanism provided by an electronic marketplace that acts as an intermediary between the sender of a communication and the one or more intended recipients of the communication. The automatic identification of suspect communications that may be inappropriate includes automatically assessing the communications in one or more ways, and identified suspect communications and any associated inappropriate user activities may be inhibited in various ways.
US08843396B2
A system and method for targeted delivery of advertising of a first or second sponsor to a plurality of cellular phones of a first or second type by way of a competitive bid auction process includes (a) receiving a offline purchase datum; (b) presenting to the first and second sponsor data corresponding to (1) the offline purchase datum and (2) the first type and the second type of cellular phone; (c) receiving from each sponsor advertising associated with the offline purchase datum characteristic, wherein each advertising has a different rendering capability associated therewith; (d) attributing a priority to the delivery of the advertising based upon a resultant yield determination; and (e) transmitting the appropriate advertising to the types of cellular phones having the corresponding rendering capabilities of the advertising.
US08843387B2
A system and method of managing business process calendars. A method of managing a process includes defining at least one process to be performed by a first entity for at least one second entity, and associating a first subset of a plurality of tasks of the at least one process with the first entity. The method further includes associating a second subset of the plurality of tasks with the at least one second entity, and creating a process calendar based upon the at least one process and the plurality of tasks. The method additionally includes displaying the process calendar.
US08843369B1
Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for speech endpointing based on a voice profile. In one aspect, a method includes the actions of receiving audio data corresponding to an utterance spoken by a particular user. The actions further include generating a voice profile for the particular user using at least a portion of the audio data. The actions further include determining in the audio data a beginning point or an ending point of the utterance based at least in part on the voice profile for the particular user. The actions further include based on the beginning point, the ending point, or both the beginning point and the ending point, outputting data indicating the utterance.
US08843364B2
Methods and systems for non-negative hidden Markov modeling of signals are described. For example, techniques disclosed herein may be applied to signals emitted by one or more sources. The modeling may be constrained according to high level information. In some embodiments, methods and systems may enable the separation of a signal's various components. As such, the systems and methods disclosed herein may find a wide variety of applications. In audio-related fields, for example, these techniques may be useful in music recording and processing, source separation/extraction, noise reduction, teaching, automatic transcription, electronic games, audio search and retrieval, and many other applications.
US08843362B2
A system includes one or more computer processors that are configured to receive data relating to a composition of a target group, receive logged communications of the target group, extract textual information from the logged communications, analyze the textual information using statistical and linguistic sentiment analysis techniques, identify an individual or sub-group from the target group as a function of the analysis of the textual information, and display on a user interface or transmit to another processor the identified individual or sub-group of the target group and to display on the user interface or transmit to another processor a sentiment assessment of the identified individual or sub-group as a function of the statistical and linguistic sentiment analysis.
US08843361B1
A method, an apparatus, and a computer-readable medium are provided. Whether at least one significant change occurs in a use of at least one word of a group of text documents of a text corpus is determined. A display based, at least in part, on at least one change point corresponding to the at least one significant change is presented when the at least one significant change is determined to have occurred.
US08843360B1
Disclosed are various embodiments for client-side internationalization of network pages. A network page and code that localizes the network page are obtained from a server. The code that localizes the network page is executed in a client and determines a locale associated with the client. One or more internationalized elements are identified in the network page. The internationalized elements are replaced with corresponding localized translations. The network page is rendered for display in the client after the network page has been localized.
US08843358B2
Systems and methods are operable to concurrently present images on a small display of a mobile media device and a large display of a media presentation system. An exemplary method receives emulated information from a mobile media device, wherein the emulated information corresponds to at least one image that is being currently presented on a display of the mobile media device; generates at least one image based upon the received emulated information, wherein the at least one image is configured for presentation on a display of a media system; and communicates the at least one image to a display of the media system. The image presented on the display of the media system is substantially the same image presented on the display of the mobile media device. The image presented on the display of the media system is substantially larger than the image presented on the display of the mobile media device.
US08843355B2
A particle size distribution creating method includes a particle size range determining step, an integrating step of integrating the frequency of appearance of particles within the particle size range determined in the particle size range determining step, a division point determining step of determining particle sizes that provide division points, using the integral of the frequency of appearance obtained in the integrating step, and a typical point determining step of determining the minimum particle size, maximum particle size and the particle sizes of the division points as typical points. This method is characterized by assuming a particle size distribution which contains particles having the particle sizes of the respective typical points and is plotted such that the frequency of appearance of the particles having the particle size of each of the typical points is equal to the integral over each of the regions defined by the typical points, and obtaining the assumed particle size distribution as a particle size distribution model.
US08843349B2
An apparatus being capable of quickly removing noise from a partial discharge signal generated from the electrical power facility such as a gas insulated switchgear (GIS) and the like, and an apparatus for detecting a partial discharge generated section. The apparatus for removing noise from a partial discharge signal comprises a PD signal detection unit configured to detect a PD signal of the power facility and to detect and output peaks of the PD signal in respective preset time intervals, a noise signal detection unit configured to detect a noise signal outside the power facility and to detect and output peaks of the noise signal in the respective preset time intervals, and a noise removal unit configured to eliminate the peaks of the PD signal output in time intervals identical to those in which the peaks of the noise signal detection unit are output.
US08843347B2
A monitoring system, method and computer program product are provided for monitoring the health of a monitored system. The monitoring system may include a receiver module to receive a plurality of sensor data relating to the monitored system and to receive textual data, such as free text, relating to the monitored system. The monitoring system may also include an associative memory to store and process the sensor data and the textual data and to establish associations between at least some of the sensor data and the textual data. Further, the monitoring system may include a dynamic change identification module to identify an instance in which the sensor data represents a dynamic change in condition and a correlation module to identify an instance in which textual data is associated with the sensor data proximate the dynamic change in condition so as to correlate the sensor data and the textual data.
US08843344B2
Systems and methods for reducing temperature variation during burn-in testing. In one embodiment, power consumed by an integrated circuit under test is measured. An ambient temperature associated with the integrated circuit is measured. A desired junction temperature of the integrated circuit is achieved by adjusting a body bias voltage of the integrated circuit. By controlling temperature of individual integrated circuits, temperature variation during burn-in testing can be reduced.
US08843338B2
A method including switching hardware into a pre-calibration mode; and using the hardware to selectively pre-store measured data for calibration.
US08843333B2
A battery system includes a discharge amount obtaining portion that obtains a discharge amount (determination zone discharge amount) from a determination start voltage until a predetermined determination end voltage of a battery; an internal resistance obtaining portion that obtains an internal resistance value of the battery; a correlation map in which a combination of internal resistance value information and determination zone discharge amount information for a battery that is the same kind as a target of a determination and in which lithium deposition has not occurred is stored for each degree of age-related deterioration of the battery; and a deposition determining portion that determines a degree of lithium deposition in the target battery by comparing the determination zone discharge amount during the determination of the target battery with the internal resistance value during the determination of the target battery on the same scale by converting at least one via the correlation map.
US08843329B2
A method for filling level measuring includes generating an echo curve. The echo curve is analyzed by at least one analysis method selected from analysis methods including analyzing the echo curve by at least two parallel tasks or is analyzed by comparing the echo curve with a spurious-echo curve at the IF-level.
US08843327B2
A method and apparatus are disclosed for determining status of a canister of a topical negative pressure (TNP) system. The method includes the steps of monitoring pressure provided by a pump element of the TNP system, determining at least one characteristic associated with the monitored pressure and determining status of at least one parameter associated with a canister of the TNP system responsive to the determined characteristics.
US08843321B2
Methods and systems are disclosed for estimating a glucose level of a person having diabetes comprises. One method may comprise: receiving into a computing device a plurality of measured glucose results from a glucose sensor coupled to the person; using the computing device to analyze the plurality of measured glucose results with a probability analysis tool configured to determine a probability of glucose sensor accuracy based on the plurality of measured glucose results; and using the computing device to estimate a glucose level of the person with a recursive filter configured to estimate the glucose level based on the plurality of measured glucose results weighted with the probability of glucose sensor accuracy.
US08843316B2
Songs titles and song artists or other content received on an HD-radio are cross-referenced to one or more geographic locations where they were heard on the radio by identifying a song title or artist in the HD radio data stream and instructing a global positioning system navigation unit to contemporaneously determine its location. The determined location and song title and/or artist are cross-referenced to each other in a list or database. A touch-sensitive display device is configured to display the location or portion of a route where a listened-to song was heard. Song titles and/or artists can be determined by tactile selection of portions of a route displayed on the map.
US08843313B2
A method, system, and apparatus are disclosed for multipath isolation through the combined use of antenna diversity and frequency diversity. In particular, the present disclosure utilizes antenna diversity and frequency diversity to combat the deleterious effects of reflected signals on the positioning accuracy of satellite navigation systems. In at least one embodiment, the present disclosure uses two antennas and two frequencies for operation with a satellite navigation system. The present disclosure segregates the antennas and frequencies into two classes: references and monitors. The reference measurements are used for estimating the state of the vehicle, and the monitor measurements are used to detect faults that might degrade the reference estimation. Thus, the present disclosure enables an improvement in the positioning error experienced by roving users in downtown and indoor environments. Applications include positive train control, aircraft surface guidance, marine craft navigation in canals and ports, as well as automotive lane keeping.
US08843308B2
A system for displaying a map, the system including: a map database maintaining map data associated with a route; a map data identification unit identifying map data corresponding to a driving route of a vehicle from the map database; an information receiving unit receiving weather information associated with a current seasonal weather from a background service server in real time; a background data generation unit generating background data according to an actual environment based on the received weather information; and a route guidance unit guiding a route by associating the map data with the generated background data.
US08843307B1
A real time parking location navigator may automatically locate an available parking location and provide navigation information indicative of how to navigate to this location. Payment for the available parking location may also be automatically made. Either or both of these may be done at the time the vehicle is in proximity to a programmed destination.
US08843296B2
Methods and systems are provided for conditioning a throttle command so that, on average, a difference between an actual airflow rate and a commanded airflow rate is substantially zero. A commanded throttle position is modified with a correction factor to also reduce a throttle angle error. By reducing engine air disturbances, engine performance is improved.
US08843293B2
With a method for controlling a gas turbine in a power plant, a multiplicity of operating lines for the gas turbine for different gas turbine inlet temperatures TIT or gas turbine exhaust temperatures TAT and positions of the compressor inlet guide vane cascade VIGV are specified as a function of the load. For minimizing the electricity production costs during operation switching can be optionally carried out between different operating lines during constant or varying power output of the power plant.
US08843289B2
At least a method is provided learning a characteristic filling volume of a hydraulic clutch. The method includes, but is not limited to applying a pressure pulse to the hydraulic clutch when the clutch is in a disengaged state and determining an inflection event at an input or at an output of a torque path in which the hydraulic clutch is situated. A characteristic filling volume of the hydraulic clutch is derived from the determined inflection event. Furthermore, a method is provided for learning a characteristic return spring pressure of the hydraulic clutch, for engaging the hydraulic clutch and corresponding devices for carrying out these methods.
US08843288B1
A system and method of operating a vehicle at a driver selected target speed. The system and method configured to identify a target speed based on a position of a gear shift selector and control engine torque and brake pressure to control the vehicle to operate at the target speed. The system and method is further provides manipulating the engine torque and brake pressure of the vehicle in response to a driver's throttle and brake commands to operate at a speed desired by the driver.
US08843286B2
A vehicle driving force suppression device is provided, and driving force suppression is conducted on the basis of existence of an obstacle which is on the opposite course to the selected shift position. Adding specific conditions related to acceleration pedal depression amount and speed, inclination of the road in the direction which an obstacle exists, or distance to the obstacle, magnitude of driving force suppression is decided.
US08843283B2
A method and apparatus for controlling a height of an agricultural equipment component is provided. An average crop height is determined. In one embodiment, the agricultural equipment component is controlled to maintain a predetermined distance from a current top of crop level. If a current top of crop level cannot be determined, a virtual top of crop level is calculated using the average crop height value. The agricultural equipment component is controlled to maintain a predetermined distance from the virtual top of crop level. In another embodiment, the agricultural equipment component is controlled to maintain a predetermined distance from current ground level. If a current ground level cannot be determined, a virtual ground level is calculated using the average crop height value. The agricultural equipment component is controlled to maintain a predetermined distance from said virtual ground level. An ultrasonic sensor is also provided.
US08843278B2
A method is disclosed for detecting the activation of a coupling in a damper actuator, the coupling engaging a drive motor and an adjustable damper with each other, so that the damper can be adjusted by means of the drive motor, and the engagement between the drive motor and the damper being disengaged if a force or a momentum acting on the damper exceeds a maximum value. The method comprises the following steps: detecting the indication of an adjustment rate, in particular a rotary speed of the drive motor; determining a gradient of the adjustment rate, in particular a rotary speed gradient, by the indication of the adjustment rate; determining the activation of the coupling by determining whether the determined gradient exceeds or falls below a predetermined threshold value of the gradient.
US08843273B2
A control system for adjusting suspension settings of a bicycle, including a bicycle sensor configured to sense a coasting condition and a non-coasting condition and generate input signals indicative of the sensed condition, and a control unit in communication with the bicycle sensor and configured to generate output signals in response to the input signals, the output signals receivable by the bicycle suspension to selectively adjust the suspension settings.
US08843269B2
Systems and techniques are provided for managing an interface between a machine or work vehicle and a surface that the machine/work vehicle travels on in order to provide an optimum work performance level that balances fuel efficiency and surface adversity. Fleet management and reporting capabilities pertaining to such interface management are also provided.
US08843259B2
An engine includes variable valve mechanisms capable of causing an intake valve and an exhaust valve to stop. An ECU estimates poisoning states of catalysts, and executes and prohibits stopping of the valves based on the poisoning states. When stopping of the valves is prohibited during a fuel-cut operation, the ECU drives a crankshaft of the engine by means of a motor to idle the engine. Thus, even in a hybrid vehicle in which the engine is stopped during a fuel-cut operation, a sufficient amount of oxygen can be rapidly supplied to the catalysts by utilizing a pumping action of pistons, and the catalysts can be caused to recover from rich poisoning efficiently.
US08843256B2
An apparatus for determining the state of occupation of a track circuit on a railway line provided with a plurality of track circuits adjacent to one another, said circuit comprising a pair of rails (R) formed by parallel metal sectional elements between which it is possible to apply a voltage, each track circuit being separated from the adjacent stretch via electrically insulating joints (G). Said apparatus comprises a transmission block (2) capable of transmitting to the track circuit an a.c. voltage signal, associated to which is a predetermined sequence of at least three codewords that are different from one another.
US08843252B2
A piloting assistance device (5) comprising a calculation unit (10) and a display unit (20). The calculation unit (10) executes stored instructions to determine at least one thrust margin for a propeller between a current thrust being exerted by said propeller and a threshold thrust corresponding to a negative power limit (Pmin), and to determine a main minimum total ground slope that can be followed by the aircraft in descent as a function of said thrust margin. Finally, the calculation unit presents a main symbol (25) on a display unit (20), the main symbol (25) representing the minimum total ground slope that can be followed by the aircraft (1) in descent, the main symbol (25) appearing superimposed on a representation (21) of the surroundings that exist in front of the aircraft (1).
US08843251B2
A method comprising: receiving first information for defining a first algebraic function that relates a time variable to a first mapped variable; using the function to convert a time variable value to a first value of the first mapped variable e.g. s; converting the first value of the first mapped variable to a second value of a second mapped variable e.g. U; and positioning a satellite by converting the second value of the second mapped variable value to a position value that positions a satellite.
US08843246B2
An unmanned vehicle comprising a body and a crush zone combined with the body. In a preferred embodiment, the crush zone is a crushable bumper connected to the body. The unmanned vehicle including the crush zone may be used to swarm a vehicle in training during a training exercise. Particularly, the unmanned vehicle including a crushable bumper may be used to swarm a warship during a live fire exercise.
US08843244B2
A system and method for allowing an operator to switch between remote vehicle tele-operation and one or more remote vehicle autonomous behaviors, or for implementing remote vehicle autonomous behaviors. The system comprises an operator control system receiving input from the operator including instructions for the remote vehicle to execute an autonomous behavior, and a control system on the remote vehicle for receiving the instruction to execute an autonomous behavior from the operator control system. Upon receiving the instruction to execute an autonomous behavior, the remote vehicle executes that autonomous behavior.
US08843242B2
An electromechanically controlled cooking appliance is provided. The cooking appliance includes one or more power consuming elements including at least one of a surface heating unit for surface cooking and an oven heating unit for heating a cooking cavity, at least one of an infinite switch and a thermostat, a control configured to receive and process a signal indicative of the current state of an associated utility including a peak demand state and an off-peak demand state and operate the cooking appliance in one of a plurality of operating modes, at least one of the power consuming elements operating at a lower power level when in the energy saving mode than in the normal operating mode, and a first element status sensor adapted to provide feedback to the control indicative of whether at least one of the one or more power consuming elements is in use, wherein at the conclusion of an energy savings mode, the controller is configured to use said feedback to determine when to restore the at least one or more power consuming elements to its normal mode power level.
US08843237B2
A method according to the invention for controlling a manipulator, in particular a robot, includes the following steps:determining (S10, S20) a target path (q(s)) of the manipulator, anddetermining (S70) a motion value (v(s)) for this target path,optionally, determining (S50) a path segment ([s_A, s_E]) with a defined profile of a motion value (v(s)=vc), and automatically determining (S60) this motion value on the basis of motion values (v_max_RB, v_max_vg) permissible in this path segment.
US08843235B2
Robots, computer program products, and methods for trajectory plan optimization are disclosed. In one embodiment, a method of controlling a robot having a first manipulator and a second manipulator includes receiving a trajectory plan including a plurality of sequential motion segments. The method further includes determining a moveable motion segment, and shifting the moveable motion segment and motion segments subsequent to the moveable motion segment backward in time to a shifted time such that one or more unshifted segments of the trajectory plan occur at a same time as one or more shifted segment segments. The method may further include controlling the robot according to the optimized trajectory plan such that one or more components of the first manipulator are moved concurrently with one or more components of the second manipulator.
US08843234B2
A system and method for controlling motion interference avoidance for a plurality of robots are disclosed, the system and method including a dynamic space check system wherein an efficiency of operation is maximized and a potential for interference or collision is minimized.
US08843230B2
A machining time predicting apparatus of a numerically controlled machine tool divides a tool path into a plurality of segments, obtains a speed in a tangential direction of each of the divided segments, calculates a time taken for the tool to move on each segment, and obtains the total of the calculated times taken for the tool to move on each segment as a tool moving time, in order to calculate a time (tool moving time) taken for the tool to move on the designated tool path according to an NC command.
US08843225B2
A portable audio device suitable for reproducing MPEG encoded data includes a plurality of inputs, a data storage, a display, an audio output, at least one processor, and a battery. The plurality of inputs includes a forward input, a play control input, and a random input. The data storage stores compressed digitized audio data. The at least one processor is responsive to selection of at least one of the plurality of inputs to convert selected compressed digitized audio data stored in the data storage for reproduction by the audio output and to provide information to the display.
US08843224B2
Techniques for controlling one or more audio amplifiers in or associated with a device coupled on a local area network are disclosed. The device receives at least one selected source from other devices also coupled on the network According to one aspect of the techniques, an automatic shutdown control module is provided in the device to power down the audio amplifiers when there is no audio data flow coming to the device or power up the audio amplifiers when there is audio data flow coming to the device. In one embodiment, the procedure to power down or power up the amplifiers is in accordance with a hysteresis, wherein the hysteresis, being lagging of an effect behind its cause, protects the amplifiers and makes the powering-down or powering-up procedure unnoticeable to a user.
US08843223B2
The present invention relates to calibration of a computerized test system (20) for testing digital audio devices (30) through a data communication interface. The computerized test system comprises a sound card and a digital calibration generator (31) for calibrating at least a signal receipt channel (25) of the computerized test system (20).
US08843222B2
A portable media player configured to selectively enable or disable one or more input controls, such as volume controls, is described herein. In some examples, the player contains a physical button or switch that provides for the selective enabling or disabling of input controls. In some examples, the player is configured to dynamically determine when to enable or disable input controls based on information received about the player or characteristics of the player. Other embodiments are also described and claimed.
US08843220B1
A position and velocity measuring tool for use on a top drive of a drilling rig having a variable frequency drive connected to an electric motor and power supply. The position and velocity measuring tool further has a processor connected to the variable frequency drive and a data storage and computer instructions for presenting an operator directional drilling steering system dashboard with numerous visual components which creates and uses a virtual encoder eliminating a failure point of a mechanical encoder.
US08843215B2
A connecting device for an electromedical implant having a housing, the connecting device including a feedthrough and a header. The feedthrough and the header are formed in one piece so as to reduce the cost of the production process.
US08843209B2
Devices, systems, and techniques for ramping one or more parameter values of electrical stimulation are disclosed. An implantable medical device may increase or decrease a parameter value, e.g., amplitude or pulse width, over time to reach a target value of the parameter. In one example, a memory may be configured to store a plurality of amplitude ramp schedules. At least one processor may be configured to obtain a stimulation parameter set that at least partially defines an electrical stimulation therapy, select one of the plurality of amplitude ramp schedules based on a signal frequency of the stimulation parameter set, and increase an amplitude of the electrical stimulation therapy during a ramp period defined by the selected amplitude ramp schedule.
US08843208B2
A method and apparatus for neural stimulation are disclosed. The principle is that a conventional current path is used to deliver the stimulus to neural structures, but an alternative current path is provided to bypass the neural structures during the opposite polarity part of the current flow. As a consequence, charge balance can be provided at the tissue/electrode interface, whilst delivering stimuli which are not charge balanced to the neural structures.
US08843207B2
A particular method of providing power to an implantable medical device includes providing a first signal to a primary coil that is inductively coupled to a secondary coil of an implantable medical device. The method also include determining a first alignment difference between a voltage corresponding to the first signal and at least one of a current corresponding to the first signal and a component voltage at a component of a primary coil circuit. The method further includes determining a frequency sweep range based on the first alignment difference. The method also includes performing a frequency sweep over the frequency sweep range.
US08843200B2
A medical lead screening connector includes a housing, a plurality of lead receptor channels disposed within the housing, a cover hingedly attached to the housing, and a base element rotationally attached to the housing. Each lead receptor channel includes at least two lead receptor contacts. A conductor cable is attached to and extends away from the housing. The base element is configured to reel in the conductor cable upon rotation of the base element.
US08843195B2
Methods, systems and computer program products determine and identify a favorable time to deliver cardiac compression to a subject to avoid a vulnerable period of a spontaneous intrinsic cardiac cycle.
