US09050810B2
An image forming apparatus includes an apparatus body, a recording head, a cap member, and release valves. The head has a nozzle face with nozzles to eject liquid droplets. The head is placed in the apparatus body so as to eject the droplets obliquely downward in any of the vertical or horizontal arrangement of the apparatus body. The cap member caps the nozzle face and has openings at opposed ends in a longitudinal direction of the cap member to communicate an inside of the cap member with an outside of the cap member. The valves open and close the openings relative to an atmosphere. One of the valves placed higher than another one of the valves in accordance with the vertical or horizontal arrangement is configured to open the inside of the cap member to the atmosphere through one of the openings placed higher than another one of the openings.
US09050801B2
A liquid ejecting head includes a channel unit having a plurality of pressure chambers respectively communicating with a plurality of nozzles opened to a nozzle formation surface, a plurality of reservoirs for supplying liquid to the plurality of the pressure chambers, and a plurality of compliance units formed by partitioning at least a part of the surface of each reservoir opposite to the nozzle formation surface by a film member; and a head case joined to a surface of the channel unit. A concave chamber formed by depressing a part of a surface joined to the channel unit in a side opposite to the reservoir and an atmosphere opening passage whose one end communicates with the concave chamber and the other end is opened to the atmosphere are formed at the head case. The concave chamber is formed in series over the compliance units.
US09050795B2
A method for controlling an image recording apparatus includes: detecting a defective recording element out of a plurality of recording elements on a recording head for recording an image on a recording medium; performing a correction processing including suspension of an output of the defective recording element and increase of an output of a recording element at least adjacent to the defective recording element according to a detection result; determining whether or not an image defect is caused in the image by the suspension of output of the defective recording element, before performing the correction processing, according to the detection result; selecting a forced recording element that is forced to output ink out of defective recording elements when it is determined that the image defect is caused; and suspending the output of the defective recording element other than the forced recording element when the forced recording element is selected.
US09050781B2
An expanded laminate material includes a plastic sheet and two expanded layers. The plastic sheet has upper and lower surfaces and a thickness of between about 0.05 and 1 mm. The first expanded layer has upper and lower surfaces, a foam density of between about 1.2 and 8 pcf and a thickness of between about 1 and 8 mm. The lower surface of the first expanded layer is directly bonded to the upper surface of the plastic sheet. The a second expanded layer has upper and lower surfaces, a foam density of between about 1.2 and 8 pcf and a thickness of between about 1 and 8 mm. The upper surface of the second expanded layer is directly bonded to the lower surface of the plastic sheet. The first and second expanded layers comprise a material selected from the group consisting of expanded polyethylene and expanded polypropylene.
US09050774B2
A laminate having: a support; and an antistatic layer, wherein the antistatic layer is provided on the support and is made with a composition comprising at least (A) an electrically conductive polymer, and (B) a binder component, the antistatic layer has regions having local concentration of the electrically conductive polymer (A) of 1.5 times or more higher than the average value of the concentration of the electrically conductive polymer (A) in the antistatic layer and the regions are in contact with each other to form a three-dimensional connection structure in the antistatic layer, and a common logarithmic value of the surface resistivity of which unit is Ω/sq of the antistatic layer is 3.0 or more and 13.0 or less.
US09050773B2
The present invention relates to a dicing tape-integrated film for semiconductor back surface, which includes: a dicing tape including a base material layer, a first pressure-sensitive adhesive layer and a second pressure-sensitive adhesive layer stacked in this order, and a film for semiconductor back surface stacked on the second pressure-sensitive adhesive layer of the dicing tape, in which a peel strength Y between the first pressure-sensitive adhesive layer and the second pressure-sensitive adhesive layer is larger than a peel strength X between the second pressure-sensitive adhesive layer and the film for semiconductor back surface, and in which the peel strength X is from 0.01 to 0.2 N/20 mm, and the peel strength Y is from 0.2 to 10 N/20 mm.
US09050772B2
A sheet processing apparatus includes: a pressing member that presses a fold part of a bundle of folded sheets so as to perform fold-enhancing; and a moving unit that moves a pressing position of the pressing member in a direction of a fold of the bundle of sheets. The moving unit starts pressing at an area located inside one end of the bundle of sheets while moving at a first velocity, and releases the pressing after passing through other end of the bundle of sheets during a forward movement, and starts pressing at an area located inside the other end of the bundle of sheets while moving at a second velocity that is higher than the first velocity, and passes through the one end of the bundle of sheets during a backward movement.
US09050762B2
Methods for producing retroreflector tooling and retroreflective sheeting using laser writing techniques, and corresponding products thereof, are presented. In one embodiment, a seamless retroreflective sheet having a plurality of retroreflectors formed in a continuous retroreflective microstructured pattern is provided. In the methods described herein, a substrate having a photosensitive coating on a surface thereof is provided. A surface-relief microstructured pattern is produced in the photosensitive coating by selectively exposing the photosensitive coating to a beam of electromagnetic radiation. The exposed portions of the photosensitive coating are developed to form a retroreflective microstructured pattern on the surface of the substrate. The retroreflective microstructured pattern is then transferred into retroreflector tooling comprising the retroreflective microstructured pattern on a surface thereof. A retroreflective sheet containing the retroreflective microstructured pattern on a surface thereof is then formed from the retroreflector tooling.
US09050750B2
The present invention relates to a process for making a container having an integral handle, comprising the steps of: a) providing a preform (6) in a mold cavity (1); b) stretch-blow molding the preform (6) to form an intermediate container (8) which comprises at least one, preferably two, convex bubble(s) (9); c) deforming the or each convex bubble (9) by means of an inwardly moving plug (5) to form one or more concave gripping region(s), while maintaining the pressure within the intermediate container (8) above 1 bar and while the temperature of the material in the gripping region of the intermediate container is maintained at a temperature between the glass transition temperature, Tg, and the melt temperature, Tm; d) releasing excess pressure within the container, preferably prior to withdrawing the plug (5) from within the container; and e) ejecting the finished container from the mold cavity (1, 3).
US09050747B2
Methods and systems for co-extruding multiple polymeric material flow streams into a mold cavity to produce a molded plastic article having an injection-formed aperture in gate region of the article are disclosed herein. A method includes providing a valve pin having a distal portion with a first diameter and a mid-portion with a second diameter smaller than the first diameter and providing a mold defining a cavity corresponding to a shape of a resulting molded plastic article. The mold has a recess aligned with a gate region of the mold, extending into the mold and configured to receive the distal portion of the valve pin when the distal portion of the valve pin extends beyond the gate region. The method includes advancing the distal portion of the valve pin into the recess until the mid-portion of the valve pin at least partially extends into the gate region, thereby establishing a flow path for a combined polymeric stream into the cavity at the gate region for forming a molded plastic article having at least one layer of a first polymeric material and at least one layer of a second polymeric material. The method also includes withdrawing the mid-portion of the valve pin from the gate region, thereby forming an injection-molded aperture in the resulting molded plastic article at the gate region.
US09050739B2
A method of making and recycling a golf ball is disclosed. The method may include processing a used golf ball to make the materials of the used golf ball reusable in a new golf ball. As a result, the disclosed method may decrease the waste of disposing of used golf balls and the costs associated with acquiring and/or processing new materials. The method may include melting a golf ball made of layers each having a different melting point. The materials may be separated by melting the different layers one by one. The method of recycling a golf ball may generally include pulverizing used golf balls made of materials having differing amounts of magnetic additive into particles. The particles may be separated by a magnetic field. At least a portion of the particles may be reused to make a new golf ball.
US09050735B2
A method and apparatus for trimming the edges of sheets including providing a conveyor, a first saw and a second saw, first conveying the sheets on the conveyor past the first saw, trimming a first side edge of the sheets, and then conveying the sheets on the conveyor past the second saw and trimming a second side edge of the sheets.
US09050727B2
A master operation input device operates a slave manipulator provided with joints adapted to multiple degrees of freedom. The master operation input device includes a grip portion and a first operation portion. The grip portion is variable in position and orientation while being gripped by an operator. The grip portion is configured to give command values regarding the position and orientation of a distal end of the slave manipulator in accordance with the variation in position and orientation. The distal end is the farthest end when the slave manipulator is viewed from a fixed end thereof. The first operation portion is located to be operable by a fingertip of the operator when the grip portion is gripped. The first operation portion is operable independently of the grip portion.
US09050726B2
Disclosed herein is a system for controlling “on”/“off” functionality of an auxiliary device including a circuit designed to monitor physical rotations. The device will activate or deactivate when predetermined rotations are sensed by the circuit within a specific time period. The circuit can be used on high vibration tooling such as grinders and saws due to its resistance to relatively large vibrational noise. The circuit also includes a current sensing device to determine when the auxiliary device draws too much current. When an over current situation is measured, the circuit will automatically shut down to protect the device's electronic components. This control system can be implemented in new device designs, or installed as a retrofit control mechanism to existing commercially available devices.
US09050722B2
A pickup device includes a robot for holding a target object, a sensor for measuring a position/posture of an object, a first storing unit for storing a reference holding position/posture, a second storing unit for storing a holding position/posture modification range, a calculating unit for calculating a holding position/posture of the robot based on the position/posture of the target object and the reference holding position/posture, a third storing unit for storing a selection condition determining priority of the holding position/posture, and a selecting unit for selecting a holding position/posture of the robot, based on the priority determined by the selection condition, among the holding positions/postures of the robot obtained from the holding position/posture of the robot and the holding position/posture modification range.
US09050718B2
A work station includes tool containing or supporting features as well as workbench features, such as a work surface and work back. The work station is preferably mobile, permitting it to be moved or transported. In addition, the work station is preferably collapsible and securable. In one configuration, the work station has a work bench portion which can be raised or lowered relative to a base portion, wherein in the lowered position, the base portion is positioned in an interior space of the work bench portion.
US09050716B2
An emergency actuating tool for at least one equipment component which is specific to a vehicle with a movable roof arrangement, has at least one tool head for the equipment component, which tool head has an actuating element. For an alternative embodiment of the emergency actuating tool, it is provided that the emergency actuating tool has, moreover, at least one second tool head which has a second actuating element, that the emergency actuating tool is configured in multiple pieces, such that it can be assembled and at least partially dismantled, and that a third tool head with a third actuating element can be exposed by the dismantling of the emergency actuating tool.
US09050712B2
A driving tool having first and second linear motors, a head assembly, a nosepiece and a driver. The first linear motor forms an air compressor and includes a scotch yoke mechanism for translating a first piston in a first cylinder. The scotch yoke mechanism includes a crank arm, a crank arm roller, which is coupled to the crank arm, and a connecting rod having a roller slot into which the crank arm roller is received. At least a portion of the roller slot is configured to vary an output rate at which the connecting rod translates along a translation axis relative to an input rate at which the crank arm roller moves in a direction that is parallel to the translation axis.
US09050710B2
Vises utilizing a threaded screw and nut to translate rotary motion of the screw into linear relative movement of vise components. The nut may be a half-nut urged into contact with the screw by a cam that may be operated by a lever located near the handle for turning the screw. A tail vise embodiment may be mounted to the underside of a workbench without signification bench modification and positions the screw near the front edge of the bench top. A front vise embodiment may include a screw cover to protect workpieces from contact with the screw.
US09050707B2
A method for manufacturing a polishing pad, which may be laminated, with a small number of manufacturing steps, high productivity and no peeling between a polishing layer and a cushion layer includes preparing a cell-dispersed urethane composition by a mechanical foaming method; continuously discharging the cell-dispersed urethane composition onto a face material, while feeding the face material; laminating another face material on the cell-dispersed urethane composition; curing the cell-dispersed urethane composition, while controlling its thickness to be uniform, so that a polishing layer including a polyurethane foam is formed; cutting the polishing layer parallel to the face into two pieces so that two long polishing layers each including the polishing layer and the face material are simultaneously formed; and cutting the long polishing layers to produce the polishing pad.
US09050701B2
A rough grinding process grinds the workpiece W supported by the supporting device by the rough grinding wheel until a preset stock amount for finish grinding remains, and then the finish grinding process finish grinds the stock amount while the workpiece W is continuously supported by the supporting device. The stock amount for finish grinding is set based on at least one of a thermal displacement of the multifunction grinding machine and a changing amount of grinding force of the rough grinding wheel. A profile remaining the stock amount for finish grinding is a profile not depending on a profile of the rough grinding wheel.
US09050697B2
The present invention is directed to a self-conditioning polishing pad. The self-conditioning polishing pad comprises an insoluble polymeric foam matrix and insoluble polymeric foam particles within the foam matrix. The particles are coated with a water-soluble component over a portion of the surface area of the particle. The particles may have a diameter in the range of 5 to 1000 microns in diameter.
US09050693B2
A manufacturing device having a clamp unit according to an exemplary embodiment of the present invention may include a workpiece disposed on a frame, a clamp unit configured to fix the workpiece on the frame, and a spindle configured to a torque transferred from a motor to cut the workpiece or operates the clamp unit to make the clamp unit fix the workpiece on the frame.
US09050691B2
A flexible fuel bladder structure for an aircraft includes one or more sleeves extending along an exterior of the fuel bladder. The one or more sleeves are receptive of one or more rods to at least partially suspend the fuel bladder in the aircraft. An aircraft includes a fuselage and a flexible fuel bladder disposed in the fuselage. One or more rods are installed through a portion of the fuel bladder and into a fuselage member. The flexible fuel bladder is at least partially suspended from the one or more rods. A method of installing a fuel bladder in an aircraft includes inserting a flexible bladder into a fuselage space of the aircraft. One or more rods are installed through one or more fuselage members and one or more sleeves of the fuel bladder. The one or more rods at least partially suspend the fuel bladder in the fuselage.
US09050690B2
A component connection is provided and includes, a first vehicle component, which has a male fixing element that projects from the first vehicle component and that partially or completely has the shape of a sphere or completely or partially has a sphere-like shape, and a second vehicle component, which has a female fixing element that is intended to receive the male fixing element. The male fixing element is inserted into the female fixing element in an insertion direction. The male fixing element has an excessive dimension relative to the female fixing element substantially perpendicularly to the insertion direction so that the two vehicle components are detachably clamped together at the fixing elements.
US09050687B2
An apparatus that can change an irradiating direction of the beam and a method of recognizing an irradiation-enabled area with respect to a processing course for a work piece. The method establishes an irradiation-enabled area at a focal length that corresponds to one point along the processing course, even when the beam irradiating device is moved away from the one point along the processing course of the work piece. The method further recognizes the irradiation-enabled area with respect to the one point along the processing course.
US09050686B2
A method of creating an easily torn material using laser etching, as well as articles produced therefrom is provided. As opposed to standard perforations, a laser is used to etch a line in a sheet of material. The line allows the material to be easily torn by a user, yet exhibits enough tensile strength to prevent tearing during regular use.
US09050661B1
A collet formed as a unitary metal or steel cylinder machined so as to allow three identical weights, joined by three identical flexures to reside, equally spaced about the axis of rotation of the collet. The weight's outer surface is defined by a single length radius having a pair of centers including the collet's axis of rotation. As the spindle revolves, kinetic energy built up in the weights forces the leading edge of the weights outward from the axis of rotation until some portion of the outer face of the weights frictionally engage the inner surface of the spindle shaft. The trailing edge of the mass of the weights deflects inward thus gripping the machine bit tighter.
US09050647B2
Split pass forging a workpiece to initiate microstructure refinement comprises press forging a metallic material workpiece in a first forging direction one or more times up to a reduction ductility limit of the metallic material to impart a total strain in the first forging direction sufficient to initiate microstructure refinement; rotating the workpiece; open die press forging the workpiece in a second forging direction one or more times up to the reduction ductility limit to impart a total strain in the second forging direction to initiate microstructure refinement; and repeating rotating and open die press forging in a third and, optionally, one or more additional directions until a total amount of strain to initiate microstructure refinement is imparted in an entire volume of the workpiece.
US09050638B2
Methods and Apparatus to increase the efficiency of roll-forming and leveling systems are described herein. An example strip material processing apparatus are described herein includes a first drive system to drive a first plurality of workrolls and a second drive system to drive a second plurality of workrolls. A controller provides a first command reference to the first drive system. The controller measures a first output parameter of the first drive system when the first drive system operates at the first command reference. The controller determines a second command reference based on the first output parameter and the controller drives the second drive system based on the second command reference.
US09050628B2
A piezoceramic pulse-echo acoustic transducer includes protection layers for the piezoceramic that are tuned to the piezoceramic so as to optimize pulse-echo signal response (i.e. greater output signal bandwidth and increased return signal sensitivity). The protection layers are tuned to the piezoceramic via material selection and thickness. The acoustic transducer has a backing, a piezoceramic adjacent the backing, an intermediate protection layer adjacent the piezoceramic, and a front protection layer adjacent the intermediate protection layer and opposite the piezoceramic. The front and intermediate protection layers are tuned to the piezoceramic via their acoustic impedance such that the acoustic impedance of the intermediate layer is greater than the acoustic impedance of the piezoceramic and of the front protection layer. The acoustic impedance of the front protection layer is less than the acoustic impedance of the piezoceramic.
US09050625B1
The present invention is related to a floor grout installation apparatus and its method of use. The apparatus not only applies grout to fill spaces between floor tiles but also includes means for removing grout from the surface of the tiles after the grout has been applied and cleaning the tile as it passes.
US09050618B2
According to one embodiment, a double-sided coating apparatus includes a first coating head arranged on one side of a raw material to coat the one side with a coating liquid by alternately forming a coating region and a non-coating region in a direction crossing a delivery direction, a second coating head arranged on the other side of the raw material to coat the other side with the coating liquid by alternately forming the coating region and the non-coating region in the direction crossing the delivery direction, and a coating roller arranged near a position on the one side of the raw material and opposite to the second coating head across the raw material and having a large-diameter portion and a small-diameter portion with different diameters along an axial direction with the small-diameter portion opposite to the coating region and the large-diameter portion opposite to the non-coating region.
US09050614B2
A paint delivery and application apparatus, wherein the apparatus includes a source of paint, a paint applicator, a supply line interconnecting the source of paint and the applicator and at least one pig in the supply line, wherein the paint pushes the pig from adjacent the source of paint to the paint applicator and a source of purging solvent delivering a small volume of purging solvent to the supply line when the pig is adjacent the source of paint adjacent to and upstream of the pig acting as a lubricant, reducing chattering and skipping of the pig and extending the life of the pig. Where the apparatus includes two pigs, purging solvent is delivered between the pigs adjacent the applicator, the pigs are delivered to adjacent the source of paint and a small volume of solvent is then delivered from between the pigs upstream of the pigs.
US09050601B2
A cone-shaped crusher according to the invention includes a frame having a cavity; a main shaft that is disposed in the cavity; main shaft driving means for driving the main shaft such that the main shaft performs a gyratory movement; a mantle core assembly body that performs a gyratory movement together with the main shaft; a suspension bearing chamber capable of accommodating an upper end portion of the main shaft; and a suspension bearing. According to the cone-shaped crusher, there are advantages in that damage to the suspension bearing can be minimized, the gyratory movement of the main shaft can be stably performed, and a suspension bearing part can be used semi-permanently without requiring replacement.
US09050595B2
The invention is to devices and method for rapid determination of analytes in liquid samples by various assays including immunoassays incorporating a sample dilution feature for forming a diluted sample for analysis. The devices and methods also include a dilution verification feature for verifying the degree of dilution of the diluted sample. The devices preferably are capable of being used in the point-of-care diagnostic field is provided.
US09050579B1
The method relates to the fabrication of a polymer microspheres comprised of an asymmetric layer surrounding a hollow interior. The fabricated hollow microsphere is generated from a nascent hollow microsphere comprised of an inner core of core fluid surrounded by a dope layer of polymer dope, where the thickness of the dope layer is at least 10% and less than 50% of the diameter of the inner core. The nascent hollow microsphere is exposed to a gaseous environment, generating a vitrified hollow microsphere, which is subsequently immersed in a coagulation bath. Solvent exchange produces a fabricated hollow microsphere comprised of a densified outer skin surrounding a macroporous inner layer, which surrounds a hollow interior. In an embodiment, the polymer is a polyimide or a polyamide-imide, and the non-solvent in the core fluid and the coagulation bath is water. The fabricated hollow microspheres are particularly suited as solvent supports for gas separation processes.
US09050577B2
A solid support for maintaining a uniform spot shape while improving the capacity for immobilization of nucleic acids upon spotting of nucleic acids onto a solid support is provided. A substrate has a base material, an electrostatic layer formed on the base material in order to electrostatically attract nucleic acids, and carboxyl groups formed on the electrostatic layer, wherein the ratio, (COO peak intensity)/(C—C peak intensity) in the C1s spectra obtained by X-ray photoelectron spectrometry (XPS) performed for the surface of the substrate ranges from 0.10 to 0.20. The solid support for immobilizing nucleic acids is produced by active esterification of carboxyl groups of the substrate.
US09050573B2
The present invention relates to a method for monitoring the level of an ethylene polymerization catalyst slurry in a mud pot (2), whereby said catalyst slurry is prepared by introducing a solid catalyst and a liquid diluent in said mud pot (2), and whereby through sedimentation an interface (35) is formed between said diluent and the obtained catalyst slurry, characterized in that said interface (35) is monitored with Time Domain Reflectometry.
US09050571B2
An apparatus for a radial-flow reactor according to various approaches includes a catalyst transfer pipe having an inwardly tapered end portion. According to various approaches, a catalyst transfer port of the reactor may include a centering device having an upper tapered surface for facilitating assembly of the reactor. A method according to various aspects includes assembling a radial-flow reactor by installing a catalyst transfer pipe through a catalyst transfer port.
US09050561B1
An exhaust gas treatment system includes a reductant delivery system configured to introduce a reductant solution to an exhaust gas flowing through the exhaust gas treatment system. A selective catalyst reduction device is configured to chemically react with the reductant solution to induce a NOx conversion that reduces a level of NOx in the exhaust gas. A reductant quality sensor is configured to generate an electrical signal indicating a quality of the reductant solution. The exhaust gas treatment system further includes a rationality diagnostic control module configured to rationalize the reductant quality sensor based on a comparison between the quality of the reductant solution and the NOx conversion.
US09050557B1
A process for removing sulfur dioxide from a hydrogen sulfide-containing gas utilizes a bubble tower and overcomes process control difficulties associated with known processes. Solvent is fed to the bubble tower, loaded with sulfur dioxide and maintained at desired temperature and pressure. Hydrogen sulfide-containing gas is bubbled through the solvent, causing chemical reaction between the sulfur dioxide and hydrogen sulfide to yield water and elemental sulfur. Elemental sulfur is collected and ultimately discharged from the bottom of the bubble tower, and hydrogen sulfide-depleted gas is discharged from the top.
US09050553B2
Disclosed herein are embodiments of a rotary gas separation device, such as a rotary pressure swing adsorption device. The rotary pressure swing device can include, for example, a rotor with a plurality of adsorber elements, a stator with a plurality of conduits, and a rotary valve comprising a seal assembly positioned between the rotor and the stator.
US09050552B2
A filtration system particularly suited for removing a particulate material from a hot gas includes a housing, a collection system including at least one collection belt, a cleaning system to clean the collected particulate material from the at least one collection belt, and a removal system for removing the collected particulate material from the housing.
US09050551B2
A method of removing contaminants from a gas stream utilizing a supersonic venturi including a converging section, a throat, and a diverging section is provided. A contaminated gas stream and a scrubbing liquid stream are introduced into the converging section, thereby forming a mixed stream which experiences choked flow upon exiting. The choked mixed stream is introduced into the throat section wherein the scrubbing liquid is contacted with the contaminated gas stream. The contaminated scrubbing liquid stream is removed from the supersonic venture scrubber, and an essentially pure gas stream is removed from the diverging section. A flow modification device may be introduced into the throat section. The flow modification device may be either axially or radially adjustable in order to effect the atomization of the scrubbing liquid and/or the contacting of atomized scrubbing liquid with the contaminated gas stream within the throat section.
US09050549B2
A filter arrangement may include a housing having two front walls substantially extended on both sides of a housing center plane and a circumferential wall connecting the front walls. The housing may include an untreated space inlet and a clean space outlet. A filter insert may be arranged between the inlet and the outlet and include two bottom discs that are adjacent to the side walls in the assembled state of the filter insert. The filter insert may include a filter wall extending between and connecting the bottom discs. The filter wall may extend substantially orthogonal to the housing center plane. A lateral disc may define an opening configured to be tightly connected to at least one of the inlet and the outlet. The front walls may be coupled to the bottom discs in the assembled state of the filter insert through interacting profile parts arranged on at least one of the front walls and the bottom discs into a double wall.
US09050545B1
In embodiments, an aqueous solution containing lixiviants and/or other chemicals and/or reagents may be delivered into the well through one or more conduits or pipes. The chemicals in the aqueous solution may further be mixed together and/or with other ingredients. The solution may thereafter be screened and delivered by being pumped to pressures required for delivery of the solution from a perforated well, deep into a heap leach pad to leach, re-leach, and/or rinse extracted components of interest, such as metals for recovery. The delivery method may open or stimulate new fluid pathways or channels by lifting and mobilizing materials in the heap, thereby creating new channels, and allowing fluid to travel substantially horizontally through the heap to interface with inventory metal for recovery. The system may include a mobile platform assembled near or at the vicinity of the injection well.
US09050543B2
A bubble-producing device includes a container for receiving a quantity of a bubble-forming liquid to a desired liquid level in the container; a bubble-forming loop moveable within the container to a lower position below the desired liquid level so as to be submerged in the liquid when received within the container, or to an upper position emerged from the liquid; and a controlled gas supply system for controlling the introduction of a gas (e.g. air) into the container effective: (a) first to move the bubble-forming loop from its lower position submerged in the bubble-forming liquid, to its upper position emerged from the bubble-forming liquid; and then (b) to discharge gas through the bubble-forming loop and thereby to produce a bubble therein. Embodiments are described wherein the bubbles are produced at a distance to serve as targets for a water gun, and wherein bubbles of different colors are produced.
US09050539B2
A method and apparatus is shown to allow expanded control capability for devices on and attached to a model railroad layout. Included is the capability for track section occupancy detection for one or more track sections, employing a switched impedance occupancy detection method, simultaneously allowing; transponding location and/or data feedback detection and intelligent power management, and/or autoreversing methods in the same device, and further providing for this encoded detection and power state information to be communicated to a layout control and monitoring system. Additional capability is to display on the local device or remote indicator lights and/or aural alarms any user selectable device state information by employing a recognizable and predefined indication pattern.
US09050536B2
A communication game system includes a plurality of game apparatuses which are able to wirelessly communicate with each other. Each of the game apparatus registers identifying information of an opponent obtained by a short-distance wireless communication or by user's manual input in a friend list. Thereafter, the game apparatus connects to the Internet, and inquires whether it is possible to communicate with an opponent in the friend list over the network. If it is possible to communicate, the game apparatus obtains an address of the opponent to make a network communication. Even if a user makes a short distance wireless communication with a friend to exchange and register the identifying information or registers the friend by hand and then is parted from the friend, the user can safely communicate with the friend across the network without being exposed to unknown players. In a case that an additional opponent is to be added to the multiplayer game session, one of the participants transmits identifying information to introduce the communication opponents to each other. The game apparatuses introduced to each other make a communication over a network, and add the identifying information of the opponents to the friend list, if necessary.
US09050535B2
A method of implementing challenges in single-player games starts with a server receiving a challenge from a first mobile device and transmitting the challenge to a second mobile device. The challenge may include a high score or an achievement of a single-player game obtained on the first mobile device. The server may determine that a new high score is obtained on the second mobile device that is equal or greater than the high score included in the challenge or that the achievement is completed on the second mobile device. The server may then transmit a notification to the first mobile device that the challenge has been completed. If the server determines that the new high score is obtained, the notification may include a new challenge from the second mobile device to the first mobile device and the new challenge may include the new high score. Other embodiments are also described.
US09050525B2
An information processing program is provided, which is executed by a computer of an information processing apparatus that executes predetermined processing based on acceleration data outputted from an input device including an acceleration sensor for detecting acceleration. The information processing program causes the computer to function as data obtaining means, change amount calculation means, and gravity direction calculation means. The data obtaining means repeatedly obtains the acceleration data. The change amount calculation means calculates, by using a history of acceleration indicated by the acceleration data, a change amount of acceleration generated in the input device. The gravity direction calculation means calculates a direction of gravity of the input device by using the acceleration indicated by the acceleration data, based on the change amount of the acceleration.
US09050522B2
A method of managing a card game, a computer implementation thereof, and a card game kit are disclosed. In the method, a plurality of cards are dealt in one or more rounds to a plurality of players, each player receiving one or more cards in each round, with each card bearing a designated value and suit. The values and suits of the cards dealt are recorded in each round. Those values and suits are then revealed to the players during one or more of the rounds to enable the players to wager or withdraw from the game.
US09050516B2
A ball tee for batting practice has a base assembly including a base, a post cup pivotally attached to the base, and at least one spring biasing the post cup into an upright position. A post assembly has a lower end inserted into the post cup. The spring causes the post assembly to return to the upright position after the post assembly is struck and deflected by a bat. The base assembly may include a base plate, a spring bracket attached to the base plate, and an axle extending through the spring bracket, through the spring, and through an axle hole in the post cup. The post assembly may have two or more tubes that allow the height of the post assembly to be telescopically adjusted.
US09050514B1
The martial arts training dummy is an anthropomorphic mannequin formed of substantially solid resilient material, such as rubber or plastic, and having a specific gravity approximating that of the human body. The limbs at the shoulders, hips, and knees are pivotally attached to their adjacent components, the joints having sufficient friction to hold a set position after adjustment. The training dummy is devoid of external support and, while being incapable of standing erect, it may be positioned on hands and knees or on its back for practicing various ground moves and holds in various martial arts. The upper arms, thighs, and lower trunk are hollow and have springs installed therein. The springs have bending resistances approximately equal to the forces required to break bones of the corresponding areas of the human body. A limb suffering a simulated breakage will return to its original position without damage for continued practice.
US09050512B2
A method and system to analyze sports motions using the motion sensors of a mobile device, such as a smart phone, is provided. This method uses the mobile device motion sensor output to define the impact point with a virtual object, such as a golf ball, baseball or tennis ball. The motion sensor signature of the sports motion is analyzed for characteristics, specific to each type of sports motion. A method is disclosed using multiple sensors outputs in a mobile device to compute the impact point with a virtual object, such as a golf ball, baseball, tennis ball. Further, a method is disclosed where moving virtual sports objects interact with virtual sports motions and the responsive outputs are displayed on the mobile device and/or any Web-enabled display device.
US09050507B2
Golf club heads are releasably engaged with shafts so that the club heads and shafts can be readily interchanged and/or so that the shaft position with respect to the club head can be readily changed. Assemblies for connecting the club head and shaft may include: a shaft adapter, a collet, a ferrule, and a club head having an interior chamber. The club head and shaft may be changed by releasing the securing system and exchanging the original parts with different parts.
US09050503B2
A golf utility tool that may be attachable to a golf club. The golf utility tool may include a clip that may be used to clip to a putter. The golf utility tool may further include a divot tool prong and a ball marker that is removably attached. The golf utility tool may further include a loop cutout for carrying other devices, such as a towel.
US09050502B1
A golf ball comprising a core comprising an inner core center and an outer core layer disposed over the inner core center. An inner mantle layer is disposed over the core, an outer mantle is disposed over the inner mantle layer, and a cover is disposed over the outer mantle. The golf ball preferably has a core compression ratio of greater than 150.
US09050493B2
The resistance band exercise station disclosed here is a modular hooking system used to perform a myriad of exercises with various exercise tools that require anchoring such as standard resistance bands, suspension straps and stretch straps. The resistance band exercise station includes multiple components: one or more lower units each having column(s) of vertically spaced safety hooks for exercises performed at various heights, from the ankle to eye level, and an upper unit having one or more safety hooks used for exercises performed above the head. The multiple lower and upper units are wall mounted in varying heights. The safety hooks are used to anchor resistance bands, suspension straps and stretch straps from one or multiple points. The safety hooks are open-loop hooks having a barrier member such as a T-bar at the tip to prevent the straps from slipping out.
US09050492B2
Machine for exercising the core muscles having a swiveling seat mounted on a base for receiving a person in a reclined position with his legs and torso extending in opposite directions, a pad for supporting the upper portion of the torso while the legs are swung back and forth in a horizontal direction, resilient means connected to the seat for resisting the swinging of the legs, and handles on opposite sides of the seat in position to be gripped by the person while he is swinging his legs.
US09050491B2
An exercise device for performing a variety of movement patterns is provided, having upper right and left leg links pivotally mounted to lower right and left leg links respectively. The upper leg links are pivotally coupled to the frame. A foot support is provided on the distal end of the lower leg links. The device includes first and second transfer systems for coordinating movement of the right and left sets of upper and lower leg links. The first transfer system is movably coupled to the frame and includes a first transfer member coupled to the first upper leg link, a second transfer member coupled to the second upper leg link, and a pivot bar pivotally mounted to the frame between a first end and a second end thereof with the first end coupled to the first transfer member and the second end coupled to the second transfer member.
US09050490B2
A rehabilitation mechanism includes a supporting base having a seat member, a frame member is mounted on the supporting base and includes two protrusions each having a pivot shaft, two handle members and two foot supports are pivotal attached to the pivot shaft, and a latch device includes two catch members slidably attached to the handle members and each catch member includes one end for selectively locking the handle member to the frame member and for preventing the handle member from being rotated relative to the frame member, and the catch members each include another end for selectively locking the handle member to the foot support and for allowing the handle member and the foot support to be rotated relative to the frame member altogether.
US09050481B2
A decontaminating system (100) comprising a decontaminant reservoir (152), a transport fluid source (160) and a mist generating apparatus (10). The mist generating apparatus (10) has a longitudinal axis and comprises a first fluid passage (38) having a first fluid inlet (18) in fluid communication with the decontaminant reservoir (152) and a first fluid outlet (84), and a second fluid passage (90) having a second fluid inlet (20) in fluid communication with the transport fluid source (160) and a second fluid outlet (94). The first passage (38) surrounds the second fluid passage (90) and the first and second outlets (84, 94) are oriented relative to one another such that they have an angle of incidence between (5) and (30) degrees. The second fluid passage (90) includes a throat portion (92) located between the second fluid inlet (20) and the second fluid outlet (94), the throat portion (92) having a smaller cross sectional area than that of either the second fluid inlet (20) or second fluid outlet (94).
US09050477B2
The present invention related to cosmetic compositions comprising oridonin and new cosmetic uses. Oridonin is used for fighting the signs of cutaneous aging and for slimming. A composition comprising a combination of oridonin and darutigenol or a derivative thereof, in particular darutoside, is disclosed together with the cosmetic use of such composition.
US09050475B2
Methods and composition for the protection of an object from UV light are provided. For example, in certain aspects, the composition can include a plurality of photo stabilizers that enhance SPF values of the composition. Furthermore, the invention provides for the use of the compositions.
US09050472B2
A neurostimulation system includes a neural stimulation lead having a proximal portion and a distal portion and including a plurality of electrodes along the distal portion. The plurality of electrodes are configured for positioning proximate a portion of the autonomic nervous system. A neural stimulation circuit, coupled to the plurality of electrodes, delivers neural stimulation pulses to the plurality of electrodes. A processor and controller is configured to control the neural stimulation circuit to deliver first neural stimulation pulses to each of a plurality of electrode configurations. Each electrode configuration includes one or more of the plurality of electrodes. The processor and controller is further configured to receive information related to motor fiber activity that is induced in response to delivery of the first neural stimulation pulses to each of the plurality of electrode configurations and to identify the electrode configurations that induce the motor fiber activity.
US09050471B2
The disclosure provides a system that displays a posture state indication to a user. A posture state indication represents the current posture state of the patient, which may be a combination of patient posture and activity. As a patient changes posture and activity throughout a daily routine, a posture state detector may generate a posture state value that may be used to categorize the patient's posture or posture and activity level as one of multiple posture states used to adjust therapy. The posture state may be associated with one of multiple posture state indications that may be presented to the patient. The posture state indication shows the patient the posture state currently detected by the posture state detector. The posture state indication may help the patient to effectively monitor therapy changes due to automatic, semi-automatic or patient-directed therapy adjustments made as a function of posture state.
US09050464B2
A method and a multichannel implantable device are described for partial or complete restoration of impaired gastrointestinal motility, or for disturbing and/or partially or completely blocking normal gastrointestinal motility using one or multiple microsystem-controlled channels of circumferentially arranged sets of two or more electrodes which provide externally-invoked synchronized electrical signals to the smooth muscles via the neural pathways.
US09050457B2
An implantable electrical lead includes a lead body and a multi-layer coil conductor extending within the lead body. The multi-layer coil conductor includes a first coil layer and a second coil layer disposed about the first coil layer. The first and second coil layers are configured such that the multi-layer coil conductor has an axial stiffness substantially equal to an axial stiffness of the lead body adjacent to the multi-layer coil conductor.
US09050444B2
The present invention relates to a nano-enhanced device for substance transfer between the device and a tissue. The device comprises a substrate with substantially aligned carbon nanotubes anchored within the substrate, and with at least one end of the carbon nanotubes protruding from the substrate. The protruding nanotube ends may be coated with a drug for delivery of the drug into body tissue. The present invention may be incorporated into an angioplasty catheter balloon or into a patch that is worn on the skin. The carbon nanotubes can be grouped in clusters to effectively form nano-needles which can transfer fluid to or from the subdermal tissue. The nano-needles can be used in conjunction with a sensor to ascertain body fluid information such as pH, glucose level, etc.
US09050434B2
The invention relates in general to a respiratory therapy device, and more specifically to an apparatus and method for providing continuous positive airway pressure therapy that may be connected to a small-volume nebulizer in order to provide a combination therapy that requires only a single source of gas. The apparatus of the invention includes a valveless patient interface and a source of pressurized gas which may be split into two streams to provide both continuous positive airway pressure therapy as well as aerosol therapy to a patient.
US09050431B2
A device for dispensing a medium is disclosed. The device comprises an elongated body including a chamber for containing a medium and an outlet through which the medium exits the device into an oral or nasal opening. A dispensing system selectively places the chamber and the outlet in communication, causing medium to flow out of the device.
US09050430B2
The present invention provides a kit comprising a unibody auscultation interface for use with mechanical ventilation or intubation, formed from a single contiguous nonmetallic piece, the piece being shaped into a cylindrical member having opposing ends respectively adapted to frictionally connect to the external end of an endotracheal tube and either the stem of a Y piece or the patient end of a common conduit, the cylindrical member having an opening in its wall, the perimeter of which seamlessly elaborates a flared turret whose roof is adapted for non-adherent contact with the chest piece of a stethoscope; and, packaging means for enclosing the auscultation interface aseptically. The present invention additionally provides an endotracheal tube, Y piece, breathing circuit and mechanical ventilation system incorporating the auscultation interface.
US09050421B2
The invention relates to a calculation and control system for the determination of the state of a vascular access of a patient intended to follow successive sessions of extracorporeal blood treatment by extraction and return of the blood via the vascular access, the system comprising: means for determining the value of at least one hemodynamic extracorporeal parameter of the patient for at least two sessions; means for determining the value of the purification effectiveness of the treatment for at least two sessions; programmed means for determining a risk score relating to the state of the vascular access of the patient as a function of at least two values of the hemodynamic extracorporeal parameter and of at least two determined values of the purification effectiveness.
US09050420B2
A device and method for monitoring an access to a patient for an extracorporeal blood treatment apparatus with an extracorporeal blood circuit are described, as well as an extracorporeal blood treatment apparatus with a device for monitoring the vascular access. The device and method are based on the monitoring of a characteristic property of the blood, in particular the concentration of haemoglobin in the blood flowing in the arterial blood line of extracorporeal blood circuit I of an extracorporeal blood treatment apparatus A. In the event of an incorrect vascular access, the flow conditions change in the communicating intra- and extracorporeal blood circulation system. These changes in the flow conditions can be detected as a change in the haemoglobin concentration. A disconnection of venous puncture cannula for the patient access is ascertained by a reduction in the haemoglobin concentration in the blood in arterial blood line.
US09050416B2
A needle safety device includes a sleeve having proximal and distal portions separated by a radially-inwardly projecting ledge. A ring in the proximal portion is movable between a first position spaced from the ledge, and a second position adjacent to or abutting the ledge. A shield with at least one radially deformable tab receives the syringe and is movable in the sleeve between an initial position with the tab adjacent to or abutting the ledge, an injection position with the tab spaced from the ledge, and a protection position with the tab located distally from the ledge. The tab, during movement between initial and injection positions, deforms inwardly and traverses the inner surface of the ring, and during movement between injection and protection positions, translates with the ring from the first to the second position, and subsequently deforms inwardly and traverses the inner surface of the ring and the ledge.
US09050412B2
A dialysis apparatus includes a housing; a first electrical contact carried by the housing; a hydrogel material located within the housing; a second electrical contact connected to the hydrogel material, the hydrogel material located so as to be contacted by a liquid flowing through the housing; and wherein the hydrogel material expands as the material absorbs the liquid such that the second electrical contact is moved and eventually engage the first electrical contact.
US09050406B2
A device for delivering fluid to a user includes a housing, a drive motor assembly in the housing, a force sensor, and an electronics module. The drive motor assembly regulates delivery of fluid by actuating a piston of a fluid reservoir, and the force sensor generates output levels in response to force imparted thereto during, for example, fluid delivery operations. The electronics module processes the output levels of the force sensor to assess the operating health of the force sensor, to check for occlusions in the fluid delivery path, and to monitor the seating status of the fluid reservoir.
US09050398B2
Disclosed herein are several embodiments of a reduced pressure appliance and methods of using the same in the treatment of wounds. Some embodiments are directed to improved fluidic connectors or suction adapters for connecting to a wound site, for example using softer, kink-free conformable suction adapters. Certain embodiments are directed to connectors used to connect fluid passage tube used in transmitting negative pressure to a fabric channel used in a suction adapter.
US09050395B2
A method for manufacturing a medical product comprising a hollow body (2), wherein at least part of a wall of the hollow body (2) is coated at least on the inside with a layer comprising a polymer; at least the part of at least the inside of the wall of the medical product is brought into contact with a mixture (6) of the polymer and the polymer is deposited from the mixture (6) on at least the part of the inside of the wall. And a medical product comprising a hollow body (2) with a wall consisting of one or more structural elements (16), at least a section of the wall being coated with a layer (15) comprising native chitosan, wherein both on the inside and the outside of the hollow body (2) at least some of the one or more structural elements (16) of the wall of the hollow body (2) are at least partly coated with the native chitosan layer (15). And a method for electrodepositing a polymer on an electrode from an acidic mixture of the polymer, wherein the mixture (6) comprises a multibasic acid.
US09050390B2
A kneadable and moldable bone-replacement material includes a mixture of calcium-containing ceramic particles and a hydrogel or a substance which can be swelled into a hydrogel. The ceramic particles are of fully synthetic origin and the individual ceramic particles have a structure which is at least partially cohesive and porous. In addition, the majority of the ceramic particles have a non-spheric shape.
US09050389B2
A medical implant comprises a biodegradable magnesium-based alloy of which at least a part of its surface layer comprises a magnesium carbonate. A method for the manufacture of a biocompatible, corrosion-inhibiting protective surface layer on a medical implant comprising a magnesium-based alloy, comprises: providing an implant comprising a magnesium-based alloy to be coated; placing the implant into a reactor chamber; exposing at least part of the surface of said implant to an atmosphere comprising humid carbon dioxide to produce a coating on the surface of the implant comprising a magnesium carbonate of the formula x MgCO3.y Mg (OH)2, whereby x+y=1; removing the implant from the reactor chamber; and drying the surface of the implant.
US09050380B2
The device for presenting a given fragrance comprises a presenting rod (10) in a confining enclosure (20), this confining enclosure comprising a collar (21) and this presenting rod comprising a porous portion (11) loaded with this fragrance and designed to fit through this collar, and another portion forming a head (12) suitable for grasping and designed to close this collar in a rest configuration such that the porous portion is, inside this confining enclosure, in a region where the fragrance exists in the gaseous state only, the constituent materials of the presenting rod underneath the head and those of the confining enclosure having no smell of their own.
US09050378B2
The invention provides, in a general sense, a new labeling strategy employing compounds that are N2S2 chelates conjugated to a targeting ligand, wherein the targeting ligand is a disease cell cycle targeting compound, a tumor angiogenesis targeting ligand, a tumor apoptosis targeting ligand, a disease receptor targeting ligand, amifostine, angiostatin, monoclonal antibody C225, monoclonal antibody CD31, monoclonal antibody CD40, capecitabine, a COX-2 inhibitor, deoxycytidine, fullerene, herceptin, human serum albumin, lactose, leuteinizing hormone, pyridoxal, quinazoline, thalidomide, transferrin, or trimethyl lysine. The present invention also pertains to kits employing the compounds of interest, and methods of assessing the pharmacology of an agent of interest using the present compounds.
US09050371B2
The present invention relates to the field of diabetes. More particularly, the invention relates to PEGylated insulin lispro compounds that are PEGylated with high molecular weight poly(ethylene glycol), are highly soluble at physiological pH, have an extended duration of action, and characterized by pharmacokinetic, pharmacodynamic, and/or activity peak-trough ratios of less than 2. The invention also relates to methods of providing such molecules, to pharmaceutical compositions containing them, and to their therapeutic uses.
US09050352B2
The present invention discloses immunomodulating compositions. More particularly, the present invention discloses compositions comprising an immune-modulating agent and a lectin-interactive agent, which are useful for stimulating and prolonging host immune cell responses. The compositions of the present invention are particularly useful in the treatment and/or prophylaxis of a range of conditions including pathogenic infections, autoimmune diseases, transplant rejection, graft versus host disease, allergies, inflammatory disease, as well as cancers and tumours.
US09050349B2
Bile acids and related compositions and methods of synthesis and use. More specifically, deoxycholic acid and related compositions, said compositions being free of all moieties of animal origin and free of pyrogenic moieties.
US09050348B2
A transdermal drug delivery device is disclosed. Over an extended wear period, the device causes cumulative moderate irritation plus significant irritation of less than 5% and/or achieves a meaningful degree of detachment over a seven day period of less than 20%.
US09050344B2
Compounds of formula I: or pharmaceutically acceptable salts thereof are disclosed. Also disclosed are pharmaceutical compositions comprising a compound of formula I, processes for preparing compounds of formula I, intermediates useful for preparing compounds of formula I and therapeutic methods for treating a Retroviridae viral infection including an infection caused by the HIV virus.
US09050341B2
Methods employing and uses of a compound of formula (I) in inhibiting the growth of a tumor cell in a subject in need thereof. Methods employing and uses of a compound of formula (I) in treating pancreatic cancer in a subject in need of treatment for pancreatic cancer. Methods employing and uses of a compound of formula (I) in treating HER-2 positive breast cancer in a subject in need of treatment for HER-2 positive breast cancer. Methods employing and uses of a compound of formula (I) in treating drug resistant non-small cell lung cancer in a subject in need of treatment for drug resistant non-small cell lung cancer. Each of these methods can include administering to the subject an effective amount of a compound of formula (I) or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt thereof.Method of manufacturing a medicament including a compound of formula (I) for treating a subject suffering from growth of a tumor cell; for treating a subject suffering from pancreatic cancer; for treating a subject suffering from HER-2 positive breast cancer; or for treating a subject suffering from drug resistant non-small cell lung cancer.
US09050338B2
An L2/L1 microemulsion composition comprising water, a compound of formula (I) wherein R1 is a straight or branched alkyl group containing 8 to 16 carbon atoms at the 2- or 3-position of the morpholino ring, and R2 is a straight or branched alkyl group containing 2 to 10 carbon atoms, substituted with a hydroxy group except in the alpha-position, and a salt of a compound of formula (I).
US09050334B2
The invention relates to MIF inhibitors; compositions comprising an effective amount of a MIF inhibitor; and methods for treating or preventing diseases associated with MIF.
US09050326B2
The present invention relates to a pharmaceutical composition containing a solid dispersion comprising an amide derivative or a salt thereof and a water-soluble polymer, wherein the pharmaceutical composition is not prepared by a melting method. The pharmaceutical composition contains the solid dispersion having an improved oral absorption, properties suitable for formulation, and an excellent stability.
US09050323B2
Use of at least one transferrin, preferably lactoferrin, for preventing and/or treating destructive inflammation affecting mucous membranes, optionally associated with states of hypoferremia and/or anemia and/or acute and chronic infections. The destructive inflammation is caused, for example, by pathological conditions during pregnancy and by infections sustained by intracellular or adhered or biofilm-protected pathogens. The action of the transferrins described here is achieved by means of their topical and/or oral administration. A combined preparation for simultaneous, sequential or separate use is also described which comprises, as active components, a first composition for topical administration of at least one transferrin and a second composition for oral administration of at least one transferrin.
US09050320B2
Methods and products for modulating the lymphoid system, especially intestinal homeostasis between intestinal lymphoid tissues and gut flora using ligands for NOD1 and/or CCR6.
US09050317B2
Certain embodiments disclosed herein relate to compositions, methods, devices, systems, and products regarding frozen particles. In certain embodiments, the frozen particles include materials at low temperatures. In certain embodiments, the frozen particles provide vehicles for delivery of particular agents. In certain embodiments, the frozen particles are administered to at least one biological tissue.
US09050315B2
The present invention provides a therapeutic approach to maintain and expand HSCs in vivo using currently available medications that target GSK-3 and mTOR. The present invention also provides a system and method for the ex vivo culturing of HSCs, where an mTOR inhibitor is combined with a GSK-3 inhibitor within the culturing conditions.
US09050314B2
Embodiments of the present invention provide processes for preparing thymus extracts and plant or fungal extracts, and more particularly provide compositions (Thyex-1-6A and -6B) produced in accordance with said processes, and methods for treatment of various conditions comprising administration of said compositions including but not limited to arthritis and/or arthritis-related conditions, including: gout, rheumatoid arthritis (RA), osteoarthritis (OA), and pseudogout, and/or inflammation resulting from any of the conditions Additional aspects provide methods for combination or adjunctive therapies (with anti-inflammatories, etc.). Methods to modulate immune response are also encompassed.
US09050313B2
The invention is directed to ginseng fractions and methods for activating innate and adaptive immune responses to prevent, treat or ameliorate a condition in a subject by administering to the subject an effective amount of a ginseng traction, a pharmaceutical composition comprising the fraction in combination with another medicament or with one or more pharmaceutically acceptable carriers, or a food item comprising the fraction. The fraction may be made from Panax quinquefolius or may be selected from CVT-E002, PQ2, PQ223 and purified fractions from CVT-E002, PQ2, and PQ223.
US09050306B2
The present invention relates to oxaloacetate compounds that activate AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK), including the preparation of the compounds, compositions containing the compounds, preserving said compounds and the use of the compounds in the prevention or treatment of disorders such as diabetes, metabolic syndrome, obesity, cardiovascular disease, Alzheimer's disease, and cancer.
US09050300B2
The present invention relates to the clinical application of BBP, alone or in combination with other growth factors, for use in bone healing applications, such as spinal surgery. Additional applications include use in orthopedic implantable prostheses and implantation into other surgical sites (e.g., surgical reconstruction, regional osteopenia, etc.) where bone is desired.
US09050294B2
Compounds, methods, uses, compositions, kits and packages for the prevention and/or treatment of neural injury or a neurodegenerative disease, based on the use of a retinoic acid derivative, such as fenretinide, and/or analogs, derivatives, prodrugs, precursors thereof, and/or salts thereof, are described.
US09050292B2
Provided herein are methods for treating conditions associated with a chemosensory receptor, including diabetes, obesity, and other metabolic diseases, disorders or conditions by administrating a composition comprising a chemosensory receptor ligand, such as a bitter receptor ligand. Also provided herein are chemosensory receptor ligand compositions, including bitter receptor ligand compositions, and methods for the preparation thereof for use in the methods of the present invention. Also provided herein are compositions comprising metformin and salts thereof and methods of use.
US09050289B2
A composition of an antitussive, a decongestant, or an antihistamine to treat respiratory and oral pharyngeal congestion and related symptoms in a patient.
US09050285B2
The invention encompasses a recombinant bacterium capable of eliciting an immune response against Streptococcus pneumoniae, a vaccine comprising the bacterium, and methods of using the bacterium.
US09050281B2
The present invention discloses a vaccine that provides protection from coccidiosis, and methods of making and using the vaccine alone, or in combination with other protective agents.
US09050280B2
A real-time method of detecting the presence and/or amount of a methylated or unmethylated gene of interest in a DNA-containing sample, comprises the steps of: (a) contacting the DNA-containing sample with a reagent which selectively modifies unmethylated cytosine residues in the DNA to produce detectable modified residues but which does not modify methylated cytosine residues (b) amplifying at least a portion of the methylated or unmethylated gene of interest using at least one primer pair, at least one primer of which is designed to bind only to the sequence of methylated or unmethylated DNA following treatment with the reagent, wherein at least one primer in the primer pair produces a detectable fluorescence signal during amplification which is detected in real-time (c) quantifying the results of the real-time detection against a standard curve for the methylated or unmethylated gene of interest to produce an output of gene copy number.
US09050278B2
An object of the present invention is to provide a scavenger of in vivo harmful reactive oxygen species and/or free radicals, which is capable of effectively reducing the concentrations of in vivo reactive oxygen species and/or free radicals and exhibiting given effects such as the suppression of aging process, the prevention of geriatric or lifestyle-related disease, health promotion, and the inhibition of oxidative stress by virtue of this reduction in the concentrations of reactive oxygen species and/or free radicals. The scavenger of in vivo harmful reactive oxygen species and/or free radicals of the present invention comprises a liquid or gas comprising at least a hydrogen molecule. This medium may further comprise an oxygen molecule. Furthermore, this medium may comprise water or an aqueous solution or may be a gas. The scavenger of reactive oxygen species and/or free radicals can be used in the treatment or prevention of a disorder attributed to reactive oxygen species and/or free radicals.
US09050276B2
The invention discloses biomarkers for human autism. The invention provides methods for treating, preventing, and diagnosing human autism and autism-related disorders.
US09050265B2
Provided herein is a method of treating, preventing, or managing osteolysis in a subject, comprising administering to the subject a therapeutically effective amount of vitamin C, or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt, solvate, or hydrate thereof, in combination with vitamin K, or a single enantiomer, a mixture of enantiomers, or a mixture of diastereomers thereof, or a pharmaceutically acceptable salt, solvate, or hydrate thereof.
US09050264B2
Disclosed are cellulose capsules, methods for preparing a cellulose capsule, and compositions comprising cellulose capsules, including sustained- or controlled-release dosage forms comprising cellulose capsules.
US09050263B2
Single oral solid dosage form comprising an immediate release first dosage composition having at least two antibiotic agents and a delayed release second dosage composition having a proton pump inhibitor are provided herein. The single oral solid dosage form according to some aspects of the invention can be used for the treatment of disorders associated with infection by H. pylori or the prevention of recurrence of disorders associated with infection by H. pylori.
US09050256B2
The invention relates to an oral dosage form, comprising at least one biologically active agent, formulation auxiliary substances and magnetizable particles, wherein the dosage form has an at least two phase composition, wherein the phases can dissolve in the body after oral administration due to their formulation and the magnetizable particles are bound in formulation auxiliary substances and are present in a magnetized state, wherein the magnetized particles are present in at least two phases of the dosage form and generate magnetic fields, wherein these phases dissolve at different times in the body after oral administration, and wherein the magnetic field strength with respect to time, position and movement in the body is acquired using a detection system and can be evaluated using a computer-based evaluation system.