US08843194B2
A method of and a device for non-invasively measuring the hemodynamic state of a subject or a human patient involve steps and units of non-invasively measuring cardiac cycle period, electrical-mechanical interval, mean arterial pressure, and ejection interval and converting the measured electrical-mechanical interval, mean arterial pressure and ejection interval into the cardiac parameters such as Preload, Afterload and Contractility, which are the common cardiac parameters used by an anesthesiologist.The converted hemodynamic state of a patient is displayed on a screen as a three-dimensional vector with each of its three coordinates respectively representing Preload, Afterload and Contractility. Therefore, a medical practitioner looks at the screen and -quickly obtains the important and necessary information.
US08843193B2
A TWA measuring apparatus includes: an electrocardiograph controlling section which is configured to produce an electrocardiogram from electrocardiographic signals of a subject; and a TWA measuring section which is configured to select at least two waveforms that contribute to a measurement of TWA, from the electrocardiogram, and which is configured to measure a presence of TWA by using the selected at least two waveforms.
US08843189B2
A volume of a patient can be mapped with a system operable to identify a plurality of locations and save a plurality of locations of a mapping instrument. The mapping instrument can include one or more electrodes that can sense a voltage that can be correlated to a three dimensional location of the electrode at the time of the sensing or measurement. Therefore, a map of a volume can be determined based upon the sensing of the plurality of points without the use of other imaging devices. An implantable medical device can then be navigated relative to the mapping data.
US08843188B2
Example adjustable electrodes are described. One example adjustable electrode includes two or more contacts configured to selectively deliver high frequency alternating current (HFAC) to a nerve in an amount sufficient to produce an HFAC nerve conduction block in the nerve. The example adjustable electrode also includes a logic configured to selectively control which of the two or more contacts deliver HFAC to the nerve to control whether the nerve electrode is in a first (e.g., onset response mitigating) configuration or in a second (e.g., HFAC nerve conduction block maintenance) configuration. The electrode may be used in applications including, but not limited to, nerve block applications, and nerve stimulation applications. The electrode may be adjusted by changing attributes including, but not limited to, the number, length, orientation, distance between, surface area, and distance from a nerve of contacts to be used to deliver the HFAC.
US08843182B2
A communication device may select a communication path to check for pending messages in a multiple network environment. The communication device may exit from a power-saving operating mode during which the communication device does not receive messages from a message server. After exiting the power-saving operating mode, the communication device may identify multiple different communication paths. The multiple communication paths may include different communication networks in the multiple network environment. The communication device may determine a selected communication path from among the multiple communication paths and communicate with a message server across the selected communication path to check for messages.
US08843180B2
Embodiments for at methods, apparatus and systems for operating a voltage regulator are disclosed. One apparatus includes a switching voltage regulator, wherein the switching voltage regulator includes a series switch element, a shunt switch element, a switching controller and a switched output filter. The switching controller is configured to generate a switching voltage through controlled closing and opening of the series switch element and the shunt switch element. The switched output filter filters the switching voltage and generates a regulated output voltage, wherein the switched output filter includes a plurality of capacitors that are selectively included within the switched output filter.
US08843178B1
A wireless hotspot device capable of sharing video picture includes a first control unit connected with a battery and a second control unit. The second control unit is connected with a wireless transmission unit and a high-definition multimedia interface transmission port. The second control unit via the high-definition multimedia interface transmission port is connected with an external terminal apparatus. By means of the wireless hotspot device, the picture of the screen of a mobile device connected with the wireless hotspot device can be synchronously displayed on the screen of the external terminal apparatus. Also, the wireless hotspot device can charge the mobile device or other mobile device at the same time.
US08843168B2
Methods for allocating a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) to reduce a number of PDCCH candidates in a search space for carrier aggregation on a user equipment (UE) are disclosed. The method comprises the step of selecting a control channel element (CCE) aggregation level for a PDCCH allocation for each of a plurality of user equipments (UEs) at an evolved NodeB (eNB). The operation of identifying a transmission mode for each of a plurality of component carriers (CCs) associated with the PDCCH at the eNB follows. The next operation of the method is assigning each CC's downlink control information (DCI) into CCEs in a PDCCH search space in the PDCCH starting at a CCE location based on the CC's transmission mode and the CCE aggregation level for the UE receiving the CC.
US08843165B2
Devices, systems, and methods are disclosed for delivering enhanced message content to subscribers and for overcoming common incompatibilities found in message delivery mechanisms. Exemplary embodiments, profile an intended recipient's network capabilities, the intended recipient's device, and/or the recipient's service feature profile. This profile is leveraged to predictively and adaptively adjust the subsequent enhanced message content delivery process. Further, content modification can be applied for those cases where there is a defined mismatch that can be handled in order to facilitate delivery of the substance of the enhanced content. Finally, in cases where the content needs to be delivered intact to the intended recipient, but where the recipient network, the recipient's device and/or the recipient's service profile do not allow for delivery, the content may be delivered to an alternative device or system. These alternative devices or systems may be managed by the sender, the recipient, or a service provider's network.
US08843162B2
Exemplary methods and systems are disclosed herein that may, among other benefits, help a mobile station to conserve power by intelligently determining how often to scan for incoming pages. An exemplary method may be carried out by a mobile station that has most-recently registered with a radio access network in a zone of last registration, and involves the mobile station (a) determining a location of the mobile station in relation to the zone of last registration, (b) using the location of the mobile station in relation to the zone of last registration as a basis for determining a scan period to wait between scans of the paging channel; and (c) periodically scanning the paging channel according to the determined scan period. Furthermore, an exemplary method may be carried out in order to conserve battery power when a mobile station determines that its battery power is low.
US08843159B2
Mobile terminals to receive location-based information upon entering a local wireless zone established by an access point are described. The access point includes or is associated with one or more servers, which may provide the location-based information and control access. The local wireless zone is a limited area in which communications between the access point and the mobile terminal are possible. Once the mobile terminal enters into one or more local wireless zones, the presence of the mobile terminal in the local wireless zone is detected. Once detected, the mobile terminal is afforded access to a server on which the location-based information is stored. The server is associated with the local wireless zone.
US08843153B2
Systems and methods of mobile traffic categorization and policy implementation for network use optimization are disclosed. In one aspect, embodiments of the present disclosure include a method, which may be implemented on a system, of detecting an activity state of an application on a mobile device to which traffic is originated from or directed to, detecting a time criticality of data contained in the traffic to be sent between the mobile device and the host server, determining a timing with which to allow the traffic to pass through, based on the activity state or the time criticality and/or controlling radio use on the mobile device based on the timing with which the traffic is allowed to pass through. The method may further include selecting a network configuration in the wireless network for use in passing traffic to and from the mobile device.
US08843148B2
Channel resource allocation is disclosed. Embodiments of channel resource allocation allocate channel resources to plural cells or cell sections according to a classification depending on distribution statistics.
US08843133B2
A method of handling cell change for a mobile device compatible with a plurality of radio access technologies (RATs) including a first RAT supporting reception and transmission on a plurality of component carriers and a second RAT supporting reception and transmission on a single component carrier, in a wireless communication system, the method includes determining that cells using the first RAT have higher priority for cell selection or cell reselection than cells using the second RAT.
US08843111B2
A method for emitting a message relating to a determined type of information to be exchanged between an aircraft and a ground base reception method, and corresponding devices. The method determines a level of a securement associated with the determined type by a correspondence table, and emits the message according to a protocol having the determined level of securement.
US08843104B2
Methods that allow a mobile device to communicate with a wireless communications network via device-to-device communication when the device is out of range of the network are provided. One method, at a first mobile device, comprises receiving a message from a second mobile device, adding information to the message, forwarding the message to a network if a network connection is available for the first mobile device, and forwarding the message to a third mobile device if no network connection is available. Another method at a mobile device comprises receiving an indication that an emergency condition exists, sending a message from the device to a network element if a network connection between the mobile device and network element exists, and sending the message from the device to a second mobile device if no network connection between the mobile device and a network element exists. Mobile devices configured to perform these methods are also provided.
US08843101B2
A wearable device for detecting a user state is disclosed. The wearable device includes an accelerometer for measuring an acceleration of a user, a magnetometer for measuring a magnetic field associated with the user's change of orientation, a microphone for receiving audio, a memory for storing the audio, and at least one processor communicatively connected to the accelerometer, the magnetometer, the microphone, and the memory. The processor is identified to declare a measured acceleration as a suspected user state, and to categorize the suspected user state based on the stored audio as one of an activity of daily life (ADL), a confirmed user state, or an inconclusive event.
US08843099B2
The disclosure is directed at a method of providing extension list dialing in a mobile communication device comprising storing a plurality of extensions within a single address book entry; sensing dialing of a phone number associated with the single address book entry; sensing connection between the mobile communication device and the phone number to establish a call; and displaying a screen dialog with each of the plurality of extensions for selection of one of the plurality of extensions.
US08843092B2
A method of using an entertainment system to access content stored on a digital content storage device having one or more records containing metadata associated with the content on the storage device. The method includes downloading from the storage device to an entertainment system at least some of the metadata; storing the downloaded metadata in a database accessible to the entertainment system; and accessing content on the storage device from entertainment system using at least a portion of the downloaded metadata in the database.
US08843075B2
A RF distribution system determines its configuration and verifies the consistency of the determined configuration. Based on a device identifier, the RF distribution system may individually instruct each RF component to provide a generated signal. Consequently, a first RF component may modulate a signal on a first port. If a second RF component detects a modulated signal on a second port, then the RF distribution system deems that the two RF components are connected together. The procedure may be repeated for the remaining RF components so that the RF configuration of the RF distribution system may be determined. The determined RF configuration may be further verified for operational consistency. The RF distribution system may also scan a RF spectrum, determine a set of frequencies that provides RF compatibility with the RF distribution system based on the scanning, and configure the RF components in accordance with the set of frequencies.
US08843069B2
Techniques for transmitting data with short-term interference mitigation in a wireless communication system are described. In one design, a first station (e.g., a base station or a terminal) may send a first message to at least one interfering station to request reduction of interference on at least one resource. The first station may send the first message in anticipation of receiving data on the at least one resource. An interfering station may receive the first message from the first station and may reduce interference on the at least one resource by reducing its transmit power and/or by steering its power in a direction different from the first station. The first station may thereafter receive data from a second station on the at least one resource. The techniques may be used for data transmission on the forward and reverse links.
US08843063B2
A method and an electronic device for establishing, at a first electronic device, a communication link between the first electronic device and at least one other electronic device in a Near Field Communication (NFC) network are provided. The method includes setting up an underlying Media Access Control (MAC) link; sending a Parameter Exchange (PAX) command for exchanging parameters concerning a Logical Link Control Protocol (LLCP) to at least one other electronic device; receiving a response PAX command for exchanging parameters concerning the LLCP from at least one other electronic device; and establishing the communication link between the first electronic device and the at least one other electronic device based on the received response PAX command.
US08843054B2
A downsized recording apparatus capable of housing inside a holding member that holds a disc recording medium so as to convey the disc recording medium. The recording apparatus includes a conveyance unit that conveys a sheet; a recording unit that performs recording on the sheet conveyed by the conveyance unit; a duplex conveyance path that guides the sheet having recording performed on a first side thereof by the recording unit and reverses the sheet before guiding the sheet to the conveyance unit so that recording is performed on a second side of the sheet having recording performed on the first side thereof, the second side being opposite the first side; a holding-member-housing portion provided at a position enclosed by the duplex conveyance path, the portion housing a holding member that holds a disc recording medium; and a moving unit that moves the holding member to the conveyance unit so that the holding member is conveyed by the conveyance unit.
US08843049B2
An image forming method including forming an image of a toner including a wax on a recording medium; fixing the toner image using by an oil-less fixing device; and then forming an overcoat layer on the fixed toner image. When a portion of the fixed toner image having the heaviest toner weight is subjected to an ATR FT-IR analysis, a peak area ratio Ab/Aa falls in a range of 3.0 to 7.0 or a peak area ratio Ab′/Aa′ falls in a range of 0.004 to 0.014, wherein Aa represents the area of a peak present in a range of 2896 cm−1 to 2943 cm−1, Ab represents the area of a peak present in a range of 2946 cm−1 to 2979 cm−1, Aa′ represents the area of a peak present in a range of 791 cm−1 to 860 cm−1, and Ab′ represents the area of a peak present in a range of 2834 cm−1 to 2862 cm−1.
US08843043B2
A fixing device includes a flexible, endless belt-shaped fixing member that rotates in a predetermined direction of rotation, a substantially cylindrical metal heat conductor provided inside a loop formed by the fixing member and facing an inner circumferential surface of the fixing member, a pressing member that presses the fixing member against the metal heat conductor to form a nip between the fixing member and the pressing member through which a recording medium bearing a toner image passes, and a separator that presses the fixing member against the metal heat conductor, provided downstream from the nip in the direction of rotation of the fixing member and contacting the recording medium discharged from the nip to separate the recording medium from the fixing member and guide the recording medium out of the fixing device.
US08843041B2
A fixing device includes a heat assembly including an endless belt, a heat source, a pressure pad, and a cleaning member that cleans an inner surface of the endless belt as the result of circulation movement of the endless belt; and a pressure member that presses an outer surface of the endless belt. The cleaning member contacts the endless belt with a contact-pressure distribution such that a contact pressure of a portion located downstream of a most upstream portion in a moving direction of the endless belt is the maximum in a contact region where the cleaning member contacts the endless belt.
US08843040B2
A sheet separation mechanism including a compressed air generator, a first nozzle to eject compressed air onto a leading edge of a sheet, a control valve provided between the compressed air generator and the first nozzle to control a flow of the compressed air, and a second nozzle provided between the control valve and the first nozzle. The control valve controls the compressed air to be simultaneously ejected from both the first nozzle and the second nozzle.
US08843035B2
A developing device includes a developer bearing member, a layer restricting member, a facing magnet and a nonmagnetic member. The developer bearing member has a sleeve for bearing magnetic toner and a fixed magnet included inside the sleeve. The layer restricting member faces one magnetic pole of the fixed magnet, is arranged at a distance from the sleeve and made of a magnetic material. The facing magnet is arranged upstream of the layer restricting member in a rotation direction of the sleeve and at a distance from the sleeve, includes a first facing surface facing a position overlapping with a position with a maximum magnetic force of the one magnetic pole and has a magnetic pole having the same polarity as the one magnetic pole on the first facing surface. The nonmagnetic member is connected at an upstream side of the facing magnet in the rotation direction.
US08843027B2
A photosensitive cartridge includes: a photosensitive member mounted to the photosensitive cartridge such that a surface thereof is movable in a first direction; an electric discharge electrode that extends in a second direction at an interval with the surface of the photosensitive member, the second direction being orthogonal to the first direction and parallel with the surface of the photosensitive member; a frame holding the photosensitive member and the electric discharge electrode and including an opening at an opposite side of the photosensitive member across the electric discharge electrode, the opening extending in the second direction; a cleaner movable along the opening so as to clean the electric discharge electrode; and a reinforcement member, which is a separate member from the cleaner, and which is contactable with the frame to reinforce a surrounding part of the opening.
US08843025B2
A process cartridge includes a first cartridge and a second cartridge. The first cartridge includes a frame, a first opening and closing member and a first operating member. The first opening and closing member is configured to open and close a first opening formed in the first wall. The second cartridge includes a housing, a second opening and closing member, a second operating member and a third operating member. The second opening and closing member is movable between an open position in which a second opening formed in the second wall is opened and a closed position in which the second opening is closed. The third operating member faces the second operating member spaced therebetween. When the second cartridge is attached to the first cartridge, the second operating member and the third operating member are integrally displaced via the first operating member.
US08843024B2
An electrophotographic photosensitive member having excellent cleaning performance, a process cartridge, and an electrophotographic apparatus.The peripheral surface of the member has flat portions having a width e (μm) satisfying 0.1≦e≦25 and a plurality of groove portions having a width w (μm) satisfying 0.1≦w≦25 and a depth d (μm) satisfying 0.1≦d≦3.0, the flat and groove portions at an angle θ (°) satisfying 80≦θ≦100 with respect to the axial direction of the member. The sum esum (μm) of the widths e of the flat portions per each width of 100 μm in the axial direction of the peripheral surface satisfying 5≦esum≦75, and eσ/eAv satisfying eσ/eAv≦0.46, where eAv (μm) is the average value of the widths e of the flat portions, and eσ is the standard deviation thereof.
US08843014B2
In an image forming apparatus, a cartridge has a cartridge side electrode. A main casing has a main casing side electrode. The cartridge includes a moving member that allows the main casing side electrode to be located at a connection position when the moving member is at a first position, to be located at a disconnection position when the moving member is at a second position, and to be located at the connection position when the moving member is at a third position. A determining unit determines that the cartridge's state is new if the determining unit detects that the main casing side electrode is electrically connected to the cartridge side electrode, then the main casing side electrode is electrically disconnected from the cartridge side electrode temporarily, and then the main casing side electrode is again electrically connected to the cartridge side electrode.
US08843011B2
An image-forming apparatus includes: a fixing unit; a load; a power source circuit section; a fixation electrical current detecting body; a total electrical current detecting body; a storage unit; and a fixation control unit. The fixing unit fixes a toner image using a heat generator. The power source circuit section supplies electric power to the load. The storage unit stores electrical current change amount data establishing an amount of change in the magnitude of the total electrical current relative to an amount of change in a phase for each value of the power factor of the fixing unit. The fixation control unit finds the power factor of the fixing unit, and alters the phase at which the heat generator starts to be energized on the basis of the power factor thus found and the electrical current change amount data, so that the total electrical current value approaches a target value.
US08843003B2
An image forming apparatus includes an image holding member, a transfer unit, a fixing unit, a transport unit, a transfer-performance-detection toner image forming unit, a density detection unit, and a selector. A toner image is held on the image holding member. The transfer unit transfers the toner image onto a recording medium. The fixing unit fixes the toner image onto the recording medium. The transport unit reverses the recording medium onto which the toner image has been fixed, and transports the reversed recording medium back to the transfer unit. The transfer-performance-detection toner image forming unit forms plural transfer-performance-detection toner images with different transfer settings of the transfer unit. The density detection unit detects densities of plural transfer-performance-detection toner images. The selector selects a transfer setting of the transfer unit in accordance with a detection result obtained by the density detection unit.
US08843002B2
A method for measuring Side 1 to Side 2 image on paper misregistration includes using a series of lines printed on both sides of a substrate, such as, paper. The paper is passed in front of an in-line spectrophotometer or densitometer. The amount of image “show through” is measured and correlated to an amount of misregistration.
US08842999B2
Provided is an optical network unit saving power. The optical network unit may include a processor checking whether at least one downward physical block, the upward physical block and a data switching block operate in an idle mode, sequentially transiting at least one downward physical block, an upward physical block and a data switching block to a sleep mode according to the checking result and sequentially transiting an optical transmission-reception block and the medium access control block to a sleep mode by judging whether or not a medium access control block transits to a sleep mode.
US08842994B2
A method and system of distributing clock synchronization information within an optical communications network including a plurality of network elements, in which a first network element receives an ingress clock synchronization message, the ingress clock synchronization message including a clock synchronization message identifier and a correction field. The first network element inserts the clock synchronization message identifier into an optical channel frame overhead and inserts the ingress clock synchronization message into an optical channel frame payload. The first network element transmits the optical channel frame overhead and the optical channel frame payload to a second network element, and determines a transit time of the clock synchronization message identifier across each of the network elements. The second network element updates the correction field of the ingress clock synchronization message with said transit times to form an egress clock synchronization message.
US08842992B2
A communications device includes a transmitter device having an optical source configured to generate an optical carrier signal, a first E/O modulator coupled to the optical source and configured to modulate the optical carrier signal with an input signal having a first frequency, and a second E/O modulator coupled to the optical source and configured to modulate the optical carrier signal with a reference signal. The communications device includes an optical waveguide coupled to the transmitter device, and a receiver device coupled to the optical waveguide and including an O/E converter coupled to the optical waveguide and configured to generate an output signal comprising a replica of the input signal at a second frequency based upon the reference signal.
US08842990B2
A method performed in an optical line terminal (OLT) in a passive optical network (PON) for detecting a rogue optical network unit (ONU) operating among a plurality of ONUs in the PON. The OLT receives a plurality of bursts of light from a plurality of ONUs, each burst being separated from other bursts by an inter-burst gap containing a minimum dark interval during which the OLT expects to receive no optical power. The OLT measures the received optical power during one or more of the minimum dark intervals of the inter-burst gaps and determines whether the inter-burst gaps were anomalous. In response to determining that an inter-burst gap was anomalous, the OLT increments an anomaly count that indicates a rogue ONU has been detected when the anomaly count exceeds an anomaly count threshold. When the anomaly count is exceeded, the OLT declares an alarm associated with the presence of a rogue ONU, and may also initiate rogue isolation diagnostics.
US08842986B2
A circuit and a method for controlling multi-channel power are disclosed. The method includes: according to a channel selection signal in the previous clock cycle, select one channel signal from the received at least one channel signal in the previous clock cycle; according to an amplification factor control signal in the previous clock cycle, amplify the selected one channel signal to acquire a first signal; perform A/D conversion on the first signal to acquire a second signal; and according to the second signal, generate an amplification factor control signal in the next clock cycle, so that according to the amplification multiple control signal in the next clock cycle, amplify the selected one channel signal in the next clock cycle when the next clock cycle comes. The scheme can be used to detect the multi-channel optical power and its circuit implementation is simple.
US08842984B2
A method and system for identifying and, optionally, managing protection resource sharing opportunities, such as within a large-scale wavelength-division multiplexing (WDM) mesh network.
US08842977B2
A storage medium is provided for storing metadata for providing an enhanced search function using various search keywords of audio-visual (AV) data. The storage medium stores AV data; and metadata for conducting an enhanced search of the AV data by scene using information regarding at least one search keyword. The metadata may include information regarding an entry point and/or a duration, angles, etc., of each scene. Hence, the enhanced search can be conducted using various search keywords. Further, search results can be reproduced according to diverse scenarios, and the enhanced search function can be provided for movie titles that support multiple angles or multiple paths. Moreover, metadata can be created in multiple languages, thereby enabling the enhanced search function to support multiple languages.
US08842974B2
A content transmission apparatus includes: a retaining section adapted to retain a high-definition video image content; a reception section adapted to receive picture frame information transmitted from a content reproduction apparatus; a calculation section adapted to calculate a cutout range based on the received picture frame information; a cutout section adapted to cut out the calculated cutout range from the retained high-definition video image content; and a signaling section adapted to signal an arbitrary picture frame content configured from a result of the cutout to the content reproduction apparatus.
US08842966B2
An apparatus configured to record data onto removable storage media, includes: an image receiving interface configured to receive imaging data from an imaging modality, a central processing unit configured to process the image data to generate a study in a standard medical imaging format, and a removable media interface built-in or attached-to the modality and configured to, in response to receiving the study from the central processing unit, automatically start an storage operation to record at least part of the study generated by the central processing unit onto the removable storage media. In one embodiment, the removable media interface receives the study via a localhost address without the use of a physical network between the modality and removable media interface.