US09050250B2
The invention provides an oral care composition suitable for delivering a temporary whitening effect to the surface of teeth, the composition comprising: a continuous phase comprising water or polyhydric alcohol or a mixture thereof; a tooth surface whitening agent which is dispersed in the continuous phase, and a deposition aid for the tooth surface whitening agent; characterized in that the tooth surface whitening agent is a pearlescent pigment in an amount of at least 0.1% by weight based on the total weight of the composition, the pearlescent pigment being formed by coating one or more metal oxide layers onto particles of an inorganic substrate.
US09050244B2
A consumable pacifier for an infant is provided herein. The invention provides a consumable gelatinous nipple where the gelatinous nipple may also contain a nutrient. The base of the gelatinous body is trapped between a seat and retainer. A variety of flavors and nutrients may be infused in the consumable gelatinous nipple.
US09050240B2
An adult toy, such as a phallus-shaped vibrator, has a hollow core, a tip coupled to an end of the core and a handle containing a control interface allowing user control of the vibrator. The handle, which is coupled to the core at a distal end to the tip, houses a peristaltic pump that engages a flexible pipe network. The hollow core incorporates an access door that, when opened, allows loading of a reservoir cartridge into an internal compartment of the core. Under selective microprocessor control, the peristaltic pump spins its rotor assembly to engage and squeeze part of the pipe network. This squeezing effect encourages lubricant, liquid hormonal stimulant or other chemical solutions to exit the cartridge and controllably flow through the pipe network. With ejection of lubricant from the cartridge, the internal volume of the cartridge decreases.
US09050232B2
A wheelchair footrest retraction device has been developed to allow wheelchair users to easily retract the footrest and have assistance as they rise from the wheelchair. The device includes a handle that can be rotated by the user from a horizontal to a vertical position where it can then be used to provide support as the user rises from the wheelchair. Rotation of the handle acts to retract the footrest through a series of linkages that transmit force from the handle to the footrest. The device also includes a support post that prevents the wheelchair from tipping forward as the user rises from the wheelchair.
US09050222B2
An incontinence brief for an adult wearer has an absorbent body having a fluid-permeable inner side, a fluid-tight outer side, and an absorbent liner therebetween. The body is subdivided into a central part adapted to fit in a crotch region of the wearer, a rear part connected to the central part and adapted to fit against a rear waist region of the wearer, and a front part adapted to fit against a front waist region of the wearer. Two fastening straps adapted to fit around respective sides of a waist of the wearer each have a rear end secured to the rear part and a front part. At least one of the fasteners is provided between its respective front and rear ends with an elastic layer forming an elastically stretchable region, and each of the fasteners has an outer layer formed by a water-jet consolidated fleece.
US09050217B2
In an incontinence article in pant form, a crotch section is connected to stomach and back sections in respective overlapping regions of the crotch section and the stomach section and the crotch section and the back section, by means of multiple adhesive strips extending spaced apart from one another in a transverse direction of the incontinence article, whereby visually and/or tactilely perceivable structures are formed on the outer visible side of the incontinence article in the respective overlapping regions, which structures correspond in their course to a course of the adhesive strips.
US09050206B2
Described herein are flexible implantable occluding devices that can, for example, navigate the tortuous vessels of the neurovasculature. The occluding devices can also conform to the shape of the tortuous vessels of the vasculature. In some embodiments, the occluding devices can direct blood flow within a vessel away from an aneurysm or limit blood flow to the aneurysm. Some embodiments describe methods and apparatus for adjusting, along a length of the device, the porosity of the occluding device. In some embodiments, the occluding devices allows adequate blood flow to be provided to adjacent structures such that those structures, whether they are branch vessels or oxygen-demanding tissues, are not deprived of the necessary blood flow.
US09050200B2
A Brain Machine Interface (BMI) agent (110) is provided, that when operatively coupled to a subject during a mental task by the subject to control a prosthetic device (130), monitors one or more states (125) of neural activity of the subject, receives feedback associated with a behavior of the prosthetic device responsive to the control, learns a functional mapping between the mental task and the behavior in view of the feedback, and applies at least one control action (115) to the prosthetic device in accordance with the learning to control the prosthetic device for a targeted behavior.
US09050187B2
A tissue plication device and method of using the same is described. The tissue plication device includes a helical fastener having a distal portion with a first pitch and a proximal portion with a second pitch that is smaller than the first pitch. The method includes introducing the distal tip of the helical fastener into the tissue and advancing the helical fastener to plicate the tissue. Another tissue plication device includes a helical fastener having a first configuration with a first pitch and a second configuration with a second pitch. The helical fastener in the first configuration is advanced into a tissue and then converted to the second configuration by applying a stimulus.
US09050184B2
A soft breast prosthesis is provided, the prosthesis having a surface configuration advantageous for dual plane placement of the prosthesis in a breast.
US09050181B2
A stent arrangement which has at least a first ring (3) and zig zag struts (5) extending axially from the periphery of the ring. There can be first and second rings (3, 4) axially spaced apart and defining substantially parallel planes and a plurality of zig zag portions (5) between the first and second ring portions around the periphery thereof. The stent can be formed from a single wire or laser cut from a cannula and can be covered or uncovered.
US09050175B2
A treatment pad for applying heat, cooling or an antiseptic fluid to a subject's body surface incorporates a heat transfer member or a wound treatment member that is adapted to be held in place by application of a vacuum pressure. The heat transfer member may comprise an electrical resistance wire arranged in a serpentine pattern within a housing or, alternatively, may comprise interconnected heat transmissive tubing through which either a heated or a cooled fluid may be made to pass. Alternatively, the pad may contain a gel that can be cooled in a refrigerator or heated in a microwave oven and held in place on the subject's body by application of a vacuum to the assembly. The wound treatment member may comprise a gaseous antiseptic delivery pad held in place on the patient's body by use of a vacuum.
US09050174B2
A deflation catheter device, comprising: a catheter tube having a proximal end and a distal end; a stylet disposed within the catheter tube; a stylet handle attached to the stylet; and a y-connector disposed near a proximal end of the catheter tube, configured to provide fluid communication from the distal end of the catheter tube and a suction port, and configured to provide access for the stylet from the proximal end of the catheter tube to the distal end of the catheter tube.
US09050171B2
A medical instrument is disclosed, comprising a tubular member with proximal and distal ends. The distal end of the tubular member provides an elongated section having a substantially constant outside diameter of no more than 23-gauge (about 0.57 mm). The tubular member is in energy communication with an emulsification energy source disposed to deliver emulsification energy at the distal end of the tubular member. The tubular member may also be in suction communication with a suction source disposed to deliver suction at the distal end of the tubular member. The medical instrument may be used in a method to remove lens fragments from the eye, through incisions in the eye that are small enough not to require suturing after the operation.
US09050141B2
The present invention includes a pedicle screw made with a bone fastener and a rod coupling head, the rod coupling head comprising an upper rod coupling: the lower rod coupling having a lateral rod opening adapted to receive a permanent rod; an angled bore extends into the lateral rod opening; and a permanent rod fastener in the angled bore to engage a permanent rod in the lateral rod opening; and a upper rod coupling having an upper rod opening adapted to receive a temporary rod, wherein the upper rod opening is formed to receive a temporary rod fastener; wherein the upper rod coupling is detachable from the lower rod coupling at a transition and a temporary rod is temporarily affixed into the upper rod opening during a bone realignment and a permanent rod is positioned in the lateral rod opening and engaged by the permanent rod fastener upon final bone alignment.
US09050140B2
A dynamic stabilization apparatus comprises elongated members mounted within the proximal end of anchoring devices that are placed in adjacent vertebral bodies. A flexible element having elastic properties within the applicable range of loading, for example loads that the spine experiences, is disposed between the proximal ends of the elongated members. At least one additional flexible element is mounted about the proximal ends of the elongated members adjacent the central flexible element. A housing encapsulates the proximal ends of the members such that the flexible element and the additional flexible elements are contained therein. As compressive, tensile, angular, shear and rotational forces are applied to the elongated members the central flexible element and the additional flexible elements interact with the elongated members and the housing to allow for motion of the elongated members.
US09050136B2
An external fixation assembly includes a plurality of hollow pins that are inserted into a patient's bone. Each pin has an interior bore and a plurality of apertures extending through the pin wall from the bore. The pin may be coupled to a source of vacuum pressure operable to create reduced pressure in the tissue surrounding the pin. A cover is placed around the pin and sealed to provide a fluid-tight enclosure that maintains reduced pressure around the pin. A method for applying external fixation using the fixator pins described above includes the steps of inserting each pin through a skin opening, positioning the pin apertures near selected tissue, covering the skin opening with a sealed enclosure, connecting the pins to a source of vacuum pressure, and activating the source of vacuum pressure to create reduced pressure in the patient's tissue at or near the bone.
US09050130B2
A medical infusion device including a chamber characterized by an upper body joined to a lower body by a reversibly collapsible sidewall, affixed to the upper body is a downward extending needle, wherein the upper body having two channels, the first channel fluidly coupled to the needle and the second channel fluidly coupled to the interior of the chamber, further wherein each channel is configured to receive fluid from outside of the chamber, the lower body comprising a pierceable barrier that can be pierced by the needle; wherein the chamber has a collapsed state and an expanded state, the collapsed state characterized as the sidewall being collapsed and the needle piercing entirely through the pierceable barrier, the expanded state characterized as the needle less than entirely piercing through the pierceable barrier and the chamber capable of retaining a fluid.
US09050129B2
A positioning device for providing access to a ventricle of a heart. In one embodiment, the device includes a cup positionable over an apex of the heart and at least a first access valve in the cup for accessing an entry point to the ventricle of the heart.
US09050114B2
The invention relates to a surgical implant (10), and in particular, to a surgical implant for stabilizing a bone fracture (20). The surgical implant (10) comprising a plate (14) and an elongate member (16) projecting from the plate (14). The elongate member (16) is provided for insertion into a bone (32) and the plate (14) is provided for attachment to a surface of a bone (24). Each of the elongate member (16) and the plate (14) are provided with at least one fastening region for fastening the surgical implant (10) to the bone (24, 32).
US09050105B2
A probe, including an insertion tube and an electrode mounted on a distal end of the insertion tube. A force sensor is mounted in the distal end of the insertion tube. The force sensor has a central opening and is configured to measure a force on the distal end. The probe also includes tubing, passing through the central opening, which is configured to supply irrigation fluid through apertures in the electrode.
US09050097B1
Method and device for single-point identification of neural tissue during endoscopic microdiscectomy
A method and device for single-point identification of neural tissue during endoscopic spinal surgery including the use of an electrical switch that accepts separate inputs from a bipolar generator and an electrical nerve stimulator.
US09050091B2
Various endograft assemblies and methods for using the same. In at least one embodiment of an endograft assembly of the present disclosure, the endograft assembly comprises an endograft and a tube defining one or more tube openings coupled to said endograft. In another embodiment of an endograft assembly of the present disclosure, the endograft assembly comprises an endograft, a sponge sheath coupled to the endograft, and a reservoir bag coupled to the sponge sheath, said reservoir bag capable of receiving fluid from the sponge sheath.
US09050090B2
A device and method for facilitating access to a perimeter surface of a body structure is provided. The device includes an elongate flexible member configured to be positioned adjacent the perimeter surface of the body structure, an atraumatic tip positioned at a distal end of the elongate flexible member, and an elongate body. The elongate body has a surface positioned to guide the elongate flexible member and to permit longitudinal movement of the flexible member with respect to the elongate body. The body also has a curved distal portion and a distal end for releasably engaging the atraumatic tip.
US09050087B2
Apparatus and methods are provided for use in sealing a vascular puncture site. The invention comprises an integrated vascular device having a sheath with a closure component and puncture sealant. The closure component is disposed on and advanceable over the exterior of the sheath and may comprise any of a variety of apparatus suited for closing a vascular puncture. Once the closure component has been actuated to close the puncture, sealant is introduced to seal the puncture. The sheath and closure component are then removed from the patient.
US09050084B2
A staple cartridge for use with a surgical stapler can comprise a cartridge deck and a plurality of staples at least partially positioned within the cartridge deck. In various embodiments, the staples can comprise legs which extend upwardly from the deck wherein the deck can further include supports, or guides, which are configured to hold the staple legs in a particular alignment. In at least one such embodiment, the staple legs can extend upwardly from the supports into a tissue thickness compensator.
US09050075B2
A cryosurgical instrument including: a shaft having a closed distal end defining an expansion chamber and an open proximal end adapted and configured to receive an inflow of cryogen and to exhaust a flow of expanded cryogen; and a heat exchanger. The heat exchanger includes: a plurality of cryogen delivery tubes that spiral around a longitudinal axis thereof; and a diffuser having a plurality of branches, each of the branches supplying received cryogen to a respective one of the delivery tubes. The cryogen delivery tubes, where they spiral, are spaced from each other and in fluid tight contact with the inner surface of the shaft so as to form spiraling cryogen exhaust pathways that extend along a portion of a length of the cryosurgical instrument from the distal end of the shaft.
US09050074B2
Improved systems, devices, and methods for delivering cryogenic cooling fluid to cryosurgical probes such as cryosurgical endovascular balloon catheters take advantage of the transients during the initiation and termination of cryogenic fluid flow to moderate the treatment temperatures of tissues engaged by the probe. A flow limiting element along a cryogenic fluid path intermittently interrupts the flow of cooling fluid, often cycling both the fluid flow and treatment temperature. This can maintain the tissue treatment temperature within a predetermined range which is above the treatment temperature provided by a steady flow of cryogenic fluid. In another aspect, room temperature single-use cooling fluid cartridges are filled with a sufficient quantity of cryosurgical fluid to effect a desired endovascular cryosurgical treatment.
US09050071B2
An instrument for taking a tissue sample includes a tissue receiving element with a distal end and a proximal end and at least partly has a spiral or helix that has an outer surface and a central longitudinal axis (X-X′). The spiral or helix has at least has one zone where the distance (dd) from the outer surface to the central longitudinal axis (X-X′) is smaller than at a more proximally located part of the spiral or helix.
US09050067B2
A device for delivering a percutaneous nephrostomy plug is provided. The device comprises a tubular member configured for insertion into a biological body. The device further comprises a handle coupled to a proximal end of the tubular member. The handle comprises a pusher element, an actuation element, and a transmission. The pusher element is disposed within the tubular member, and is configured to deliver a plug through a distal end of the tubular member. The transmission is coupled to the tubular member and the actuation element, and the transmission is configured to cause a retraction of the tubular member relative to the pusher element in response to a depression of the actuation element. A first depression of the actuation element toward the tubular member urges a partial exposure of the plug. A second depression of the actuation element urges a further exposure of the plug.
US09050066B2
A device for closing at least one opening leading to an anatomical cavity is delivered via a catheter positioned in a first opening leading to the anatomical cavity. An orientation control unit, positioned within the anatomical cavity, an orientation of a portion of a tissue surface within the anatomical cavity that is skewed with respect to the first opening and orients a closure member of the device with the tissue surface. An occluding member and a constricting unit are positioned within the anatomical cavity, the occluding member blocking a portion of an opening that is constricted by the constricting unit. An intermediate member of the device is positioned within the anatomical cavity and a closure unit employing at least one piercing element pierces through the intermediate member into a tissue wall surrounding the anatomical cavity.
US09050060B2
An X-ray imaging system that allows X-ray images to be acquired from a desired direction by considering the tilt of a tabletop. The X-ray imaging system includes a support unit that holds an X-ray imaging unit that performs X-ray imaging of a subject. The subject is placed on the tabletop. A memory stores in advance imaging angle information from previous imaging. A tilt detector detects the tilt angle of the tabletop. A calculator calculates a correction angle for correcting the imaging angle information based on the imaging angle information and on the tilt angle. A drive unit moves the support unit to a position based on the imaging angle information and the correction angle.
US09050055B2
A method for determining a patient-specific contrast medium impulse response function includes providing patient-specific test bolus contrast medium behavior data and a number of basic impulse response functions on the basis of a defined test bolus input function. Simulated test bolus contrast medium behavior functions are generated by combining the basic impulse response functions with the test bolus input function. The simulated functions and the patient-specific data are fitted to one another by varying a number of fitting parameters to obtain optimum fitting parameter values, and the patient-specific contrast medium impulse response function is then created based on the basic impulse response functions and the optimum fitting parameter values. A method for predicting a likely contrast medium behavior and a method for controlling a medical imaging system are also described. Additionally a corresponding apparatus, a control device and an imaging system having such a control device are also described.
US09050051B2
There is provided a radiographic imaging device including: a radiation detector including plural radiographic image acquisition pixels that are arranged in a matrix in an imaging region for capturing a radiographic image and that acquire image information representing the radiographic image by converting applied radiation into electric charges and storing the electric charges and plural radiation detection pixels that are arranged in the imaging region, that have mutually different characteristics, and that detect the applied radiation by converting the applied radiation into electric charges and storing the electric charges; and a detecting unit that uses the radiation detection pixels selectively according to the characteristics to detect a state of application of the radiation.
US09050050B2
The invention provides methods and kits for monitoring the status of women's health, including HRT monitoring and determination or diagnosis of ovulation, contraception, pregnancy, menopause, polycystic ovarian disease, and female sexual dysfunction. The method comprises the steps of: (a) collecting a tear fluid from a female human; (b) determining the tear concentration of at least one hormone of relevance to female fertility, sexual differentiation or sexual dysfunction in a female human, wherein the tear concentration is diagnostics of the status of women's health.
US09050044B2
Systems and methods for measuring a physiological parameter of tissue in a patient are provided herein. In a first example, a method of measuring a physiological parameter of blood in a patient is provided. The method includes emitting at least two optical signals for propagation through tissue of the patient, detecting the optical signals after propagation, identifying propagation pathlengths of the optical signals, and identifying detected intensities of the optical signals. The method also includes processing at least the propagation pathlengths to scale the detected intensities for determination of a value of the physiological parameter.
US09050038B2
An ultrasound diagnosis apparatus: in conjunction with change of a projection region using an operation part, changes a viewpoint to a position where a reference cross section is in front and the changed projection region is on the back; in conjunction with change of the viewpoint using the operation part, changes a region where the reference cross section is in front and the changed viewpoint is on the back to the projection region; in conjunction with change of a scanning region using the operation part, changes the viewpoint to a position where the reference cross section is in front and the changed scanning region is on the back; in conjunction with change of the viewpoint using the operation part, changes the scanning region to a region where the reference cross section is in front and the viewpoint is on the back; and then executes rendering.
US09050035B2
The present disclosure provides a pupillary light reflex (PLR) system, wherein the PLR system includes a remote tracking and imaging system that is structured and operable to generate and acquire high resolution pupil stimulus and response data from a test subject while the test subject is moving and is disposed a distance from remote tracking and imaging system that is greater than or equal to one-third of a meter. The PLR system additionally includes a computer based system controller that is structure and operable to execute PLR software to control the operation of the remote tracking and imaging system and compute PLR information based on the pupil stimulus and response data acquired as the test subject is moving.
US09050034B1
A system for monitoring the condition of an optical device user with non-visible light includes a non-visible light source that is positioned to direct a beam of non-visible light onto an eye of the optical device user. A non-visible light sensor is positioned to receive non-visible light that is reflected off of the eye and is configured to generate a signal corresponding to either a level or an intensity of the received non-visible light. A processor is connected to the light sensor, and is configured to determine a condition of the eye including whether the eye is either not moving, closed without blinking or open without blinking for more than a pre-determined amount of time based upon signals received from the light sensor. Also disclosed herein is a method for monitoring the condition of an optical device user with non-visible light.
US09050022B2
Method for dynamically analyzing distribution variation of scatterers and application using the same
A method for dynamically analyzing distribution variation of scatterers is provided and used for dynamically analyzing changes in two or three dimensional scatterer distribution and concentration of ultrasound data by using probability density function along with a moving window technique. The present invention has advantages in low computation load and may be used for real-time analysis. A method for dynamically detecting thermal ablation area and thermal ablation level and a method for dynamically controlling thermal ablation intensity are also provided for non-invasive detection and thermal ablation.
US09050017B2
An impedance analyzer includes: a control voltage generating unit for generating a control voltage that has a predetermined amplitude value; a measuring unit operable to provide an output current, which has an amplitude value corresponding to that of the control voltage, for flowing through first and second body portions of a biological target, and to generate a measurement voltage that has an amplitude value corresponding to a difference between voltages at the first and second body portions attributed to flow of the output current therethrough; and a calculating module operable to determine an electrical impedance between the first and second body portions according to a predetermined adjustment value and the amplitude value of the measurement voltage.
US09050012B2
An endoscope apparatus includes an excitation-light radiation unit; a fluorescence-image acquisition unit; a fluorescence-spectrum storage unit; a density computation unit, an image combining portion; and an image display portion; wherein when coefficients at wavelengths of fluorescent components obtained from the fluorescence spectra in the storage unit, and when intensities of fluorescence images at the wavelengths acquired by the acquisition unit, the density computation unit calculates the densities of the fluorescent components from an equation, and when the densities are calculated, in accordance with a change in the value of an exposure condition item during acquisition of the fluorescence image at a wavelength, the density computation unit changes the coefficients at the wavelength using the ratio of the value after the change to the value of the exposure condition items under the reference exposure conditions has been made.
US09050011B2
A method for mapping, consisting of receiving an initial set of measured values of a physiological parameter, which were measured at respective locations in a body organ and receiving a three-dimensional (3D) map of the organ including an array of spatial map elements. The method includes forming a correspondence between the respective locations at which the measured values were measured and a sub-group of the map elements, and in response to the correspondence, associating respective element values of the physiological parameter with map elements other than the sub-group. The method further includes adjusting the respective element values so that contiguous sets of the map elements form a geodesic, and displaying a map of the organ showing the adjusted element values.
US09050003B2
In order to provide a reconstruction computing device, a reconstruction computing method, and an X-ray CT apparatus capable of improving the image quality while reducing the amount of computation when reconstructing an X-ray CT image using an iterative method, a reconstruction computing device 45 divides an initial image 50 reconstructed using an analytical method such as an FBP method into a bed region 51, an object region 52, and the other air region 53, sets reconstruction conditions including at least convergence conditions and a pixel size for each of the divided regions, updates estimation images by performing an iterative process, and fixes estimation images or forward projection data of a subset satisfying the convergence conditions until other subsets satisfy the convergence conditions.
US09050002B2
Image reconstructing apparatus, X-ray computed tomography apparatus, and image reconstructing method
According to one embodiment, an apparatus includes a reconstructing unit, a first control unit, a detecting unit, a generating unit, and a second control unit. The first control unit controls the reconstructing unit to reconstruct first images based on projection data collected in first periods. The detecting unit detects second periods which belong to pulsation cycles different from one another and in which an organ to be imaged is in the substantially same form, based on the first images. The generating unit generates data for reconstruction including projection data for the required angle range by combining projection data collected in third periods close to the second periods. The second control unit controls the reconstructing unit to reconstruct a second image based the data for reconstruction.
US09049999B2
A biometric information processing device includes a heart rate detection unit, a relative heart rate calculation unit, a relative oxygen intake calculation unit, an oxygen intake estimation unit and a calorie expenditure calculation unit. The relative heart rate calculation unit calculates a relative heart rate obtained from a first difference over a second difference, the first difference being by subtracting a resting heart rate of the subject from the heart rate, the second difference being by subtracting the resting heart rate from a maximum heart rate. The relative oxygen intake calculation unit calculates a relative oxygen intake based on the relative heart rate. The oxygen intake estimation unit estimates the oxygen intake from the relative oxygen intake. The calorie expenditure calculation unit calculates calorie expenditure based on the oxygen intake.
US09049995B2
Techniques are provided for detecting pulmonary congestion based on an increase in right ventricular (RV) stroke volume over left ventricular (LV) stroke volume. In one example, the device generates an index based on accumulated differences between RV stroke volume and LV stroke volume while RV stroke volume exceeds LV stroke volume, such that the index is indicative of an ongoing imbalance between RV and LV stroke volume. The index is compared to a suitable threshold to detect a severe imbalance indicative of pulmonary edema. Additionally, techniques are described for estimating RV and LV stroke volumes based on pulmonary artery pressure, left atrial pressure, aortic pressure, LV strain or on various intracardiac or extracardiac impedance measurements.
US09049993B2
A biological signal measuring apparatus includes: a pressure sensor which measures a pressure in a living body; a respiratory sensor which measures respiratory information; and an outputting unit which detects an end-tidal based on the respiratory information measured by the respiratory sensor and which outputs a pressure value based on the pressure measured by the pressure sensor when detecting the end-tidal.
US09049992B2
A covering device having first, second, and third bores in which first, second, and third portions of tubing, respectively, of a stethoscope can be inserted when the covering device is attached to the stethoscope in a first state. Each of the first, second, and third bores may have a length and a width, wherein the length of each of the first, second, and third bores is greater than its width, and wherein the width of each of the first, second and third bores is less than the outer diameter of a diaphragm device of the stethoscope. The covering device may have first, second, and third slits, each of which can be pried open to allow the first, second, and third portions of tubing to be inserted into the first, second, and third bores of the covering device, respectively.
US09049984B2
The present invention provides a gas water bottle adaptor that is suitable for attachment to a water bottle and to a bottle cap. The adaptor can include a gas inlet on one side thereof suitable for attachment to the gas connection of an endoscope. A sealing member can be affixed to the adaptor to prevent leakage of any fluid (e.g., liquid or gas) that is inside of the water bottle. The adaptor may be used in endoscopy methods and is particularly useful for adding a secondary gas source to a water bottle.
US09049981B2
A system and method provide heart sound tracking, including an input circuit, configured to receive heart sound information, and a heart sound recognition circuit. The heart sound recognition circuit can be coupled to the input circuit and can be configured to recognize, within a particular heart sound of a particular heart sound waveform, a first intra heart sound energy indication and a corresponding first intra heart sound time indication using the heart sound information from the particular heart sound waveform and the heart sound information from at least one other heart sound waveform. The particular heart sound can include at least a portion of one of S1, S2, S3, and S4. Further, the first intra heart sound energy indication and the corresponding first intra heart sound time indication can correspond to the at least a portion of one of S1, S2, S3, and S4, respectively.
US09049978B1
A shoe cleaning apparatus includes a housing that has a top wall, a bottom wall and a perimeter wall attached to and extending between the top and bottom walls. A cleaning assembly is mounted to the housing and extends upwardly from the top wall. The cleaning assembly cleans a shoe positioned on the top wall. A drive assembly is mechanically coupled to the foot cleaning assembly and rotates a plurality of brushes of the foot assembly when the drive assembly is turned on. A vacuum is mounted within the housing and is in fluid communication with apertures extending through the top wall. The vacuum suctions material from the shoe into the housing.
US09049974B2
A cleaning pad structure of stitch bonded construction incorporating one or more substrate layers of an absorbent nonwoven material with an optional additional fluid blocking substrate layer of polymer film or other suitable material in juxtaposed relation to the absorbent nonwoven layers. Stitching yarns are introduced in stitching relation through the substrate layers. One face of the pad defines a cleaning surface of raised yarn loops formed by the stitched yarns. The pad further includes an attachment surface facing away from the cleaning surface. The stitches of yarns across the attachment surface define an engagement surface for attachment to cooperating hooking elements across a surface of a mop head to define a hook and loop attachment system.
US09049971B2
A storage system for a vacuum cleaning system has a hose storage structure defining a storage chamber having a storage chamber inlet port and a storage chamber outlet operatively connected to the common chamber operatively connected to a vacuum. The storage chamber defines a chamber cross-sectional area. The hose end carrier defines a carrier cross-sectional area, where the carrier cross-sectional area is slightly less than the chamber cross-sectional area. The hose member defines a hose cross-sectional area, where the hose member cross-sectional area is sized and dimension with respect to the carrier cross-sectional area to facilitate movement of the hose member along the storage chamber.
US09049970B2
A toilet seat cover assembly that has a cover shaped to fit over a toilet seat, the cover including internal side walls and an arm assembly disposed within the cover, the arm assembly including at least one arm that radially spans from an axis of rotation, defines a path of rotation, has a proximal end and a distal end, the distal end defining a discontinuity between the distal end and the internal side walls such that it is operable to move freely of the internal side walls, and defines a first plurality of cutouts fluidly coupled to a liquid source and sized to discharge liquid matter over the toilet seat.
US09049941B2
A mattress retention system for adjustable beds employs a tension web attached to a top surface of an element of an articulating support structure. The tension web is inset from a longitudinal edge and lateral edges of the articulating support structure element and incorporates a first fastener moiety on an extending edge. A mating element is attached to the bottom surface of a mattress adjacent an edge to be restrained. The mating element incorporates a second fastener moiety for operable connection to the first fastener moiety and includes a web section having a first edge attached to the bottom surface of the mattress and a second edge carrying the second fastener moiety for flexibility in attaching the fastener moieties.
US09049932B2
According to the present teachings, a system is provided which allows a user or mover to move large, heavy appliances across finished floor surfaces without damaging by scratching, indenting or cracking under the weight of the object. When placing the object on the mover's surface, the weight becomes distributed and absorbed across the mover instead of localized points such as the case with casters, wheels or legs.
US09049927B2
The reading stand includes a base, a book support adjustably mounted to the base, a timer module disposed on the book support, and a multimedia player disposed on one side of the book support. The book support can be horizontally adjusted with respect to the base in order to accommodate larger books and reading material and vertically adjusted for user comfort. Additionally, the book support can be adjustably tilted to various angles for setting a comfortable viewing angle for the user. The timer helps the reader to keep track of the reader's reading skills and progress, while the multimedia player can be used to listen to lessons from digital media, such as a compact disc.
US09049926B2
An article of digital furniture piece comprises a table and a computer disposed in an accommodating space of the table, the computer comprises a frame, and a power supply, a hard disk and a host are disposed thereon. The frame comprises a first frame body and a second frame body connected each other, the first frame body is able to overturn relative to the second frame body according to the shape of the accommodating space, for matching the shape of the computer and the shape of the accommodating space, such that the appearance of the digital furniture piece could have variety designs.
US09049925B1
The tool mounting structure includes a base plate for mounting on a supporting structure, such as a workbench. On top of the base plate is a thrust bearing and on top of the thrust bearing is a top plate upon which shop tools can be mounted. Any one of the shop tools can be rotated to an accessible position for use. A lock releasibly locks the top plate and the tools mounted thereon in the selected rotary position.
US09049923B1
A powered height adjustable desktop having a base with a fixed peripheral wall defining a cavity and a cover defining a horizontal work surface. A lift mechanism supports the cover relative to the base. The lift mechanism includes a linkage with at least one pair of lift arms pivotably connecting each side of the base to a respective side of the cover and a powered actuator attached to the base and operatively connected to the linkage. The actuator selectively activates the linkage to rotate the lift arms from a relatively horizontal position to at least one substantially fixed upright position, thereby raising the work surface from a sitting height to a standing height. At the sitting height, the cover rests upon the peripheral wall to fully enclose the cavity. At the standing height, the cover is spaced above and offset forward of the base.
US09049922B2
A support assembly includes a first member, a second member spaced apart from the first member, a third member securing the first and second members together, and a fourth member extending between the first and second members. The fourth member forces the first and second members apart to provide a tensile force in the third member and a compressive force in the fourth member, thereby stabilizing the support.
US09049919B2
Toothbrush with a bristle field which comprises a composite of layers of base and bristle components
The toothbrush includes a brushhead (24) having a multi-layer bristle field assembly (30), which includes alternate thin base layers (32) and thin bristle layers (34) which are bonded together to form the bristle field assembly. The base layers provide support for the bristle field assembly while the bristle layers are configured to provide bristle elements therealong for brushing of the teeth.
US09049912B1
A portable container for transporting and storing a plurality of perishable items including food and beverage items, having a heat-resistant outer tubular member with double-layered insulation in an adjacent inner tubular member to accommodate a plurality of perishable items and to sustain the prescribed temperature of such food and beverage items and to promote longevity thereof. The portable container optionally includes a plurality of external compartments and has removable endcaps enclosing both ends thereof. Each endcap is conveniently removed from a tubular end and then used as a cup for drinking a plurality of beverage items or used as a dish for eating a plurality of food items.
US09049905B2
A clip can couple components together and includes a substantially u-shaped clip portion. The substantially u-shaped clip portion includes a first lateral portion, a second lateral portion, and a curved clip portion interconnecting the first and second lateral portions. The clip further includes a retention clip portion extending from the first lateral portion. Additionally, the clip includes an insertion clip portion extending from the retention clip portion. The insertion clip portion is obliquely angled relative to the retention clip portion.
US09049904B2
A button fastener made of metal for fastening a button such as a male snap button or a decorative button to a cloth, includes a plate-like base and a cylindrical post projecting from a center area of the base. The upper end face of the post is open as a top opening, and the lower end face of the post is open in the center area of the base as a bottom opening. To the button fastener, a closing member which closes the inside of the post at a proximal side thereof is provided. The closing member is a closing part which has been cut out, by a punch, of an unfinished post of a semifinished product which is fabricated to the button fastener and then displaced by the punch through the inside of the unfinished post toward the lower end.
US09049901B2
A method for producing a regionalized-firmness midsole utilizing a heat press, and a description of the resultant product, are provided. Initially, the method involves providing a plurality of pre-formed phylon biscuits. Typically, the plurality of biscuits includes at least a first biscuit that has a first density and a second biscuit that has a second density. The method may further include the steps of arranging the biscuits into a receiving area of the heat press, and integrating the plurality of biscuits to form the midsole by activating the heat press. Integrating the biscuits includes raising the biscuits above a threshold temperature, and causing the biscuits to expand such that each of the plurality of biscuits couples with another of the biscuits to form a midsole with two or more degrees of firmness located at distributed regions thereon.
US09049885B2
A resealable spigot for a coconut that provides easy access by consumers to the sterile coconut water within a coconut includes a valve seat positioned within a coconut aperture and a plunger sleeve positioned within the valve seat. The plunger sleeve has a based positioned membrane that seals the coconut aperture, A plunger-stopper is tethered to the plunger sleeve for shipping and storage and is used by the consumer to pierce the plunger sleeve membrane to gain access to the coconut water. The plunger sleeve is also used to reseal the coconut aperture to preserve any remaining coconut water for future consumption. Further provided is an additional embodiment for a spigot comprising a conduit having a spike-tip on one end and a spout on the other with a through bore therebetween. The coconut having a partially inserted spigot is provided to the consumer whereby the consumer gains access to the sterile coconut water by pushing the partially inserted spigot to its seated position with a grommet provided as an insertion stop for the spigot. An optional air vent is provided to aid in fluid flow from the spigot.
US09049860B2
The invention provides an ectoparasiticidal formulation which comprises an ectoparasiticidal agent, preferably fipronil, as the pesticidally-active ingredient, together with a crystallization inhibitor selected from the group consisting of alkyl-substituted pyrrolidones, and optionally, one or more organic solvents and/or co-solvents. Preferably, the crystallization inhibitor is N-octyl pyrrolidone, and the organic solvent, if present, preferably comprises diethylene glycol monoethyl ether. The ectoparasiticidal formulation surprisingly yields a significantly enhanced speed of kill. Methods for manufacturing the formulation, as well as methods for treating animals infested with ectoparasites, are also disclosed.
US09049857B2
Flush preservation solution for the preservation of cells in the absence of a blood supply comprising: v) water for injection; and vi) at least one saccharide such as a monosaccharide, disaccharide, trisaccharide, or polysaccharide and vii) at least one component with pH buffer properties; and viii) at least one component with calcium transport blocking properties or an anti-calcium action activity; method for the preparation thereof; use thereof in transplantation including organs from heart beating or non heart beating donors, in surgery including any situation of warm or cold ischaemia, cardioplegia or open heart surgery, whole limb or whole body preservation in experimentation on living tissues or in culturing and preserving engineered cells, tissues and organs, limbs or the whole body; method for flushing, preserving or flush preservation of cells; and a kit of parts comprising the solution components.
US09049854B2
A crop spraying vehicle includes a mast arm having a mast arm sleeve slidingly engaged with it. A crop spraying apparatus is coupled to the mast arm sleeve with a pendulum arm. The engagement between the mast arm and mast arm sleeve restricts and allows the transverse and longitudinal rotation, respectively, of the crop spraying apparatus.
US09049852B1
A spoon fishing lure is configured to catch fish in shallow water without becoming entangled in grass. The spoon fishing lure includes a body which includes a raised right portion immediately adjacent to front central portion and rear central portion and a lowered left portion. The body is shaped to efficiently travel through the grass in the shallow water. A hook assembly mechanically coupled to the body and further comprising an eye immediately adjacent to a shank which is further immediately adjacent to a hook. The eye can be tethered to a line and the hook can catch the fish. The body is made of a semi-buoyant material and the lowered left portion attached to an egg sinker causing the body to sink slightly in the shallow water without precision reeling making the spoon fishing lure easier to use.
US09049847B1
An aquarium fish partition device separates an aggressive fish from other fish within an aquarium. The device includes a base, a top, and an inner perimeter wall extending between the base and the top defining a central interior space. An outer perimeter wall extends between the base and the top defining a medial space between the inner perimeter wall and the outer perimeter wall. Each of a plurality of slits extends through the inner perimeter wall wherein the central interior space is in fluid communication with the medial space. Each of a plurality of slots extends through the outer perimeter wall wherein the medial space is configured to be in fluid communication with an area outside of the outer perimeter wall. The slits are offset from the slots such that the inner perimeter wall and the outer perimeter wall are configured for retaining a fish in the central interior space.
US09049846B2
A foldable poultry brood box having a folding bottom, folding endwalls, and folding sidewalls provides a sheltered environment for the maturation of a brood of young poultry. Preferably, after the brood box is deployed, a floor overlay insert is placed and retained within the brood box to overlay, bridge over, and cover substantial portions of two floor free edges.
US09049835B2
In a milking cluster of teat cups, each teat cup has a port in the form of a nozzle disposed in the head portion of the flexible liner of the teat cup. The milking cluster includes a distributor having a fluid inlet and outlets connected to the nozzles of the cups. The distributor inlet is connected to a delivery line for supplying sanitizing treatment fluid, which is utilized to treat the teats and teat cups in a cleansing cycle following the milking cycle, by a second valve operable to maintain the delivery line primed with treatment fluid preparatory to initiation of the cleansing cycle. A safety valve is disposed at the distributor inlet, the safety valve being operable during a milking cycle to open a drain port through which treatment fluid may flow to waste.
US09049832B1
A wheat variety designated W020536B1, the plants and seeds of wheat variety W020536B1, methods for producing a wheat plant produced by crossing the variety W020536B1 with another wheat plant, and hybrid wheat seeds and plants produced by crossing the variety W020536B1 with another wheat line or plant, and the creation of variants by mutagenesis or transformation of variety W020536B1. This invention also relates to methods for producing other wheat varieties or breeding lines derived from wheat variety W020536B1 and to wheat varieties or breeding lines produced by those methods.
US09049826B1
A novel maize variety designated PH1TP4 and seed, plants and plant parts thereof. Methods for producing a maize plant that comprise crossing maize variety PH1TP4 with another maize plant. Methods for producing a maize plant containing in its genetic material one or more traits introgressed into PH1TP4 through backcross conversion and/or transformation, and to the maize seed, plant and plant part produced thereby. Hybrid maize seed, plant or plant part produced by crossing the variety PH1TP4 or a locus conversion of PH1TP4 with another maize variety.
US09049825B1
A novel maize variety designated PH18H4 and seed, plants and plant parts thereof. Methods for producing a maize plant that comprise crossing maize variety PH18H4 with another maize plant. Methods for producing a maize plant containing in its genetic material one or more traits introgressed into PH18H4 through backcross conversion and/or transformation, and to the maize seed, plant and plant part produced thereby. Hybrid maize seed, plant or plant part produced by crossing the variety PH18H4 or a locus conversion of PH18H4 with another maize variety.
US09049824B1
A novel maize variety designated X08C960 and seed, plants and plant parts thereof, produced by crossing Pioneer Hi-Bred International, Inc. proprietary inbred maize varieties. Methods for producing a maize plant that comprises crossing hybrid maize variety X08C960 with another maize plant. Methods for producing a maize plant containing in its genetic material one or more traits introgressed into X08C960 through backcross conversion and/or transformation, and to the maize seed, plant and plant part produced thereby. This invention relates to the maize variety X08C960, the seed, the plant produced from the seed, and variants, mutants, and minor modifications of maize variety X08C960. This invention further relates to methods for producing maize varieties derived from maize variety X08C960.
US09049820B2
A commercial mechanical plant hedger is disclosed. This hedger is capable of trimming multiple cutting planes—top, left, and right simultaneously. Stated different three (3) sides of a row of a hedge can be trimmed at the same time. More specifically, the hedger can simultaneously cut the top of and both sides of the plant rows simultaneously. Hedging debris from the plant is also removed. The hedger is also capable of hedging multi rows from single drive middle up to 12 feet on centers. A small tractor with minimum horsepower is capable of running the hedger.
US09049819B2
A structure for reinforcing a greening member and a construction method thereof are provided. The structure for reinforcing a greening member comprises a greening member adapted for being placed on a surface of an area to be greened, a positioning cover (2), a positioning member (3) and a rope (4). The positioning member is adapted to be inserted into the ground of the area to be greened. A positioning member is provided with a pivot portion (31). One end of the rope is fixedly connected to the pivot portion, and the other end is exposed out of the ground of the area to be greened and passes through the greening member to reach the positioning cover. The other end of the rope is fixed by the positioning cover.
US09049817B2
A control system for an unload drive system of a combine and a method for controlling an unload drive system of a combine by sensing a force on an unload auger. The combine includes a grain tank for storing grain and at least one auger for unloading grain from the grain tank. The combine includes at least one movable auger cover coupled to the grain tank for controlling the amount of grain to flow into the at least one auger. The control system includes at least one sensor for sensing a force on the unload drive system and a controller for receiving at least one force condition from the at least one sensor representing the sensed force on the unload drive system and causing the at least one movable auger cover to move based on the sensed force condition.
US09049815B2
A rotary mower has a lift frame comprising swiveling linkages that allow rotation of the deck with respect to a three point hitch. The lift frame further has a pair of angled legs rotatably affixed to the lift frame, each angled leg having an upper end and a lower end, the lower ends rotatably affixed to pivot brace brackets rigidly affixed to the deck. Each angled leg of the lift frame is rotatably affixed to one or more pivot bars near the upper end of the angled leg. Each pivot bar extends upwardly between the angled leg and an upper end of the lift frame. A shield covers the pivot bars to protect the users.
US09049814B2
Seed coatings and coated seeds as provided herein include at least one fungicide and at least one VAM fungus-enhancing composition. Coated seeds exhibit enhanced growth due to depression or elimination of undesirable fungi coupled with either enhanced growth of VAM fungus or lack of detrimental fungicide effect on VAM fungus.
US09049813B2
The present invention relates to a method to overcome negative effects of the treatment of seeds with insecticides, acaricides or nematicides on the germination of seeds and vitality of seedlings. The inventive method markedly enhances germination and vitality of seeds that are treated with insecticides, acaricides or nematicides. The present invention describes a method that at least comprises the following steps: 1) Hydration of the seed 2) Followed by drying of the seed 3) Followed by a treatment of the seed with insecticidal, acaricidal, or nematicidal compounds.
US09055711B2
A method of storing data on a storage medium includes determining a risk index associated with a performance of the storage medium, adjusting a refresh factor associated with at least a portion of the storage medium in response to determining the risk index, and performing a data refresh operation on the portion of the storage medium based at least in part on the on the refresh factor.
US09055702B2
One embodiment of the invention comprises an improved method for making a via structure for use in a printed circuit board (PCB). The via allows for the passage of a signal from one signal plane to another in the PCB, and in so doing transgresses the power and ground planes between the signal plane. To minimize EM disturbance between the power and ground planes, signal loss due to signal return current, and via-to-via coupling, the via is shielded within two concentric cylinders, each coupled to one of the power and ground planes.
US09055701B2
An improved alignment precision of Micro-Electromechanical Systems (MEMS). A method includes two parts of MEMS separated by at least one rolling element having a first diameter, where the rolling element is maintained on one of the two parts using a thermally dissipative material, horizontally aligning the two parts by pivoting one of the two parts about the rolling element, and locking the two parts together.
US09055695B2
A roof for a computer rack aisle is provided. The roof has a canopy that may be flexible and/or fire-resistant. The canopy has a retracted position and an extended position. In the extended position the canopy may cover the top of an aisle between two computer racks, while in the retracted position the aisle can be uncovered. A canopy retractor is provided to move the canopy from the extended position to the retracted position when a predetermined condition is met. The canopy has first and second lateral edges that are slidably received within the channels of guide tracks to facilitate the smooth movement from the extend position to the retracted position.
US09055693B2
An electronic enclosure includes a chassis with a fan base and a fan module. The fan base and fan module are disposed so that the fan module may installed in the fan base in a first configuration to provide front-to-rear air flow within the enclosure, or the fan module may be detached from the fan base, turned and reinserted into the fan base in a second configuration to provide rear-to-front air flow within the enclosure. The fan base is provided with two power connectors, one of which mates with the fan module in the first configuration and the second one of which mates with the fan module in the second configuration.
US09055691B2
An assembly includes an enclosure and a guide rail. The enclosure includes first and second top portions, first and second side portions, and a bottom portion, and is a single piece of material such that the first top portion, the first side portion, the bottom portion, the second side portion, and the second top portion are continuous portions of the single piece of material. The guide rail is attached to the first and second top portions of the enclosure, to join the first and second top portions together, and to align the assembly within a server rack chassis.
US09055689B2
A door mechanism includes a cover, a connecting bracket, a rotary door, a sliding bracket and a sliding button. The sliding button is connected to the sliding bracket. When the sliding button is located at a stopping position, the sliding button contacts against the rotary door for constraining the rotary door from moving in a first direction and the sliding button drives the sliding bracket to a position where the sliding bracket is stopped for constraining the rotary door from pivoting relative to the cover. When the sliding button is located at an unlocking position, the sliding button drives the sliding bracket to a position where the sliding bracket is not stopped and the rotary door can move in the first direction, so that the rotary door can pivot relative to the cover to expose a containing space of a housing.
US09055688B2
Systems and methods are provided for aligning status indicators on a terminal block of an I/O device by locating the status indicators directly adjacent to or integrated directly within their respective terminals on the terminal block. The status indicators are illuminated by LEDs or other light emitters disposed within a housing of the I/O device. Light from the LEDs are directed to the status indicators by light pipes disposed within the housing of the I/O device. LED activation circuitry disposed within the housing determines a manner in which to activate the LEDs to illuminate the status indicators based on inputs and outputs between the I/O device and a controlled process. In certain embodiments, the status indicators are disposed on a raised section of the I/O device, which may be part of a removable LED indication assembly including the LEDs, light pipes, and LED activation circuitry.
US09055684B2
A contact piece of a gold finger comprises: a first main body segment; a second main body segment; and a transition segment connected to the first main body segment and the second main body segment, respectively, in a vertical direction, in which an upper edge and a lower edge of the transition segment are inclined with respect to a lateral direction respectively. A gold finger and a connector comprising the same are also provided.
US09055677B2
An electronic equipment enclosure includes a frame structure and at least one panel secured to the frame structure. The at least one panel includes one or more panel knockouts arranged therein. Each panel knockout is configured to be removable from the at least one panel to provide a pass-through opening for a cable. The at least one panel further includes a split brush assembly seated in place of a removed one of the one or more panel knockouts.
US09055656B2
A discharge lamp operating apparatus including: a discharge lamp; an operating circuit; a voltage measuring unit; a magnetic field applying unit; and a control unit, wherein the voltage measuring unit measures the voltage of power at sampling intervals, the control unit calculates an average value VL1 of a group of the measured value of the voltage as a standard and an average value VL2 of a group of the measured value of the voltage for comparison after a predetermined time has elapsed from the measurement of the measured value of the voltage measured at the beginning from the group of the measured value of the voltage as a standard, and when the difference (VL2−VL1) between the average value VL1 and the average value VL2 exceeds a predetermined value, drives the magnetic field applying unit.
US09055652B2
The disclosed technical solution relates to an organic light emitting diode driving circuit, and a display panel, a display and a driving method using the same. The organic light emitting diode driving circuit includes a driving unit, a threshold compensation unit and an organic light emitting diode. The preferred threshold compensation unit comprises 5 transistors and a capacitance. The organic light emitting diode driving circuit compensates the threshold voltage Vth of the driving transistor by means of this 6T1C circuit, eliminates the inconsistent operation states of the organic light emitting diode caused by the different threshold voltages of the driving transistor in the entire circuit, thereby solving the problem regarding the brightness and evenness of the organic light emitting diode.
US09055649B2
The present invention discloses a control circuit and a control method of a light emitting device circuit. When the light emitting device circuit is normally connected in normal operation, an output current is regulated to a predetermined current. When the light emitting device circuit is removed, an output voltage is regulated to a predetermined voltage. When the light emitting device circuit is reconnected, the output current is regulated to the predetermined current. The output voltage is at or above a level when the light emitting device circuit is normally connected in normal operation, and the predetermined voltage is lower than this level.
US09055642B2
An LED lighting device includes at least one LED light source emitting light, at least one rechargeable battery for supplying power when external power is not available, at least one electrical connector for connecting the rechargeable battery to external power source for recharging, and at least one control mechanism for switching the operation mode of the device. By setting the operation mode via the control mechanism, the LED light device can be used for more than one intended purposes such as regular lighting, emergency lighting, and flashlight.
US09055639B2
An LED-based lighting apparatus includes a plurality of LED-based lighting segments connected in series with a current control device. Each lighting segment has at least one LED-based lighting unit connected in series. A plurality of switch controllers controlled by a switching voltage comparator unit is connected with the plurality of LED-based lighting segments to provide multiple operation modes for turning on different number of LED-based lighting segments. In one embodiment, each switch controller is connected in parallel with a corresponding segment. The switching voltage comparator unit generates a propagation signal that propagates through and controls the plurality of switch controllers. In the other embodiment, each switch controller is connected between a positive end of the corresponding segment and a current control device. The switching voltage comparator unit generates two propagation signals that propagate through and control the plurality of switch controllers.
US09055637B2
An LED load driving apparatus including a power conversion circuit and a control chip is provided. The power conversion circuit receives an input voltage and drives an LED load in response to a PWM signal. The control chip includes a control core circuit and a memory unit. The control core circuit is operated under a system voltage to provide the PWM signal for controlling operation of the power conversion circuit. The control core circuit is inactivated during a power-off period and restarted during a power-on period. The memory unit is operated under the input voltage and is configured to: store a dimming operation data before the control core circuit is inactivated during the power-off period; and provide the stored dimming operation data during the power-on period to the control core circuit, so as to make the control core circuit perform corresponding dimming operation relating to the LED load.
US09055636B2
A light source driving device includes a transformer, a rectifying diode, a filter, and an open loop preventing circuit. The transformer has a primary winding part including first and second external input terminals configured to receive external power from a ballast stabilizer and a coil having an impedance level set to allow the ballast stabilizer to output a normal amount of power, and a secondary winding part electromagnetically coupled to the primary winding part to transform received external power. The rectifying diode rectifies power from the secondary winding part, and the filter filters the rectified power from the rectifying diode. The open loop preventing circuit provides a closed loop to the filter such that power stored in the filter is applied to the output terminal when the rectifying diode is turned off.
US09055634B2
A lighting device having an electrical circuit includes an LED having a variable illuminating resistance. The electrical circuit is configured for energizing the LED light source with a source of electrical power. The LED light source is energized with an effective power such that the LED light source functions in accordance with a targeted illuminating resistance. The circuit includes one or more components for monitoring circuit parameters, calculating the illuminating resistance of the LED and for changing the effective power applied to the LED light source in response to a relationship between the illuminating resistance and the targeted illuminating resistance. The change in effective power made by the circuit is for returning the illuminating resistance to a predetermined relationship with the targeted illuminating resistance.
US09055630B1
A control system and method for automatically and seamlessly providing optimal power and/or voltage levels to an integrated, connected or other designated light assembly. In particular, the control system comprises corresponding boost, buck and feedback circuitry cooperatively utilized to intelligently increase, decrease or maintain the signal or power delivered to the light assembly at an optimal level, thereby increasing efficiency and productivity of the light assembly and allowing the light assembly to operate even in the event of a severely degraded signal due to resistance or impedance resulting from a lengthy power wire or other factors.
US09055624B2
System and method include luminaires, control switches, occupancy detectors, and photocells connected to central control module for setting up, testing, commissioning and maintaining the system. Memory card interface and associated memory card provided for loading, saving and/or transferring configuration, update firmware, and log system operation data, which can be automatically recognized to perform appropriate actions. System and method provide switching between different mutually exclusive lighting modes where lighting of each mode is sequenced such that second lighting mode is initiated before first mode is terminated, resulting in continuity of lighting in controlled area. Other features include daylight harvesting control with multiple zone dimming and switching, programmable attack and decay dimming rates, ability to return system to previous dimming level after lights have been turned off, and ability to start controlled lights at full light level then dim down to previous level to ensure lighting ballasts have sufficient start up voltage.
US09055620B1
A lighting system includes one or more methods and systems to control an input switching stage of a power converter to provide power for a lamp and modulate a line current supplied to the power converter to carry data related to a state of the lamp. In at least one embodiment, a single controller consolidates the functions of controlling an input stage of the power converter and communicating to an external device by modulating the line current supplied to the power converter to carry data related to a state of the lamp. The particular type of current modulation and communication protocol utilized by the consolidated power conversion-communication controller is a matter of design choice. In at least one embodiment, the lamp includes one or more electronic light sources, such as one or more light emitting diodes (LEDs) and/or one or more compact fluorescent lamps (CFLs).
US09055615B2
The present invention provides an induction heating cooker, which is structured to cut off visible light being incident upon an infrared sensor, yet being capable of more accurately sensing any abnormality of the infrared sensor before heating is started. To this end, the induction heating cooker includes a sensor failure sensing-purpose light emitting portion that emits visible light for sensing any failure of an infrared sensor, a visible light cutting filter provided on a surface of a printed circuit board holding the infrared sensor so as to cover the field of view of the infrared sensor, and a control unit that limits the output of an inverter circuit supplying a high-frequency current to a heating coil when the output of the infrared sensor is equal to or less than a threshold value in a situation where the sensor failure sensing-purpose light emitting portion is lit up. The infrared sensor receives the visible light from the sensor failure sensing-purpose light emitting portion to irradiate inside the visible light cutting filter.
US09055614B2
An induction heating device includes a top plate arranged to have an object placed thereon, a heating coil provided under below the top plate for heating the object, a sensor provided under the top plate for detecting a temperature of the object, a judging unit for judging whether or not the object is positioned directly above the sensor, a controller operable to allow the heating coil to heat the object in response to the temperature detected by the sensor detecting, and a position indicator provided at the top plate for indicating a position of the sensor. The position indicator includes a detectable area of the sensor, and is larger than the detectable area. This induction heating device securely positions the object directly above the sensor and detects a temperature of the object accurately, hence heating the object accurately at a predetermined temperature.
US09055612B2
Systems and methodologies are described that facilitate supporting Quality of Service (QoS) continuity during an inter-base station mobility procedure. Layer 2 (L2) protocol configuration information for QoS (e.g., uplink, downlink, . . . ) and/or uplink QoS configuration information set by a source base station can be transmitted via an interface (e.g., X2 interface, . . . ) to a target base station during an inter-base station mobility procedure. Further, the target base station can select whether to reuse at least a portion of the L2 protocol configuration information for QoS and/or uplink QoS configuration information received from the source base station. Moreover, L2 protocol configuration information for QoS and/or uplink QoS configuration information not selected to be reused can be reconstructed.