US08842964B2
An audio and/or video generation apparatus which is arranged in operation to generate audio and/or video signals representative of an audio and/or video source, the audio and/or video generation apparatus including a recording unit which is arranged in operation to record the audio and/or video signals on a recording medium, wherein the audio and/or video generation apparatus is arranged to receive metadata associated with the audio and/or video signals generated by a data processor, the recording unit being arranged in operation to record the metadata on the recording medium with the audio and/or video signals. The data processor may be arranged to receive signals representative of the time codes of the recorded audio/video signals, and the metadata may include time code data representative of the in and out points of a take of the audio/video signals generated by the data processor.
US08842962B2
A strain relief device for a fiber optic cable is disclosed. The strain relief device has a cable fitting having a cable fitting body, a shoulder washer and a compression cap. The cable fitting is positioned on the fiber optic cable. The shoulder washer is installed on a central tube of the fiber optic cable, under strength members of the fiber optic cable and fitted in the cable fitting body. The compression cap is installed over the central tube with the strength members inserted through the compression cap. The strength members are compressed between the shoulder washer and the compression cap. The compression cap provides compressive force between the cable fitting body, the shoulder washer and the compression cap.
US08842956B2
A non-kink, non-hockling optical cable comprising an optical fiber capable of propagating light along its longitudinal axis. A buffer layer made of a soft plastic material surrounds the silica core and cladding, and a supplemental layer surrounds the buffer layer. The supplemental layer consists essentially of a liquid crystal polymer (LCP) material to enhance the tensile strength of the optical fiber. Finally, an encasing polymer layer with a breaking strain greater than 30%, surrounds the supplemental layer, to increase the flexibility of the optical cable.
US08842953B2
An apparatus for applying energy to an object and/or sensing the object. The apparatus includes an optical device for applying and/or sensing light energy and an electrical device for applying and/or sensing electrical energy. At least one optical fiber is provided for applying light energy to the object and/or sensing the object. The at least one optical fiber is connected to the optical device and includes a conductive coating forming an electrical conductor for applying electrical energy to the object and/or sensing the object. The electrical conductor is connected to the electrical device.
US08842949B2
An embodiment of the invention relates to a single photon emission system having a proximal end, a distal end, and a single photon emitter located between the proximal end and the distal end; wherein the single photon emission system is adapted to guide optical pump radiation, which is inputted at the proximal end to optically excite the single photon emitter, along a predefined direction that runs from the proximal end to the distal end; and wherein single photons emitted by said single photon emitter, are guided along said predefined direction to the distal end.
US08842948B2
A terahertz (THz) switch consisting of perfect conductor metamaterials is discussed in this invention. Specifically, we have built a THz logic block by combining two double-sided corrugated waveguides capable of slowing down the electromagnetic waves in the THz regime with a sub-wavelength cavity, having one or more grooves with shorter height than the grooves of the periodic corrugated waveguide. This new type of THz structure is called as the waveguide-cavity-waveguide (WCW). The new invention is based on our mathematical modeling and experimentation that confirms a strong electromagnetic field accumulation inside the tiny cavity which can confine EM field for a long time within a very small effective volume (Veff) to provide high quality (Q) factor. Therefore, an efficient THz switch can be designed to achieve ON-OFF switching functionality by modulating the refractive index n or extinction coefficient α inside the switching junction. The dimensions of the periodic structure and cavity can be optimized to apply the invention to slow-EM wave devices working at other frequencies in the EM spectrum including the microwave and outside the THz domain which is generally accepted as from 0.3 THz to 3 THz.
US08842946B1
The light sensor is included on an optical device having a waveguide on a base. The waveguide is configured to guide a light signal through a crystalline light-transmitting medium. The light sensor is also positioned on the base and is configured to receive the light signal from the waveguide. The light sensor includes a planar interface between two different materials. The interface is at a 45° angle relative to a <110> direction of the light-transmitting medium.
US08842942B2
An optical modulator comprises a bulk-silicon substrate comprising a trench having a predetermined width and a predetermined depth. A bottom cladding layer is formed in the trench, and a plurality of waveguides and a phase modulation unit are formed on the bottom cladding layer. A top cladding layer is formed on the plurality of waveguides and the phase modulation unit.
US08842935B2
An image capturing apparatus with image compensation and a method thereof, which can perform compensation of a user's facial image that is distorted in accordance with the position of an image capturing device such as a camera. The image capturing apparatus with image compensation includes an image capturing unit capturing an image of an object, a tilt determining unit determining a tilt of the image capturing unit relative to the object, and a compensation unit compensating the captured image in accordance with the determined tilt.
US08842933B2
Capturing facial surface using marker patterns laid out on the facial surface by adapting the marker patterns to contours of the facial surface and motion range of a head including: generating a facial action coding system (FACS) matrix by capturing FACS poses; generating a pattern to wrap over the facial surface using the FACS poses as a guide; capturing and tracking marker motions of the pattern; stabilizing the marker motions of the pattern using a head stabilization transform to remove head motions from the marker motions; and generating and applying a plurality of FACS matrix weights to the stabilized marker motions.
US08842932B2
An image processing apparatus includes an obtainment section to obtain a face image; an area specifying section to specify a set of a plurality of corresponding areas in the face image obtained by the obtainment section; and a correction section to generate a face image in which one area of the plurality of corresponding areas of the face image is used as a reference to correct another area.
US08842929B2
A method of deblocking an input signal is disclosed. The method generally includes the steps of (A) calculating a plurality of transform coefficients corresponding to each of a plurality of blocks in the input signal at baseband, (B) calculating a plurality of quantization parameters based on the transform coefficients, at least one of the quantization parameters corresponding to each respective one of the blocks and (C) generating an output signal by deblocking the input signal based on the quantization parameters.
US08842917B2
An information processing apparatus includes: a calculation unit adapted to analyze an image and calculate an intermediate value; a setting unit adapted to set a feature extraction region in the image, using the intermediate value; and an extraction unit adapted to extract a local feature of the feature extraction region, reusing the intermediate value used by the setting unit.
US08842908B2
A method of initially estimating a front view portion of a photographed image and separating the photographed image into a front view and a background without user interaction and apparatus performing the method are provided. The method of separating a front view and a background of an image includes dividing one or more pixels included in a photographed image into pixel groups according to color similarity between the pixels, estimating the position of the front view in the image divided into the pixel groups, and separating the front view and the background based on the estimated position of the front view. The method automatically separates the front view and the background of the image without a user input.
US08842906B2
A method of generating three dimensional body data of a subject is described. The method includes capturing one or more images of the subject using a digital imaging device and generating three dimensional body data of the subject based on the one or more images.
US08842904B2
A method of generating a dissection curve between a first and a second object in a volume image. The method accesses volume image data of a subject as a set of image slices and identifies a region of the volume image data that includes at least the first and second objects. At least one starting point in the volume image data is defined for the dissection curve according to a geometric primitive entered by an operator. Successive dissection curve points are identified according to points of minimum intensity in successive image slices. The dissection curve that connects the identified plurality of successive dissection curve points is displayed.
US08842903B2
An apparatus includes a storage unit to receive and store an image file, a processor to parse a media data field of the image file including one or more image data samples and to parse a media header field including an image type data field indicating whether each of the one or more image data samples is one of 2 dimensional (2D) image data and 3 dimensional (3D) stereoscopic image data to generate an image corresponding to one of a 2D image and a 3D stereoscopic image based on the image type data field of the image file, and a display unit to display the generated image according to the image type data field of the image file.
US08842892B2
The method traces the origin of a (illegally) distributed video material. It fingerprints a data object A having a nominal stream format F to provide a fingerprinted data object B including a pre-fingerprinting forensic luring process.
US08842882B2
A method of making individualized communications includes providing one or more images including each of a plurality of individuals, automatically extracting one or more individual appearance attributes for each of the individuals from the image including the individual, providing a communication that is generic to the individuals, using a processor to make an individualized communication for each of the individuals by modifying the generic communication in accordance with the one or more individual appearance attributes associated with the individual, communicating the individualized communication to a corresponding individual.
US08842881B2
A method for detecting and tracking a target includes detecting the target using a plurality of feature cues, fusing the plurality of feature cues to form a set of target hypotheses, tracking the target based on the set of target hypotheses and a scene context analysis, and updating the tracking of the target based on a target motion model.
US08842880B2
An information processing apparatus comprising: an obtaining unit configured to obtain image data; a detection unit configured to detect an object from the image data; an attribute determination unit configured to determine an attribute indicating a characteristic of the object detected by the detection unit; a registration unit configured to register the image data in at least one of a plurality of dictionaries based on the attribute determined by the attribute determination unit; and an adding unit configured to add, when the image data is registered in not less than two dictionaries, link information concerning the image data registered in the other dictionary to the image data registered in one dictionary.
US08842867B2
A loudspeaker box (300) has a loudspeaker housing (1) and a sound source (3a) with a non-rotationally symmetrical radiation characteristic. The sound path of the sound source (3a) contains an acoustic element (4) which dilates or constricts the radiation of sound in at least one radiation plane. The loudspeaker box (300) comprises a mechanism which can be used to position the sound source (3a) and the acoustic element (4) in different rotational positions relative to one another.
US08842864B2
The invention relates to a hearing instrument comprising an ITE-part adapted for being positioned in the ear canal of a user, the ITE-part comprising a housing comprising first and second openings adapted for facing towards the ear drum when said ITE-part is mounted in the ear canal, said first and second openings being adapted to allow first and second functional elements of the ITE-part to be in communication with the ear canal, the hearing instrument further comprising a wax filter adapted to fully or partially cover said first and second openings. The invention further relates to the use of a hearing instrument, to a method of wax protection in a hearing instrument and to a wax filter. The object of the present invention is to provide an alternative solution to protect relevant parts of a hearing aid against wax deposition. The problem is solved in that the wax filter comprises at least first and second distinctly different parts for covering respectively, said first and second openings, each of said first and second distinctly different parts of the wax filter being individually optimized. This has the advantage of providing a flexible one-piece wax filter that is optimized according to need. The invention may e.g. be used for the hearing instruments comprising an in-the-ear-part.
US08842852B1
An input audio signal is detected to provide a fast time constant control signal which is clamped for immediate response when the input signal drops below a threshold level and filtered to provide a modified control signal with a slow time constant. As the modified control signal level decreases toward the control signal level, a time constant differential control signal decreases and slows the rate of change of the decreasing modified control signal which, as it nears the control signal level, reverts to a slow response. The resulting control signal has an exponential release response which can be applied to an audio dynamics processor. The time constant differential control signal may also be detected to provide an inverted output when it is significantly less than the modified control signal so as to result in the control signal also having an exponential attack response to be applied to the processor.
US08842850B2
An input device of an electronic apparatus including an input detection unit which is provided on the electronic apparatus at a position that is difficult to be seen by a user who uses the input device, and which detects an input operation of the user; a movement distance detection unit that detects a movement distance of an input position over the input detection unit; and an action control unit that controls a predetermined action of the electronic apparatus based on the movement distance detected by the movement distance detection unit.
US08842844B2
In one aspect, the invention divides an audio signal into auditory events, each of which tends to be perceived as separate and distinct, by calculating the spectral content of successive time blocks of the audio signal, calculating the difference in spectral content between successive time blocks of the audio signal, and identifying an auditory event boundary as the boundary between successive time blocks when the difference in the spectral content between such successive time blocks exceeds a threshold. In another aspect, the invention generates a reduced-information representation of an audio signal by dividing an audio signal into auditory events, each of which tends to be perceived as separate and distinct, and formatting and storing information relating to the auditory events. Optionally, the invention may also assign a characteristic to one or more of the auditory events. Auditory events may be determined according to the first aspect of the invention or by another method.
US08842841B2
The present invention relates to the field of security of electronic data and/or communications. In one form, the invention relates to data security and/or privacy in a distributed and/or decentralised network environment. In another form, the invention relates to enabling private collaboration and/or information sharing between users, agents and/or applications. Embodiment(s) of the present invention enable the sharing of key(s) and/or content between a first user and/or agent and a second user and/or agent. Furthermore, embodiment(s) of the present invention have application in sharing encrypted information via information sharing services.A number of inventions, aspects and embodiments are disclosed herein.
US08842836B2
A system for and method of securely provisioning a module with cryptographic parameters, such as cryptographic keys and key tables, is presented. Such modules may be used to enable encrypted communications between mobile phones to which they are coupled. The system and method prevent a malevolent individual involved in manufacturing the modules from compromising the security of the module. In particular, the modules are provisioned by an entity different from the manufacturer.
US08842831B2
A method for the authentication of an RFID tag uses an asymmetric cryptography method which ensures protection against the recycling of authentication RFID tags and needs no deactivation of the corresponding RFID tag for this purpose. To this end, the certificate of an RFID tag to be checked is not stored on the RFID tag but is stored physically separately from the RFID tag. Firstly, the RFID reader reads the certificate of the RFID tag to be checked before the challenge-response protocol is carried out successfully with the RFID tag to be checked. Consequently, an RFID tag can be reused for authentication only when the certificate relating to this RFID tag is known.
US08842829B2
Disclosed are alternate embodiments of various components of a barrier operator system. and methods of operation, including of the mechanical drive subsystem with segmented and self-locking rail unit, rail mounting supports, belt and chain drive tensioning, and drive assembly carriage and interface; the electronics and software routines for controlled operation of the various barrier operator functions; wall console communications with the barrier operator; encryption and decryption of access codes; establishment and monitoring of travel limits and barrier speed and force profiles; thermal protection of barrier operator drive motors; and establishment and control of communications from the barrier operator to accessories by way of a wireless adapter.
US08842824B2
An encryption processing circuit capable of inhibiting leakage of secret information from bit transitions of a register while inhibiting an increase in performance/area ratio is provided.N (N is an integer equal to 2 or greater) sets, each of which including an encryption block and a register, are included, wherein an encryption block of an i-th set performs encryption in a certain step on plain text stored in the register of the i-th set or intermediate data stored in the register of the i-th set obtained from the plain text and the intermediate data obtained by the encryption is stored in the register of an (i+1)-th set and the encryption block of an N-th set performs the encryption in the certain step on plain text stored in the register of the N-th set or intermediate data stored in the register of the N-th set obtained from the plain text and the intermediate data obtained by the encryption is stored in the register of a first set.
US08842823B2
A technique for determining usage of encrypted media content is described. A method implementation of this technique comprises the steps of obtaining a short-term key for decrypting the media content, obtaining a long-term key for decrypting the short-term key, decrypting the short-term key based on the long-term key, decrypting the media content based on the decrypted short-term key, and logging a parameter relating to the short-term key as a basis for determining media content usage. The short-term key may be a Traffic Encryption Key, TEK, and the long-term key may be a Service Encryption Key, SEK.
US08842819B1
Activities performed by a client at a site of an organization are monitored and stored in an activity database. A call is thereafter received from the client at a telephone system of the organization, which performs an identification of the client. The identification is provided to a cross-channel router as a request for a prediction on where the call from the client should be routed, and the router indexes into the activity database based on the identification of the client to obtain the monitored activity of the client. The router employs predicting rules and the obtained activity to generate a prediction of client needs, and returns the generated prediction to the telephone-based system, which presents prioritized telephone prompts to the client according to the returned prediction to help in routing the call.
US08842807B2
An X-ray moving image radiographing apparatus includes an X-ray detector configured to detect an X-ray transmitting through a subject to acquire a subject image, an image processing unit configured to process an X-ray radiographic image output from the X-ray detector, and a control unit configured to capture a mask image by selectively scanning X-ray focal positions of an X-ray source which has a plurality of X-ray focal points so that an X-ray incident angle varies with respect to a target point of the subject, and to capture a moving image after a predetermined work is performed on the subject by selectively scanning X-ray focal positions of the X-ray source similar to the scanning operation used to capture the mask image.
US08842806B2
An apparatus for imaging a breast of a patient has a gantry with a radiation source and a sensor, the source and sensor rotatable in an arcuate orbit about a central axis and within a plane of revolution, wherein the arcuate orbit spans more than 180 degrees and less than 360 degrees, and wherein the gantry has a gantry cover that is disposed to be in contact with at least the chest wall of the patient. The gantry cover has a central opening about the central axis for insertion of the breast that is to be imaged and a peripheral cutout portion that defines the end-points of the arcuate orbit and that provides a space for positioning a portion of the patient's anatomy.
US08842801B2
A rod assembly for a fuel bundle of a nuclear reactor may include an upper end piece, lower end piece and a plurality of rod segments attached between the upper and lower end pieces and to each other so as to form an axial length of the rod assembly. The rod assembly may include an adaptor subassembly provided at given connection points for connecting adjacent rod segments or a given rod segment with one of the upper and lower end pieces. The connection points along the axial length of the rod assembly may be located where the rod assembly contacts a spacer in the fuel bundle. One (or more) of the rod segments may include an irradiation target therein for producing a desired isotope when a fuel bundle containing one (or more) rod assemblies is irradiated in a core of the reactor.
US08842768B2
A radio communication system has a plurality of transmission formats available for transmitting data signals, and a pilot signal is transmitted during the transmission of data to enable channel estimation. The transmit power of the pilot signal is varied depending on the current transmission format of the data, and is reduced in the periods between data transmissions.
US08842764B2
The method and apparatus disclosed herein improve throughput conditions limited by multiplicative noise by determining precoder weights for each data stream communicated between a MIMO transmitter node and a MIMO receiver node. The precoder weights are determined based on information derived from non-precoded reference symbols to decrease the energy allocated to the dominant signal path relative to the energy allocated to the non-dominant signal paths.
US08842762B2
For an integer number R (greater than one) of demodulation reference signal DM RS resources that are reserved for SU-MIMO transmissions by a UE, there is associated in a memory a) for a first transmission instance each of the R DM RS resources with a unique one of R spatial layers or R transmit antennas, and b) for a second transmission instance each of the R DM RS resources with a different unique one of the R spatial layers or transmit antennas. The first and second transmission instances (slots or sub-frames) are consecutive. A UE transmission to a network in the first slot/sub-frame comprises each DM RS resource on the respective spatial layer or transmit antenna with which they are associated for the first slot/sub-frame, and a UE transmission to the network in the first slot/sub-frame comprises each DM RS resource on the respective spatial layer or transmit antenna with which they are associated for the second slot/sub-frame.
US08842760B2
A spatial multiplexing scheduler in, for example, an eNB or other base station, determines rank n precoders for UEs. Each UE reports the preferred precoder from this set of rank n precoders. The preferred precoder results in imbalance in performance over m layers compared to the rest of (n−m) layers. The UEs also report channel quality to the eNB, from which the eNB determines which layer(s) is better for the UE. For example, when n=2 and m=1, the eNB may then select two UEs such that, for the same precoder used by the UEs, the first UE has much higher layer 1 performance than layer 2, and the second UE has much higher layer 2 performance than layer 1. These two UEs may then share the same frequency-time domain resources, with the first UE information sent/received on layer 1, while the second UE information is sent/received on layer 2.
US08842759B2
An OFDM system and method using amplitude shift keying (ASK) for subcarrier modulation is provided. Because ASK is used, the signal of each symbol in time domain is conjugate-symmetric. In addition, among the discrete numbers of each symbol, two of them are always real. These properties are utilized such that only half of the numbers of each symbol sequence are transmitted. The generated baseband signal can be a complex or a real signal. As a result, the bandwidth efficiency of the derived ASK-OFDM is the same as that of QAM-OFDM.
US08842757B2
A method and system adaptively reduce a peak-to-average power ratio in a communication system. Energy is clipped from at least one peak of a modulated signal. The modulated signal includes a plurality of sub-carriers. At least one data sub-carrier is adaptively selected for peak-to-average power ratio reduction use based on known scheduling information. The clipped energy is distributed among at least one data sub-carrier.
US08842756B2
A method and apparatus for improving channel estimation within an OFDM communication system. Channel estimation in OFDM is usually performed with the aid of pilot symbols. The pilot symbols are typically spaced in time and frequency. The set of frequencies and times at which pilot symbols are inserted is referred to as a pilot pattern. In some cases, the pilot pattern is a diagonal-shaped lattice, either regular or irregular. The method first interpolates in the direction of larger coherence (time or frequency). Using these measurements, the density of pilot symbols in the direction of faster change will be increased thereby improving channel estimation without increasing overhead. As such, the results of the first interpolating step can then be used to assist the interpolation in the dimension of smaller coherence (time or frequency).
US08842754B2
A process for estimating a channel in an OFDM communication system, wherein an OFDM sample is based on a time-frequency grid comprising a set of pilots may include the steps of receiving, by a receiver, OFDM sample based subframes comprising a set of pilot signals, performing an iterative loop for the purpose of computing (Mk, kk) respectively corresponding to the covariance matrix and the mean of the probability distribution of p(hk|yk, lk) at time instant k, yk, and lk respectively corresponding to the received signal and to a priori known information, the value of (Mk, kk) being computed as a function of (Mk−1, kk−1) as well as the values of the pilots received at instant k.
US08842751B2
An apparatus method of estimating a channel in a wireless communication system are provided. The method includes determining channel estimation values of pilot tones, selecting data tones to which a first estimation scheme is applied, according to frequency selectivity and time-axis variance of the channel, determining channel estimation values of the selected data tones according to the first estimation scheme by using the channel estimation values of the pilot tones, and determining channel estimation values of the remaining data tones according to a second estimation scheme by using the channel estimation values of the pilot tones and the channel estimation values determined by the first estimation scheme.
US08842747B2
The present invention provides, inter alia, a method for digital communication between at least one first node and a plurality of second nodes which are connected with the first node by a field bus. According to one aspect a highly effective presence detection scheme for checking the operational status of the second nodes by the first node is integratively combined with a message query for providing an effective first mode of digital communication between said nodes, which may be used very effectively to provide a communication channel which is independent of message priorities. According to another aspect the first mode of digital communication is combined with a second mode of digital communication which is based on message priorities of digital messages to be send by a respective second node to the first node. To advantage, a bitwise bus access arbitration mechanism may be used for implementing those modes of communication.
US08842746B2
A method begins by a processing module determining a mapping of encoded data slices to wireless channels for wireless communication of data, wherein a data segment of the data is encoded in accordance with a dispersed storage error encoding protocol to produce a set of encoded data slices. The method continues with the processing module configuring, in accordance with the mapping, receivers of a wireless communication device to receive, via a set of wireless channels, at least some of the set of encoded data slices to produce configured receivers. The method continues with the processing module facilitating the configured receivers to receive encoded data slices of the set of encoded data slices to produce received encoded data slices and when at least a decode threshold number of received encoded data slices have been received, decoding the received encoded data slices to recapture the data segment.