US09055610B2
There is disclosed an integrated base station (BS) communicatively combined with two or more simplified radio access points (APs). The integrated BS is configured to receive a signal from a backbone/backhaul network and transmits the received signal to the simplified radio APs, route a signal to at least one of the two or more simplified radio APs, and communicate with the two or more simplified radio APs through wireline communication.
US09055604B2
One or more scheduling grants may be received from a Node B related to a plurality of uplink MIMO streams. A determination may be made as to a primary transport power and a primary transport block size for a primary stream. A secondary transmit power and a secondary transport block size for a secondary stream may also be determined.
US09055599B2
A wireless communication apparatus is capable of improving communication efficiency by reducing the amount of control information transmitted. A channel quality information extraction section extracts CQI's from a received signal. An allocation control section allocates subcarriers for every communication terminal apparatus and selects a modulation scheme in such a manner that required transmission rate is satisfied for each communication terminal apparatus based on required transmission rate information, etc. and CQI's for communication terminal apparatus of each user. A required subcarrier number determining section decides the number of subcarriers allocated to every communication terminal apparatus so as to satisfy the required transmission rate for each communication terminal apparatus. A required subcarrier number information generating section generates information for the number of subcarriers allocated to every communication terminal apparatus. A subcarrier allocation section allocates packet data to selected subcarriers. Modulating sections adaptively modulate packet data allocated to each subcarrier.
US09055597B2
Techniques for making channel assignments to reduce interference and increase capacity of wireless networks are described. In an implementation, a first station receives a signal from a second station. The first station measures a signal strength of the received signal, and determines that the signal strength is relatively weak compared to other signals received at the first station from other stations. A set of OFDMA subcarriers available for assignment is divided into a first subset for relatively weak signals within a first cell and a second subset for relatively strong signals within the first cell. The second station is assigned a transmit subchannel that is formed for a predetermined period of time by the first subset of subcarriers, the transmit subchannel assigned based on the determination that the signal strength of the received signal is relatively weak.
US09055592B2
Wireless communication under IEEE 802.11 standards utilizing carrier specific interference mitigation where an AP or UE employs an ultra-wideband tuner to evaluate available spectrum between several communication bands. Rather than being constrained to communicate in a single communication band, the AP and UEs may utilize more than one communication band to communicate with one another. In doing so, the AP and UE search across several bands and measure interference on a carrier-by-carrier basis across those bands. Either of the AP and UE may select a cluster of carriers for communication, where the cluster of carriers may comprise 1) contiguous carriers in a single sub-channel, 2) contiguous carriers spanning across more than one sub-channel, 3) discontinuous carriers in a single sub-channel, or 4) discontinuous carriers spanning across more than one sub-channel. The mapping between a cluster and its carriers can be fixed or reconfigurable.
US09055587B2
The present invention discloses a method for realizing buffer status reporting. The method includes the following steps: a user equipment reporting a buffer status of a logical channel by using one of an original buffer status level format and a newly-added buffer status level format; wherein, the newly-added buffer status level format comprises a plurality of data-amount-range boundary values which are higher than a maximum data-amount-range boundary value in the original buffer status level format. The present invention also discloses a system and user equipment for realizing buffer status reporting. With the invention, the accuracy of the buffer status reported by the user in a long term evolution-advanced (LTE-A) system can be improved.
US09055576B2
Methods, systems, apparatus and computer program products are provided to receive downlink control information (DCI) in a downlink control channel, where the downlink control information configured to indicate an allocation of uplink resources with a clustered uplink resource allocation protocol or a contiguous uplink resource allocation protocol, to detect which of the clustered uplink resource allocation protocol and the contiguous uplink resource allocation protocol is indicated and to allocate the uplink resources based on the indicated uplink resource allocation protocol.
US09055575B2
A base station in a mobile communication system containing a user equipment and the base station that includes an uplink (UL) resource management unit that allocates a plurality of parameters related to a physical uplink control channel (PUCCH) resource used for transmission processing, between the user equipment and the base station; a reception processing unit that receives a signal sent from the user equipment including a transmission processing unit that performs transmission processing based on transmission timing adjustment information; and a control unit that, if a valid term of first transmission timing adjustment information expires before transmission processing of a signal including identification information of the user equipment is performed during connection processing while performing the connection processing to the base station based on the first transmission timing adjustment information, aborts the connection processing and releases at least one of the allocated plurality of parameters related to the PUCCH resource.
US09055571B2
When transmission of uplink control information is necessary, a transmission processor (a14) allocates the uplink control information to one of radio resources assigned by a base station device, and transmits the uplink control information.
US09055570B2
A user equipment (UE) is disclosed. The UE includes a processor configured to transmit a rank indicator (RI) using one of an assigned periodic RI reporting resource that precisely aligns with the start on an on-duration of a discontinuous reception (DRX) operation mode of the UE and a fast assigned periodic RI reporting resource after the start of the on-duration.
US09055562B2
A scheduling component associated with a data channel configures initial reserved bandwidth allocations for each agency permitted access to a shared data channel. When sufficient bandwidth is available on the shared data channel to meet all bandwidth requests, the scheduling component schedules access to available random access slots on the shared data channel. When an agency accesses a scheduled random access slot, the agency is able to reserve additional reserved slots on the shared data channel for data transmission on an on-demand basis. The scheduling component enables bandwidth management controls when one or more requests for the additional reserved slots on the shared data channel cannot be fulfilled due to insufficient available additional reserved slots on the shared data channel and controls access to the shared data channel by distributing limited access permissions for future available random access slots to agencies permitted access to the shared data channel.
US09055553B2
A method for guaranteeing correct establishment of Local IP Access service includes: obtaining the service type of a user equipment (UE) and the equipment capability type of a base station. The method also includes determining whether the UE and the base station are consistent. The method also includes, in response to determining that the UE and the base station are consistent, establishing LIPA service for the UE. The method also includes, in response to determining that the UE and the base station are inconsistent, deciding whether to establish LIPA service for the UE according to the preserved strategy.
US09055552B2
Systems and methods of generating quick paging messages having nearly unique identifiers and variable capacity are described. The system generates a quick paging message identifying an access terminal to indicate the presence of a scheduled paging message for that access terminal. The system generates a quick paging notification for each access terminal having a scheduled paging message and generates a compressed nearly unique identifier of each access terminal that is notified in the quick paging message. The compression technique can vary based on the number of bits allocated to the quick paging message as well as the number of access terminals notified in one quick paging message.
US09055549B2
A method and device for accessing and obtaining user equipment (UE) context and UE identity are provided. The method for access includes: when a UE accesses a System Architecture Evolution (SAE) network, judging, by a network node, whether a Globally Unique Mobility Management Entity Identifier (GUMMEI) carried by the UE or a Mobility Management Entity Group Identity (MMEGI) in the GUMMEI is allocated or mapped by the SAE network; if the GUMMEI or MMEGI is allocated by the SAE network, selecting, by the network node, a Mobility Management Entity (MME) according to the GUMMEIA network device includes an identity attribute obtaining module and a network resource node allocation module. Therefore, the access of the UE is achieved.
US09055541B2
Transmit power for an access point is controlled based on information received by the access point. For example, an access point may employ one or more algorithms that use messages received from nearby access terminals to maintain an acceptable tradeoff between providing an adequate coverage area for access point transmissions and mitigating interference that these transmissions cause at nearby access terminals. Here, the access point may employ a network listen-based algorithm upon initialization of the access terminal to provide preliminary transmit power control until sufficient information is collected for another transmit power control algorithm (e.g., an access terminal assisted algorithm). Also, the access terminal may employ an active access terminal protection scheme to mitigate interference the access point may otherwise cause to a nearby access terminal that is in active communication with another access point.
US09055540B2
There is provided a method of calculating a maximum allowed transmit power for a user equipment within a cellular network system. The cellular network system includes a first cell having a first base station and a second cell having a second base station. The user equipment is served by the first base station. The method includes determining, by the first base station, a maximum degree of interferences being tolerable by the first base station, wherein the interferences are caused by the user equipment following a handover of the user equipment from the first base station to the second base station, and calculating a maximum allowed transmit power for the user equipment to be used following the handover based on the determined maximum degree of interferences.
US09055536B2
Techniques for uplink transmit power command (ULTPC) rejection threshold optimization in WCDMA for power control algorithm 2 (PCA2) are described. Uplink transmit power control commands may be received on a five-slot interval. The uplink transmit power control commands may be decoded for each of the five slots. The decoded uplink transmit power control commands may be compared for each of the five slots to a threshold. The threshold may be optimized to minimize overall transmit power control decision error. A bit decision may be made for each of the five slots based on the comparison and an overall transmit power control command may be determined based on the bit decision for each of the five slots over the five-slot interval.
US09055532B2
The present disclosure relates to an operation method of a base station for supporting a sleep mode in a broadband mobile communication system, and the method may include transmitting a sleep response message containing sleep identification information to the terminal during a sleep mode entry process; transmitting a traffic indication message containing updated sleep identification information to the terminal during a listening window when the sleep identification information is updated; receiving a traffic indication request message from the terminal subsequent to the listening window; and transmitting a traffic indication response message containing the updated sleep identification information to the terminal.
US09055520B2
A method for mobile management entity (MME) selection includes receiving at a base transceiver station (BTS) a message from each of multiple MMEs including information for advertising functionalities of each of the MMEs. The functionalities include at least one type of communications session supported by each of the MMEs. The method also includes receiving at the BTS a message from a user equipment (UE) to request for a communications session. The request message includes session type information indicating a type of session requested by the UE. At least one of the MMEs is capable of serving the requested type of session. The method further includes generating a list of candidate MMEs capable of serving the requested type of communications session from the MMEs by matching the session type information with the capability information, and selecting a serving MME from the list based on the information relating to the advertised functionalities.
US09055519B2
A method of providing network data to a Station includes receiving, by an Access Point of a plurality of Access Points, a request for network link data output by the Station, to be used by the Station in deciding which of the plurality of Access Points to connect to; initiating, by the Access Point, backhaul measurements over a wireless network that includes the Access Point and a Gateway; obtaining and storing, by the Access Point, backhaul measurement data based on the backhaul measurements performed; and providing the backhaul measurement data to the Station.
US09055515B2
A method for transmitting control information to a wireless node in a communications system includes mapping, by a communications controller, the control information onto resources associated with a wireless node specific search space, the wireless node specific search space being located in a first data region of a first subframe, the first subframe including a first common search space in addition to the wireless node specific search space. The method also includes generating, by the communications controller, a location indicator identifying a location of the wireless node specific search space. The method further includes transmitting, by the communications controller, the first subframe to the wireless node, and transmitting, by the communications controller, the location indicator to the wireless node.
US09055508B2
A system and method are disclosed for forwarding data in hybrid wireless mesh networks. The method includes configuring a number of mesh network nodes as Potential Relay Nodes (PRNs) in an overlay network associated with a hybrid wireless mesh network, streaming data packets from a source node to a destination node using a native data forwarding algorithm of the hybrid wireless mesh network, dynamically identifying Relay Nodes (RNs) among PRNs in the overlay network, creating secondary paths for sending data packets towards selected RNs in the overlay network, and relaying data packets from RNs to the destination node using the overlay network.
US09055498B2
Described embodiments provide for handover in a long term evolution (LTE) communication network. A LTE macrocell base station may receive a measurement report from user equipment while providing a communication service to the user equipment located within a service area of the LTE macrocell base station, and determine whether or not the neighbor cell is a LTE macrocell or a LTE femtocell based on the measurement report. The LTE macrocell base station may initiate hand-over of the user equipment to a neighbor WCDMA macrocell base station when the neighbor cell is determined as the LTE femtocell.
US09055482B1
Systems, methods, and software for wireless frequency changes for wireless communication devices based on tracking area updates in wireless communication systems are provided herein. In one example, a method of operating a communication system is provided. The method includes providing wireless access to communication services for wireless communication devices over a first frequency spectrum at a wireless access node, and receiving tracking area updates transferred by ones of the wireless communication devices. The method also includes processing at least a quantity of the tracking area updates received at the wireless access node to determine idle timers for the wireless communication devices, where an expiration of an associated idle timer indicates that an associated wireless communication device can no longer receive the wireless access over the first frequency spectrum and can receive further wireless access over a second frequency spectrum.
US09055475B2
A method for a tracking device optimizing power to remain reachable for a desired period based on evaluated wide-area-network conditions. The tracking device may communicate via a power-intensive long-range transceiver and may continually measure service conditions related to network communications. The tracking device may periodically calculate statistical information describing the service conditions, such as a percentage of time in which the tracking device was out-of-network-service. Based on the statistics, the tracking device may operate in an optimization mode to conserve power when out-of-network-service. In an embodiment, the tracking device may calculate the statistics based on evaluation periods defined by predefined numbers of out-of-network-service occurrences, predefined time periods, and/or a hybrid of both. In an embodiment, the tracking device may conserve power in a power save state that alternates with another operating state in which the tracking device periodically evaluates criteria before either continuing to conserve power or utilize network resources.
US09055474B2
Generally, this disclosure provides apparatus and methods for improved User Equipment (UE) mobility in wireless heterogeneous networks. The UE device may include a location determination module configured to determine location information associated with the UE relative to one or more of a cells, wherein the of cells form part of a wireless heterogeneous network; a processing circuit configured to generate an assistance message, the assistance message including the location information associated with the UE; and a transmitter circuit configured to transmit a Radio Resource Control (RRC) message to an evolved Node B (eNB) associated with one of the cells, the RRC message including the assistance message.
US09055473B2
A transmission entity (e.g., user equipment (UE)) is expected to reduce the segmentation of Radio Link Control (RLC) Service Data Units (SDUs) while also minimizing padding. Signaling or provisioning of a constraint value such as a maximum padding amount or minimum segmentation size is employed in a determinative way in the UE to balance these objectives. A receiving entity (e.g., evolved base node (eNB)) benefits from being able to signal these parameters, whose application to RLC instances can discriminate between data and signaling radio bearers. Compliance can also be voluntary, such as the network entity employing at least a portion of the same approach on the downlink.
US09055472B2
In a distributed antenna system (DAS) and a local area network (LAN), a common communication infrastructure distributes data from radio-based and Internet-based sources. A radio equipment (RE) of the DAS interfaces to a LAN segment. For the downlink, a gateway maps radio signal data from a radio equipment controller (REC) and data packets from a switch to mixed-data frames using a radio data interface protocol for transmission in the DAS. At the RE, the signal data and data packets are retrieved from the mixed-data frames and provided to the air interface and LAN segment, respectively. For the uplink from the RE, the radio signal data from the air interface and the data packets from the LAN segment are mapped to mixed-data frames and transmitted to the gateway. The gateway retrieves the signal samples and data packets from the mixed-data frames for transfer to the REC and switch, respectively.
US09055466B2
Network performance data is gathered and analyzed to produce network patterns and data delivery strategies. Client devices and other network components report network performance data to a central management system. Data delivery strategies are applied to a portion of a network to deliver content appropriate for network patterns that are associated with the portion of the network.
US09055464B2
Data transmission with a wireless communication device which communicates over an air interface with a radio network is controlled by setting a radio link control (RLC) window size for a first logical connection established with the wireless communication device over the air interface, the RLC window size indicating a number of RLC protocol data units (PDUs), periodically estimating a total amount of memory available at the wireless communication device for storing RLC PDUs, and controlling transmission of RLC PDUs associated with the first logical connection to the wireless communication device based on the estimated total amount of memory available at the wireless communication device for storing RLC PDUs, or based on the RLC window size set for the first logical connection if the RLC window size limits the transmission of the RLC PDUs more than the estimated total amount of memory available at the wireless communication device.
US09055462B2
To provide a mobile communication terminal test device that can generate a signal with amplitude-frequency characteristics or phase-frequency characteristics which are changed over time. A mobile communication terminal test device 10 includes a data generation unit 12 that generates a bit stream, a sub-carrier generation unit 31 that receives bit stream data and performs, for example, predetermined encoding, symbol mapping, or sub-carrier mapping to convert the received data into a plurality of sub-carriers based on an OFDM modulation system, a frequency characteristic storage unit 13 that stores table data for predetermined amplitude-frequency characteristics and phase-frequency characteristics, and a frequency characteristic calculation unit 32 that sets the amplitude and phase of each sub-carrier input from the sub-carrier generation unit 31 on the basis of the table data.
US09055461B2
Systems and methods are provided for first-level debugging for a radio equipment of a base station using a local wireless hotspot created by another radio equipment of the base station in local wireless proximity to the radio equipment. In one embodiment, a network management system is remotely connected to a Radio Equipment Controller (REC) of a base station in a cellular communications network. The network management system determines that there is a loss of communication between the REC and a first Remote Radio Equipment (RRE) of the base station. The network management system causes a second RRE of the base station to create a local wireless hotspot and then obtains debug information for the first RRE that is obtained by the second RRE via the local wireless hotspot. The network management system then utilizes the debug information for the first RRE.
US09055458B2
A method of providing aggregated MAC protocol data unit (AMPDU) duration control in a wireless communication device includes setting an AMPDU duration. Pass/fail statistics are collected for each MPDU of an AMPDU in a time window, W. A packet error rate (PER) difference is calculated between first and last sets of MPDUs for each AMPDU in the window. An average PER difference is calculated across all AMPDUs in the window. When the average PER difference is greater than a first threshold, then the AMPDU duration is decreased. When the difference is less than a second threshold, then the AMPDU duration is increased. When the difference is within the first and the second thresholds, then the method returns to the step of collecting for a next time window. The AMPDU duration can also be adjusted based on detected Doppler and line-of-sight transmissions.
US09055456B2
The present invention is directed to a method employing a basestation with downlink and uplink flows of information between users; remotely virtualizing the flows from an entity external to the basestation without any modification to the basestation; and creating virtual basestations or networks responsive to the remotely virtualizing.
US09055455B2
Systems and methods which provide local sensor and/or external information derived proactive aiming assistance with respect to wireless nodes for facilitating desired wireless links are shown. Embodiments provide an aiming assistance user interface providing guidance with respect to properly altering the orientation of a wireless node to provide a desired wireless link. To facilitate providing aiming assistance embodiments of wireless nodes are adapted to include a plurality of sensors operable to provide information useful in environmental analysis for determining proactive orientation guidance information. Wireless nodes adapted according to embodiments additionally or alternatively utilize information obtained externally useful in determining proactive orientation guidance information. Embodiments of the invention utilize the foregoing sensor information and externally sourced information to determine proactive orientation guidance information.
US09055451B2
An indoor position determination method and system based on WLAN signal strength using remote monitoring and cell space environmental attenuation is provided. The indoor position determination method includes a remote monitoring step of collecting information about signal strength from a neighboring AP and generating an AP signal strength table, a position information requesting step of receiving identification information and signal strength of a detected AP from a mobile terminal, and a cell determination step of comparing a signal strength pattern of each AP received from the mobile terminal with a neighboring AP signal strength pattern of each AP with reference to the AP signal strength table and determining a cell having an AP with a most similar pattern as a cell where the mobile terminal is presently located.
US09055448B2
A cooperative beamforming apparatus and method in a wireless communication system supporting channel sensitive scheduling based on feedback information is provided. A beamforming method in a wireless communication system according to the present invention includes transmitting, at a mobile station, a channel condition information of a channel of a serving base station to the serving base station and a channel condition information of a channel of a neighbor base station; and forming, at the serving base station, a beam based on the channel condition information to transmit a signal and, at the neighbor base station, a beam to transmit a signal.
US09055438B2
Illustrated is a system and method to transmit a credential to a proximate first device, the first device validating the credential. The system and method also includes transmitting data to the first device. The system and method also includes transmitting the credential to a proximate second device, the second device validating the credential and to receive the data from the first device.
US09055436B2
A transmitting device, a receiving device, a wireless communication system and a method for controlling the wireless communication system are used for creating a secure wireless communication network of a limited area. The transmitting device comprises: one or more transmitters configured to transmit wireless signals, and create the limited area by a coverage scope of the wireless signals; a cryptography key generating unit configured to generate a cryptography key for the wireless signals; a cryptography key encoding unit configured to encode the cryptography key to a cryptography key frame; and a cryptography key scheduling unit configured to schedule the cryptography key frame so as to control the transmitter to transmit the wireless signals including the cryptography key frame.
US09055434B2
An example of the present invention is a method of transmitting encrypted user data to a mobile terminal in a wireless telecommunications network. The method comprises sending to the mobile terminal a data packet. The data packet comprises both an identifier of encryption information to used in recovering encrypted user data, and user data encrypted using said encryption information.
US09055428B2
A communication apparatus of the present invention is a communication apparatus that communicates with a plurality of other communication apparatuses, and starts processing for setting an address for the communication apparatus using encrypted communication when encrypted communication with the plurality of communication apparatuses becomes possible by sharing encryption keys for encrypting communication with the other communication apparatuses.
US09055426B2
A method and apparatus for disabling the communication functionality (i.e., disabling the transmission and/or reception of RF signals) of an integrated device, while still providing access to the local functionality of such device. A control and select function, such as a switch that is implemented by hardware or software or a combination thereof, is provided in an integrated device to allow the end user of the device to access the local data processing functionality of the device, even while the wireless communication functionality of such device is disabled.
US09055420B2
A computer receives a plurality of records each relevant to a relationship between a first person and a second person. The computer determines a communication score of a communication from the first person to the second person, wherein the score is based on at least one of the plurality of records. The computer compares the communication score to an established mediation threshold. Responsive to determining that the communication score violates the established mediation threshold, the computer passes the communication to a user device of the second person. Further, the computer prioritizes the plurality of records according to a set of priorities, and presents the plurality of records to the first person or to the second person.
US09055419B2
A method and apparatus for recommending a short message recipient. The method includes parsing history short messages of a user to generate data associated with contacts, constructing a semantic association database by using the data, identifying a critical object in a new short message text of the user, analyzing an association between the critical object and the contacts by using the semantic association database, and recommending a short message recipient to the user according to a strength of association.
US09055418B2
A method and system for delivering data are provided. The method includes sending, by a User Equipment (UE), to an evolved Node-B (eNB) a service request message for requesting data when setting up Radio Resource Control (RRC) connection using a RRC connection complete message, sending, by the eNB, the received service request message to a Mobile Management Entity (MME) using an initial UE message, sending, by the MME, an ‘initial context setup for signaling’ message that does not include information about data bearers, to the eNB, upon receiving the initial context setup message, setting up, by the eNB, Access Stratum (AS) security with the originating UE and performing, by the originating UE, Non Access Stratum (NAS) security with the MME, and upon completion of the NAS security process with the MME, transmitting, by the originating UE, the data to the MME using an uplink NAS transport message.
US09055407B1
A system and program of instructions for generating and utilizing a database of driving trip data and event data to identify drivers by mobile devices during a driving trip, comprising identifying a driver, determining a driving trip based on driving trip data, identifying device usage events associated with the driver, determining a driving context for the driver based on the driving trip, the usage events and context data, filtering the usage event data associated with the portable electronic device based on the driving context to create a set of risk events that occurred during the trip, and taking some action based on the set of risk events. The usage event data includes phone calls, text and other forms of messages, emails, applications, and other usage information, including usage associated with third party sources, each of which occur during the operation of a motor vehicle during a trip.
US09055394B2
The present invention provides a wireless communication device comprising: a wireless communication unit configured to perform wireless communication using radio waves belonging to a predetermined radio wave band between a first external device and a second external device; a proximity communication unit configured to perform proximity communication with a control terminal; and a control unit configured to cause control data, which indicates an instruction for the first external device, received from the control terminal via the proximity communication unit to be transmitted to the first external device via the wireless communication unit, the control unit adjusting a transmission timing of the control data or the data when causing the control data to be transmitted to the first external device while the first external device or the wireless communication unit sequentially transmits data to the second external device.
US09055382B2
User headphones are calibrated in real time to improve the reproduction accuracy of recorded audio content. Microphones of a type used to record the audio content (including their orientation and recording characteristics) are characterized to indicate a first audio coloration. Audio playback devices of a type used to process the audio content are characterized to indicate a second audio coloration. Headphones of a type corresponding to the user headphones are characterized to indicate a third audio coloration. An equalization signal is computed based on the audio colorations, and is applied to calibrate the user headphones during playback of the audio content. A database of the characterizations is maintained so that calibration of different models of headphones using different playback devices can be accomplished for audio content recorded using different models of microphones.
US09055381B2
It is disclosed to determine, for a direction being at least associated with a value of a first direction component and with a value of a second direction component, at least one weighting factor for each basis function of a set of basis functions, each of the basis functions being associated with an audio transfer characteristic, wherein said determining is at least based on a first set of gain factors, associated with the first direction component, and on a second set of gain factors, associated with the second direction component
US09055380B2
A method for producing a tube for a hearing aid is disclosed. And more specifically, a method is disclosed for anchoring a fiber to a tube of a hearing aid, the fiber running through the tube. The fiber is positioned within the tube as a reinforcement fiber to improve the pull strength of the tube.
US09055377B2
A personal communication device provides hearing support, and includes an input receiving an audio signal, a programmable processor, and an output outputting the processed signal. The programmable processor performs a filtering operation on a digital version of the audio signal in a first signal path based on parameter settings and provides control logic that determines the parameter settings based on information on user preferences, on audiological information and on information on the listening situation to provide hearing loss compensation. The programmable processor has a second signal path in parallel with the first signal path that receives the digital version of the audio signal and parameter settings and determining the filter coefficients of the filtering operation based on the parameter settings and the digital version of the audio signal.
US09055376B1
Systems and methods are provided herein relating to audio classification. Genres of music can be identified by detecting unique spectral features inherent to those genres. One example genre detected is techno music. Two dimensional discrete cosine transforms can be generated for consecutive windows of the spectrogram or chromagram. A max value of the energy of portions of the two dimensional discrete cosine transforms can be determined. The max value can be normalized and aggregated with max values related to neighboring windows. If the aggregate scores meet a genre threshold, the audio sample, or portions thereof, can be associated with a genre of music.
US09055375B2
A gaming system includes a central server linked to user stations defining gaming zones each defined as comprising one or more of said user stations. The server analyzes ambient conditions and generates baseline audio files for the user stations. The stations each include a gaming terminal, and sound receiving and emitting devices. The user stations sample ambient sounds and generate a representative audio file for analysis by the central server. The stations further enable users to select external sounds for local sound suppression, and can direct the sound emitting devices to emit sound waves for locally suppressing the selected external sounds. The stations extract user station-specific sound signatures from a combination of the local audio file and the baseline audio file, and direct the sound emitting devices to locally amplify sounds associated with the extracted user station-specific sound signatures.
US09055367B2
Psychoacoustic Bass Enhancement (PBE) is integrated with one or more other audio processing techniques, such as active noise cancellation (ANC), and/or receive voice enhancement (RVE), leveraging each technique to achieve improved audio output. This approach can be advantageous for improving the performance of headset speakers, which often lack adequate low-frequency response to effectively support ANC.
US09055364B1
An earset has an automatic rewinding unit of a ball/wire spring type. In the earset, an earphone cable extends from a wheel by a desired length if a user pulls the earphone cable, and the drawn earphone cable is rewound back into the wheel if the user pulls the earphone cable slightly.
US09055357B2
Disclosed herein, among other things, are methods and apparatus for an directional microphone arrays for hearing assistance devices. In various embodiments, the present subject matter provides a microphone array system for receiving sounds including a first directional microphone, a second directional microphone and an omnidirectional microphone. The first directional microphone has a first directional axis in a first direction, and the second directional microphone has a second directional axis that is collinear with the first direction and pointing in the same direction as the first direction. The omnidirectional microphone has a sound sampling position that is a disposed between the first directional microphone and the second directional microphone, and the omnidirectional microphone sound sampling position is on or about the first directional axis. Weighted outputs of the first directional microphone, second directional microphone, and omnidirectional microphone are processed to provide a second order directional microphone system, according to various embodiments.