US08842740B2
Aspects of fast channel change of programs are presented. Initial pictures of a program may be decoded earlier and displayed longer than what is indicated by corresponding clock references. Additional pictures of the program may be decoded and displayed at time indicated by the clock references. Within the time period of the initial pictures, decoding timing advances of initial pictures may be reduced and corresponding picture displaying rates may converge to an intended constant frame rate used for additional pictures displaying. Pictures may be decoded and displayed when the corresponding data are available in a coded data buffer (CDB) and a decoded picture buffer (DPB), respectively. Depending on the implementation, the respective previous picture may be displayed when a decoded picture is available in the DPB.
US08842732B2
An encoding apparatus for encoding progressive image data and interlace image data corresponding to this progressive image data, having a first encoding unit configured to encode picture data composing the interlace image data to generate first encoded data and decoding and recomposing the first encoded data to generate recomposed image data, an up sample processing unit configured to up sample the generated recomposed image data to generate image data having the same resolution as that of the progressive image data, and a second encoding unit configured to encode the picture data composing the progressive image data to generate second encoded data using the generated image data as predictive image data.
US08842731B2
A method is provided of coding an image or a sequence of images generating a stream of data comprising data representative of at least one group of pixels in one of said images. Such a method comprises the steps of: selecting, for a group of pixels to be coded, an initial partition of predetermined linear form, slicing said group of pixels to be coded according to said selected initial partition, propagating said initial partition selected in said group of pixels to be coded, until the latter is sliced in its entirety into a plurality of partitions of predetermined form, selecting, for said sliced group of pixels, a predetermined order of traversal of said partitions, predicting and coding said partitions one after the other, according to said selected order of traversal.
US08842726B2
An encoding apparatus employing both a CPU and a chip or circuit dedicated to the encoding is disclosed. The encoding apparatus includes a hardware encoder and a software encoder. The hardware encoder is configured by hardware dedicated to the encoding and encodes a portion of AV data. The software encoder encodes another portion of the AV data in parallel to the encoding process of the hardware encoder by the use of a CPU. A position detector detects a switching position of an allocation destination in the AV data. A data allocator allocates sections of the AV data divided by the switching position to both encoders. A synthesizer arranges the encoded AV data in a predetermined sequence to synthesize a series of encoded AV data. An output unit outputs the series of encoded AV data.
US08842722B2
Equalization techniques are provided for high-speed data communications and, more specifically, DFE (decision feedback equalizer) circuits and methods are provided which implement a high-order continuous time filter in a DFE feedback path to emulate structured elements of a channel response.
US08842721B1
A Method and Apparatus for Channel Equalization in High Speed S-RIO based Communication Systems have been disclosed. By adjusting equalizer coefficients based on 8B10B error counts and an error threshold, a receiver may be dynamically adjusted. By adjusting transmitter pre-emphasis based on 8B10B error counts and an error threshold, a transmitter may be dynamically adjusted. Both the transmitter and receiver may be adjusted dynamically based on 8B10B error counts and different error thresholds.
US08842709B2
A surface emitting semiconductor laser includes a first semiconductor multilayer reflector of a first conductivity type, an active area, a second semiconductor multilayer reflector of a second conductivity type, a current confinement layer having a conductive area and a surrounding high-resistance area, each provided on a substrate, and a higher-order transverse mode suppressing layer formed on an emission surface from which laser light is emitted and in an area in which higher-order transverse mode is induced. The higher-order transverse mode suppressing layer includes first to third insulation films having first to third refractive indices, respectively, formed on each other, and capable of transmitting an oscillation wavelength. The second refractive index is lower than the first refractive index. The third refractive index is higher than the second refractive index. The optical film thickness of the first to third insulation films is an odd number times one-fourth of the oscillation wavelength.
US08842707B2
A semiconductor laser element includes: a window region including a disordered portion formed by diffusion of a group-III vacancy, the diffusion promoted by providing on the window region a promoting film that absorbs a predetermined atom; a non-window region including an active layer of a quantum well structure; and a difference equal to or larger than 50 meV between an energy band gap in the window region and an energy band gap in the non-window region.
US08842706B2
An opto-electronic oscillator circuit, including: an opto-electronic circuit loop including an optical modulator that receives a first electrical signal and produces an optical output signal coupled with an optical resonator, a photodetector circuit optically coupled with the optical resonator, and a phase shifter coupled with the photodetector circuit for producing a phase shifted output signal that is fed back as the first electrical signal; an optical loop comprising the optical coupling of the optical resonator with the photodetector; and an electrical feedback circuit loop for coupling the first electrical signal with the photodetector circuit.
US08842702B2
Multiple control indications are transmitted within timeslots defined for a slotted communication system. For example, a wireless node may transmit a control indication at a beginning of a timeslot and at an end of a timeslot. A control indication may comprise a resource utilization message that a node generates in an attempt reduce inference at the node that is caused by transmissions by neighboring nodes. A node also may synchronize to a received timeslot of another node based on the position of one or more control indications within the timeslot. Here, each control indication may include information that indicates the position of the control indication within the timeslot.
US08842699B2
A wireless communication system in which retransmission is performed between a transmitting apparatus and a receiving apparatus, whereby the transmitting apparatus includes, a first transmitting unit to transmit first data to the receiving apparatus and retransmission controlling unit to perform transmission of second data, the data part of which is same as that of the first data, without waiting for a feedback signal from receiving apparatus regarding the first data, and to wait for a feedback signal from the receiving apparatus regarding the second data, and the receiving apparatus includes, a second transmitting unit to transmit the feedback signal regarding the second data to the transmitting apparatus.
US08842697B2
An improved method of allocating MAC addresses for an electrical distribution network to make it possible to save a great deal of time during the address allocation phase. The method stores, at the central address allocation device, a list of associations between the serial numbers of the devices and the MAC address allocated. The method also sends a cataloging request serving to allocate the MAC address prior to the sending of a communication frame. In this manner, the discovery phases for allocating the MAC addresses to devices without addresses are appreciably reduced. The time when the network is dedicated to such discovery is reduced, thereby increasing accordingly the useful communication time available in the network.
US08842694B2
The present invention provides methods and devices for implementing a Low Latency Ethernet (“LLE”) solution, also referred to herein as a Data Center Ethernet (“DCE”) solution, which simplifies the connectivity of data centers and provides a high bandwidth, low latency network for carrying Ethernet and storage traffic. Some aspects of the invention involve transforming FC frames into a format suitable for transport on an Ethernet. Some preferred implementations of the invention implement multiple virtual lanes (“VLs”) in a single physical connection of a data center or similar network. Some VLs are “drop” VLs, with Ethernet-like behavior, and others are “no-drop” lanes with FC-like behavior. Some preferred implementations of the invention provide guaranteed bandwidth based on credits and VL. Active buffer management allows for both high reliability and low latency while using small frame buffers. Preferably, the rules for active buffer management are different for drop and no drop VLs.
US08842690B2
A data structure is provided for storing network contact information based on an array of physical memory locations. Virtual vectors are constructed for each source, wherein each element in each virtual vector is assigned to a corresponding physical memory location within the array. The physical memory locations are shared between the virtual vectors uniformly at random so that the noise introduced by sharing can be predicted and removed. A method for storing network contact information is also provided in which a hash function is performed using the address of a source host to find a virtual vector for holding information about the source host. A second hash function is performed using the address of a destination host to find a virtual memory location, within the virtual vector, for holding information about the destination host. Finally, information is stored at a physical memory location assigned to the virtual memory location. Estimation range enhancement is further provided by performing multiple estimations with different sampling probabilities and selecting a best estimation based on a maximum likelihood method.
US08842689B2
In certain embodiments, a system comprises a connection to a network and an application server providing a cross cluster extension mobility (CCEM) service configured to receive a request from a user to log into the CCEM service from a telephony device connected to the network, prompt the user via the telephony device to provide a user ID, determine whether the user is logging in from a home cluster or a remote cluster, and perform a local extension mobility login for the user.
US08842680B2
A mobile device configured to communicate with one or more various enterprise services and Internet services. Such services include such features as e-mail, calendar, and personal information management (PIM). The mobile device is configured to maintain a distinction between each of these services by having a number of databases, each database dedicated to a specific service. To facilitate this distinction, a service identifier is generated with respect to each database. When a service is removed, the mobile device no longer has access to the service. In such an instance, the mobile device is configured to maintain the associated database and the service identifier. Should a removed service become reactivated for the mobile device, the maintained database will become re-associated with the proper service by using the service identifier. By distinguishing between databases using the service identifiers, the mobile device may prevent “cross-pollination” between its databases when synchronizing with different services.
US08842679B2
Some embodiments provide a control system for managing a network that includes several switching elements managed by the control system. The system includes several controller instances for managing the switching elements. Each particular controller instance includes a coordination manager for communicating with the coordination managers of the other controllers in order to partition control of the plurality of switching elements by electing a master controller for different sets of switching elements. The particular controller instance also includes a storage for storing control data for controlling the set of managed switching elements managed by the controller instance, and a switch interface for passing the control data to the set of managed switching elements.
US08842675B2
Methods and systems are described to allow for the parallel processing of packets and other subsets of data that are to be delivered in order after the completion of the parallel processing. The methods and systems may process packets and subsets of data that may vary in size by orders of magnitude. The packets may be transmitted and/or received over data transmission networks that may be orders of magnitude faster than the processing speeds of the parallel processors. Entire packets or subsets of data may be allocated to individual processing units without segmenting the packets between the processing units. A count value may be inserted as metadata to received packets in order to indicate a relative order of arrival. The metadata may be utilized by a multiplexor at the output of the parallel processing units in order to maintain in-sequence delivery of the processed packets.
US08842670B2
At a network device that forwards packets between compute devices and virtual storage area networks using Fiber Channel over Ethernet techniques, data is stored for a virtual fabric port of the network device identifying each of a plurality of virtual storage area networks. For each virtual storage area network, data is stored identifying each of a plurality of compute devices that are logged into the virtual storage area network via the network device. The network device forwards packets sent to the virtual fabric port of the network device from the plurality of compute devices to corresponding ones of the plurality of virtual storage area networks.
US08842666B2
Methods and apparatus for packetization of content for transmission over a network. A method is provided that includes generating one or more content packets from the multimedia content, wherein the content packets are associated with a time reference, and adding a sync header to the one or more content packets to form one or more application layer packets, respectively, wherein the sync header comprises a time indicator that indicates time relative to the time reference. An apparatus includes encoding logic configured to generate one or more content packets from the multimedia content, wherein the content packets are associated with a time reference, and packetization logic configured to add a sync header to the one or more content packets to form one or more application layer packets, respectively, wherein the sync header comprises a time indicator that indicates time relative to the time reference.
US08842655B2
A communication apparatus capable of simultaneously receiving signals from a plurality of users by an SC-FDMA scheme reduces its circuit size. A communication apparatus BS1, BS2 is capable of simultaneously receiving signals from a plurality of users by the SC-FDMA scheme. The communication apparatus BS1, BS2 includes a plurality of antennas 1a and 1b; a processing unit 6 that performs multi-antenna signal processing on a plurality of received SC-FDMA signals in a frequency domain, the received SC-FDMA signals being received by the plurality of antennas 1a and 1b; and a user separating unit 7 that demultiplexes a signal obtained through the multi-antenna signal processing, into signals for each user based on user allocation information in the SC-FDMA scheme.
US08842654B2
The present invention provides a method for realizing compatibility between a WCDMA system and a GSM system, including: in the downlink data path of a base station, In-phase/Quadrature (IQ) data of the GSM system are mapped to the Common Public Radio Interface (CPRI) according to a predetermined rate before IQ data interleaving and framing the CPRI Base Frame (BF), and then the mapped data of the GSM system are de-multiplexed with IQ data of the WCDMA system; in the uplink data path of the base station, IQ data in the CPRI are de-multiplexed after de-framing and IQ data de-interleaving CPRI BFs, and then the de-multiplexed IQ data of the GSM system are de-mapped according to the predetermined rate. The present invention further provides an apparatus for realizing compatibility between a WCDMA system and a GSM system. The method and apparatus genuinely realize the compatibility between the WCDMA system and the GSM system by unifying two different radio transmission modes between the WCDMA system and the GSM system in the bottom layer.
US08842652B2
A relay node receives from user equipments UE CQI reports which give a CQI value per radio band resource RBR, from which are aggregated across the RBRs and/or aggregated per UE across that UE's RBR values. The relay node reports an indication of the average to its controlling access node (eNodeB), either explicitly or implicitly (e.g., a gain applied to the CQI of the downlink between the relay and access nodes). The relay node also checks the UEs' buffer status (actual or predicted) and reports either periodically or based on an underflow/overflow occurrence. For periodic reports, each UE buffer experiencing the overrun/underrun is reported.
US08842651B2
An apparatus and method for access point groupings bridging tunneled traffic for a communication network, includes a first step of associating each access point with a location parameter. A next step includes grouping access points in accordance with the location parameter. A next step includes receiving a packet. A next step includes bridging the packet between Layer-2 tunnels of all access points that are part of a grouping.
US08842650B2
A method of operating a mobile router network, comprises: providing a plurality of wireless mobile routers, each having access a cellular network provided by a predetermined cellular carrier, operating each mobile router to upload and download data via the cellular network, operating each mobile router to monitor the uploaded data and downloaded data to generate usage statistical; providing a server coupleable to the plurality of wireless mobile routers via the cellular network; operating the server to access billing data from the predetermined carrier for each mobile router; automatically operating each mobile router to upload its corresponding usage statistical data to the server; and operating the server to compare the usage statistical data for each wireless mobile router to corresponding billing data to determine if there is a billing discrepancy.
US08842645B2
A transmitting apparatus, a receiving apparatus, and a communication system are provided that allow a reduction in a frame loss due to interference caused by use of the same channel. A transmitting apparatus disposed in a base station includes a GPS receiver for receiving a GPS signal, a timing generator for controlling respective function blocks in accordance with the GPS signal and an inter-base-station control signal so as to precisely synchronize the timing of frame transmission among base stations, the front-end transmission processing unit including for converting transmission information into transmission time slots, a frame generator for generating a frame including a plurality of time slots and one frame guard, and a back-end transmission processing unit for transmitting the generated frame as a radio signal.
US08842639B2
A method for transmitting a pilot signal in a downlink MIMO (Multi Input Multi Output) supporting multiple transmission antenna is disclosed. The method includes transmitting a subframe to which cell-specific pilot symbols and User Equipment-specific (UE-specific) pilot symbols are mapped, in which the cell-specific pilot symbols are mapped to a first region of the subframe and the UE-specific pilot symbols are mapped to a second region of the subframe.
US08842635B2
Provided is an anti-collision method and apparatus used during wireless power transmission with respect to a plurality of target devices. According to one general aspect, an anti-collision method in wireless power transmission may include: transmitting, from a source device to one or more target devices, an access standard instruction including an access standard that is used for identifying the target devices; transmitting, to the one or more target devices, a call parameter used to detect identifications (IDs) of the target devices, generated based on the access standard; and assigning, to the one or more target devices, control IDs based on response signals that the one or more target devices transmits in response to the call parameter.
US08842634B2
Systems, methods, and instrumentalities are disclosed that may provide for a WTRU to perform measurements in order to avoid radio link failure that may occur because the WTRU's neighboring cells are, or include, CSG cells. For example, thresholds may be implemented to compensate for the presence of CSG cells, a WTRU may make adjustments when performing measurements, etc.
US08842632B2
Example embodiments are directed to a system and methods of pre-registration, storing of pre-registered session information and session transfer, which may occur when an access terminal is in close proximity to a border area between a first radio access technology (RAT) area and a second RAT area. A method includes obtaining pre-registration session information if an access terminal enters a pre-registration zone, starting a pre-registration session information timer associated with the obtained pre-registration session information, and storing the obtained pre-registration session information until the associated pre-registration information timer expires. Further, both an access terminal and an access network include one or more memories configured to store more than one group of pre-registration session information and more than one timer. Each of the timers are associated with a corresponding set of pre-registration session information.
US08842629B2
Disclosed are a scheduling method, device and system based on quality of service. The method includes: for downlink service data, an access point (AP) or a gateway (GW) determines the quality of service (QoS) level of a downlink service packet of a media access control (MAC) layer according to the QoS attribute information of the downlink service packet of the IP layer, and then the AP transmits and schedules radio resources according to the QoS level; for uplink service data, user equipment (UE) determines the QoS level of an uplink service packet of the MAC layer according to the QoS attribute information of the uplink service packet of the IP layer, and reports the QoS level and the other QoS parameters to the AP in the manner of a scheduling request, and the AP completes the transmitting and scheduling of radio resources according to the QoS level, so that the UE transmits the uplink service data to the AP. Aimed at low-cost hot spot and indoor data service access, the present invention provides a novel network architecture and a perfect QoS service mechanism.
US08842621B2
A wireless network, connecting network users to a communications network, comprises base stations connected to the communications network and terminals connected to the network users, each terminal having a link with a base station to form a base station/terminal pair, the links established over a wireless resource comprising resource blocks. The method comprises: determining, for each base station/terminal pair, a set of resource utilization fractions; determining a set of co-channel interference matrices for each network component, distributing, to each base station, corresponding elements from the sets of resource utilization fractions and the sets of co-channel interference matrices; suppressing, in each network component, co-channel interference in dependence on the determined co-channel interference matrix; and dynamically establishing links required to handle the network traffic for each base station by selecting from the resource blocks in accordance with the resource utilization fractions.
US08842619B2
To support mobile stations that are not capable of demodulating the entire bandwidth or that can be made to demodulate less than the entire bandwidth, a system, apparatus and method are provided to schedule users on less than all of the bandwidth. Further, certain users can be scheduled on more of the bandwidth than others.
US08842614B2
The present disclosure includes systems and techniques relating to wireless local area network devices. Systems and techniques include determining wireless resource allocations in a time domain, a spatial wireless channel domain, and a frequency domain to coordinate communications with wireless communication devices, generating a control frame that directs wireless communications based on at least a portion of the wireless resource allocations, and transmitting the control frame to the wireless communication devices. Determining wireless resource allocations can include determining frequency allocations in the time domain.
US08842613B2
Systems and methodologies are described that facilitate split a common total power resource among a plurality of carriers. A power distribution scheme can be employed jointly across the plurality of carriers to determine an amount of power to allocate to respective carriers. Based upon an amount of power allocated, a packet format can be selected for each carrier based upon the amount of power allocated to the carrier and/or a serving grant associated with the carrier.
US08842601B2
The present invention discloses a method and a device for detecting a primary synchronization signal and generating a sequence in a LTE system, so as to solve the problem that the overhead for 3GPP LTE system to store a local primary synchronization sequence is too much during the initial cell search process. The method for detecting a primary synchronization signal includes: directly generating a local primary synchronization signal sequence with equal amplitude in the time domain as a matched filter; performing a front-end processing for a received signal; performing the matched filtering between the received signal after the front-end processing and the local primary synchronization signal sequence; judging the output amplitude of the signal sequence obtained after the matched filtering; and then obtaining a judgment result of the local primary synchronization signal sequence.
US08842598B2
A method is provided for sending a communications signal in a communications network having a plurality of nodes assuming alternating sleeping and waking states and in which a sender node executes a step of sending an initial preamble, prior to sending data to a destination node. The method includes at least one operation of a neighbor node of the sender node relaying the initial preamble, where a relaying operation corresponds to sending a preamble formed from the preamble sent during the preceding relaying operation, the preamble sent during the first relaying operation being formed from the initial preamble, and the at least one relaying operation continuing until the destination node for the data detects the sent preamble.
US08842597B2
Disclosed in the present application are a method, an apparatus and a system for data transmission, which are used to realize support for transmission of MBMS service in a network scene with deployment of RNs. A data transmission method disclosed in the present invention comprises the following steps: a Relay Node RN establishes a first corresponding relationship between indications of Multimedia Broadcast Multicast Service MBMS bearers and indications of user plane data tunnels of MBMS sessions, and a second corresponding relationship between the indications of user plane data tunnels of MBMS sessions and indications of MBMS sessions; the RN obtains, according to the first corresponding relationship, the user plane data of a MBMS session transmitted from a Donor Evolved Node DeNB, and transmits, according to the second corresponding relationship, the user plane data of the MBMS session to a User Equipment UE.
US08842595B2
A method of processing a multicast frame in a wireless local area network system. The method includes transmitting a request message for requesting a Directed Multicast Service (DMS) in which at least one multicast frame is transmitted as at least one unicast frame by an Access Point (AP), receiving a response message from the AP in response to the request message, and receiving the at least one multicast frame from the AP, the at least one multicast frame being transmitted as the at least one unicast frame. The request message includes a DMS descriptor list field comprising a Transmission Class (TCLAS) element field and a Transmission Specification (TSPEC) element field. The TCLAS element field includes a requested multicast group address for the DMS. The TSPEC element field defines Quality of Service (QoS) expectations information for the DMS.
US08842593B2
The present invention discloses a method for activating a Multimedia Broadcast/Multicast Service (MBMS) comprising the steps: a. sending a message which carries MBMS bearer capabilities of a user equipment (UE) from the UE to a SGSN which the UE belongs to after passing authorization; b. verifying whether the MBMS bearer capabilities of the UE are less than Required MBMS Bearer Capabilities, if the SGSN has the Required MBMS Bearer Capabilities; and c. rejecting a request for activating an MBMS Context if the MBMS bearer capabilities of the UE are less than the Required MBMS Bearer Capabilities, or creating an MBMS UE Context if the MBMS bearer capabilities of the UE are not less than the Required MBMS Bearer Capabilities. The method can simplify the signaling interaction between the network entities, reduce the network complexity and save the network resources.
US08842591B1
An access point for a wireless local area network (LAN). In one aspect, the access point includes (i) a media access control (MAC) device, and (ii) a radio frequency (RF) transceiver in communication with the MAC device. The access point uses a random order or a rotating order to access a client station in the wireless LAN, and the client station transmits data to the RF transceiver after at least one of (i) the RF transceiver finishes transmitting directed data to the client station, or (ii) the RF transceiver transmits a null data frame to the client station.
US08842583B2
A system for maintaining data connectivity in a satellite communications system including a satellite terminal with a ping mechanism, a satellite ground station, and a ping server, where the ping mechanism pings the ping server and restores data connectivity between the satellite terminal and the satellite ground station.
US08842580B2
A method of communicating digitized speech from a transmitting forum participant comprises the step of receiving a data structure that includes said digitized speech. The data structure is analyzed to determine whether the digitized speech is redundantly represented in a plurality of forms in the data structure. A portion of the data structure is forwarded to a receiving forum participant, thereby communicating the digitized speech from the transmitting forum participant. In this method, when the digitized speech is redundantly represented in the data structure in a plurality of forms, the forwarding step includes a step of selecting one or more forms, based on a function, from the plurality of forms in the data structure. Furthermore, the portion of the data structure that is forwarded to the receiving forum participant includes data in the data structure that corresponds to each of the selected one or more forms.
US08842579B2
In one embodiment, a solution is provided wherein multiple virtual devices may be configured on the same physical port of a network device. For example, a first virtual device and a second virtual device may be configured to use the same physical port. A single internal spanning tree instance may be configured for both the first virtual device and the second virtual device.
US08842574B2
Methods and systems for configuring networks are disclosed. For example, in an example of an embodiment, a network device includes a plurality of first ports each connected to a Local Area Network (LAN) segment, a network link circuit configured to generate network link notices conforming to a network forming protocol for establishing network links between the network device and other switches in the network so as to enable the other switches to select a network link by which to send packets to the network device, the generated link notices being based in part on a power consumption capability of one or more first ports in the network device, and transmit circuitry configured to transmit the network link notices to the other switches through one or more of the first ports.
US08842563B1
Aspects of the present disclosure are directed towards a data retrieving engine that is designed to retrieve interval data from the endpoint devices that is communicated for indicating utility usage readings. The interval data is provided at least once for each interval period (used by each of the endpoint devices). The data retrieving engine is additionally designed for retrieving, from the endpoint devices, other different type of data, which is transmitted over a time period that overlaps multiple interval periods. In certain implementations, the system allows a dynamic adjustment to a ratio of the respective amounts for each type of data.
US08842560B2
Systems, methods, devices, and computer program products are described for handling of access terminals on an out-of-band piconet within a femto-proxy architecture. A femto-proxy system includes a femtocell (a femto access point, or FAP) and one or more out-of-band (OOB) proxies. One of the OOB proxies is configured to act as a master of an OOB piconet, through which various services are provided, including services to support the femtocell operation of the femto-proxy system. For example, the OOB piconet is used to facilitate lower power access to the macro communications services provided through the femtocell. In some cases, a combination of connected and inactive OOB operational modes are used to support an expanded number of slave access terminals on the piconet, where some of those slaves are operating in an active WWAN mode and others are operating in an idle WWAN mode. For example, parked mode may be used for idle WWAN mode access terminals.
US08842554B2
The embodiments of the invention describe a method for antenna selection in a wireless communication network. The network includes a transceiver having a set of antennas. The transceiver is configured to transmit a frequency-hopped sounding reference signal (SRS) over a subband from a subset of antennas at a time. The transceiver transmits the frequency-hopped SRS from subsets of antennas in the set of antennas substantially alternately. In response to the transmitting, the transceiver receives information indicative of an optimal subset of antennas and transmits data from the optimal subset of antennas.
US08842536B2
A network device monitors the traffic of individual flows through one of its ingress ports and, if the traffic volume exceeds a predetermined threshold, signals for a reduction in data traffic volume transmitted to that ingress port from one or more source devices. Example signals may include without limitation a unicast congestion message sent to the source of a flow, an Explicit Congestion Notification to one or more source devices, and the dropping of packets by the receiving device. In response to such signals, one or more of the source devices decrease the transmission rate of data traffic to the receiving device.
US08842535B2
A method and apparatus for radio link control during network congestion in a mobile wireless communication device connected to a radio network subsystem in a wireless cellular network. The mobile wireless communication device detects a pending uplink control message. The mobile wireless communication device determines that an uplink channel on which the pending uplink control message is to be sent has insufficient bandwidth for uplink transmission. After waiting a congestion delay time interval, the mobile wireless communication device sends the pending uplink control message on an uplink signaling channel instead of on the uplink channel. In some embodiments, the uplink channel is associated with a radio access bearer and the uplink signaling channel is associated with a signaling radio bearer.
US08842527B2
A high speed multiple user multiple-loop DSL system is described. In one embodiment, it includes a first DSL loop to carry DSL traffic to a first user and a second DSL loop to carry DSL traffic to a second user. A first junction connects the traffic of the first DSL loop to a third DSL loop, and a second junction connects the traffic of the second DSL loop to the third DSL loop.
US08842526B2
A method for handling error recovery at a user equipment is provided herein. In one embodiment, the method includes: maintaining first and second communication channels between the user equipment and a radio access network; storing a plurality of control messages in a buffer for transmission over the first communication channel; detecting if the first communication channel is disabled; initiating a recovery procedure using the second communication channel that includes restoring the first communication channel using the second communication channel and sending a further message to one of the one or more buffers for transmission on the restored first communication channel; and in response to detecting that the first communication channel is disabled, moderating control messages stored in the one or more buffers.
US08842523B2
Techniques are disclosed to reduce crossover between traffic from switch elements of different switch domains in a distributed switch. Addition of a first switch element to the distributed switch is detected. The distributed switch includes multiple switch elements at least subsequent to the addition, and each switch element has a switch element identifier and a fabric identifier. The respective fabric identifiers of the first switch element and of a second switch element are retrieved. The second switch element is communicably connected to the first switch element via a link, and the link is configured to allow only command traffic to be transmitted via the link. Upon a determination that the fabric identifier of the first switch element does not match the fabric identifier of the second switch element, then no command is issued specifying to reconfigure the link to allow at least one additional traffic type, different from command traffic.
US08842521B2
A communication management apparatus that manages transmission of data in a network in which plural communication nodes are connected via a transmission line in a ring shape, the apparatus including: a network-presence checking unit that transmits a network-presence-check frame in broadcast and generates network connection information indicating a connection state among the connection nodes from a received network-presence-check acknowledge frame, a token-circulation-order determining unit that determines token circulation order; a setup processing unit that performs setup processing for notifying each of the communication nodes of a token circulation destination; a data-frame-communication processing unit that performs transmission and reception of a data frame using a token frame; and a line-connection managing unit that disables, when the network has a ring configuration, any one of ports of any one of the communication nodes to prevent a connection state of the network from becoming a ring shape.
US08842517B2
A method is provided in one example embodiment and includes receiving a first pseudo-node identifier associated with a first network node via a network. The first pseudo-node identifier is generated by the first network node in a first designated intermediate system (DIS) operation. The method further includes detecting a loss of connectivity to the first network node, and receiving a second pseudo-node identifier associated with a second network node via the network. The second pseudo-node identifier is generated by the second network node in a second DIS operation. The method further includes executing a first network path determination operation using the first pseudo-node identifier and the second pseudo-node identifier when an elapsed time between the detecting of the loss of connectivity with the first network node and the executing of the first network path determination operation is within a predetermined threshold.
US08842514B2
Systems and methods for OFDM channelization are provided that allow for the co-existence of sub-band channels and diversity channels. Methods of defining diversity sub-channels and sub-band sub-channels are provided, and systematic channel definition and labeling schemes are provided.
US08842510B2
Provided is a multi-functional optical disc drive that includes an interface that connects a front-end of the optical drive to a back-end, and also connects the front-end of the optical drive to an external device. The optical drive also includes a controller that selectively controls connection to the back-end or the external device.
US08842509B2
In a multilayer optical disc having information layers conforming to a plurality of different optical disc standards, because the type of each information layer is not recorded in the other information layers, in read and write operations by a compatible optical disc device conforming to a plurality of optical disc standards, every time the information layer being accessed changes, it has been necessary to read the type of the information layer and select a method of generating a tracking error signal adapted to the type of information layer, so access has taken time. In order to solve the above problem, in the optical multilayer disc according to the present invention, having information layers conforming to a plurality of different optical disc standards, in an area in one of the information layers, information about the other information layers is recorded. The time required to access the other information layers can be reduced by using this information to select a tracking error signal generating method.
US08842501B2
Systems and methods for tracking dosage periods are disclosed. The systems and methods may include setting a timer (140) to a predetermined value corresponding to a dosage period in response to the engagement of a cover (110) to a container (120). An indication may be provided that corresponds to a remaining period in the dosage period set by the engagement of the cover (110) and container (120). The indication may also indicate a remaining time period in the dosage period.
US08842497B1
The invention is a method directed towards measuring differences in sounds, temperatures and pressures detected within a marine mammal, then analyzing the data to better understand the activities and behavior of the marine mammal. Wherein a buoyant capsule having a hydrophone, a temperature sensor, a pressure sensor, a memory chip, a radio frequency (RF) generator (or other means to enable its detection), software and a battery enclosed within a shell is disposed into a body of water. After a marine mammal ingests the capsule, the capsule is activated after which pressure data and sound data is detected, including sonar transmitted by a monitoring ship. The data is saved on the memory chip for recovery.
US08842496B2
Providing indoor location, position, or tracking of a mobile computer is disclosed. Outdoor location, indoor location, and determined motion information is used to track the mobile computer indoors.
US08842494B2
An apparatus for sensing motion of a surface comprises a stabilized platform comprising a support structure and a moveable mass resiliently suspended with respect to the support structure; a transmitter transducer and a receiver transducer mounted on the moveable mass, the transmitter transducer arranged to transmit an acoustic wave towards the surface, and the receiver transducer arranged to receive a reflected wave from the surface, and detection means for measuring motion of the surface based on a Doppler shift in the reflected wave. The detection means may comprise an amplifier arranged to receive a Doppler modulated signal from the receiver transducer, and a phase detector arranged to receive an amplified signal from the amplifier and to provide a demodulated output signal indicative of the motion of the surface. Preferably, the apparatus further comprises relative motion compensation means arranged to remove from the demodulated output signal phase noise caused by motion of the transducers, and to provide a surface motion output signal.
US08842491B2
A system and method for operating a unipolar memory cell array including a bidirectional access diode. The system includes a column voltage switch electrically coupled to a plurality of column voltages. The column voltage switch includes an output electrically coupled to the bidirectional access diode. The plurality of column voltages includes at least one select column voltage and one deselect column voltage. The system includes a row voltage switch electrically coupled to a plurality of row voltages. The row voltage switch includes an output electrically coupled to the bidirectional access diode. The plurality of row voltages includes at least one select row voltage and one deselect row voltage. The system includes a column and row decoder electrically coupled to a select line of the column and row voltage switches, respectively.
US08842488B2
A circuit for programming a fuse is disclosed. The circuit includes a voltage supply terminal (Vf) and a semiconductor controlled rectifier (222, 224). The fuse is coupled between the voltage supply terminal and the semiconductor controlled rectifier. A switching circuit (200, 202, 208, 210) is coupled to the semiconductor controlled rectifier.
US08842486B2
An integrated circuit chip includes an internal circuit configured to generate output data, an inversion determination unit configured to activate/deactivate an inversion signal according to state information regarding a state of the integrate circuit chip, and a signal output circuit configured to invert or not to invert the output data in response to the inversion signal and output the inverted or non-inverted output data.
US08842476B2
Methods and non-volatile storage systems are provided for determining erratically programmed storage elements, including under-programmed and over-programmed storage elements. Techniques do not require any additional data latches. A set of data latches may be used to store program data for a given memory element. This program data may be maintained after the programming is over for use in erratic program detection. In one embodiment, lockout status is kept in a data latch that is used to serially receive program data to be programmed into the storage element. Therefore, no extra data latches are required to program the storage elements and to maintain the program data afterwards.
US08842468B2
Methods for monitoring one or more load currents corresponding with one or more voltage regulators used during operation of a semiconductor memory are described. The one or more load currents may be due to the biasing of memory cells within a memory array or due to the presence of shorts between lines in the memory array. A plurality of load currents corresponding with a plurality of voltage regulators may be monitored in real-time before and during biasing of one or more memory arrays. The plurality of load currents may be monitored using a configurable load current monitoring circuit that uses a current summation technique. The ability to monitor the plurality of load currents before performing a programming operation on a memory array allows for remapping of defective portions of the memory array and modification of programming bandwidth prior to the programming operation.
US08842461B2
A phase change memory device having a multi-level and a method of driving the same are presented. The disclosed phase change memory device includes variable resistors and shifting units. The variable resistors are interchanged into set and reset states in response to an applied current. The shifting units, which are connected to the variable resistors, shift resistance distribution in the set and reset state of the variable resistors by a predetermined level.
US08842450B2
A resonant power converter draws current from a source that provides a supply current. Multiple quasi-resonant converters are interleaved and each quasi-resonant converter receives the supply current and forms a phase-shifted current according to drive signals supplied by a controller. Each phase-shifted current includes a dead-time delay and is phase-shifted relative to the other phase-shifted currents. The dead-time delay is determined as a time value within a calculated dead-time delay range having a dead-time delay minimum and a dead-time delay maximum. The outputs of each quasi-resonant converter are added together thereby reducing the AC components of current. Two, three, or four quasi-resonant power converters can be interleaved, each forming phase-shifted currents that are phase-shifted relative to the other phase-shifted currents.
US08842449B1
An LLC resonant converter implements a primary-side current feedback scheme. The LLC resonant converter includes an isolation transformer having a primary winding and at least one secondary winding and is controlled by a control circuit to operate at a switching frequency. The LLC resonant converter includes a first capacitor connected to the primary winding through AC coupling to sense a first voltage indicative of a current flowing through the primary winding of the isolation transformer, and a current sense circuit configured to receive the first voltage and to generate a feedback signal. The feedback signal is coupled to the control circuit to regulate the switching frequency in response to the current at the primary winding. In another embodiment, the current sense circuit is a current and voltage sense circuit configured to sense a voltage at the primary winding.
US08842448B2
The configurations of a parallel-connected resonant converter circuit and a controlling method thereof are provided in the present invention. The proposed circuit includes a plurality of resonant converters, each of which has two input terminals and two output terminals, wherein all the two input terminals of the plurality of resonant converters are electrically series-connected, and all the two output terminals of the plurality of resonant converters are electrically parallel-connected.
US08842447B2
A DC power supply (1) having a series regulator (2) for generating a fixed output DC voltage (VCC) at a variable input AC voltage (VAC) with low power loss. For this purpose, the DC power supply (1, 101, 201, 301) has a transformer (3, 103) having at least two auxiliary windings (W1, W2) having different numbers of windings that can each be connected via a switching device (4, 104, 204, 304) to the series regulator (2). Switching is effected such that the power loss is kept as low as possible.
US08842444B2
A fixing structure is configured on a back cover of an electronic device and engages with a first fastener and a second fastener to hang the electronic device on the wall. The fixing structure includes a first fixing hole and a second fixing hole respectively running through the back cover to receive the two fasteners. The first fixing hole includes a first receiving portion, a first guiding portion and a second guiding portion. The second fixing hole includes a second receiving portion, a first sliding portion, a second sliding portion and a third sliding portion communicating end to end. The first sliding portion is parallel with or collinear with the first guiding portion, the second sliding portion is parallel with the second guiding portion, and the third sliding portion is parallel with the first sliding portion.
US08842440B2
A method for manufacturing a printed circuit board includes forming an opening portion in a substrate, positioning chip capacitors in the opening portion of the substrate such that the chip capacitors are accommodated in the opening portion of the substrate, forming a buildup structure including an interlayer resin insulating layer and a conductive layer over a surface of the substrate and the chip capacitors accommodated in the opening portion of the substrate, and forming on a surface of the buildup structure bump structures positioned to mount an IC chip such that the chip capacitors in the opening portion of the substrate are positioned directly below the IC chip.
US08842424B2
An apparatus including a cover; a first connection section; and a second connection section. The first connection section includes a first hinge connected to a first end of the cover. The first hinge is configured to pivotably connect the first end of the cover to a first housing section. The second connection section is connected to a second end of the cover. The second connection section is configured to connect the second end of the cover to a second housing section which is pivotably connected to the first housing section. The second connection section is configured to provide both rotational and longitudinal sliding motion of the second end of the cover on the second housing section.
US08842418B2
Provided is a method for forming a capacitor. The method includes: providing an anode with a dielectric thereon and a conductive node in electrical contact with the anode; applying a conductive seed layer on the dielectric; forming a conductive bridge between the conductive seed layer and the conductive node; applying voltage to the anode; electrochemically polymerizing a monomer thereby forming an electrically conducting polymer of monomer on the conductive seed layer; and disrupting the conductive bridge between the conductive seed layer and the conductive node.
US08842416B2
Technologies and implementations for graphene integrated energy storage devices having capacitive-like properties are generally disclosed. Such energy storage devices may comprise capacitive-like properties and may include a first electrode including graphene, one or more electrolytes arranged in contact with the first electrode, and a second electrode arranged in contact with the one or more electrolytes. The energy storage device may further be configured to provide pseudocapacitance based at least in part on a surface layer deposition of a chemical entity accompanied by a charge transfer at the first electrode.
US08842410B2
Techniques for providing a switchable inductor network having configurable inductance in response to a control signal. The switchable inductor network may adopt a fully symmetric architecture to reduce the effects of parasitic elements in differential mode operation. The switchable inductor network is particularly suitable for multi-mode communications circuitry applications, e.g., in the design of a voltage-controlled oscillator (VCO) or an amplifier or buffer in such circuitry.
US08842408B2
There is provided a power supply circuit, in which cost reduction is realized by reducing the number of electric wires. An inverter 3 and a motor 4 are supplied with power by a high-voltage battery 21. Relays 22a to 22c are provided between the high-voltage battery 21 and the inverter 3. Both ends of each of relay coils C provided to the relays 22a to 22c are connected to an ECU 5, and the ECU 5 controls a current flowing through the relay coils C and thereby controls the turning on and off of the relays 22a to 22c. A service plug 6 is detachably provided between batteries making up the high-voltage battery 21, and when the service plug 6 is detached, the supply of power from the high-voltage battery 21 to the inverter 3 and the motor 4 is blocked and when the service plug 6 is attached, the supply of power from the high-voltage battery 21 to the inverter 3 and the motor 4 is enabled. An interlock switch 7 is turned off when the service plug 6 is detached, is turned on when the service plug 6 is attached, and is connected between the ECU 5 and the relay coils C.
US08842404B2
A short-circuit protection device for limiting, preferably also deactivating, short-circuit currents in high energy direct current networks, in particular short-circuit currents of battery systems in submarine direct current networks. The device includes an electrical resistor, in particular an ohmic resistor, to conduct and limit the short-circuit current in the case of a short-circuit, a first switch connected in parallel with the resistor for bridging the resistor when the network is free of short-circuit, a monitoring and control arrangement for monitoring the current by the switch and for opening the switch if the current through the switch exceeds a specified threshold value.
US08842403B2
An electrical system having at least one load that is protected by a protective device, where a tripping parameter, i.e., a tripping current of the protective device can be set. A control unit is provided to which a measured current value of the current consumed by the at least one load is supplied, where the control unit generates a limit value, which is provided to the protective device for setting a tripping parameter as a function of the characteristic curve of the measured current value. The control unit thus permits ongoing adjustment of the tripping parameters, i.e., the release current, according to the actual operating conditions.
US08842399B2
A power amplifier (PA) controller semiconductor die and a first radio frequency (RF) PA semiconductor die are disclosed. The PA controller semiconductor die includes a first electro-static discharge (ESD) protection circuit, which ESD protects and provides a first ESD protected signal. The RF PA semiconductor die receives the first ESD protected signal. In one embodiment of the PA controller semiconductor die, the first ESD protected signal is an envelope power supply signal. The PA controller semiconductor die may be a Silicon complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) semiconductor die and the RF PA semiconductor die may be a Gallium Arsenide semiconductor die.
US08842384B2
A system for monitoring and analyzing operation of a tape infrastructure. The system includes a plurality of real and virtual tape libraries each including a plurality of tape drives and tape media. The system includes a server linked to the tape library. On the server, a storage tape analytics application is provided that functions to extract raw data sets from the tape library corresponding to operations of the tape library. The data pertains to use of the drives and media during data storage operations and data about the activities of the real or virtual tape libraries. The analytics application stores the extracted data sets in an analytics database. The analytics application provides a user interface for viewing data in the analytics database, e.g., a GUI operable by monitoring personnel to view and interact with the gathered and processed tape operations monitoring data to provide historical and user-driven analysis of data for an entire data center.
US08842382B2
Position sensor assemblies having compact structures and capable of precisely sensing a position change, and optical devices including the same are disclosed. A position sensor assembly is provided that includes: a sensing unit that outputs a signal varying as a magnetic force varies; and a magnet spaced apart from the sensing unit and i movably disposed with respect to the sensing unit, and comprising protrusion units of opposite polarities that protrude from each end portion of the magnet in one surface of the magnet toward the sensing unit.
US08842375B1
An image capturing system includes, in order from an object side to an image side, a first lens element, a second lens element, a third lens element, a fourth lens element and a fifth lens element. The first lens element with positive refractive power has a convex object-side surface at a paraxial region. The second lens element and the third lens element have refractive power. The fourth lens element with negative refractive power has a concave object-side surface at a paraxial region and a convex image-side surface at a paraxial region. The fifth lens element with refractive power has an image-side surface, wherein the image-side surface changes from concave at a paraxial region to convex at a peripheral region, and an object-side surface and the image-side surface of the fifth lens element are aspheric. The image capturing system has a total of five lens elements with refractive power.
US08842372B2
A flexible lens may be actuated to change its focal length by a deployable lens actuator. The lens actuator translates a rotational motion of an outer frame into a linear radial motion of a plurality of linear elements. The linear elements have fixed pins, which may be slidably coupled to cam pockets in the outer frame. The cam pockets have a gradually varying distance from the center of the outer frame. The rotation of the outer frame thus drives the cam pockets to slide about the pins, thereby causing radial motions of the linear elements. The linear elements stretch a flexible lens, thereby changing a curvature of the flexible lens.
US08842371B2
Provided is a zoom lens including a focus lens portion, a zoom portion, an aperture stop, and a relay portion that does not move for zooming but comprises a negative fourth-first unit, a fourth-second unit interchangeable for an optical path, a positive fourth-third unit, and a fourth-fourth unit inserteable for the optical path for shifting a focal length range of an entire system to a long focal length side after removing the fourth-second unit from the optical path, and a distance on an optical axis between the aperture stop and a last lens surface of the fourth-fourth unit in a state of inserting the fourth-fourth unit in the optical path, a distance on the optical axis between a first lens surface and the last lens surface of the fourth-fourth unit, and an aperture diameter in an opened state of the aperture stop satisfy a predetermined conditions.
US08842365B2
A phase difference element capable of reducing reflection of incident light and a manufacturing method for the phase difference element are disclosed. The phase difference element includes a transparent substrate 11, an interface anti-reflection film group 12 and an obliquely vapor deposited film 13. The interface anti-reflection film group is composed by one or more of alternately high and low refractive index films, with the film thicknesses of the respectively films being equal to or less than the wavelength of light in use. The obliquely vapor deposited film is formed by a plurality of layers of a dielectric material. These layers are alternately obliquely vapor deposited from two directions differing by 180° from each other. The refractive index of the interface anti-reflection film group 12 is higher than the refractive index of the transparent substrate 11 and lesser than that of the obliquely vapor deposited film 13.
US08842363B2
An apparatus for dynamically varying an optical characteristic of a light beam includes an optical element configured to receive a beam of light. The optical element includes at least one sub-wavelength grating formed of a plurality of lines. The apparatus includes at least one actuator connected to at least one component of the optical element and a controller for controlling the at least one actuator to dynamically vary a characteristic of the beam of light that is at least one of emitted through and reflected from the optical element.