US09055353B2
A content transmission device for transmitting content, whose copying is controlled, includes an authentication section for performing an authentication procedure between the content transmission device and a content receiving device, a first copy-control-information processing section for processing first copy control information describing copy control information concerning the content, a second copy-control-information processing section for processing second copy control information including content information different from the first copy control information, and a content transmission section for generating and transmitting, to the content receiving device, a packet including a header including the first copy control information and the second copy control information, and a payload obtained by encrypting the content with a predetermined content key.
US09055343B1
Systems and methods for recommending content to a user that the user previously viewed for viewing again are presented. A system includes a crawling component configured to crawl watch histories of a plurality of users, wherein the watch histories reflect videos watched by respective users of the plurality of users, and identify based on the watch histories, a set of videos that have been watched more than once by individual users of the plurality of users. An identification component further analyzes watch history of a first user, wherein the watch history of the first user reflects videos watched by the first user, and identifies based on the watch history of the first user, one or more videos watched by the first user that are included in the set of videos, and a recommendation component recommends the one or more videos to the first user for re-watching.
US09055336B2
Methods and apparatus for multi-purpose metering are disclosed. An example method includes transmitting a first discovery inquiry message in response to a wakeup timer expiration signal, disabling a media detection circuit of the portable device when a base unit responds to the discovery inquiry message, and enabling the media detection circuit of the portable device when the base unit response to the discovery inquiry message is absent.
US09055332B2
Disclosed herein is a method of synchronizing of a plurality of data streams having time-stamped packets, wherein the plurality of data streams are of a first type and at least a second type different than the first type, of which at least one stream of the first type is to be processed at a server. The method includes re-dating a timestamp of a packet, using a processor, based on an estimated relative delay for transport up to the server between first-type and second-type streams and a predicted relative delay representative of a processing time duration between first-type and second-type streams, thereby allowing the relative delays to cancel at least partially.
US09055323B2
Disclosed is a touchscreen remote control device and system having means of locating the remote if misplaced, wherein the remote includes an imbedded receiver, television control emitter, a signal generator and a touchscreen interface. A corresponding television or electronic device includes three modes of locating the remote, including an audible tone alert, a voice messaging alert and a means of activating the backlight of the remote touchscreen for low light visualization. The remote is a structure that includes a touchscreen for control purposes and for interfacing with the television, wherein the remote includes rechargeable batteries and a speaker for transmitting the audible locating signal upon request.
US09055320B2
An approach is described that includes determining that a remote device has moved outside of a pre-defined area associated with a digital video recorder (DVR), and transmitting program data from the DVR to the remote device while the remote device remains outside of the pre-defined area. Another approach includes a digital video recorder (DVR) having a memory and a processor. The DVR operates to: receive an incoming transmission signal; transmit a selected program to a primary display device; determine that a remote device has moved outside of a pre-defined area; and transmit program data corresponding to the selected program to the remote device while the remote device remains outside of the pre-defined area.
US09055318B2
An interactive television program guide system is provided. An interactive television program guide provides users with an opportunity to select programs for recording on a remote media server. Programs may also be recorded on a local media server. The program guide provides users with VCR-like control over programs that are played back from the media servers and over real-time cached copies of the programs. The program guide also provides users with an opportunity to designate gift recipients for whom programs may be recorded.
US09055311B1
Systems and methods for providing a program listing include storing user profile data and a user identifier for a user; storing an association of the user identifier with user identifiers for each of the plurality of social contacts of the user; receiving program identifier data representing programs currently being viewed by the social contacts; ranking the program identifier data for each of the plurality of social contacts based at least in part on the user profile data; and sending display data representing the program identifier data for display in an order based on the ranking.
US09055310B2
An apparatus, method and data structure for generating at least one table in a broadcast environment, are provided. The apparatus includes a generator to generate an event information table (EIT) and an extended text table (ETT). The ETT has program guide information for an n-hour span and has a transmission interval. The ETT has a transmission interval and program description information according to the EIT. The transmission interval of the EIT is shorter than the transmission interval of the ETT.
US09055305B2
An apparatus and method for sample adaptive offset to restore intensity shift of processed video data are described. In a video coding system, the video data are subject to various processing such as prediction, transformation, quantization, deblocking, and adaptive loop filtering. Along the processing path in the video coding system, certain characteristics of the processed video data may be altered from the original video data due to the operations applied to video data. For example, the mean value of the processed video may be shifted. Therefore, the pixel intensity shift has to be carefully compensated or restored to alleviate the artifacts. Accordingly a sample adaptive offset scheme is disclosed that can take into consideration of the dynamic characteristics within a frame using a region partition scheme. Furthermore, the sample adaptive offset scheme also supports multiple SAO types that can be tailored to the characteristics of processed video data and achieve better quality.
US09055300B2
An image encoder generates a reference frame by modifying a previously encoded frame and encodes a current block of a current frame based on a group including the previously encoded frame and the reference frame, wherein in the encoding of the current block, a reference to a first frame included in the group is considered to be the same as a reference to any other frame included in the group.
US09055296B2
Devices, methods, and other embodiments associated with processing rasterized data are described. In one embodiment, an apparatus includes translation logic for converting lines of rasterized pixel data of a compressed image to a plurality of two-dimensional data blocks. The lines of rasterized pixel data are stored in consecutive memory locations. Each data block is stored in a consecutive memory location. The apparatus includes decompression logic for at least partially decompressing the compressed image based, at least in part, on the two-dimensional data blocks.
US09055289B2
Provided is a three-dimensional (3D) display system. The 3D display system synthesizes a 3D image and position information data of an observer obtained through a camera with an optimal viewing area image with respect to horizontal and vertical directions of a display panel in a 3D space, and displays the synthesized image on the display panel such that the observer can visually know an optimal viewing area. Accordingly, the 3D display system enables the observer to visually check the optimal viewing area with ease and induces the observer to move to a position in the optimal viewing area.
US09055286B2
A method is disclosed for a stereoscopic display system. The display system has a display panel containing an array of display units and a plurality of stereoscopic devices coupled to the display panel to affect three-dimensional (3D) display. The method includes receiving a 3D image to be displayed on the array of display units. The method also includes determining original display values for the display units and determining a coupling relationship between the display units and the stereoscopic devices. Further, the method includes determining a crosstalk condition based on the coupling relationship, and adjusting the original display values of display units based on the coupling relationship, the crosstalk condition, and the original display values of both the left display units and the right display units such that the crosstalk condition is cancelled. The method also includes displaying the 3D image using the adjusted display values of the display units.
US09055277B2
An image rendering device realizes stereoscopic viewing of composite images generated by compositing background three-dimensional models and foreground three-dimensional models each defined in three-dimensional modeling space. A texture mapping unit converts background image data into two or more viewpoint textures and maps each viewpoint texture to a background three-dimensional model in the three-dimensional modeling space. A viewport conversion unit extracts, for each of the two or more viewpoint textures, a viewport image from the background three-dimensional model mapped with the viewpoint texture and from the foreground three-dimensional model. By comparing a parallax of the foreground three-dimensional model occurring in stereoscopic playback with a parallax of the intra-texture object occurring in stereoscopic playback, the device determines depth relationship between the foreground three-dimensional model and the intra-texture object and adjusts positional relationship between the foreground three-dimensional model and the intra-texture object based on a result of the determination.
US09055276B2
A digital camera system that implements a method for providing image processing customized according to an identified person. The method includes: capturing an input digital image of a scene; identifying at least one particular person in the input digital image by analyzing signals received from an electronic device associated with the particular person; retrieving image processing preferences, wherein the retrieved image processing preferences are associated with one of the identified particular persons; processing the input digital image to form a modified digital image according to retrieved image processing preferences; and storing the modified digital image in a storage memory.
US09055260B2
Various embodiments determine electronic program guide information based on user viewing habits. One embodiment provides an electronic program guide generator that receives usage information that includes indications of a plurality of viewed channels, determines one or more channels of the plurality of viewed channels based on the received usage information, and provides indications of the determined one or more channels.
US09055253B2
When processing image data by referring to at least one of reference image data and correction data, an image is processed in a unit of band area by dividing image data of a target image in a plurality of band areas. In this case, the minimum transfer unit of the image data is set. The minimum transfer unit of at least one of the reference image data and the correction data is obtained to process the image data in the minimum transfer unit. The transfer rate of the image data is determined so that the image data to be buffered fits in a capacity of a buffer available in image processing. The height of the band area to be created by division is determined based on the ratio of the transfer rate of the image data to the minimum transfer unit of the image data.
US09055245B2
Adverse effects of noise are reduced. A photodetector circuit, a difference data generation circuit, and a data input selection circuit are included. The photodetector circuit has a function of generating an optical data signal. A first data signal and a second data signal is input to the difference data generation circuit and the difference data generation circuit has a function of generating difference data of data of the first data signal and data of the second data signal. The data input selection circuit has a function of determining that the data of optical data signal is regarded as data of the first data signal or data of the second data signal.
US09055239B2
Methods, apparatus, and systems for signal continuity assessment using embedded watermarks are provided. The embedded watermarks are recovered from the content and one or more attributes associated with the recovered watermarks are identified. A continuity of the content can then be assessed in accordance with the one or more attributes. The continuity assessment may be based on a variety of factors, including but not limited to a determined heartbeat of the recovered watermarks, a density, separation, location, or extent, of the recovered watermarks, as well as information associated with the watermarks, such as a stego key, channel bits, packet numbers, a fingerprint, or the like.
US09055236B2
According to one embodiment, an information processing apparatus includes a display, a connector which outputs a video signal, a display driver which controls output of a video signal to the display and connector, a monitoring unit which monitors whether a partner switches an input from a video signal output from the connector to another video signal, the partner being connected to the connector, and an output switching unit which instructs the display driver to switch the output destination of the video signal from the connector to the display when the monitoring unit detects that the input of the partner is switched to the other video signal.
US09055235B2
A video output apparatus outputs one of image information items received from external storage units. The video output apparatus includes input interfaces, an image information acquisition unit that acquires the image information items from the external storage units through the input interfaces, an output object management unit that manages one of the image information items as an output object among the image information items, an image information presence determination unit that sends a notification of presence or absence of image information to the output object management unit for each of the input interfaces based on whether image acquisition information for acquiring image information has been acquired, and an output unit that outputs an image information item acquired through one of the input interfaces associated with the notification of the presence of image information received from the image information presence determination unit.
US09055231B2
Techniques for creating a High Dynamic Range (HDR) image within a consumer grade digital camera from a series of images of a scene captured at different exposure levels, and displaying the HDR image on the camera's built-in display, are provided. The approach employs mixing images of the series to incorporate both scene shadow and highlight details, and the removing of “ghost” image artifacts appearing in the mixed HDR image resulting from movement in the scene over the time the series images are captured. The low computational resource utilization of the present invention's image mixing and ghost removal processing operations, along with the present invention's ability to commence image mixing and ghost removal prior to the acquisition of all series images, can significantly reduce the time required to generate and display a tone mapped HDR image.
US09055230B2
An embodiment of the invention provides a camera comprising a photosurface having a substrate comprising photopixels and associated storage pixels and a controller that controls the photosurface to image a scene by maintaining a bias between the photopixels and their respective storage pixels at all times during an exposure period of the photosurface so that photocharge, substantially upon its generation in a photopixel by light from the scene incident on the photopixel moves towards the photopixel's storage pixel.
US09055226B2
Systems and methods are provided for using tracking data to control the functions of an automated fixture. Examples of automated fixtures include light fixtures and camera fixtures. A method includes obtaining a first position of a tracking unit. The tracking unit includes an inertial measurement unit and a visual indicator configured to be tracked by a camera. A first distance is computed between the automated fixture and the first position and it is used to set a function of the automated fixture to a first setting. A second position of the tracking unit is obtained. A second distance between the automated fixture and the second position is computed, and the second distance is used to set the function of the automated fixture to a second setting.
US09055225B2
Provided is a display device that processes images in a set cycle, creates image data for each frame or field and that has: a receiver that receives transmitted data from an imaging device that encodes image data as packets, creates transmission data and transmits said transmission data; a display processing unit that generates a display signal for display from the transmitted data; a measuring unit that measures the reception timing of specific packets among the transmitted data; a determination unit that determines the reception state of the specific packets and, based on the results of this determination, determines whether or not to use the received timing; and a processing unit that uses the reception timing and phase regulates the display signal if the determination unit determines to use the reception timing.
US09055213B2
A camera array, an imaging device and/or a method for capturing image that employ a plurality of imagers fabricated on a substrate is provided. Each imager includes a plurality of pixels. The plurality of imagers include a first imager having a first imaging characteristics and a second imager having a second imaging characteristics. The images generated by the plurality of imagers are processed to obtain an enhanced image compared to images captured by the imagers. Each imager may be associated with an optical element fabricated using a wafer level optics (WLO) technology.
US09055206B1
An electronic device including a housing, a support member, and a camera module is provided. The housing has a bump. The bump extends toward the outside of the electronic device and correspondingly forms a recess on the inside of the housing. The support member includes a chassis and a holder. The chassis is disposed inside the housing. The holder includes a body, an accommodation recess located on the body and facing the recess, and a skirt extending outwardly from a side of the accommodation recess. The holder is supported against the chassis through the skirt. The camera module is disposed inside the accommodation recess, and a portion of the camera module protrudes outside the accommodation recess, wherein the protruding portion is located in the recess, and the support member is located outside the recess, such that a sidewall of the recess faces and surrounds the camera module.
US09055203B2
Generally, in accordance with one embodiment, an image forming apparatus comprises a communication section, a storage section, an operation section, an image forming section, and a controller. The communication section receives print data. The storage section stores print data in a print data area. The operation section receives an operation input. The image forming section forms, if the operation section receives a printing instruction of print data, an image on a sheet based on the print data. The controller moves the print data which are not printed even a given period has passed since the print data is received by the communication section from a print data area to other storage area.
US09055202B1
Doorbells can detect visitors using a visitor detection system that includes a camera assembly, a motion detector assembly, or an infrared detector assembly. The visitor detection system can have a first sensor configured to detect a first indication suggestive of a visitor and a second sensor configured to detect a second indication suggestive of a visitor. A wall can separate the first sensor from the second sensor to divide the field of view of the visitor detection system such that the first sensor is configured to detect the first indication within a first portion of the field of view and the second sensor is configured to detect the second indication within a second portion of the field of view.
US09055200B1
Systems an methods are provided that disclose providing a positioning service for devices based on light received from one or more light sources. This light based positioning service uses light information transmitted by each light source to determine the position of the device. The positioning information can include three dimension position information in a building that can then be used to deliver services and information to a mobile device. The content delivered to a mobile device can include multimedia, text, audio, and/or pictorial information. The positioning information along with other location or positioning information can be used in providing augmented reality or location aware services. The light sources can be independent beacons that broadcast information in visible light at a rate that is undetectable by the human eye. Content can be retrieved from a server over a communications connection.
US09055197B2
In a network-based system for recommending media content items based on user preferences, clients contact a server on a periodic basis, independent of the user. In addition to client-server interaction, clients also interact with one another in peer-to-peer fashion. Peers query one another and evaluate their similarity to each other in an interactive comparison of user preferences. When two clients are sufficiently similar, the interaction culminates in the originating client downloading content listings from the targeted peer to generate suggestions for their user. If the two clients are dissimilar, the query may be terminated, or the targeted peer may route the query to a second targeted peer. In addition to the lists of preferences, the originating client may download actual content items from the targeted peers.
US09055193B2
A system may include a first communication device, and a recording server. The first communication device may set layout information indicative of a layout of media data. The first communication device may transmit, to the recording server, first media data to be transmitted to the second communication device, the layout information, and first identification information identifying the first communication device. The recording server may store the first media data, the layout information, and the first identification information transmitted from the first communication device. The recording server may receive a request for conference proceedings data from a particular device. The recording server may determine particular layout information for the particular device. The recording server may generate conference proceedings data based on the determined layout information and media data requested by the particular device.
US09055179B2
Systems and methods of measuring a temporal offset between audio content and video content that employ audio fingerprints from an audio signal in the audio content, and video fingerprints from video frames in the video content. The systems obtain reference audio and video fingerprints prior to transmission of video over a media channel, and obtain target audio and video fingerprints subsequent to transmission of the video over the media channel. Each fingerprint has an associated time stamp. Using the reference and target audio fingerprints and their associated time stamps, the systems determine an audio time stamp offset. Using the reference and target video fingerprints and their associated time stamps, the systems determine a video time stamp offset. Using the audio and video time stamp offsets, the systems determine a temporal offset between the video content and the audio content introduced by the media channel.
US09055171B2
An electronic device includes: a communication unit that performs communication with an external device; and a control unit that issues a command to the external device via the communication unit, on the basis of at least one of capacity of the external device, and capacity of the electronic device.
US09055159B2
Mobile communication device and method for selectively turning on an additional wireless transceiver
A mobile communication device includes a main wireless transceiver unit for sending and receiving wireless signals, an additional wireless transceiver unit for sending and receiving wireless signals, a motion detection unit, connected to a processing unit and arranged to send a motion signal to a processing unit, and the processing unit, arranged to receive the motion signal and to determine therefrom a parameter representative of a velocity of the mobile communication device, wherein the processing unit is arranged and constructed to turn on the additional wireless transceiver unit when the parameter exceeds a first threshold value. Furthermore, the processing unit is arranged and constructed to turn off the additional wireless transceiver unit when the parameter representative of a velocity remains below a second threshold value for a predetermined period of time.
US09055154B2
In one embodiment, a method of directing calls on a mobile communication device comprises receiving a call signal at the mobile communication device from a short-range enabled communication device operably connected with the mobile communication device, accessing subscriber identity module data of the short-range enabled communication device, preparing an outgoing call signal using the accessed subscriber identity module data of the short-range enabled communication device, establishing a communication session between the short-range enabled communication device and a network, and transmitting the outgoing call signal to the network.
US09055146B2
Illustrative embodiments provide a computer implemented method, an apparatus in the form of a data processing system and a computer program product for social network based call management. In one illustrative embodiment, the computer implemented method comprises receiving an incoming call from a caller for a subscriber, and obtains preferences for the subscriber, wherein the preferences describe a caller relationship to the subscriber. Using a location provided in the preferences for the subscriber, the computer implemented method locates attributes for the caller. The computer implemented method processes the call in accordance with the attributes and the preferences.
US09055143B2
A mobile terminal is provided. The mobile terminal includes a case defining a body of the mobile terminal, a circuit board located in the body, an electronic device located in the body, a mounting portion formed at the case so as to mount the electronic device to the case, and a connection terminal provided at the circuit board, the connection terminal providing an elastic contact between the circuit board and the electronic device, the electronic device being electrically connected to the circuit board via the connection terminal.
US09055141B2
A Family Branch Exchange (FBX) overcomes limitations of conventional residential telephone technology to inexpensively provide more useful and advanced residential telephone services. For example, a method of providing distinctive ringing comprises receiving, at a service provider system connected to a telephone network and optionally to a data network, a call from a calling party to a user of the service provider system, playing, from the service provider system to the calling party, a message indicating a plurality of choices from which to select, receiving, at the service provider system, the calling party's selection, and transmitting, from the service provider system, a message indicating a ring tone or ring type to be used based on the calling party's selection.
US09055134B2
Embodiments of an electronic system for asynchronous audio and video in and environment includes a server with a connection to a wireless access point or a personal digital device that communicates with the server through the wireless access point. The server receives and stores an audio track that is to accompany a public display. The personal digital device acts as a client to the server. A user interface enables a user of the personal digital device to request an audio track corresponding to the public display. The server initiates a stream of the requested audio track to be wirelessly transmitted to and received by the personal digital device. The personal digital device plays at least some of the requested audio track to the user.
US09055126B2
A communication system (1) comprising: determining means operable to determine an attribute of a communication device; identifying means operable to identify an avatar by using the attribute, wherein the avatar is such that it conveys to a viewer thereof information about a person; and communicating means operable to communicate the avatar to the communication device.
US09055124B1
Features are disclosed for caching network resources. A system determines whether a resource which does not contain an indication in its associated header that it is cacheable may nevertheless be cached. The determination may be based on observations of a number of requests for the resource over time and from a number of different requesting clients. In response to determining that the resource is cacheable, the system may cache the resource, and in some cases modify the cache control header of resource to facilitate caching. The system may insert fields into the header or otherwise modify the header so that the resource may be cached at a network computing provider, at a requesting client device, or at some other shared or private cache.
US09055121B2
A social networking system offers a variety of fixed and intelligent services and social device resources participating as members in a social network (SNET) group. Such members may include, for example, social billing and payment services, digital assistants and artificial intelligence functions, robotic control and training services, media content storage and playback services, data backup services, services that support distributed processes such as distributed research projects, networking elements such as network attached storage (NAS), firewalls, proxies, etc. In various embodiments, such services and resources may become available upon being selectively docked or otherwise associated (e.g., through docking of a supporting device) with a SNET group by a human member or third party via a docked user device. Selection of available services may be supported through a visual menu provided by a member device or support service.
US09055116B2
A presence system in which communication terminals and a presence server may cooperate to provide status notifications. A communication terminal may provide the server a store message to suspend transmission of status notifications to that communication terminal. The presence server may be arranged so that in response to a store message requesting storage of status notifications the transmission of status notifications from the server to that communication terminal is suspended. Several approaches to release the suspension are provided. The presence system, communication terminal and/or the communication presence server may include hardware and/or computer code or software to provide the respective functions and operations.
US09055113B2
A method and system for correlating web content with content providers to determine the origin of the content such that it is not necessary to look inside the information exchange. The method and system maintains sequences of reference points, which are ordered lists of content providers accessed by subscribers over time, and correlates the internet content applications, such as video, found in network traffic to the sequence of reference points accessed by subscribers to determine the origins of the content even when the content being delivered by third-party content delivery networks.
US09055112B2
Network addresses are dynamically allocated to devices based on demand. A first network address allocation is initially assigned to a subdivision of a network including multiple computing devices. A router for the subdivision is configured to implement the first network address allocation. Data indicating a reconfiguration of the computing devices is obtained. A second network address allocation is subsequently assigned to the subdivision of the network based at least in part on the reconfiguration of the computing devices. The router for the subdivision is reconfigured to implement the second network address allocation.
US09055099B2
Provided is a method of preventing a Transmission Control Protocol (TCP)-based Denial of Service (DoS) attack on a mobile device. The method efficiently prevents a DoS attack on a mobile device, which wirelessly and constantly transmits TCP packets to the mobile device using a TCP protocol and thereby exhausts resources of a wireless network and also battery power of the mobile device depending on a battery. An attack conventionally made in a wired network by abusing TCP-based three-way handshaking is more severe in the wireless network of mobile devices. To prevent such an attack on a mobile device, the method capable of checking three-way handshaking and each transition operation makes the mobile device check whether or not a received TCP packet is valid. Therefore, it is possible to efficiently prevent a DoS attack from exhausting wireless resources and battery power of the mobile device.
US09055093B2
Method, system and computer program product for detecting at least one of security threats and undesirable computer files are provided. A first method includes receiving a data stream which represents outbound, application layer messages from a first computer process to at least one second computer process. The computer processes are implemented on one or more computers. The method further includes monitoring the data stream to detect a security threat based on a whitelist having entries which contain metadata. The whitelist describes legitimate application layer messages based on a set of heuristics. The method still further includes generating a signal if a security threat is detected. A second method includes comparing a set of computer files with a whitelist which characterizes all legitimate computer files. The whitelist contains one or more entries. Each of the entries describe a plurality of legitimate computer files.
US09055092B2
Client network traffic data and server network traffic data regarding a number of network nodes is collected and then grouped by IP address. The network nodes are divided into logical groupings and the network traffic data is presented in the aggregate for all IP addresses in each logical group. The logical groupings may be further divided by protocol, application, port and/or logical group-to-group. Each logical group can be further generalized as either a set of IP addresses (e.g., a business group) or a specific logical link between one set of IP addresses to another set of IP addresses (e.g., a business group link). Either or both of these “groups” may be divided in further logical sub-groups: for example, by protocol, application, port and in the case of business groups, group-to-group. The logical groups provide facilities for initial problem detection and identification while the logical sub-groups provide facilities for troubleshooting and problem isolation.
US09055082B2
Provided is a method for localizing content in a peer-to-peer network. The method includes receiving a message announcing first content. Storing a
US09055078B2
Token-based flow control of messages in a parallel computer, the parallel computer including a plurality of compute nodes, each compute node including one or more computer processors, including: allocating, by a token administration module to a plurality of the computer processors in the parallel computer, a number of data communications tokens; identifying all communicators executing on each computer processor, where each communicator is participating in a distinct parallel operation executing on the parallel computer; allocating, to the communicators, the data communications tokens; determining, by a communicator attempting to send data to the destination, whether the communicator has enough available data communications tokens to send the data to the destination; and responsive to determining that the communicator has enough available data communications tokens to send the data, sending, by the communicator, the data to the destination.
US09055073B2
A method of controlling access to a network, the method comprising storing in a data repository first identifying detail relating to a second type of connection and associating the details with respective base credential relating to a first type of connection, and granting a request to access to network via second type of connection, the request comprises a second identifying detail, if correlation is found between the second identifying detail and the first identifying detail.
US09055069B2
A method of operation of a hardware computing system includes: generating a command stream by a general purpose central processing unit; and receiving, by an application manager, the command stream for executing a command by a programmable execution engine and providing a status through a command execution interface to the general purpose central processing unit for the command from the command stream.
US09055041B2
Embodiments of the present invention address deficiencies of the art in respect to configuring a computing appliance and provide a method, system and computer program product for device certificate based virtual appliance configuration. In one embodiment of the invention, a virtual appliance secure configuration method can be provided. The method can include mounting non-volatile storage to the virtual appliance, retrieving a device certificate from the mounted storage and extracting a signature from the device certificate, activating the virtual appliance in a network domain and acquiring an adapter address and unique identifier for the virtual appliance, and authenticating the signature with the adapter address and unique identifier to ensure a unique active instance of the virtual appliance.
US09055040B2
Disclosed is a method for securely presenting content in a mobile station. The mobile station may have a smart module, a security agent, and an air interface for communicating with a content provider and with a remote content rights manager. The smart module stores content presentation units and has a proxy content rights manager for when the mobile station is unable to receive secure content keys from the remote content rights manager using the air interface. In the method, content presentation units are transferred from the remote rights manager to the smart module for storage. Secure content keys are requested from the smart module for allowing presentation of content requested while the mobile station is unable to communicate with the remote rights manager. The secure content keys are transferred, based on a stored content presentation unit, from the proxy content rights manager to the security agent for allowing content presentation.
US09055039B1
An apparatus for transmitting N packets including a key mixing circuit to generate N groups of encryption seeds, each based upon a predetermined key, a transmitter address, and a predetermined start value for a packet number. A packet number circuit inserts a different one of N values for the packet number into each of the N packets. Each of the N values for the packet number is greater than, or equal to, the predetermined start value for the packet number. An encryption circuit encrypts each of the N packets using the one of the N groups of encryption seeds that was generated based on the value for the packet number in the respective one of the N packets. An output circuit sends the N packets. The encryption circuit generates each of the N groups of encryption seeds before an input circuit receives the respective one of the N packets.
US09055033B2
A system and method for communicating with power tools using a universal protocol. The universal protocol may be implemented using a universal core module that is installed across a variety of power tools and other devices to enable communications therewith. Communications to and from the power tools are translated to a universal protocol once received. The translated communications are handled by the universal core module of a particular tool according to a set of rules. In response, the universal core module outputs communications according to the universal protocol and the set of rules, which may be translated to another protocol for receipt by components of the tool or an external device. The communications may be used, for example, to obtain tool performance data from the tools and to provide firmware updates.