US08842360B2
An electrowetting display device includes a black matrix that includes a plurality of openings corresponding to pixels, respectively, a first extension portion extending in a driving direction of an electrowetting layer, the driving direction being a direction in which motion of the electrowetting layer is induced when a voltage difference is applied between a common electrode and a pixel electrode, and a partition wall that partitions the pixels. The first extension portion includes first and second areas respectively extending in opposite directions to each other and a third area having a width substantially the same as a width of the partition wall. The first area has a width less than about half of a first length corresponding to a length extending between both sides of each pixel in the driving direction, and the second area has a width less than the width of the first area.
US08842359B1
A system including spatial light modulators with multiple one-dimensional (1D) diffractor arrays and methods of operating the same are provided. In one embodiment, the system comprises a spatial light modulator (SLM) assembly including a plurality of one-dimensional (1D) diffractor arrays to modulate light from a light source, the plurality of 1D diffractor arrays integrally formed on a die; illumination optics disposed in a light path between the plurality of 1D diffractor arrays and the light source to illuminate a substantially linear portion of at least one of the plurality of 1D diffractor arrays; and imaging optics disposed in a light path between the SLM assembly and an image plane on a target-substrate, the imaging optics adapted to transmit modulated light from the SLM assembly to a substantially linear portion of the image plane. Other embodiments are also provided.
US08842355B2
The present invention provides optical systems, devices and methods which utilize one or more electroactive polymer actuators to provide shutter and/or aperture control.
US08842354B2
A display substrate includes a base substrate, a micro shutter, a first driving electrode, a second driving electrode, and a plurality of anchors. The micro shutter includes a flat portion having at least one opening, a main concave portion adjacent to the opening and extending in from the flat portion to a first depth, and at least one sub-concave portion extending in from a bottom surface of the main concave portion to second depth. The first driving electrode is connected to a first side of the micro shutter. The second driving electrode is connected to a second side of the micro shutter. The second side is positioned opposite to the first side. The anchors fix the first and second driving electrodes on the base substrate.
US08842353B2
A microstructure includes a substrate, a fixed supporting portion fixed to the substrate, a first movable portion, a second movable portion enhancing the rigidity of the first movable portion, and an elastic supporting portion elastically interconnecting the first movable portion and the fixed supporting portion. The second movable portion is secured to the first movable portion with a gap interposed therebetween and in such a manner as to cover the elastic supporting portion and the fixed supporting portion. The first movable portion and the second movable portion are elastically supported by the elastic supporting portion in such a manner as to be displaceable together relative to the fixed supporting portion.
US08842343B2
An image scanner includes: a light source that irradiates, with light, a recording medium on which an image is formed; a light receiving portion that receives light reflected by the recording medium; a reflecting portion that has plural reflecting surfaces respectively disposed at positions having different distances in an optical axis direction from the light receiving portion; and a processing portion that generates information on the image formed on the recording medium and information for measuring illumination depth of the light source, by use of the light received by the light receiving portion.
US08842342B2
A method for detecting and growing isolated holes in a document image having a plurality of pixels is provided. The method includes isolating the pixels of the image to form a plurality of windows, each window having a target pixel; identifying a hole growth factor to grow an isolated hole in the received image; using the hole growth factor to identify tiered pixel patterns from a plurality of predefined, tiered pixel patterns, wherein each of the tiered pixel patterns having a predetermined hole growth factor; comparing the pixels within each window to the pixel patterns within the identified tier to identify a match between the pixels within the window and at least one of the pixel patterns; and changing a pixel value of the target pixel, when a match is identified, to grow the isolated hole by the hole growth factor.
US08842332B2
Disclosed is an image deformation processing device including: a shift amount calculating unit configured to calculate the difference between the coordinate of the input image which is mapped to the position of the specified pixel by the deformation process and the coordinate of the specified pixel as a shift amount, for each specified pixel in the output image; and an output unit configured to obtain the threshold corresponding to the coordinate of the specified pixel in the second direction from the dispersion threshold table, to calculate a pixel shift amount by comparing the obtained threshold with a decimal component of the shift amount for the specified pixel and by rounding the decimal component of the shift amount, and to output the pixel in the input image, which has a coordinate shifted from the coordinate of the specified pixel by the pixel shift amount, as the specified pixel.
US08842329B2
An image forming apparatus which is capable of executing real-size preview of image data which does not have output sheet size information or resolution information. The image forming apparatus stores a plurality of data items therein. A printer section prints a data item selected from the stored data items. A controller unit determines whether or not the selected data item has sheet size information. When it is determined that the selected data item does not have sheet size information, the controller unit prompts the user to select a sheet size for printing of the selected data item via a console section. An image for real-size preview is generated from the selected data item based on a sheet size selected via the console section, and displayed on the console section.
US08842325B2
To accomplish this, when an image processing apparatus determines with reference to a parameter associated with the image processing apparatus that allocations of storage capacities to a first storage unit which stores block images obtained by dividing image data in a page unit and a second storage unit which stores tile images obtained by dividing each block image are required to be changed, the apparatus changes the allocations of the storage capacities in correspondence with the parameter, and also changes division sizes of the block images and the tile images in accordance with the changes in storage capacities.
US08842313B2
There is disclosed a system and method of processing a document corresponding with a printable format in a print path. A browser, communicating with a user interface (having a display) and a network, is used to access a services interface, the services interface including at least one selectable service available by way of the network. A browser activating system, communicating with the browser and a print driver, is used to open the browser to display the at least one selectable service of the services interface on the user interface display. Responsive to selecting the at least one selectable service from the displayed services interface, the at least one selectable service is applied to the document corresponding with the printable format.
US08842311B2
An electronic apparatus includes a security storage unit, a security information acquisition unit, a calculation unit, a determination unit, a notification unit, and an operation control unit. The security storage unit is configured to store a plurality of securities together with respective security levels associated with the securities. The security information acquisition unit is configured to acquire security information concerning the apparatus. The calculation unit is configured to calculate a total of the security level or levels of the security or securities applied to the apparatus, using the security levels of the securities stored in the security storage unit. The determination unit is configured to determine whether or not the calculated total has reached a predetermined threshold.
US08842305B2
An image processing device, comprises: a display part on which a variety of information is displayed; an image processing part for performing a plurality of image processing sequentially to process an input image data; a thumbnail image generating part for generating a thumbnail image one after the other based on the input image data or the processed image data generated sequentially in response to each image processing performed by the image processing part; an image outputting part for outputting an image based on the image data which is processed through the entire plurality of image processing; a display controlling part for displaying a processing path of the plurality of image processing performed sequentially by the image processing part from the image data is input until the image is output on the display part, and for displaying the thumbnail image along the processing path.
US08842302B2
An image forming apparatus including an image forming unit which continuously forms an image on sheets of paper, three or more stackers to which the sheets on which the image is formed by the image forming unit are ejected and a control unit which determines paper ejection order of stackers to which the sheets are to be ejected among the three or more stackers in a predetermined order, wherein each of the stackers includes a loading unit on which the sheets are loaded and a conveyance cart which is disposed under the loading unit and by which the loading unit can be removed from the stacker.
US08842296B2
An exemplary method involves, in a system comprising a tool that performs a task on a workpiece, a method for determining displacement of the workpiece relative to the tool. Respective displacements of loci of at least a region of the workpiece are mapped using a Goos-Hänchen-insensitive (GH-insensitive) displacement sensor to produce a first set of physical displacement data for the region. Also mapped are respective displacements, from the tool, of the loci using a GH sensitive sensor to produce a second set of optical displacement data for the region. Goodness of fit (GOF) is determined of the second set of data with the first set. According to the GOF, respective GH-correction (GHC) coefficients are determined for at least one locus of the region. When measuring displacement of the at least one locus in the region relative to the tool, the respective GHC coefficient is applied to the measured displacement to reduce an error that otherwise would be present in the measured displacement due to a GH effect.
US08842291B2
Systems and method are disclosed for measuring small angular deflections of a target using weak value amplification. A system includes a beam source, a beam splitter, a target reflecting surface, a photodetector, and a processor. The beam source generates an input beam that is split into first and second beams by the beam splitter. The first and second beams are propagated to the target reflecting surface, at least partially superimposed at the target reflecting surface, and incident to the target reflecting surface normal to the target reflecting surface. The first beam is reflected an additional even number of times during propagation to the photodetector. The second beam is reflected an additional odd number of times during propagation to the photodetector. The first and second beams interfere at the photodetector so as to produce interference patterns. The interference patterns are interpreted to measure angular deflections of the target reflecting surface.
US08842285B2
An optical measurement apparatus is configured to detachably connect to a measurement probe for performing optical measurement by receiving and outputting light from a tip of the measurement probe. The optical measurement apparatus includes a computation unit configured to compute intensity of the light inputted to the measurement probe, and output the intensity as measurement data, a recording unit configured to record the measurement data of at least one subject, a reset controller configured to perform control of deleting the measurement data recorded in the recording unit and resetting the recording unit, and a detector which is provided at a connection part between the optical measurement apparatus and the measurement probe, and which is configured to detect that the measurement probe is attached to the optical measurement apparatus and cause the reset controller to be in an on state according to the detection.
US08842260B2
A laser distance measuring device comprising a transmitter channel (1), a receiver channel (2) and a dimensionally stable multilayer base printed circuit board (3), with the transmitter channel (1) and the receiver channel (2) being mounted and symmetrically disposed one on each side of the base printed circuit board (3), with the base printed circuit board (3) serving as a mechanical foundation, as an optical and electrical shield, as a carrier of electrical and optical connections and, optionally, as a heat conductor.
US08842251B2
Provided is a liquid crystal display (LCD) in which warping of a liquid crystal panel-driving printed circuit board (PCB) is reduced. The LCD includes: a liquid crystal panel; a lower housing which accommodates the liquid crystal panel; a lamp-driving PCB fixed to the lower housing; a reinforcing member which has one end fixed to at least one surface of the lamp-driving PCB and another end separated from the lamp-driving PCB; and a liquid crystal panel-driving PCB which includes a circuit-mounting board disposed outside the lower housing, wherein at least part of the circuit-mounting board is inserted between the lamp-driving PCB and the reinforcing member, so as to be at least partially supported by the lamp-driving PCB and the reinforcing member.
US08842245B2
A method of fabricating a thin film pattern according to an embodiment of the present invention comprises forming an organic material pattern on a substrate, forming a metal material of liquid phase on a substrate provided with the organic material pattern, hardening the metal material of liquid phase, and removing the metal material located on the organic material pattern, allowing some metal material to be left at an area non-overlapped with the organic material pattern.
US08842231B2
An array substrate comprises: a base substrate; a gate scanning line, a data scanning line, a pixel electrode and a thin film transistor, formed on the base substrate; and a light blocking layer, formed on the base substrate and corresponding to the thin film transistor and the data scanning line.
US08842224B2
Provided are an image signal processing apparatus and a controlling method thereof. The image signal processing apparatus includes a signal decoder, an image signal processor, a display, a controller, a memory, and a power interface. The signal decoder decodes input signals, and the image signal processor processes signals decoded by the signal decoder so that they are outputable. The display outputs the signals processed by the image signal processor, and the controller allows a list of modules recognized by the connector to be displayed, and controls driving of the module selected by a user. The memory stores a program transmitted from the selected module, and the power interface supplies power to the module.
US08842218B2
A video/audio data output device includes a demultiplexing section, a video decoder that generates video data by decoding the video stream signal, an audio decoder that generates audio data by decoding the audio stream signal, a video output section that outputs the video data in synchronism with the system clock, an audio output section that outputs the audio data in synchronism with the system clock, a video adjusting section, and an audio output adjusting section. The demultiplexing section demultiplexes a video stream signal, an audio stream signal, and a system clock from an input signal, the video adjusting section processes a video frame that has been output from the video output section, and the audio output adjusting section delays the system clock to be supplied to the audio output section, in accordance with a length of time that the video adjusting section takes to process the video frame.
US08842204B2
An image capturing device, a dust removal system and a vibrating dust removal method thereof. The image capturing device comprises an image sensor, a vibrating dust removal unit, an optical component adapter, a detector, a touch screen and a controller. The image sensor receives an optical signal and converts the optical signal into an image signal. The vibrating dust removal unit produces a vibration to remove dust from the image sensor. The detector detects whether a detachable optical component is connected to the optical component adapter and generates a detecting signal. The touch screen displays the image signal and allows a user to designate a dust-removal position. The controller receives the detecting signal to enter into a dust-removal mode or controls the frequency or amplitude of the vibration produced by the vibrating dust removal unit according to the dust-removal position.
US08842200B2
An imaging device, capable of generating a movie or a live view that has a part that has been subjected to image processing within at least a frame, includes an imaging section for converting a subject image into electrical signals and outputting image data in live view, a bright spot region setting section for setting a bright spot detection region for the image data, a bright spot detection section for detecting bright spots within the bright spot detection region set by the bright spot setting section, a bright spot processing section for performing bright spot processing at the bright spot positions detected by the bright spot detection section, and an image output section for outputting an image that has been subjected to bright spot processing by the bright spot processing detection for display or for storage.
US08842188B2
A camera device includes a first information acquisition portion that acquires first information used to control a first area that is specified within a whole image captured by a camera portion, a second information acquisition portion that acquires second information used to control a second area that is specified within the whole image, a control portion that controls mechanical movement of the camera portion based on the first information input from a device having a control right of the first area, among the first information that can be input from a plurality of devices, and an image processing portion that acquires an image of the first area from the whole image captured by the camera portion, and extracts an image of the second area from within the first area based on the second information input from a device having a control right of the second area, among the second information that can be input from a plurality of devices.
US08842187B2
According to an embodiment, a high dynamic range synthesizing circuit includes an interpolation processing unit, a blur detection unit and a mix processing unit. The interpolation processing unit generates an interpolation signal. The blur detection unit uses a first image signal and a second image signal a signal level of which is adjusted for detecting the amount of blur. The mix processing unit performs processing of mixing the second image signal into the interpolation signal. The mix processing unit applies a weight of the second image signal depending on the amount of blur to the interpolation signal by the mix processing.
US08842179B2
A surveillance system and method with at least one wireless input capture device ICD(s) and a corresponding digital input recorder (DIR) and/or another ICD, including the steps of providing base system; at least one user accessing the DIR via user interface either directly or remotely; the DIR and/or ICD searching for signal from the ICD(s) and establishing communication with them; providing DIR interface and setup options, for providing a secure surveillance system having wireless communication for monitoring a target environment.
US08842178B2
The object of the invention is to provide a supervising system for image to detect a scheme at high accuracy. The supervising system for image is provided with a first portion for detecting change of time detecting the change of time in amount of feature of an image taken pictures by a image forming device, a second portion for detecting change of time in the illuminance detected by an illuminance sensor, and a scheme judging portion detecting a scheme against the image forming device in accordance with the change of time in amount of feature and the change of time in the illuminance as detected.
US08842175B2
A system and method that provide reduced latency in a video signal processing system. Various aspects of the present invention may comprise receiving a current request from a user for first video information. Such a request may, for example, be received with a user interface module. A first video stream and a second video stream may be received simultaneously, where the first video stream comprises the first video information currently requested by the user, and the second video stream comprises second video information not currently requested by the user. A video receiver module may, for example, perform such receiving. The first video stream may be processed to present the first video information to the user at the current time. Further, the second video stream may be pre-processed in preparation for being presented to the user in the future. A video processing module may, for example, perform such video stream processing.
US08842163B2
Objects within two-dimensional (2D) video data are modeled by three-dimensional (3D) models as a function of object type and motion through manually calibrating a 2D image to the three spatial dimensions of a 3D modeling cube. Calibrated 3D locations of an object in motion in the 2D image field of view of a video data input are computed and used to determine a heading direction of the object as a function of the camera calibration and determined movement between the computed 3D locations. The 2D object image is replaced in the video data input with an object-type 3D polygonal model having a projected bounding box that best matches a bounding box of an image blob, the model oriented in the determined heading direction. The bounding box of the replacing model is then scaled to fit the object image blob bounding box, and rendered with extracted image features.
US08842161B2
A videoconference apparatus and method coordinates a stationary view obtained with a stationary camera to an adjustable view obtained with an adjustable camera. The stationary camera can be a web camera, while the adjustable camera can be a pan-tilt-zoom camera. As the stationary camera obtains video, faces of participants are detected, and a boundary in the view is determined to contain the detected faces. Absence and presences of motion associated with the detected face is used to verify whether a face is reliable. To then capture and output video of the participants for the videoconference, the view of the adjustable camera is adjusted to a framed view based on the determined boundary. In the end, active video captured in the framed view with the adjustable camera can be sent to a far-end for the videoconference.
US08842153B2
Customizing a conferencing system based on proximity of a participant. A first participant may be detected as being proximate to a first conferencing system. For example, the first participant may provide user input to check in to the first conferencing system. Alternatively, the conferencing system may automatically detect the first participant (e.g., by automatically detecting a personal device of the first participant). In response to detecting the proximate participant, the first conferencing system may be automatically customized for the participant.
US08842152B2
Generally described, the present disclosure relates to electronic devices. More specifically, the disclosure relates to a collaboration appliance and methods thereof. In one illustrative embodiment, the collaboration appliance can provide an all-in-one conference room solution having numerous functions and features. The collaboration appliance can incorporate a beam forming microphone array and speaker for high quality audio conferencing, a built-in display capability that supports two different displays, one being an external high resolution monitor or projector connected via a high-definition multimedia interface, the other being a built-in liquid crystal display that has a touch overlay for navigation and application invocation. Built-in support for multi-party high definition video conferencing can be provided.
US08842148B2
An image forming device includes an exposure device configured to emit exposure light and an air flow generator configured to generate an air flow. The exposure device includes a heat source that generates heat and a heat sink configured to dissipate the heat. The heat sink includes a plurality of fins located inside the air flow. The plurality of fins extend in a direction parallel to a direction where the air flow flows and are arrayed in a direction orthogonal to the direction where the air flow flows. The plurality of fins are formed so as to increase in height from an upstream side toward a downstream side in the direction where the air flow flows.
US08842147B2
An optical scanning device includes: light sources emitting first beams having colors; a beam splitting unit splitting the first beams into second beams; a deflecting unit including reflecting members, each corresponding to one of the second beams and each performing deflection scanning of the second beams; an optical system for image formation of the second beams scanning on target surfaces that have been assigned with colors corresponding to the first beams; a detecting unit for detecting which of the reflecting member corresponds to the second beam; an interchanging unit for obtaining data of a lines corresponding to each of the first beams and interchanging the data of the lines based on a detection result; and a light source control unit for controlling the light sources in such a way that the light sources emit the first beams in accordance with the data of the lines interchanged.
US08842145B2
A substrate marking apparatus for use in combination with a substrate comprising a multi-color change diacetylene compound is disclosed. The substrate marking apparatus comprises: at least two radiation sources operable to emit radiation of different wavelengths, optical transformation elements and a control system. The control system takes digital file information and converts this to a set of emission instructions for the radiation sources. The radiation sources are then applied to the substrate in sequence and intensity determined by the control system such that the substrate is activated to change from a colorless state to any one of a range of multiple permanent colors.
US08842144B2
A laser induced thermal imaging (LITI) apparatus and a method of manufacturing an organic light emitting diode (OLED) display device using the LITI apparatus. The method of manufacturing the OLED display device using the LITI apparatus includes arranging an acceptor substrate on a substrate stage; forming a donor film on the acceptor substrate; disposing a patterned mask above the acceptor substrate; irradiating the donor film with a laser beam generated by a laser beam generator through an opening of the mask; and transferring a pattern of the donor film onto the acceptor substrate. The LITI apparatus and the manufacturing method allow a transfer layer of a donor film to be easily transferred onto a substrate by scanning a laser beam without regard to a size of the substrate.
US08842143B2
A printing system having a chassis for housing a modular print station; a power source in communication with the print station; a controller circuit card assembly encoded with at least one feature module and being in communication with the print station; a display panel in communication with the print station; a media rewind hub; a pair of adjustable media guides connected about a base of the print station; and at least one sensor affixed to the print station base and being operable for detecting the presence and position of media passing through a media feed path of the printing system.
US08842133B2
Embodiments enable a graphics processor to more efficiently process graphics and compositing processing commands. In certain embodiments, a client application submits client graphics commands to a graphics driver. The client in certain embodiments can notify a window server that client graphics commands have been submitted. In response, the window server can generate compositing processing commands and provide these commands to the graphics driver. Advantageously, a graphics processor can execute the client graphics commands while the window server generates compositing processing commands. As a result, processing resource can be used more efficiently.
US08842127B1
A system, method, and computer program for high-speed, efficient text rendering are disclosed. In accordance with certain embodiments of the present invention, an image resource architecture is provided for optimal sub-image uploads to keep the glyph cache up to date. A glyph cache is divided into zones, or sub-caches, wherein requests for writing a glyph bitmap to the cache may be handled by destroying or clearing an entire zone. In accordance with other embodiments of the present invention, a highly efficient method of rendering is provided wherein commands are automatically combined and made into larger commands for the GPU. Alternatively, rather than performing a command stream flush upon each intersection, a texture cache flush may be implemented. All source glyph bitmaps may be placed into one texture.
US08842113B1
Embodiments relate to a method for synchronizing media playback across multiple computing devices on a network. Multiple display screens, each coupled to a computing device, can be arranged in a circular formation surrounding a user. For example, a special enclosure for the display screens may be constructed for this purpose. An immersive viewing experience is created for the user by synchronizing the views displayed on each screen. The multiple screens operate in unison to create a tiled view of a three-dimensional environment. This immersive experience can be referred to as a “Liquid Galaxy.” The experience is enhanced by allowing the user to view and navigate through such three-dimensional environments using an input device, such as, for example, a joystick or game controller.
US08842106B2
In a portable telephone according to the present invention, a display displays a block indicative of an operator, predetermined information and a pointer; the operator can be operated in directions opposite to each other; and the controller controls the display so as to shift the pointer to a desirable position within a predetermined information on a screen of the display in accordance with an operation of the operator and also display a mark indicative of a direction to which the pointer can be shifted and in which the predetermined information exists, adjacently to the block along a shift direction through the operator.
US08842102B2
According to one exemplary embodiment, an apparatus and method for displaying graphic media are disclosed. The apparatus and method can contain and secure graphic media and provide illumination. The apparatus and method may also contain electronic communication devices.
US08842101B2
A panel, display device and control method in which pixels each have a light emitting element. The potential of the video signal line is switched to a low potential before writing, a high potential during writing, and an intermediate potential after writing has been performed. Switching of the power supply lines from the high potential to the low potential is performed in a period after the potential of the video signal line has been switched from the high potential to the immediate potential, before the potential of the video signal line is switched from the intermediate potential to the low potential.
US08842097B2
Provided are a command input device, a mobile information device, and a command input method which can easily be operated by a user even when the input unit in the device is small. A first and a second detection modules arranged on a device which is brought into contact with a user body detect vibration caused by a tapping operation on the user body and transmitted via the user body. The position of the tapping operation on the user body is identified according to analysis data obtained by analyzing the vibration relations detected by the first and the second detection modules such as a known correspondence between a time difference between the detection timings and the position of the tapping operation on the user body. Since the user body can be used as a space for inputting a command, it is possible to secure a sufficient input space.
US08842096B2
An interactive projection system, apparatus, and methods for their use are provided. The system includes a projection unit that projects an image of a user interface onto a projection surface. At least one vision sensor is provided that is configured to sense a location of an infrared light source. A computing device that is configured to execute applications to provide the user interface and to determine corresponding outputs based on inputs received by the vision sensor is also provided. An infrared input device, or stylus, is employed by a user to provide infrared light inputs at desired locations with respect to the projected user interface. Additionally, a plurality of styli, each emitting a different respective wavelength of infrared light is also useable to provide multiple simultaneous inputs to the system. An equal plurality of vision sensors may also be employed to separately sense inputs from a respective stylus.
US08842095B2
Example embodiments are directed to light sensing circuits having a relatively simpler structure by using light-sensitive oxide semiconductor transistors as light sensing devices, and remote optical touch panels and image acquisition apparatuses, each including the light sensing circuits. The light sensing circuit includes a light-sensitive oxide semiconductor transistor in each pixel, wherein the light-sensitive oxide semiconductor transistor is configured as a light sensing device, and a driving circuit that outputs data. The light sensing circuit may have a relatively simple circuit structure including a plurality of transistors in one pixel. As a result, the structure and operation of the light sensing circuit may be simplified.
US08842092B2
A method of detecting a contact state of resistive touch panel device includes measuring a potential at both ends of a first resistive film, as viewed in a first direction, as a first-film-potential. At this time, the both ends of the first resistive film are short circuited, and a predetermined current is applied between both ends of a second resistive film, as viewed in a second direction. The method further includes measuring a potential at the both ends of the second resistive film as a second-film-potential. At this time, the both ends of the second resistive film are short circuited, and the current is applied between the both ends of the first resistive film. The method further includes deriving distance information between two contact points of the first and the second resistive film, based on the first-film-potential and the second-film-potential.
US08842086B2
A mobile terminal as broadly described herein may comprise a terminal body including a display module, a touch sensor disposed to overlap the display module and configured to be touch sensitive, haptic modules mounted at the body, and a controller configured to feed a current to at least one of the haptic modules when the touch sensor senses a touch input. Each haptic module may include a chamber covered by a flexible membrane and an actuating module accommodated in the chamber and configured to press the flexible membrane based on an energy conversion of the current such that the flexible membrane is expanded.
US08842080B2
Methods and apparatus for indicating a status of an application that is displayable on one or more displays of a handheld computing device. An icon may be provided that indicates the status and/or potential statuses of the application (e.g., whether the application is expandable and/or expanded). The icon may be changeable between a first state and a second state depending on the status of the application. The change in the icon from the first state to the second state may be animated along with an animated change of the application between display states. As such, a user may observe the icon to determine the status of the application with respect to the one or more displays (e.g., whether the application is expandable, expanded, or expanding).
US08842078B2
A touch display device includes a display panel including a first surface and a second surface. The first surface is a displaying surface of the display panel, and the second surface is the other surface of the display panel opposite to the displaying surface. The touch display device further includes a circuit board disposed on a side of the second surface of the display panel, and a touch panel disposed between the display panel and the circuit board.
US08842077B2
A touch-control structure for a flexible display device is provided. The touch-control structure comprises a flexible display panel, at least one menu display area, a touch film and at least one sensing element. The flexible display panel comprises a visible surface. The menu display area is located on at least one side of the visible surface. The touch film comprises a first flexible substrate and an operating contact surface. The visible surface and the operating contact surface are disposed on the two opposite ends of the touch structure respectively. The sensing element is disposed on at least one side of the first flexible substrate corresponding to the menu display area.
US08842066B2
A method for driving a three dimensional (3D) display and a 3D display apparatus using the same are provided. The 3D display apparatus includes a storage unit which stores a received image; and a controller which compares a previous frame of the received image with a current frame of the received image, and determines whether or not to input an image of the current frame to a liquid crystal panel based on whether the previous frame is identical to the current frame. Therefore, a method for driving a 3D display which does not cause characteristics of a liquid crystal to be deteriorated and a 3D display apparatus using the same are provided.
US08842061B2
The present invention discloses a shifting register and an apparatus for driving gate lines, and it relates to Liquid Crystal Display technical field, for reducing the noise of a shifting register during non-working period. The shifting register comprises: a first thin film transistor, a second thin film transistor, a third thin film transistor, a fourth thin film transistor, a capacitor and a pull-down module, and the pull-down module is connected among a clock signal port, a first node and a signal output terminal, and further is connected to a low level signal terminal, for maintaining the first node and the signal output terminal to be at low level during the non-working period of the shifting register. The apparatus for driving gate lines comprises a plurality of above shifting registers connected in serial. The present invention is applicable to driving gate lines.
US08842058B2
An organic light emitting display (OLED) is provided. The OLED includes data line capacitors, which is disposed in a plurality of data lines included in a display panel. Each of the data line capacitors has a larger capacitance than a storage capacitor of each pixel. The data line capacitor includes the data line, an insulating layer, a metal, which are stacked. The metal is a cathode or a pixel electrode. The insulating layer of the data line capacitor is a passivation layer, a planarization layer, or a pixel defining layer. The capacitance of the data line capacitor is adjusted by controlling the thickness of the insulating layer or controlling the size of a via hole or a contact hole for controlling the thickness of the insulating layer.
US08842054B2
A grid array antenna configured to operate with millimeter wavelength signals, the grid array antenna comprising a plurality of mesh elements and at least one radiation element; each mesh element comprising at least one long side and at least one short side operatively connected to the at least one long side; at least one of: the at least one radiating element, the at least one short side, and the at least one long side having compensation for improved antenna output for improved antenna radiation.
US08842044B2
An antenna system for a wireless device and a method for operating same are provided for controlling radiation characteristics of the antenna system. The antenna system includes first and second sets of feed points disposed so that first and second radiation pattern are generated by the antenna system when drive currents are provided at the first and second set of feed points, respectively. The second radiation pattern is different from the first radiation pattern. The first and second drive currents are supplied such that a predetermined overall radiation pattern is generated. The predetermined overall radiation pattern is at least in part a combination of the first radiation pattern and the second radiation pattern. The system and method may be directed toward SAR mitigation.
US08842043B2
A method is presented to extend a frequency lock range of a received RF signal in a satellite receiver. One step in the method includes analyzing data information of a preamble associated with the received satellite RF signal. Another step includes determining an estimated frequency value that is a function of the analyzed data information that further includes at least a portion of the frequency error formed therein. A further step includes comparing the determined estimated frequency value to a predetermined threshold value. Another step includes using the determined estimated frequency value when the determined frequency value is greater than the predetermined threshold value to operatively control tracking mode electronic circuitry disposed in the satellite receiver to attain frequency lock on the received satellite RF signal.
US08842042B2
A method of compensating for or correcting satellite ephemeris error involves measuring time difference of arrival (TDOA) and frequency difference of arrival (FDOA) for signal replicas received via two satellites (34, 46) from calibration transmitters (42a to 42d) at different geographical locations. An initial satellite ephemeris consisting of position and velocity vectors is used to calculate ephemeris changes yielding estimated TDOA and FDOA values providing a best fit to measured TDOA and FDOA values. This provides estimated changes required to compensate for or to correct errors in the initial satellite ephemeris. The method may be iterated to deal with large ephemeris changes: i.e. the changes obtained in one iteration may be used to correct ephemeris for use as a new initial ephemeris in a following iteration. The method may be used to correct ephemeris errors in one or both satellites, if so a greater number of calibration transmitters EphemCal 1 to EphemCal 10 may be used.
US08842036B2
A method, a radar image registration manager, and a set of instructions are disclosed. A primary sensor interface 430 may receive a primary sensor image and a camera model of the primary sensor image. A data storage 420 may store a digital elevation model. A processor 410 may automatically align the primary sensor image with the digital elevation model.
US08842034B1
A resistor network implemented in an integrated circuit includes a first plurality of interconnect traces coupled in series at a first plurality of nodes; a first plurality of switches coupled between the first plurality of nodes and an output node; a second plurality of interconnect traces coupled in series at a second plurality of nodes; and a second plurality of switches coupled between the second plurality of nodes and the output node, wherein a voltage at the output node is generated in response to a resistance of the resistor network based upon a configuration of the first plurality of switches and the second plurality of switches.
US08842030B1
A sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter includes an input transconductance stage that provides an analog input current proportional to an analog input voltage and a current summing stage that generates an analog error signal corresponding to a difference between the analog input current and a feedback current. The sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter also includes a forward signal path that processes the analog error signal to provide a digital output signal corresponding to the analog input voltage. Additionally, the sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter includes a feedback path that includes a current steering digital-to-analog converter having both sourcing and sinking current sources, wherein currents provided by the sourcing and sinking current sources are steerable and connected to directly provide the feedback current based on the digital output signal. A sigma-delta analog-to-digital converter operating method is also provided.
US08842026B2
A threshold estimate system includes a level quantizer, a correlation mechanism, and a threshold adaptation component. The level quantizer is configured to receive an input signal and to generate a quantization signal from the input signal according to one or more threshold levels. The correlation mechanism is configured to correlate the quantization signal with reference symbols to generate an output signal. The threshold adaptation component is configured to modify the one or more threshold levels according to the output signal and the input signal.
US08842021B2
A system and method for warning of emergency vehicles includes a computing device that receives location data from a transmitter associated with a first vehicle based on a warning system of the first vehicle being activated. The computing device transmits vehicle notification data to a second vehicle based on the location data.
US08842020B2
The present disclosure is directed to systems and methods for relative positioning of wells. A method in accordance with an exemplary embodiment may include drilling a new well in a field having at least three completed wells using a drilling tool that includes a magnetometer. The method may further include driving current on a first pair of the at least three completed wells and then driving current on a second pair of the at least three completed wells, wherein the current is driven on each of the first and second pairs in a balanced mode. The method may also include measuring a direction of a first magnetic field generated by the current on the first pair using the magnetometer, measuring a direction of a second magnetic field generated by the current on the second pair using the magnetometer, and determining a location of the drilling tool relative to the completed wells based on the direction of the first magnetic field and the direction of the second magnetic field.
US08842016B1
A system for notifying when a fire extinguisher is discharged or moved uses a device mounted on the fire extinguisher for monitoring one or more conditions. For example, the device may be interconnected with a trigger detecting mechanism otherwise present on the extinguisher or sense a sudden drop in pressure to detect when the extinguisher is activated. An accelerometer may be provided to detect motion. GPS processing can identify the location of the fire extinguisher when an event occurs. When the device detects a change in one or more of the conditions, or needs to send periodic updates of the fire extinguisher conditions, a message is forwarded from the device to a third party clearinghouse via a wireless communication network. The clearinghouse reviews the data, and forwards the data, as may be appropriate, to one or more authorized parties identified in the database.
US08842005B1
A system and method associated with providing an alert at a client device. The system and method include receiving one or more signals indicative of a surrounding environment of a client device. The system and method further include analyzing the signals to determine a risk factor associated with the surrounding environment of the client device. The risk factor associated with the surrounding environment is then compared to a threshold indicative of a confidence level that a user of the client device may be in danger. Based on the comparison between the risk factor and the threshold, an alert may be issued at the client device to inform the user of the potential danger.
US08842004B2
A radar detector accesses a network interface module that enables communication of data to and from a server. The server executes analysis algorithms that analyze data received from multiple radar detectors to develop predictions about the likelihood of future alerts or threats in geographic locations. The server communicates the predictions to each of the radar detectors based on the geographic locations corresponding to each of the radar detectors. Each radar detector communicates alert levels as needed to its corresponding radar detector user based on predictions that correspond to the geographic locations corresponding to each of the radar detectors.
US08842002B2
A system associates change in the state of an asset to an event trigger within a monitored environment. This environment includes a plurality of assets and a tag transmitter positioned on each asset and operative for transmitting a wireless RF signal based on an event trigger based on one of at least the change in state of an asset and change in location of the asset. A plurality of spaced apart access points receive an RF signal transmitted from a tag transmitter. A processor is operatively connected to the access points and collect possible candidates as assets associated with the event trigger and assigning a numerical score to each candidate to determine which asset is best associated with the event trigger.
US08842001B2
The present application discloses methods and systems for transferring primary alarm notification on patient monitoring systems from a bedside monitor to one or more secondary devices which may operate on a less than fully reliable network. The bedside monitor includes an attached physiological parameter measurement device which detects when a specific physiological parameter measures outside a predetermined range. The bedside monitor then directs the secondary device(s) to annunciate its alarm. Primary alarming responsibility reverts from the secondary device(s) back to the bedside monitor whenever communication between the two is lost or when acknowledgement of the alarm condition by the secondary device is not relayed back to the bedside monitor within a predetermined amount of time.
US08842000B2
Systems and methods for controlling a system of fans in a facility from a central system controller are disclosed herein. In one embodiment, the system of fans can be configured to shut down automatically during an emergency condition or event. For example, a fan system controller can be connected to the system of fans and provide a signal to each of the fans. While each of the fans receives the signal, power is connected to a motor on each of the fans. Upon detection of an emergency condition, the fan system controller disconnects the signal to the fans, thereby automatically simultaneously shutting down the entire system of fans.
US08841993B2
Controller for a motor vehicle for wireless communication with a least one peripheral unit with a least one receiver unit (1) for receiving radio signals for standard applications and at least one receiver unit (2) for receiving radio signals for long-range applications which are emitted by the peripheral unit at different frequencies for the standard applications and the long-range applications. With a least one antenna (ANT1) for one of the two receiver units (1, 2) respectively and with a control unit (4) for controlling the two receiver units (1, 2) as well as for evaluating signals from the two receiver units (1, 2).
US08841986B2
A user-interactive music system is described. The system includes a web application in communication with an electronic device such as a mobile device. The web application receives an input from the electronic device, requesting a specific song or preference of songs be played on a music player at a remote location. The web application communicates with a music player, communicating the requests from the electronic device. The music player plays the requested songs or preference of songs on the music player.
US08841984B1
The invention provided in one embodiment is a transformer, comprising: at least one host board comprising internal windings, which comprise copper; external windings, which comprise copper and are connected externally, with respect to the host board, and in parallel to the internal windings, wherein the external windings are thicker than the internal windings.
US08841976B2
The printed wiring board has a conductor of signal line 41 and two conductive lines 42 on one face of the first insulating layer 10 covered by a second insulating layer 20, while having a ground layer of the ground 30 potential on the opposite face thereof, when the dielectric tangent A of the second insulating layer (insulating layer A) 20 is larger than the dielectric tangent B of the first insulating layer (insulating layer B) 10, Relational Expression 1: (relative permittivity B)·(width (W41) of signal line(s) 41)/(thickness (T10) of first insulating layer (insulating layer B) 10)>(relative permittivity A)·{(thickness (T41) of signal line(s) 41)/(distance (S1) between signal line(s) 41 and one conductive line 42a)+(thickness (T41) of signal line(s) 41)/(distance (S2) between signal line(s) 41 and other conductive line 42b)+(thickness (T41) of signal lines 41)/(distance (S3) between pair of signal lines (41a and 41b)·2} is satisfied.
US08841975B2
The present invention provides a digitally controlled oscillator device capable of reducing noise away from an oscillation frequency, and a high frequency signal processing device. Fractional capacitances are realized using a plurality of unitary capacitor units, for example. In one unitary capacitor unit, one ends of two types of capacitive elements are respectively coupled to oscillation output nodes. On the other hand, in the unitary capacitor units other than the one unitary capacitor unit, one ends of two types of capacitive elements are respectively coupled to a fixed voltage. The other ends of one capacitive elements in all the unitary capacitor units are coupled in common, and the other ends of other capacitive elements are also coupled in common. Turning on and off of respective switches in all the unitary capacitor units are controlled in common.
US08841968B2
An envelope detector (ED) includes a voltage-mode ED core including parallel detection transistors for detecting a voltage envelope of a radio frequency (RF) signal input, the RF signal input including an output of a radio such as a cellular transmitter (TX). The ED further includes multiple voltage amplifiers positioned serially in gain stages between the TX output and the ED core to provide a total linear voltage range of the envelope detector. A final voltage amplifier of the multiple voltage amplifiers drives the ED core and includes a class-AB RF amplifier configured to operate within a full linear voltage range of the ED core.
US08841964B2
An apparatus for demodulating an input signal that includes a frequency detector for tracking a frequency of the input signal, an oscillator and a mixer is disclosed. The input signal and an output signal of the oscillator can constitute the incoming signals for the mixer and the output signal of the mixer can constitute the demodulated input signal, wherein an arithmetic unit is arranged downstream of the frequency detector and upstream of the oscillator, wherein the tracked frequency of the input signal and a predefined second frequency constitute the incoming signals of the arithmetic unit and the arithmetic unit is designed such that it computes a control signal for the oscillator from the tracked frequency of the input signal and the predefined second frequency with the output signal of the oscillator depending on the control signal.
US08841961B2
An apparatus includes a processor and a device. The processor generates an output signal and a control signal. The device consumes power while operating in first and second states. The device consumes less power while in the first state than while in the second state. The processor: accounts for a transition time for the device to transition among a powered off state, the first state, and the second state; and generates the control signal based on the transition time. The device: in response to the control signal, transitions to the second state at a speed of periodicity of a periodic signal of the processor; subsequent to the transitioning to the second state, performs a function based on the output signal; and subsequent to performing the function, transitions from the second state to either the first state or the powered off state.
US08841959B2
Disclosed is a noise removing circuit including: a voltage booster which boosts an input signal; and a regulator which receives an output signal of the voltage booster and reduces the signal's voltage higher than a specific value to the signal's voltage having the specific value and then outputs the signal.
US08841954B2
An input signal processing device includes an oscillator circuit, a signal processing circuit, and a control circuit. The oscillator circuit performs an oscillation operation to output a clock signal. The signal processing circuit operates based on the clock signal outputted from the oscillator circuit. The signal processing circuit performs a predetermined process to an input signal when a level of the input signal changes and outputs a signal after the predetermined process. The control circuit instructs the oscillator circuit to start the oscillation operation based on a level change of the input signal. The control circuit instructs the oscillator circuit to stop the oscillation operation when the signal processing circuit finishes the predetermined process.
US08841938B2
The invention provides a voltage to current converter that contains an diode-connected NMOS transistor, a diode-connected PMOS transistor, and a voltage-controlled signal input circuit. The source of the NMOS transistor and the drain of the PMOS transistor are connected together and connected to the voltage-controlled signal input circuit in series. The invention is implemented and tested in the integrated circuit. When an input voltage signal is inputted, a current of the PMOS transistor is substantially linearly proportional to the input voltage signal.
US08841935B1
An application specific integrated circuit (ASIC) that includes a digital signal processing (DSP) core and a configurable logic block coupled to the DSP core. The configurable logic block including a plurality of interconnected logic modules to apply a pre-configured logic function to an input. Each of the plurality of logic modules including a controller and a plurality of logic components, the controller of each logic module dynamically reconfigures the connections between the controller's logic module and another logic module.
US08841933B2
A system and method for improved voltage contrast inspection is disclosed. In one embodiment the temporal response to voltage contrast is considered to find an optimal acquisition time. In another embodiment, multiple optimal acquisition times are identified. The identified acquisition times are used in voltage contrast inspection of semiconductor fabrication, and are well-suited to SOI technology.
US08841931B2
The present disclosure provides a probe card for wafer level testing. The probe card includes a space transformer having first power/ground lines and first signal lines embedded therein, wherein the first power/ground and signal lines are configured to have a first wiring pitch on a first surface and a second wiring pitch on a second surface, the second wiring pitch being substantially less than the first wiring pitch; a printed circuit board bonded to the first surface of the space transformer, wherein the printed circuit board includes second power/ground lines and second signal lines embedded in the printed circuit board and coupled to the first power/ground and signal lines; and conductive lines configured to a surface of the printed circuit board remote to the first surface of the space transformer, wherein each of the conductive lines includes a first end coupled to one of the second signal lines and a second end coupled to a different location of the printed circuit board.
US08841925B2
The invention relates to devices for liquid level detection (LLD). It relates to a laboratory device having an electronic circuit for detecting a liquid level in a liquid container, a feeler, which can be advanced, and which is connected to an input side of the electronic circuit, and having a movement device, which allows the feeler to be advanced in the direction of the liquid in the liquid container. Upon the immersion of the feeler in the liquid, a capacitance change is caused in the electronic circuit, which triggers a signal in the circuit. The laboratory device comprises a reference circuit, which is connected to the input side of the circuit, and which specifies an effective capacitance on the input side of the circuit. A sequence controller is used, which causes the triggering of a test by the application of a control signal to the reference circuit, the control signal causing an increase of the effective capacitance through a switching procedure. The processing of the corresponding capacitance change is monitored by the sequence controller, for example.
US08841914B2
In some embodiments, a method of approximating or determining at least one dimension of at least one underground geological feature in a zone of interest proximate to a well bore includes generating an electric field in the zone of interest while the well bore and geological feature at least partially contain conductive fluid. At least two sensing electrodes are provided in the well bore and configured to detect differences therebetween in electric potential caused by at least one target object in the zone of interest and provide data relating thereto to at least one data processing system. The data processing system(s) approximates or determines the dimension(s) of the geological feature(s) based at least partially upon data provided by the sensing electrodes.
US08841912B2
A pre-amplifier circuit for connection to an antenna of a human-portable locator includes a differential amplifier/mixer pair and means for allowing a common-mode “phantom” signal to modulate a transfer function of the differential amplifier/mixer pair. The common-mode phantom signal modulates the transfer function of the differential pre-amplifier “onboard” the antenna without the usual requirement for onboard power supply and signal oscillator. This technique uses the same electronic components to provide both pre-amplification and mixing functions, thereby improving circuit performance-to-cost ratio, reducing mixer power consumption, situating the necessary signal oscillator remotely from the mixer, and greatly improving the available system bandwidth by limiting spectral transmission demands to the mixed signal bandwidth alone.
US08841906B2
A current sensor having a magnetic field sensor, and a variable current source connected to the magnetic field sensor, and a first differential amplifier, connected to the magnetic field sensor, for amplifying a first sensor voltage. A second differential amplifier is provided and the second differential amplifier is connected to the first differential amplifier and to the current source. In the case of the first sensor voltage, a first operating current is present at the magnetic field sensor and in the case of a second sensor voltage, a second operating current is present, whereby the second Hall voltage is smaller than the first sensor voltage and the second operating current is greater than the first operating current.