US09055030B2
Aspects of the disclosure relate to monitoring and using telemetry information in various ways. For example, a system that monitors telemetry information may include a user that gathers telemetry information of a device and transmits the information to a monitored room. A manager may join a monitored room and monitor the monitored room for particular types of telemetry information. In one example, a manager may determine whether a downstream device is experiencing a network problem, such as a low bitrate. A manager may also transmit commands to the player via the monitored room, which causes the downstream device to operate in accordance with the transmitted command. In one example, a manager may transmit a command that causes a player to decode a particular service.
US09055025B2
Systems and methods are described for confirming the accuracy and consistency of cellular device provisioning parameters such as telematics station identifiers (TSTIDs) stored at multiple locations. One implementation consists of a method for ensuring accuracy and consistency of parameters stored at multiple locations. The method involves storing parameters on a computer readable medium, connecting to a mobile station corresponding to a first stored parameter, and requesting the mobile station with which a connection has been established report parameters stored at the mobile station. The method further involves establishing an API call with a carrier network operator who provides services to the mobile station, transmitting a second stored parameter to the carrier network operator and requesting the carrier network operator report parameters corresponding to the second stored parameter. The method then compares the parameters received from the mobile station with the parameters received from the carrier network operator.
US09055024B2
A communication system may include a first network connected to lower-layer equipment, a second network connected to a higher-layer application, a gateway device connected to the first network and the second network, and a tunnel device connected to the first network and the second network, the tunnel device bypassing the gateway device.
US09055019B1
A method and system for message multicasting which provides a programmable persistent header in a message to allow one message to be read by multiple target consumers and to ensure that the message passing mechanism does not delete the message until all target consumers have received it. The persistent header may have information about all target consumers and their priority to consume the message. A message parser may obtain from the persistent header identities of target consumers and the order in which they consume the message and allow target consumers to consume the message following the order. The message parser may have a counter which counts the number of consumers that have consumed the message, and keep the message in the queue until all target consumers have consumed the message.
US09055018B2
A method, a computer program product, and a computer system for managing requests to send messages are presented. Header information associated with a set of incoming messages on a server data processing system is retrieved in response to receiving a request to send a drafted message from a client data processing system to the server data processing system. The header information is searched to determine whether an incoming message in the set of incoming messages is related to the drafted message. An indication that the incoming message is related to the drafted message is presented at the client data processing system in response to determining that the incoming message is related to the drafted message.
US09055017B2
A message originator may generate messaging data for selective communication by a messaging provider via an interface generated by a browser software application. The user may also interact with various content providers such that event data is generated based on the user interaction with each content provider. The messaging provider can then obtain the messaging data and the event data to determine a target set of messages to be published. Additionally, the messaging provider can select a set of message recipients to receive, or otherwise access, the target set of messages based on filtering criteria submitted by the message originator, content provider, service provider, and/or message recipients. Credit may be allocated based on activity associated with the communicated messages. The messaging provider may also facilitate additional interaction between the message originator and the message recipients including the initiation of additional communication channels.
US09055014B2
Described herein are systems and methods for enabling access to messages on a message service system via user interfaces of receiving client devices. The message service system comprises a message storage system and a message access system. The message storage system receives messages from sending client devices and stores message data. The message access system comprises a message server and UI server. A receiving client device is connected with the UI server through a first HTTP connection for receiving UI data for building webpages of the user interface and is connected with the message server through a second non-HTTP connection for receiving message data for populating the webpages. The UI data does not comprise any message data. A client protocol engine on the receiving client device and a server protocol engine on the message server define and provide the non-HTTP protocol for receiving and transmitting message data.
US09055011B2
A buffer memory is provided that comprises a plurality of memory elements for storing data elements in an order of arrival, wherein the plurality of memory elements have a variable size and wherein each memory element comprises a pointer (such as a next block starting index) to a memory element storing a next data element. Additionally, each memory element optionally further comprises a block size field indicating the variable size and/or a sequence number field indicating a sequence number of the corresponding data element. The buffer memory optionally comprises a largest sequence variable to store a sequence number of a data element in the buffer memory having a largest sequence number. The largest sequence variable is updated if a newly arrived data element has a sequence number that is larger than the largest sequence variable. A method is also provided for managing the disclosed buffer memories.
US09055005B2
An input/output (I/O) switch fabric includes first physical ports that convey multiple network flows. Moreover, classifiers in the I/O switch fabric separate packets for network flows associated with different types of service. Then, the I/O switch fabric conveys the packets to different virtual switch ports without interference between the separated packets associated with different network flows. Furthermore, second physical ports in the I/O switch fabric output the packets, where a given second physical port outputs packets for at least some of the network flows associated with different types of service. In this way, the given second physical port can output packets having: the same source and destination; different sources and the same destination; or the same source and different destinations.
US09055003B2
In a method for regulating network bandwidth in a virtualized computer environment, a computer having a hypervisor program receives a request from a first virtual client to transmit data. In response, the computer transfers the data from a memory of the first virtual client to a memory of a virtual server. The computer receives an error notification from a shared virtual network adapter of the virtual server, indicative of insufficient network bandwidth available to transmit the data. In response, the computer notifies the first virtual client that insufficient network bandwidth is available to transmit the data.
US09054997B2
A network includes a plurality of endpoint routers and intermediate routers. When a new data stream is detected at any endpoint router, the first packet is sent to a virtual routing server with knowledge of the entire network topology. Based on the topology, current usage, and historical usage, the virtual routing server determined a path for the data stream and begins to update the routing tables of the intermediate routers to reflect the determined path. Until the update is complete, all packets in the data stream are routed first to the virtual routing server and then to their destination. Once the update is complete, packets in the data stream are routed directly along the determined path.
US09054996B2
A network device receives initial policer limits for a plurality of over-subscribing ingress ports, where the initial policer limits are based on existing bandwidth limits for an over-subscribed egress port associated with the over-subscribing ingress ports. The network device receives a high threshold watermark and a low threshold watermark for bandwidth usage of the over-subscribed egress port, and identifies a queue, associated with the over-subscribed egress port, with values outside the high threshold watermark or the low threshold watermark. The network device reduces the initial policer limits for the plurality of over-subscribing ingress ports when the queue has values above the high threshold watermark, and increases the initial policer limits for the plurality of over-subscribing ingress ports when the queue has values below the low threshold watermark.
US09054995B2
A method and program product are provided for implementing object state changes in a data network system that includes at least one application having a plurality of objects. Each object is capable of being in of a plurality of different object states. The method comprises utilizing a network monitor to identify potential object state anomaly candidates from among the plurality of objects and utilizing object measurements taken during a predetermined time segment to determine if the current object state of a potential object state anomaly candidate should change from the current object state to an updated object state.
US09054994B2
A method and system for maintaining quality of service parameters for transmissions as a native Ethernet service between a first network having a first communication protocol and a second network having a second communication protocol. The interworking device includes a first network interface operable to communicate with the first communication network using the first communication protocol, a second network interface operable to communicate with the second communication network using second communication protocol and a processing unit in communication with the first network interface and the second network interface. The processing unit receives a frame from the first network in the first communication protocol, maps parameters corresponding to quality of service parameters in the first communication protocol to quality of service parameters in the second communication protocol and assembles a data packet in the second communication protocol. The assembled data packet includes mapped quality of service parameters.
US09054993B2
A method for controlling distribution of media contents over a network, wherein the contents are distributed by making the contents available at surrogate servers. The method includes the steps of identifying additional contents eligible for distribution; defining a set of categories; identifying for each category at least a reference content; associating the additional contents with the predefined categories based on semantics affinity with the reference content, the semantics affinity being calculated as the distance of each of the additional contents to the at least a reference content; selecting at least one of said predefined categories; and making at least one of the additional contents associated with said selected predefined category available for distribution at the surrogate servers.
US09054988B2
A method and apparatus for handling an overload condition in a communication network are disclosed. For example, the method calculates a call target rate by at least one core signaling network element for at least one edge signaling network element. The method then sends the call target rate by the at least one core signaling network element to the at least one edge signaling network element, when a total queueing delay of the at least one core signaling network element exceeds a predefined high threshold in a measurement interval, wherein the call target rate is used by the at least one edge signaling network element in an overload control that throttles signaling traffic.
US09054985B2
A method may include monitoring available aggregate bandwidth of a network element and determining if the available aggregate bandwidth is sufficient to communicate traffic at a rate equal to an aggregate sum of committed information rates for a plurality of classes of traffic. If the available aggregate bandwidth is sufficient to communicate traffic at the rate equal to the aggregate sum of committed information rates for a plurality of classes of traffic, traffic may be communicated for each of the plurality of classes in accordance with the respective committed information rate for each class. Otherwise, traffic may be communicated for each of the plurality of classes in an amount proportional to the respective committed information rate for a particular class and the available aggregate bandwidth.
US09054977B2
Example implementations described herein are directed to automatically determine an optimal NoC topology using heuristic based optimizations. First, an optimal orientation of ports of various hosts is determined based on the system traffic and connectivity specification. Second, the NoC routers to which the host's port are directly connected to are determined in the NoC layout. Third, an optimal set of routes are computed for the system traffic and the required routers and channels along the routes are allocated forming the full NoC topology. The three techniques can be applied in any combination to determine NoC topology, host port orientation, and router connectivity that reduces load on various NoC channels and improves latency, performance, and message transmission efficiency between the hosts.
US09054974B2
In one embodiment, packet streams are reliably transported through a network using packet replication. A packet stream is received at a duplication point in a network, with two or more copies of each of the packet streams being transported, typically over divergent paths in the network, to a merge point from which a single copy of the packet stream is forwarded or consumed. In one embodiment, this merge point is a packet switching device that includes ingress card(s) and egress line card(s), wherein multiple copies of the packet stream are received by ingress line card(s), with only a single copy provided to an egress line card of the packet switching device. In this manner, a switching fabric or other communication mechanism communicatively coupling the ingress line card(s) to the egress line card, nor the egress line card, is taxed with the burden imposed by additional copies of packet stream.
US09054972B2
A port monitor monitors network traffic that passes through a port of a switch. Frame flows routed through the switch are counted by hardware frame counting logic, which includes a content-addressable memory (CAM) and counters corresponding to various frame flows. Port monitor software includes logical containers (“buckets”), which are used to record and sort counts of the frame flows from hardware based on activity of the frame flows. Frame flow sorting is based on confidence building algorithms such that the thrashing of frame flows between buckets is reduced. Storage and sorting of the frame flows in software allows the activity level of any number of frame flows associated with the switch to be counted, regardless of hardware limitations on how many frame flows can be counted. This allows a real-time analysis of frame flows and a determination of frame flows that are major users of Fiber Channel bandwidth.
US09054968B2
Business intelligence (BI) information that includes at least one application-level directive associated with a received application-level request is collected at a BI framework situated between a transport adapter layer and a network layer of a computing device. A determination is made as to whether to defer transmission of the received application-level request based upon an evaluation of the at least one application-level directive within the collected BI information relative to current network transmission conditions. The received application-level request is stored locally in response to determining to defer transmission of the received application-level request based upon the evaluation of the at least one application-level directive within the collected BI information relative to the current network transmission conditions.
US09054967B1
Techniques are presented herein to facilitate latency measurements in a networking environment. A first network device receives a packet for transport within a network domain that comprises a plurality of network devices. The plurality of network devices have a common time reference, that is, they are time synchronized. The first network device generates timestamp information indicating time of arrival of the packet at the first network device. The first network device inserts into the packet a tag that comprises at least a first subfield and a second subfield. The first subfield comprising a type indicator to signify to other network devices in the network domain that the tag includes timestamp information, and the second subfield includes the timestamp information. The first network device sends the packet from to into the network domain to another network device. Other network devices which receive that packet can make latency measurements.
US09054963B2
A container that manages access to protected resources using rules to intelligently manage them includes an environment having a set of software and configurations that are to be managed. A rule engine, which executes the rules, may be called reactively when software accesses protected resources. The engine uses a combination of embedded and configurable rules. It may be desirable to assign and manage rules per process, per resource (e.g. file, registry, etc.), and per user. Access rules may be altitude-specific access rules.
US09054957B2
A media gateway controller (MGC) is described herein that implements a shared risk group package to control and prevent a media gateway (MG) from establishing redundant links like a primary link and a secondary link that use resources that share the same risk of failure. Essentially, the MGC uses the shared risk group package to control which resources like ephemeral terminations are used by the MG to establish the primary link and the secondary link such that if any of the resources associated with the primary link fail then the secondary link remains operational within the MG and if any of the resources associated with the secondary link fail then the primary link remains operational within the MG.
US09054956B2
Graceful restart in routers having redundant routing facilities may be accomplished by replicating network (state/topology) information.
US09054948B2
A storage apparatus connectable to a computer for transmitting a frame includes a plurality of switches connected by a cascade connection, and a plurality of storages connected to the plurality of switches, wherein at least one of the plurality of switches includes a memory for storing latency value corresponding to a destination address of the frame, the destination address indicating one of the plurality of storages and the computer of a destination of the frame, the latency value indicating an amount of delaying to begin a transmission of the frame, and a port for executing a process including receiving the frame, reading out the latency value corresponding to the destination address included in the received frame from the memory, and transmitting the frame after a time corresponding to the latency value elapsed.
US09054936B2
A semiconductor device includes a low noise amplifier configured to amplify a radio signal from an antenna and output an reception signal, a down converter configured to down-convert the reception signal, a first divider coupled with the down converter, a first local oscillator coupled with the first divider, a modulator configured to modulate a transmission signal, a second divider coupled with the modulator, and a second local oscillator coupled with the second divider. The modulator includes a first inductor of a spiral shape, the local oscillator includes a second inductor of a horse-shape having an opening, and the opening of the second inductor is disposed opposite to the first inductor.
US09054924B2
A method and apparatus for implementing space frequency block coding (SFBC) in an orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) wireless communication system may be provided. Channel quality information (CQI) may be received, for example, on a per group of OFDM sub-carrier basis. A channel coded data stream may be generated. SFBC encoding may be performed on the channel coded data stream in an open loop mode, for example, such that the SFBC encoding is performed using a plurality of pairs of OFDM sub-carriers. A portion of the channel coded data stream that is SFBC encoded using a pair of OFDM sub-carriers of an OFDM symbol may be SFBC encoded independently of another portion of the channel coded data stream that is SFBC encoded using other pairs of OFDM sub-carriers of the OFDM symbol. The SFBC encoded data may be transmitted over the plurality of OFDM sub-carriers as an OFDM signal.
US09054922B2
In one embodiment, an endpoint elicits a pattern of STUN responses to identify security devices located on a call path. The endpoint then uses address information from the identified security devices to establish an efficient media flow with a remote endpoint. The endpoint can optimize the number of network devices and network paths that process the endpoint's keepalive message. Additionally, the endpoint may request custom inactivity timeouts with each of the identified security devices for reducing bandwidth consumed by keepalive traffic.
US09054920B2
In a method for managing transmission of data files to users, a first file is divided into first segments and a second file is divided into second segments. A first segment is sent to a first user and a different first segment is sent to a second user. A second segment is sent to the first user and a different second segment is sent to the second user. At least part of a segment sent to the first user is combined with at least part of a segment sent to the second user to produce a combined segment which is of smaller size than the total size of the at least parts of segments before combining. The combined segment is transmitted to the first user and to the second user for each user to recover a segment using the combined segment and at least part of a segment.
US09054917B2
Technologies are generally described for the secure live migration of virtual machines. The migration may take place in the context of, for example, public clouds. In various embodiments, by using a hidden process incorporated in a virtual machine's kernel and a trusted wireless and/or wired positioning service, a cloud provider and/or cloud user may be alerted about possible virtual machine hijacking/theft. The provider or user may also be provided with an approximate physical location of the platform running the compromised virtual machine for further investigation and enforcement measures.
US09054916B1
A receiver that is selectively reconfigurable in a first and a second selectable configuration is disclosed. Configured in the first selectable configuration, the receiver may provide a low impedance input. Configured in the first selectable configuration, a low common-mode input signal may be received. In an embodiment, configured in the first selectable configuration, signaling technologies, such as a Near Ground Signaling (NGS) may be received. Configured in the second selectable configuration, the receiver may provide a high impedance input. Configured in the second selectable configuration, a high common-mode input signal may be received. In an embodiment, configured in the second selectable configuration, signaling technologies, such as a Low Voltage Differential Signaling (LVDS), Pseudo Open Drain Logic (PODL) signaling, Differential Rambus Signaling Level (DRSL), and/or Series Stub Terminated Logic (SSTL) signaling may be received.
US09054900B2
A network connection device includes: one or more network devices; a network switching control section configured to determine a second network as a candidate network to which connection is subsequently switched from a first network to which a network device is currently connecting; a network relation state determination section configured to determine whether or not the network device is used for forming a PAN; a disconnection-caused disadvantage determination section configured to determine whether or not a disadvantage to a user will be caused by switching connection to the second network, based on the result of the determination by the network relation state determination section; and a switching acceptability determination section configured to prohibit switching connection to the second network when the result of the determination is that a disadvantage to the user will be caused.
US09054899B2
A mobile network comprising a central unit (102) for communicating with a first network (104); at least one intermediate base station (106) for communication with the central unit (102) over the first network (104) and for transmitting data to a second network; at least one mobile unit (112) for receiving data from the base station over the second network, a memory for storing the data, a display and a processor running an application to display at least a portion of the stored data; and at least one geolocation marker (116) external to the mobile unit for generating a signal including position information indication a relative position, wherein the signal is received by the mobile unit when it is proximate to the base station wherein the central unit broadcasts at least one portion of the data to the mobile unit through the intermediate base station; and wherein the application running on the processor displays a portion of the stored data associated with the relative position.
US09054893B2
Alarm customers on VoIP may use an adapter for conversion to Internet Protocol (IP) signals or may have an alarm system that uses IP signals to transmit alarm signals over the Internet. IP signals from alarm customers may go to any monitoring center for alarm system monitoring. IP signals from alarm systems using IP conversion equipment can go only to monitoring centers with specialized receiving equipment specific to the type of transmitting equipment in use at the customer's premises. There is a pool of customers, whose dealers would convert to IP and stay with the current monitoring center if the center invested in receiving equipment. For the many small centers who will not or cannot invest in receiving equipment, the present invention will take IP signals from any or all brands of IP transmitting equipment, to a central server then retransmit to any center over POTS to the alarm monitoring center. Thus, an alarm monitoring center need not invest in a number of different IP monitoring systems in order to be IP monitoring compliant.
US09054882B2
In one embodiment, a method includes receiving one or more packets of a communication session from one or more interfaces, such that the interface is a subscriber interface or a network interface. The method further includes associating the communication session to an end user with a source Internet Protocol (IP) address of the packet if the packet is received from the subscriber interface or to an end user with a destination IP address of the packet if the packet is received from the network interface.
US09054879B2
The present invention discloses an apparatus and method for delivering a revocation list over a one-way broadcast network to receivers with limited memory capabilities. In one example, the revocation list is partitioned to form a first certificate revocation list (CRL) sequence if the number of entries in the revocation list exceeds a predetermined value. Individual identification numbers belonging to a first identification number series are subsequently assigned to partitions of the first CRL sequence. Afterwards, the first CRL sequence is interleaved into a first content transport stream.
US09054876B1
The disclosed embodiments describe a method, an apparatus, an application specific integrated circuit, and a server that provides a fast and efficient look up for data analysis. The apparatus and server may be configured to obtain data segments from a plurality of input devices. The data segments may be individual unique subsets of the entire data set obtained by a plurality input devices. A hash function may be applied to an aggregated set of the data segments. A result of the hash function may be stored in a data structure. A codebook may be generated from the hash function results.
US09054875B2
A biometric authentication apparatus includes a biometric information acquiring unit which captures an image of a first body part of a user carrying biometric information to generate a biometric image representing the biometric information, and a processing unit configured to determine a position of a second body part of the user on a position detection image to determine the user's position relative to a reference position, determine a rotation angle corresponding to the user's position based on a relationship between the user's position relative to the reference position and the rotation angle, rotate registered biometric information of a registered user or the biometric information on the biometric image according to the rotation angle so as to make the direction of the registered biometric information substantially parallel to the direction of the biometric information, and compare the registered biometric information and the biometric information to each other.
US09054869B2
The definition and use of an additional timer for the MAC-hs reordering function in a user equipment. The timer counts transmission time intervals and is reset each time that the user equipment receives a data packet. If the timer reaches a set value, indicating a sufficiently long period of inactivity, then the transmission sequence number is reset to zero or another predefined value. A base station can run a similar timer and, after the timer reaches a set value, can consider the user equipment as no longer being active.
US09054866B2
A multimode DSL (digital subscriber line) line driver circuit is disclosed. The line driver circuit includes a switch network that enables the line driver circuit to be switched between multiple DSL communication configurations. Upon receipt of a mode control signal, the line driver circuit switches from a first DSL communication configuration to a second communication configuration. A DSL communication signal configured according to the second DSL communication configuration is received at the line driver circuit. The received DSL communication signal is amplified and/or filtered by the line driver circuit. The received DSL communication signal is transmitted from the line driver circuit. In one example implementation, the line driver circuit may be switched from an asymmetric digital subscriber line (ADSL) configuration to a very high speed digital subscriber line (VDSL) configuration, and may be switched from the VDSL configuration to the ADSL configuration.
US09054855B2
Embodiments of a system and method for synchronizing chains in a transceiver using central synchronization signals are generally described herein. In some embodiments, an RF signal having a reference frequency in a differential mode and a synchronization signal having a second frequency being the reference frequency divided by an integer in a common mode are produced at a oscillator generation circuit. The RF signal having a reference frequency in a differential mode and the synchronization signal having a second frequency being the reference frequency divided by an integer in a common mode are provided over each of a plurality of LO lines to a plurality of local LO generation circuit chains. Each synchronization signal having a second frequency being the reference frequency divided by an integer in a common mode is extracted at the plurality of local LO generation circuit chains. A phase of each RF signal having a reference frequency in a differential mode is synchronized in each of the plurality of local LO generation circuit chains using each extracted synchronization signal having a second frequency being the reference frequency divided by an integer in a common mode.
US09054838B1
A synchronization recovery system is a digitized signal input derived from an analog front-end of a digital receiver and having a relatively wide bandwidth. An analysis channelizer decomposes the digitized signal input into time domain analysis channels each having a relatively narrow bandwidth. A synthesis channelizer recomposes the analysis channels so as to generate a digitized output signal. A multiplier array is disposed between the analysis channelizer and the synthesis channelizer so as to define a timing recovery vector responsive to a phase shift for retarding and advancing a timing clock. A phase locked loop is responsive to the synthesis channelizer digitized output signal so as to modify the timing recovery vector, which applies the phase shift to the time series output for each of the synthesis channelizer channels.
US09054832B2
The present invention includes novel techniques, apparatus, and systems for optical WDM communications. Tunable lasers are employed to generate respective subcarrier frequencies which represent subchannels of an ITU channel to which client signals can be mapped. In one embodiment, subchannels are polarization interleaved to reduce crosstalk. In another embodiment, polarization multiplexing is used to increase the spectral density. Client circuits can be divided and combined with one another before being mapped, independent of one another, to individual subchannels within and across ITU channels. A crosspoint switch can be used to control the client to subchannel mapping, thereby enabling subchannel protection switching and hitless wavelength switching. Network architectures and subchannel transponders, muxponders and crossponders are disclosed, and techniques are employed (at the subchannel level/layer), to facilitate the desired optical routing, switching, concatenation and protection of the client circuits mapped to these subchannels across the nodes of a WDM network.
US09054830B2
A system for providing bi-directional RF services over a point-to-multipoint Passive Optical Network (PON). A system that can transport upstream RF signals generated by devices such as a set top box or a cable modem, through a passive Optical Network while simultaneously supporting downstream RF video and bi-directional base-band services on the PON.
US09054827B2
An apparatus comprising a processor, wherein the processor is configured to split an optical signal into a first optical signal and a second optical signal, wherein the first optical signal comprises a plurality of encoded wavelengths, receive a selection signal, wherein the selection signal selects a plurality of active wavelengths, wherein the active wavelengths are a subset of the encoded wavelengths, compute the routing information for the second optical signal using the active wavelengths, and switch the second optical signal using the routing information.
US09054821B2
An apparatus and a method for frequency locking are provided. The apparatus includes a phase-locked loop (PLL), a local clock generator, a data buffer unit and a control unit. The PLL locks the phase and the frequency of a radio frequency signal to generate a recovery clock signal and received data. The data buffer unit writes the received data into an elastic buffer of the data buffer unit according to the frequency of the recovery clock signal, and reads the received data from the elastic buffer according to the frequency of a local clock signal generated by the local clock generator. The control unit obtains a write-in address and a read-out address in the elastic buffer, and sends a control signal to the local clock generator for adjusting the frequency of the local clock signal according to relationship between the write-in address and the read-out address.
US09054819B2
A system to identify a user in relation with television services comprising eyeglasses worn by said user, said eyeglasses having a pair of flexible temples taking on the shape of a portion of the circumference of the user's head, a television receiver device comprising a server module communicating wirelessly with sensors arranged on the eyeglasses. The system is characterized in that each of the flexible temples of the eyeglasses incorporates at least one sensor configured for measuring a value of deflection caused by the temple bending around a portion of the circumference of the user's head, said value being unique for each user is transmitted as biometric to the server module configured for determining the identity of the user according to the measured value of the portion of the user's head circumference.
US09054818B2
Systems, devices, and methods are provided for conducting a polling event. A central server computer system determines a polling event is to be conducted and associates one or more inputs from a beverage container with a corresponding selection. The central server computer system transmits a polling prompt message to the beverage containers to display a prompt for a user to select between a first selection and a second selection. An input is received at the beverage container indicative of the selection by the user. The input may be based on a gesture movement of the beverage container. The selection is communicated to the central server computer system which, based on receiving selections from the participating beverage containers, determines the poll results. The poll results are displayed on one or more public displays or communicated, via a network, to a wireless communication device associated with a user of the beverage container.
US09054811B2
The present invention relates to the Passive Optical Network (PON) technology, and a method for sending an upstream transfer frame in a PON is provided. The method includes: after success of link, sending a preamble according to an allocated time slot, sending a burst synchronization delimiter, and then sending successively a burst header, a Gigabit-Capable Passive Optical Network (GPON) Transmission Convergence (GTC) frame header, and GTC frame data. In the sent synchronization delimiter, the number of zeros on the odd bits is N, the number of non-zeros on the odd bits is M, a relation |N−M|≦1 is satisfied, the max number of zeros in a continuous zero group is X, the max number of non-zeros in a continuous nonzero group is Y, and a relation |X−Y|≦1 is satisfied. A device for sending an upstream transfer frame in a passive optical network is further provided.
US09054809B2
Provided is a transistor outline (TO)-CAN type optical module and an optical transmission apparatus including the same. The optical module includes a stem, a thermo-electric cooler (TEC) on the stem, a first sub-mount on the TEC, an optical element on the first sub-mount, a plurality of electrode lead wirings inserted from an outside to an inside of the stem and disposed adjacent to the TEC and the optical element, a second sub-mount between the electrode lead wirings and the optical element, radio frequency (RF) transmission lines on the second sub-mount, a plurality of bonding wires connecting the RF transmission lines and the optical element, and the RF transmission lines and the electrode lead wirings, and an impedance matching unit disposed around the RF transmission lines and the electrode lead wirings, and controlling impedances of the RF transmission lines and the electrode lead wires.
US09054806B2
A data transport system for transporting data and auxiliary signals over an optical link comprises a transmitter, a receiver and an optical link. The transmitter and receiver are coupled to a first end of the optical link. The optical link includes a number of optical channels. A controller is coupled to the transmitter and the receiver, and controls the transmitter and the receiver to operate in a first state when data are detected at an input of the transmitter. Data are transported via the data transport system in the first state. The controller controls the transmitter and the receiver to operate in a second state when the data are detected as absent at the input of the transmitter. Data are prevented from being transported via the data transport system in the second state.