US08841905B2
A system and method for fiber magneto-optic detection are provided, which belongs to the optical application field. The system comprises: a reference device (300) for generating a reference magnetic field signal with known amplitude and shape at a measurement point; a magneto-optic probe (100) for detecting a magnetic field signal of the measuring point, converting the magnetic field signal into an optical signal, and transmitting to a power supply and signal processing module (400) the optical signal sent by the magneto-optic probe; the power supply and signal processing module (400) for transmitting laser light, and converting the optical signal into an electrical signal after receiving it, and demodulating and analyzing the electric signal to acquire the magnetic field information and/or the current information of the measuring point. The reference device (300) is provided in the system, and the measured signals can be corrected by the reference magnetic field signal generated by the reference device (300) to remove the influences environment factors cause on the measurement. Thus accurate measurement data are acquired and the measurement accuracy of the system is improved.
US08841899B2
Disclosed is an electro-magnetic tomography including: a modulator configured to modulate a generated transmit reference signal using a pseudo-noise signal; a transmitter configured to transmit the signal modulated by the modulator; a receiver configured to receive a signal transmitted from a transmitter; an amplitude detector configured to compare an amplitude magnitude between the signal received by the receiver and the transmit reference signal to measure a received amplitude; and a demodulator configured to demodulate the signal received by the receiver using the pseudo-noise signal to generate a cyclic signal, compare a phase between the transmit reference signal and the cyclic signal to measure the phase of the cyclic signal, and determine the phase of the received signal based on the phase of the measured cyclic signal.
US08841898B2
Described herein is a self-powered system for detecting a current spike. The current spike is delivered through a current return network that energizes a resonant circuit to produce an alternating electrical output. The output is rectified by a rectifier into direct output that is then transferred to an integrator circuit. The integrator circuit slowly builds to and dissipates from a voltage threshold corresponding to an output transistor. When the output transistor is triggered by the voltage threshold this trigger is communicated to a fault monitoring software that recognizes the current spike.
US08841895B2
An average current mode buck-boost DC to DC converter has a buck stage coupled between an input voltage source terminal and an output terminal. A boost stage is coupled between the input voltage source terminal and the output terminal. A current ramp control circuit generates a ramp signal for driving the buck and boost stages, the ramp signals being coupled to the buck and boost stages. A constant voltage related to the desired output voltage by a constant is applied directly to both a voltage control feedback loop for adjusting the output voltage and directly to an input to the current ramp control circuit, whereby the output voltage can be shifted from one voltage to another by feedforward control.
US08841889B2
A method comprises the transmission to a regulator (8) of the alternator of width-modulated pulses (PWM1) exhibiting a duty ratio representative of a setpoint value (Vref) continuously included between a first reference duty ratio (DC1) and a second reference duty ratio (DC2), and the detection of these pulses by the regulator so as to generate the setpoint value. The method also comprises the transmission to the regulator of other width-modulated pulses (PWM2) exhibiting a specific duty ratio (EXOF_R) which is less than the first reference duty ratio (DC1) and ties between a low duty ratio (DCL) and a high duty ratio (DCH), and the detection of these other pulses by the regulator, in a first step, and the generation of an opening signal (EXOF) for a circuit for excitation of the alternator, in a second step, following this latter detection.
US08841878B2
An electronic device is disclosed. The electronic device comprises at least one solar cell, and voltage-detection means operable to detect an output voltage of the at least one solar cell to obtain a detected output voltage. The electronic device also comprises control means operable to detect an operation of the at least one solar cell based on the detected output voltage, and to perform a predefined control depending on the operation.
US08841877B2
An electrical power supply system is provided comprising a number of rechargeable cells, a number of control electronics circuits and a charger which consists of apparatus for producing electricity from a renewable energy source, the electrochemical cells being divided into separate branches connected in parallel to the charger. Each control electronics circuit controls the charging of one branch by measuring a current being applied to the branch, integrating the current measured in the branch, determining a state of charge of the cell or cells of the branch, comparing the integrated current value with a set value set as a function of the determined state of charge, and interrupting the passage of current being applied to the branch when the integrated current reaches the set value. This system makes it possible to optimize the sharing out of charging current between parallel branches of battery cells while being adaptable as regards the number of cells used in parallel in the system.
US08841873B2
The motor control device includes: a vehicle control device (1) for generating a first torque command value Tref according to state quantities of the vehicle acquired from various sensors (7); a vehicle-resonance-compensation calculation unit (23) for extracting a frequency component generating a vehicle resonance from torque ripple components detected from an electrical angle ω of a motor for traveling (3) by a vehicle resonance component extraction filter (24), and generating a second torque command value Tcmp as a resonance compensation value for carrying out feedback control for the extracted frequency component; and an adder (20) for generating a torque command value Tref_cmp by subtracting the second torque command value Tcmp from the first torque command value Tref, and the motor (3) is controlled according to the torque command value. With this, it is possible to restrain the resonance of the vehicle caused by the torque ripple of the motor (3).
US08841869B2
In summary, the present invention relates to a device, a method and a computer program enabling a rotating and translating movement by means of a single motor. An electric motor (102) for linear and rotary movement can comprise a stator (104) having a multi-phase coil arrangement including a number of coils or coil sets and a rotor (106) being movable along a direction of its rotational axis and having a number of poles respectively comprising at least one permanent magnet. A control unit (108) may determine currents based on at least the number of coils or coil sets, an angle of rotation of the rotor and a parameter depending on an axial position of the rotor, and supply the determined currents to the coils or coil sets.
US08841866B2
The invention comprises a charged particle beam extraction method and apparatus used in conjunction with charged particle beam radiation therapy of cancerous tumors. The system uses a radio-frequency cavity system to induce betatron oscillation of a charged particle stream. Sufficient amplitude modulation of the charged particle stream causes the charged particle stream to hit a material, such as a foil. The foil decreases the energy of the charged particle stream, which decreases a radius of curvature of the charged particle stream in the synchrotron sufficiently to allow a physical separation of the reduced energy charged particle stream from the original charged particle stream. The physically separated charged particle stream is then removed from the system by use of an applied field and deflector.
US08841862B2
A plurality of light emitting diodes (LEDs) is driven based on the voltage and current requirements of the LEDs at any given time. The driving of the LEDs is adapted to the input voltage provided. A series of switches (e.g. MOSFETS) is used to selectively illuminate the LEDs according to the input voltage and current, with more LEDs being lit as the input voltage or current increases. In one configuration, the switches are driven to provide a light dimming function. The LEDs can be controlled remotely using, e.g. an X10 communication protocol. A direct current implementation is also provided. In an alternate embodiment, the LEDs are used in photo diode mode for communication with a remote controller or other light bulbs.
US08841860B2
A power converter includes a single magnetic element in communication with a plurality of output channels. Each output channel includes one or more light-emitting diodes (LEDs) that may output a desired light output. Desired amounts of current may be discharged from the single magnetic element through the LEDs to generate the desired light output. The current may be drawn through the LEDs by switching “on” and “off” switches connected to the LEDs. A controller in communication with the power converter may generate switching signals to turn “on” and “off” the switches to draw the desired amounts of current. The controller may measure the current and determine whether to adjust the switching signals if the measured current draw is not the desired current draw in order to generate the desired light output from the LEDs.
US08841854B2
A driving device for a discharge lamp includes: an alternating current supply section adapted to supply two electrodes of the discharge lamp with an alternating current; a frequency modulation section adapted to modulate a frequency of the alternating current, which the alternating current supply section supplies, in accordance with a predetermined condition of the discharge lamp within a range between a predetermined upper limit frequency and a predetermined lower limit frequency; and a modulation condition setting section adapted to set a modulation condition of the frequency by the frequency modulation section, wherein the modulation condition setting section sets the modulation condition so that the lower limit frequency when the discharge lamp is in a first state is higher than the lower limit frequency when the discharge lamp is in a second state in which a flicker is harder to occur than in the first state.
US08841847B2
An electronic device is provided, which comprises one or more light groupings, each light grouping including one or more light sources, and audio processing circuitry adapted for interpreting an audio file. The audio file includes one or more instrument definitions exclusively assigned to a corresponding one of the one or more light groupings. The audio file further includes one or more note definitions associated with at least one of the one or more instrument definitions exclusively assigned to the corresponding one of the one or more light groupings, where a value associated with each of the one or more note definitions controls the color displayed by the one or more light sources within the associated exclusively assigned light grouping. In some instances, one or more commands for the instrument definitions assigned to the corresponding one of the one or more light groupings can include commands for at least one of volume definitions, note velocity definitions and modulation definitions, wherein the light intensity of the color displayed by the one or more light sources is controlled in accordance with the at least one of the volume definitions, note velocity definitions and modulation definitions. In some instances, the note definitions can include relative start times and end times, which when associated with the instrument definitions assigned to each of the one or more lighting groups affects the start time and the end time of the illumination of the light sources within the corresponding light grouping.
US08841842B2
A filament of simple structure showing improved conversion efficiency is provided. There is provided a light source device comprising a light-transmitting gas-tight container, a filament disposed in the light-transmitting gas-tight container, and a lead wire for supplying an electric current to the filament, wherein the filament consists of a single crystal. Sum of concentration of lattice defects and impurity concentration of the filament consisting of a single crystal is preferably lower than 0.01%.
US08841839B2
A display device is disclosed which prevents an overshoot of a current flowing from a power supply unit toward a pixel portion, by connecting a wire extending from the power supply unit and another wire extending from the pixel portion using a wire connection portion with a slope shape or a stepped shape.
US08841838B2
By using a light emitting device including an insulating substrate and a light emitting unit formed on the insulating substrate, the light emitting unit including: a plurality of linear wiring patterns disposed on the insulating substrate in parallel with one another, a plurality of light emitting elements that are mounted between the wiring patterns while being electrically connected to the wiring patterns, and a sealing member for sealing the light emitting elements, as well as a method for manufacturing thereof, it becomes possible to provide a light emitting device that achieves sufficient electrical insulation and has simple manufacturing processes so that it can be manufactured at a low cost, and a method for manufacturing the same.
US08841836B2
A flat panel display device includes a transparent display panel including a transparent area transmitting light incident on one surface of the transparent display panel to the other surface opposite to the one surface; a first anti-reflective film which is formed over the one surface of the transparent display panel and has a moth eye structure; and a second anti-reflective film which is formed over the other surface of the transparent display panel and has a moth eye structure.
US08841832B2
An organic light emitting diode (OLED) display. The OLED display includes a first substrate member, a first conductive wire having a contact region and formed over the first substrate member, an insulating layer including a plurality of wire contact holes exposing a part of the contact region of the first conductive wire and formed over the first conductive wire, a second conductive wire formed over the first conductive wire and connected to the first conductive wire through the plurality of wire contact holes of the insulating layer, a sealant formed over the second conductive wire, a sealing member formed over the sealant, and a fill-up layer disposed above or under the contact region of the first conductive wire.
US08841824B2
A broadband light illuminator of an optical inspector for optically detecting defects of an inspection object may include an electrode-less chamber including a plasma area from which broadband light is generated; a first energy provider, exterior to the chamber, configured to provide first energy for ionizing high pressure gases to form ionized gases in the chamber; a second energy provider, exterior to the chamber, configured to provide second energy for transforming the ionized gases into a plasma state to form the plasma area at a central portion of the chamber; an elliptical reflector having a first focus at which the chamber is positioned and a second focus such that the broadband light is reflected from the elliptical reflector toward the second focus; and a lens unit focusing the reflected broadband light onto the inspection object to form an inspection light for detecting the defects of the inspection object.
US08841810B2
A rotor iron core is used, which is formed by laminating a base steel sheets with a magnetic flux density (B8000) of 1.65 T or more as measured at a magnetic field strength of 8000 A/m and a coercivity of 100 A/m or more.
US08841795B2
An on-vehicle generator includes a field winding, an armature winding, a bridge circuit having MOS transistors, a rotation detecting circuit that detects a rotational state based on the phase voltage of the armature winding, an excitation current controlling circuit to control the output voltage to be a regulation voltage while rotation of the rotor is detected, two overvoltage detecting circuits each detecting overvoltage when the output voltage exceeds a threshold voltage, a bridge control circuit that ON-OFF controls the MOS transistors while the overvoltage is not detected and enables the MOS transistors to be continuously ON when detecting overvoltage, and a rotation output holding circuit that outputs a signal holding the rotational state of the rotation detecting circuit when detecting overvoltage and outputs the signal to the excitation current controlling circuit.
US08841790B1
There are a large number of sites in the world's oceans and rivers that can provide a significant, viable, and cost effective source of renewable energy. Many are strategically located close to populated areas where these sites can be used to harness energy using ecologically benign hydrodynamic technology. A hydrodynamic array comprises multiple hydrodynamic elements for producing electricity by the motion of ocean tides or river currents and forces acting on the hydrodynamic array, which is immersed in ocean tides or river currents and which is in motion relative to the ocean tides or river currents.
US08841789B2
An apparatus includes an electro-magnetic metallurgy high powered electric energy density push-repel two stage magnetic stack cylinder drive motor and a hydro-kinetic high pressure hydraulic and nitrogen gas piston drive pump propulsion motor arrangement. A linear electric generator can be coupled to the arrangement to generate electric energy or the output shaft may be provided for propulsion uses.
US08841785B2
An energy harvesting system and method includes a rotatable member with an electrically conductive coil mounted to the rotatable member and adapted to move with the rotatable member such that the movement of the coil through a magnetic field induces a voltage in the coil. An energy storage device is coupled to the coil.
US08841780B2
The present invention provides a dicing tape-integrated wafer back surface protective film including: a dicing tape including a base material and a pressure-sensitive adhesive layer formed on the base material; and a wafer back surface protective film formed on the pressure-sensitive adhesive layer of the dicing tape, in which the wafer back surface protective film is colored. It is preferable that the colored wafer back surface protective film has a laser marking ability. The dicing tape-integrated wafer back surface protective film can be suitably used for a flip chip-mounted semiconductor device.
US08841776B2
In a semiconductor chip, a first semiconductor chip 21 is provided on a chip-mounting component 11, and bonding wires 36 connected to electrode pads 21E of the first semiconductor chip 21 are fixed by being covered with a first insulating adhesive 31. A second semiconductor chip 22 is mounted by being stacked on the first semiconductor chip 21, with the first insulating adhesive 31 therebetween. This structure can prevent problems such as breaking and short-circuits of bonding wires of the chip disposed directly on a substrate when another chip is mounted by being stacked.
US08841769B2
A semiconductor device includes a first insulating layer on a substrate; a first contact hole passing through the first insulating layer and exposing an upper surface of the substrate; a first barrier metal layer disposed on a sidewall and at a bottom of the first contact hole and a first metal plug disposed on the first barrier metal layer and in the first contact hole. A recess region is between the first insulating layer and the first metal plug. A gap-fill layer fills the recess region; and a second insulating layer is on the gap-fill layer. A second contact hole passes through the second insulating layer and exposes the upper surface of the first metal plug. A second barrier metal layer is on a sidewall and at the bottom of the second contact hole; and a second metal plug is on the second barrier metal layer.
US08841766B2
Sidewall protection processes are provided for Cu pillar bump technology, in which a protection structure on the sidewalls of the Cu pillar bump is formed of at least one of non-metal material layers, for example a dielectric material layer, a polymer material layer, or combinations thereof.
US08841759B2
Provided are a semiconductor package and a manufacturing method thereof. A semiconductor package according to an embodiment comprises a chip part on a board, a mold member, and a plated layer on the mold member. The plated layer comprises an electrode pattern connected to a pattern of the board. The electrode pattern of the plated layer can be mounted at least one of at least one a chip part and at least one another semiconductor package.
US08841756B2
Methods for forming {110} type facets on a (001) oriented substrate of Group III-V compounds and Group IV semiconductors using selective epitaxial growth is provided. The methods include forming a dielectric film on a (100) substrate. The dielectric film can then be patterned to expose a portion of the substrate and to form a substrate-dielectric film boundary substantially parallel to a <110> direction. A {110} type sidewall facet can then be formed by epitaxially growing a semiconductor layer on the exposed portion of the substrate and the dielectric film.
US08841752B1
In one or more embodiments, a semiconductor structure is provided that includes a plurality of interposer dice on an un-singulated segment of a semiconductor wafer. Scribe lanes circumscribing each of the plurality of interposer dice have widths of at least 2.5% of the width of each interposer die. Each interposer die includes a first contact array formed on a first side of the interposer die, a plurality of vias formed through the interposer die, one or more wiring layers formed on the first side of the interposer die and electrically coupling the first contact array to the plurality of vias, and a second contact array formed on a second side of the interposer die and electrically coupled to the plurality of vias.
US08841751B2
The present invention provides a semiconductor wafer, a semiconductor chip and a semiconductor package. The semiconductor wafer includes a first pad, a first inter-layer dielectric and a second pad. The first pad is disposed on a top surface of a semiconductor substrate and has a solid portion and a plurality of through holes. The first inter-layer dielectric covers the first pad. The second pad is disposed on the first inter-layer dielectric and has a solid portion and a plurality of through holes, wherein the through holes of the first pad correspond to the solid portion of the second pad.
US08841750B2
Aspects of the invention provide for a bipolar transistor of a self-aligned emitter. In one embodiment, the invention provides a method of forming local wiring for a bipolar transistor with a self-aligned sacrificial emitter, including: performing an etch to remove the sacrificial emitter to form an emitter opening between two nitride spacers; depositing an in-situ doped emitter into the emitter opening; performing a recess etch to partially remove a portion of the in-situ doped emitter; depositing a silicon dioxide layer over the recessed in-situ doped emitter; planarizing the silicon dioxide layer via chemical mechanical polishing; etching an emitter trench over the recessed in-situ doped emitter; and depositing tungsten and forming a tungsten wiring within the emitter trench via chemical mechanical polishing.
US08841749B2
A main blind hole is formed in a front face of a wafer having a rear face. A through capacitor is formed in the main blind hole including a conductive outer electrode, a dielectric intermediate layer, and a filling conductive material forming an inner electrode. Cylindrical portions of the outer electrode, the dielectric intermediate layer and the inner electrode have front ends situated in a plane of the front face of the wafer. A secondary rear hole is formed in the rear face of the wafer to reveal a bottom of the outer electrode. A rear electrical connection is made to contact the bottom of the outer electrode through the secondary rear hole. A through hole via filled with a conductive material is provided adjacent the through capacitor. An electrical connection is made on the rear face between the rear electrical connection and the through hole via.
US08841733B2
A method of fabricating a semiconductor device includes following steps. A substrate is provided, wherein a first dielectric layer having a trench therein is formed on the substrate, a source/drain region is formed in the substrate at two sides of the trench, and a second dielectric layer is formed on the substrate in the trench. A first physical vapor deposition process is performed to form a Ti-containing metal layer in the trench. A second physical vapor deposition process is performed to form an Al layer on the Ti-containing metal layer in the trench. A thermal process is performed to anneal the Ti-containing metal layer and the Al layer so as to form a work function metal layer. A metal layer is formed to fill the trench.
US08841729B2
Provided is a semiconductor device including active regions formed in a semiconductor substrate and arranged in a first direction parallel to a surface of the semiconductor substrate; a first element isolating region formed in the semiconductor substrate and electrically isolating adjacent active regions from each other; and gate electrodes extending over the active regions respectively and arranged in the first direction. The first element isolating region includes a first region extending in a second direction orthogonal to the first direction and a second region extending in a direction intersecting the first region, one gate electrode of adjacent gate electrodes has a first edge side which includes a first overlap part placed on the second region, and another gate electrode of the adjacent gate electrodes has a second edge side which faces the first edge side and includes a second overlap part placed on the second region.
US08841725B2
A method for manufacturing a semiconductor device includes forming a first gate electrode on a semiconductor substrate in a first transistor region; forming a channel dose region; and forming a first source extension region, wherein the channel dose region is formed by using a first mask as a mask and by ion-implanting a first dopant of the first conductivity type, and the first mask covering a drain side of the first gate electrode and covering a drain region, and the first source extension region is formed by using a second mask and the gate electrode as masks and by ion-implanting a second dopant of a second conductivity type that is a conductivity type opposite to the first conductivity type, the second mask covering the drain side of the first gate electrode and covering the drain region.
US08841720B2
A semiconductor substrate capable of detecting operating current of a MOSFET and diode current in a miniaturized MOSFET such as a trench-gate type MOSFET is provided. A semiconductor substrate includes a main current region and a current sensing region in which current smaller than main current flowing in the main current region flows. The main current region has a source electrode disposed on a main surface, the source electrode being in contact with a p-type semiconductor region (body) and an n+-type semiconductor region (source), and the current sensing region has a MOSFET current detecting electrode and a diode current detecting electrode on a main surface, the MOSFET current detecting electrode being in contact with the p-type semiconductor region (body) and the n+-type semiconductor region (source), the diode current detecting electrode being in contact with the p-type semiconductor region (body).
US08841719B2
A semiconductor device includes: a semiconductor substrate; an interlayer film on the substrate; a surface electrode on the interlayer film; a surface pad on the surface electrode; a backside electrode on the substrate; an element area including a cell portion having a vertical semiconductor element and a removal portion having multiple contact regions; and an outer periphery area. The surface electrode in the removal portion is electrically coupled with each contact region through a first contact hole in the interlayer film. The surface electrode in the cell portion is electrically coupled with the substrate through a second contact hole in the interlayer film. A part of the surface electrode in the removal portion facing each contact region is defined as a contact portion. The surface electrode includes multiple notches on a shortest distance line segment between each contact portion and the surface pad.
US08841717B2
In one embodiment, a semiconductor device includes a semiconductor substrate having a first groove; and a plurality of first pillars over the substrate. The plurality of first pillars is disposed beside the first groove. A first insulator is disposed in the first groove. A bit contact is disposed in the first groove and over the first insulator. The bit contact is coupled to side surfaces of the plurality of first pillars.
US08841714B2
A solid state imaging device 1 is provided with a photoelectric conversion portion 2 having a plurality of photosensitive regions 7, and a potential gradient forming portion 3 having an electroconductive member 8 arranged opposite to the photosensitive regions 7. A planar shape of each photosensitive region 7 is a substantially rectangular shape. The photosensitive regions 7 are juxtaposed in a first direction intersecting with the long sides. The potential gradient forming portion 3 forms a potential gradient becoming higher along a second direction from one of the short sides to the other of the short sides of the photosensitive regions 7. The electroconductive member 8 includes a first region 8a extending in the second direction and having a first electric resistivity, and a second region 8b extending in the second direction and having a second electric resistivity smaller than the first electric resistivity.
US08841712B2
A field effect nano-pillar transistor has a pillar shaped gate element incorporating a biomimitec portion that provides various advantages over prior art devices. The small size of the nano-pillar transistor allows for advantageous insertion into cellular membranes, and the biomimitec character of the gate element operates as an advantageous interface for sensing small amplitude voltages such as transmembrane cell potentials. The nano-pillar transistor can be used in various embodiments to stimulate cells, to measure cell response, or to perform a combination of both actions.