US09054805B2
An optical memory system according to example embodiments includes a plurality of memory modules, each memory module including a plurality of memory devices; a light source; a light distribution unit connected to the light source through a first optical transmission line; a plurality of second optical transmission lines connected between the light distribution unit and the plurality of memory modules; a plurality of electrical to optical converters, each connected to at least one of the second optical transmission lines; and a plurality of output optical transmission lines connected to the plurality of electrical to optical converters, each output optical transmission line for outputting an electrical to optical converted signal.
US09054803B1
Systems an methods are provided that disclose providing a positioning service for devices based on light received from one or more light sources. This light based positioning service uses light information transmitted by each light source to determine the position of the device. The positioning information can include three dimension position information in a building that can then be used to deliver services and information to a mobile device. The content delivered to a mobile device can include multimedia, text, audio, and/or pictorial information. The positioning information along with other location or positioning information can be used in providing augmented reality or location aware services. The light sources can be independent beacons that broadcast information in visible light at a rate that is undetectable by the human eye. Content can be retrieved from a server over a communications connection.
US09054799B2
A wireless light communication system and method using a plurality of light transmitting units driven by a same alternating current (AC) power, and a light receiving unit for receiving optical signals transmitted by the plurality of light transmitting units are provided. The wireless light communication method includes setting a channel for each of the plurality of light transmitting units such that light transmitting units having an overlapping area that is reachable by optical signals use different channels, detecting zero crossing of the AC power, synchronizing channels by using the detected zero crossing, and transmitting an optical signal through the set channel by using the plurality of light transmitting units, and receiving the optical signal transmitted by each of the plurality of light transmitting units by using the light receiving unit, and analyzing information included in the received optical signal.
US09054797B2
A method for testing an optical network is disclosed. The method includes transmitting a first optical power level on a first optical port of an optical assembly, where the optical assembly includes the first optical port, an optical cable and/or an optical waveguide, and a second optical port. The optical assembly is installed in an assembled computer and the assembled computer is in a state suitable for an end user. The method includes measuring a second optical power level at the second optical port and determining a quality level by determining if the second optical power level is below a quality threshold value. The transmitting, the measuring, and the determining occur within the assembled computer. An apparatus and computer program product also perform the functions of the method.
US09054791B2
Methods and apparatus that enable one or more wireless networks to minimize inter-cellular interference (ICI) at a receiver. In one embodiment, the network comprises an OFDM-based cellular network, and the method comprises utilizing a priori knowledge of non-data portions of signals from multiple base stations in order to schedule transmissions. In one variant, these non-data portions comprise pilot tones; the pilot tones can be scheduled onto various time-frequency resources of the network so as to minimize ICI. The mobility context of the receiver can also be used as a basis for dynamically adjusting the pilot tone density. In another variant, precoding (e.g., Tomlinson-Harashima precoding) can be applied to “shape” the non-data portions of the transmitted signals so as to mitigate ICI. In yet other variants, frame preambles and learning sequences are used as the basis for invoking selective transmission time shifts across the potentially interfering base stations so as to minimize ICI.
US09054786B2
According to one embodiment of the invention, an integrated circuit comprises an encoding module, a modulation module and a spectral shaped module. The encoding module includes an interleaver that adapted to operate in a plurality of modes including a first mode and a second mode. The interleaver performs repetitive encoding when placed in the second mode. The modulation module is adapted to compensate for attenuations that are to be realized during propagation of a transmitted signal over the power line. The spectral shaped module is adapted to compensate for amplitude distortion and further compensates for attenuations that will be realized during propagation of the transmitted signal over the power line.
US09054784B2
A signal switching apparatus includes a switch circuit having a common terminal and first to third terminals, and enabling two terminals among the first to third terminals to be simultaneously connected to the common terminal while enabling the first to third terminals to be individually attachable/detachable to/from the common terminal, and an amplification circuit of which an input terminal is connected to the first terminal, and an output terminal is connected to the second terminal. Here, gain in the output terminal being an output point, with respect to a signal level in the common terminal being an input point, is switched to a first gain when only the first terminal is connected to the common terminal, a second gain when only the second terminal is connected to the common terminal, and a third gain when the first and second terminals are simultaneously connected to the common terminal.
US09054781B2
An adapter (400) for a portable land mobile radio (LMR) transceiver system (414) where the LMR includes a push-to-talk (PTT) transmitter control system. The adapter includes a tip-ring-sleeve (TRS) type interface connector (402) configured to accept a plug (101) from a standard mobile phone headset. An adapter circuit (401) is configured to detect a momentary actuation of an answer/end switch (201) of a standard mobile phone headset when a TRS plug of the standard mobile phone headset is inserted in the interface connector (402). The adapter circuit alternately latches a PTT input of the LMR transmitter control system in either a transmit active state, or a transmit inactive state, in response to actuation of the answer/end switch of the mobile phone handset.
US09054774B2
A communication system transmits signals having frequencies that lie within a transmission band and receives signals having frequencies that lie within a reception band. The system includes a duplexer and an antenna. The duplexer includes a transmission branch and a reception branch. The transmission branch includes a transmission filter, a transmission phase shifting network and a transmission matching network. The reception branch includes a reception filter, a reception phase shifting network and a reception matching network. The transmission matching network and the reception matching network have predominately constant phase shifts over frequencies within the reception band and within the transmission band, respectively. The antenna is coupled to the transmission matching network and to the reception matching network, and shows a predominantly reactance-only impedance variation over frequencies in the transmission band and over frequencies in the reception band.
US09054766B2
A method and apparatus for wirelessly transmitting real-time data streams is described. To ensure continuous data flow, fast diversity and slow diversity can be used. Fast diversity chooses a receive antenna based on received signal parameters, such as signal strength, during the transmission header and prior to information transfer. Slow diversity stores received signal parameters from previous packets, associates the parameters with a selected antenna, and uses the parameter history to denote a “default” antenna. Additionally, receive and/or transmit beam forming can be used to maintain continuous communication between stations. Beam forming, which combines antenna signals to maximize performance, is possible when at least two transmit/receive signal processing chains are available.
US09054745B2
Disclosed is an energy transmitting apparatus in an energy system, including: a transmit feeding cable configured to be applied with AC power; a transmit inductor in which AC current for an AP power supply flows; a transmit metal electrode configured to transmit the AC power to a receive metal electrode by the AC current flowing the transmit inductor; and a transmit grounding bar configured to control at least one of a position, a length, and a diameter thereof to control a resonance frequency generated by the transmit inductor.
US09054742B2
A codeword may have errors and erasures. In embodiments, an apparatus may include a syndrome calculator configured to generate partial syndromes of the codeword, an erasure locator configured to generate an erasure locator polynomial, and a syndrome modifier configured to generate modified partial syndromes based at least in part on the partial syndromes and the erasure locator polynomial. The apparatus may further include an error locator configured to generate an error locator polynomial using the modified partial syndromes, for error and erasure decoding of the codeword.
US09054739B2
According to an embodiment, an error correction device includes first calculators, second calculators, estimators, and an inverter. Each first calculator calculates a first message representing a probability that 1-bit data that is input in a corresponding variable node is 1. Each second calculator calculates a second message representing a probability that a value of the data input to the variable node is 1 for each of two or more variable nodes connected to the check node by using the first messages of the variable nodes connected to the check node. Each estimator estimates a true value of the data input to the variable node to generate an estimated value by using the first and second messages. The inverter inverts the estimated value associated with at least one of the variable nodes with a probability higher than 0 and lower than 1.
US09054733B2
A delta-sigma modulator has a first summing point subtracting a first feedback signal from an input signal and forwarding a result to a transfer function, a second summing point adding an output signal from said transfer function to the input signal and subtracting a second feedback signal, a first integrator receiving an output signal from the second summing point, a quantizer receiving an output signal from the integrator and generating an output bitstream, and a digital-to-analog converter receiving the bitstream, wherein the first and second feedback signal are the output signal from said digital-to-analog converter delayed by a one sample delay.
US09054729B2
The disclosure relates to a system and a method for hardware encoding and decoding according to the Limpel Ziv STAC (LZS) and Deflate protocols based upon a configuration bit.
US09054727B2
An analog-to-digital converter (ADC) system and method. The ADC system in accord with one embodiment includes a sampling digital-to-analog converter configured to sample a combination of an analog signal value and an analog dither value, and a control circuit comprising a mismatch-shaping encoder. The control circuit is configured to sequentially apply a plurality of digital codes to the sampling digital-to-analog converter during an analog-to-digital conversion operation to derive a digital code representing the combination of the analog signal value and the analog dither value. Several embodiments are presented.
US09054719B2
A first circuit operates in synchronization with a first clock having a first frequency, and generates N parallel data sets for every cycle period of the first clock. An interface circuit time-division multiplexes the N data sets received from the first circuit. A second circuit processes the N data set thus time-division multiplexed, in synchronization with a second clock having a second frequency which is N times the first frequency. A judgment unit judges whether or not the N data sets are effective data which instructs a flip-flop group, configured as a state holding element included in the second circuit, to generate an effective state transition. In a cycle period in which the N data sets are ineffective, a data replacement unit replaces at least a part of the N data sets with current compensation data DCMP.
US09054718B2
In one embodiment, a transceiver may set a first receive frequency of a first channel of the transceiver and a second receive frequency of a second channel of the transceiver. The transceiver may receive, during a first time interval, a first radio frequency (RF) signal on the first channel. The transceiver may determine that a first measured value indicative of a first detectable received RF signal on the first channel exceeds a first predetermined threshold, and in response, receive a first data frame on the first channel. The transceiver may receive, during a second time interval, a second RF signal on the second channel. The transceiver determine that a second measured value indicative of a second detectable received RF signal on the second channel exceeds the first predetermined threshold, and in response, receive a second data frame on the second channel.
US09054717B2
A method, system and apparatus to provide a solution of PLL locking issue in the daisy chained memory system. A first embodiment uses consecutive PLL on based on locking status of backward device on the daisy chained memory system with no requirement of PLL locking status checking pin. A second embodiment uses Flow through PLL control with a locking status pin either using an existing pin or a separated pin. A third embodiment uses a relocking control mechanism to detect PLL relocking from the device. A fourth variation uses flag signal generation to send to the controller.
US09054710B2
A touch keyboard with an improved structure is disclosed. The touch keyboard includes a keyboard casing and an inductive circuit layer. The keyboard casing has a front surface and a rear surface; the front surface has a keyboard key assembly composed of a plurality of touch keyboard keys. The touch keyboard keys are integrally formed with the keyboard casing and projected from the front surface of the keyboard casing. The inductive circuit layer is formed on the rear surface of the keyboard casing and is used to detect touching and sliding operations from the user. The touch keyboard keys are projected from the front surface of the keyboard casing so as to identify positions of the touch keyboard keys without fixing user's eyes on the keyboard and increase touching feeling.
US09054709B2
A touch-sensitive rotary switch is configured to be touched along a rotary path, thereby turning on or off, or adjusting stepwise the magnitude of power supplied from, an external power source. The rotary switch includes a housing whose top portion has a sensing surface. A touch control circuit board is provided in the housing and topped with a touch control circuit layer whose peripheral region is divided into multiple sensing areas in which plural first light-emitting elements are annularly arranged. The sensing areas can be sequentially triggered by touching the sensing surface along its peripheral region, so as for the corresponding portion of the touch control circuit layer to control light emission of the first light-emitting elements corresponding to the triggered sensing areas and to output a coded signal according to the triggered sensing areas in order to control the power supplied from the external power source.
US09054706B2
Methods, systems, circuits, and devices for power-packet-switching power converters using bidirectional bipolar transistors (BTRANs) for switching. Four-terminal three-layer BTRANs provide substantially identical operation in either direction with forward voltages of less than a diode drop. BTRANs are fully symmetric merged double-base bidirectional bipolar opposite-faced devices which operate under conditions of high non-equilibrium carrier concentration, and which can have surprising synergies when used as bidirectional switches for power-packet-switching power converters. BTRANs are driven into a state of high carrier concentration, making the on-state voltage drop very low.
US09054697B2
A majority decision circuit includes: a majority decision unit configured to compare first data with second data to decide whether one of the first data and the second data has more bits with a first logical value; and an offset application unit configured to control the majority decision unit so that the majority decision unit decides, in a case when the number of bits with the first logical value among the first data is equal to the number of bits with the first logical value among the second data, that the first data have more bits with the first logical value if offset is a first setting value in a first phase and decides that the second data have more bits with the first logical value if the offset is a second setting value in a second phase.
US09054692B2
A switch can be configured to receive a first signal at a first input and provide an output signal at an output, depending on a state of the switch. A switch state change can be delayed until an indication of a requested switch state different than a current switch state is received and the first signal reaches a threshold.
US09054686B1
Among other things, one or more techniques or systems for delay path selection are provided. A digitally controlled oscillator comprises an arrangement of inverters, such as tri-state inverters, that are selectively utilized to provide a process, voltage, temperature (PVT) condition output used to generate a frequency output for the digitally controlled oscillator. Delay path interpolation is used to generate a relatively high resolution range of PVT condition outputs, which results in a reduction of frequency gain (KDOC) between PVT condition outputs for improved performance of the digitally controlled oscillator.
US09054684B1
A circuit block within an integrated circuit includes a multiplexor (225, 625) configured to pass either a first signal or a second signal, wherein the first signal is independent of the second signal. The circuit block further includes a first flip-flop (210, 610) configured to receive an output of the multiplexor and a second flip-flop (215, 615) configured to receive the second signal. In a first mode of operation, the multiplexor passes the first signal to the first flip-flop. Further, the first flip flop and the second flip-flop operate independently of one another. In a second mode of operation, the multiplexor passes the second signal to the first flip-flop. Further, the first flip-flop and the second flip-flop both receive the second signal.
US09054680B2
A system-on-chip includes a clock controller configured to decrease an operating frequency of at least one function block based on a change in an operating state of the at least one function block from an active state to an idle state. In a method of operating a system-on-chip including at least one function block, an operating frequency of the at least one function block is decreased based on a change in an operating state of the at least one function block from an active state to an idle state. The decreased operating frequency is greater than zero.
US09054671B2
Tunable filter structures, methods of manufacture and design structures are disclosed. The method of forming a filter structure includes forming a piezoelectric resonance filter over a cavity structure. The forming of the piezoelectric resonance filter includes: forming an upper electrode on one side of a piezoelectric material; and forming a lower electrode on an opposing side of the piezoelectric material. The method further includes forming a micro-electro-mechanical structure (MEMS) cantilever beam at a location in which, upon actuation, makes contact with the piezoelectric resonance filter.
US09054658B2
An apparatus for driving speakers includes user-configurable amplifier cells for driving selected speakers, a synchronous rectifier circuit, and a control system. Each cell connects between power rails. The rectifier circuit provides current on the rails for consumption by the cells. The current depends on the configuration. The control system implements a model of the rectifier circuit and cells and uses it to control an audio input signal in response to information concerning electrical outputs of the amplifier cells. This indirectly limits current drawn from the synchronous rectifier circuit.
US09054655B2
Provided is a transimpedance amplifier which can realize a high-speed and high-quality receiver operation in an optical communication module or a router device having the optical communication module. An offset voltage which is generated in a post amplifier for differentiating and amplifying a single-phase output signal from a pre-amplifier in accordance with single-phase differentiation and conversion is cancelled by detecting a threshold voltage from an output of the pre-amplifier or an output of the post amplifier by a threshold detection circuit and by shifting a level of the threshold voltage corresponding to an offset amount to be compensated.
US09054647B2
A Doherty amplifier includes an impedance transformer located between a load and a signal combining point of a carrier amplifier and a peak amplifier. The impedance transformer subjects, at frequencies including a fundamental frequency and at least a second harmonic frequency thereof, an impedance Zo of the load to impedance transformation into a value lower than Zo, for example, (½)×Zo, over a wide band or a plurality of frequency bands.
US09054643B2
A method of calibrating an envelope tracking system for a supply voltage for a power amplifier module within a radio frequency (RF) transmitter module of a wireless communication unit. The method includes, within at least one signal processing module of the wireless communication unit, determining combinations of the power amplifier supply voltage and power amplifier input power that provide a power amplifier output power equal to a target output power, obtaining battery current indications for the determined combinations of the power amplifier supply voltage and power amplifier input power, selecting a combination of the power amplifier supply voltage and power amplifier input power that provide a power amplifier output power equal to a target output power based at least partly on the obtained battery current indications therefore, and calibrating the envelope tracking system using the selected combination of the power amplifier supply voltage and power amplifier input power.
US09054640B2
This invention provides an extremely accurate way to characterize the Young's modulus of thin film materials with thicknesses in the nanometer range. It takes advantage of a recently developed high Q silicon Young's modulus resonator (YMR), which has a record high quality factor of about fifty million in operation at temperatures below 10 degrees Kelvin (10K). Because of the high Q of the YMR, the temperature stability of the YMR's resonance frequency below 1K, and the extremely high degree of vibration isolation inherent in the inventive design, the relative resolution of the resonant frequency is typically in 2×10−7. This is enough to resolve a resonant frequency shift after a deposition of a thin film onto the sensitive part of the resonator, and to compute the Young's modulus of thin film materials of even a few monolayers thickness.
US09054621B2
A power converter, control apparatus and methods are presented for driving a permanent magnet motor or other load through a sine wave filter and a transformer, in which inverter output current is controlled using a current-frequency relationship to convert a desired frequency or speed value to a current setpoint, and the inverter output current is regulated to the current setpoint using a control algorithm with a bandwidth below the resonant frequency of the sine wave filter.
US09054619B2
Systems and methods for black starting a power grid are described. A battery-powered configuration including, but not limited to, a motor, drive, and batteries can be coupled to a condenser which is coupled to a power grid. The drive can draw power from the batteries and use the power to accelerate the motor. As the motor accelerates, the condenser can accelerate by virtue of a shaft coupling the motor to the condenser. Upon the condenser reaching a certain speed or operational capacity, an inverter can de-block from a power distribution line and allow power to enter the power grid. In certain embodiments, a control device such as a circuit or computing device can be used to facilitate the black start of the power grid.
US09054608B2
An upper-level control device includes a communication control unit that transmits a command, which is used after a command that is currently executed and includes an execution order, to an electric motor control device during electric motor control devices respectively perform driving controls of electric motors, and each of the electric motor control devices includes a command storage unit configured to store a plurality of commands, a communication control unit that stores the command received from the upper-level control device in the command storage unit in the execution order, and a command-follow-up control unit that performs a follow-up control of the electric motors based on the command. When the command storage unit is fully filled with the commands, the communication control unit stores a newly received command in the command storage unit by overwriting the newly received command in an area where an executed command is stored.
US09054607B2
A motor drive device has a spindle motor driver adapted to drive a spindle motor. the spindle motor driver includes lower side NMOSFETs, one for each phase, which connect and disconnect terminals, one for each phase, of the spindle motor to and from a ground terminal; a controller adapted to generate a switch control signal and a brake control signal; lower side pre-drivers, one for each phase, connected between an application terminal of an internal power supply voltage and the ground terminal and adapted to generate lower side gate signals, one for each phase, in accordance with the switch control signal to output the lower side gate signals to the lower side NMOSFETs, one for each phase; and a brake unit adapted to pull up to the internal power supply voltage all the lower side gate signals, one for each phase, in accordance with the brake control signal.
US09054603B2
A DC to AC conversion circuit including an inverter, a first inductor, a first capacitor, a second inductor and a second capacitor is provided. The inverter has two input contact points and two output contact points. The input contact points receive a DC signal, and the output contact points output an AC signal. The first terminal of the first inductor is coupled to one of the two output contact points. The first capacitor is coupled to the first inductor in parallel. The first terminal of the second capacitor is coupled to the second terminal of the first inductor, and the second terminal of the second capacitor is coupled to another one of two output contact points. The first terminal of the second inductor is coupled to the first terminal of the second capacitor, and the second terminal of the second inductor is coupled to a load.
US09054598B2
A frequency converter includes a housing, a frequency conversion component installed in the housing, a controller that controls the frequency conversion component, and a user interface that transmits control commands from a user to the controller. The controller of the frequency converter are provided with a load examination function that examines whether a load is connected to an output of the frequency conversion component, the controller raising an output frequency of the frequency conversion component to a desired value in response to a load connected to the frequency conversion component and detected by the load examination function.
US09054592B2
Disclosed are synchronous rectifying control methods and circuits for an isolated switching power supply. In one embodiment, a method can include: (i) generating a ramp voltage based on a power terminal voltage, where the power terminal voltage includes a voltage between first and second power terminals of a synchronous rectifier in the isolated switching power supply; (ii) determining whether the power terminal voltage starts declining; (iii) comparing the ramp voltage to a threshold voltage when the power terminal voltage starts to decline, where the threshold voltage substantially matches a minimum conduction time of the synchronous rectifier; (iv) reducing the ramp voltage and controlling the synchronous rectifier in an off state when the ramp voltage is lower than the threshold voltage; and (v) reducing the ramp voltage and controlling the synchronous rectifier in on state when the ramp voltage is higher than the threshold voltage.
US09054586B2
Power conversion systems and operating methods are presented in which an active front end rectifier is operated in a boost mode using discontinuous pulse width modulation in a first range of DC bus voltage boost amount, and continuous space vector pulse width modulation is used in a second range, with the ranges being correlated to output derating with respect to filter inductor magnetics in the first range and to rectifier switching loss derating and the second range.
US09054577B2
A charge pump has at least one charge pump stage. Each charge pump stage includes at least one NMOS device. The at least one NMOS device has a deep N-well (DNW), a gate and a drain, and is coupled to at least one capacitor, a first node, a second node and a switch. For the at least one NMOS device, the gate is capable of receiving a different signal from the drain. The first node is arranged to receive an input signal. The switch is coupled between the at least one NMOS device and a ground. A drain of the switch is coupled to a deep N-well of the switch. The at least one capacitor is arranged to store electrical charges. The charge pump stage is configured to supply the electrical charges to the second node. The DNW is coupled to the ground for a negative pump operation.
US09054576B2
A high efficiency DC/DC converter with high conversion ratio is provided. The DC/DC converter includes a power switch for selectively switching an electrical connection between one side of a power supply and anodes of a first diode and a second diode, a first capacitive element whose one side is connected to a cathode of the first diode, a second capacitive element whose one side is connected to a cathode of the second diode, a first-first switch for selectively switching an electrical connection between the other side of the first capacitive element and the other side of the power supply, and a second-first switch for selectively switching an electrical connection between the other side of the first capacitive element and one side of the second capacitive element.
US09054571B2
A method of manufacturing a rotor for an electric motor that includes producing a generally flat metal strip, bending one section of the strip relative to another section, and rolling the strip to form a cup-shaped shell.
US09054569B2
An object of the present invention is to provide a rotary electric machine that can improve the reliability of a connection terminal by preventing brazing material applied to butting portions of the connection terminal from flowing out. The rotary electric machine according to the present invention has, on at least one of the inner and outer circumferences of a hole portion 22 of a connection terminal 20, a groove portion 22a, 22b, 22c, 22d, or 22e that can prevent brazing material 24 from flowing out from between butting portions 23, thereby solving a problem that a crack occurs on the connection terminal upon fusing of the connection terminal and a lead conductive wire.
US09054568B2
A permanent magnet rotating electric machine includes a rotor and a stator. The rotor includes: a permanent magnet forming a single pole within a rotor core of the rotor, the permanent magnet being divided into two divided permanent magnets; a connecting portion assuming an electrical steel sheet disposed between the two divided permanent magnets; and magnet insertion holes in which the permanent magnets are inserted. In the rotor, the magnet insertion holes are shaped to include: air gaps at both end portions in a width direction of the permanent magnet, each air gap being formed between a surface of the permanent magnet extending perpendicularly to the magnetization direction and a surface of the electrical steel sheet facing the surface of the permanent magnet; a shoulder portion disposed on the facing surface; and another air gap extending toward a rotor outside diameter side and the magnetic pole center side.
US09054566B2
An electric machine comprises a rotor, preferably having permanent magnets, although other field generation means are available, and a stator. The stator has coils wound on stator bars for interaction with the magnetic field of the rotor across an air gap defined between them. The rotor comprises a housing of a chamber containing refrigerant. The rotor housing has heat dissipating fins accessible by the open environment whereby air movement relative to the housing caused at least by rotation of the rotor absorbs heat from the fins. The machine may be an axial flux machine, the coils being wound on bars that are disposed circumferentially spaced around a fixed axle of the machine forming a rotational axis of the rotor. The machine may be a wheel motor for a vehicle, wherein the wheel is mounted directly on the rotor housing.
US09054562B2
A geared motor may include a motor and a gear mechanism for transmitting rotation of the motor. The gear mechanism includes an output gear which outputs rotation of the motor and a gear in a preceding stage which is connected with the output gear through another gear and the output gear is formed with a first positioning part showing an angular position of the output gear and the gear in the preceding stage is formed with a second positioning part showing an angular position of the gear in the preceding stage. After an assembling angular position of the output gear and an assembling angular position of the gear in the preceding stage have been determined, another gear is assembled.
US09054554B2
In the case where the rotation speeds of respective magneto alternating current (AC) generators of a plurality of power source apparatuses (10, 20, and 30) are approximately the same rotation speed and the total electric power generation demand is the same as or smaller than the maximum total generated electric power of the plurality of power source apparatuses (10, 20, and 30), the integrated control unit (6) for integrally controlling the plurality of power source apparatuses (10, 20, and 30) selects at least one of the plurality of the power source apparatuses (10, 20, and 30) and controls a voltage control unit (5) of the selected power source apparatus in such a way that the selected power source apparatus generates maximum generated electric power thereof, at the rotation speed, that is the same as or smaller than the total electric power generation demand.
US09054549B2
A power circuit includes a voltage limited charge circuit and a linear regulator to supply high current pulses to a load while maintaining a regulated output and not discharging the battery below a predetermined level. The voltage limited charge circuit includes a low impedance transistor and an operational amplifier that are together configured as an active loop. The transistor functions as a switch, and the operational amplifier provides an adjustable control voltage that adjusts the impedance of the transistor according to current battery voltage and a minimum threshold voltage. Adjusting the impedance of the transistor enables the storage capacitor to charge very fast when the battery impedance is low, or very slow when the battery impedance is high.
US09054543B2
Electronic circuits and methods are provided for power conservation applications. A latching relay includes a controlled switch electrically coupled within a power supply of a computer or other load. Circuitry of the present teachings controls operation of the latching relay. Set and reset conditions of the latching relay establish normal and deep standby operating modes for the computer, respectively. Manual switching or automated signaling are used to assert the set and reset relay conditions. Very low power consumption is achieved during the deep standby mode of operation.
US09054542B2
An inductive power supply system in which the receiving unit includes a secondary coil and a plurality of resonating circuits with different characteristics. Each of the resonating circuits may include a resonating coil and a resonating capacitor. The resonating coils may be inductively coupled to the secondary coil so that energy may be transferred from one or more of the resonating coils to said receiving unit. The plurality of resonating circuits are configured to provide improved power transfer efficiency or performance at different distances between the primary coil and secondary coil. The present invention may also provide a method for tuning the wireless power system including the general steps of measuring an operating characteristic in the primary unit, measuring an operating characteristic in the receiver unit and tuning one or more of the components in the primary unit and the secondary unit based on a comparison of the two measurements.
US09054538B2
In a battery management system, a charging/discharging relay has a relay switch coupled to a charging/discharging line of battery cells and a driving coil driving the relay switch, a relay driving unit is coupled to the driving coil so as to control the driving coil, a first switch is coupled to the charging/discharging relay so as to control on/off of the charging/discharging relay, and a control unit applies a control signal to control on/off of the first switch. The battery management system further includes a short circuit protection (SCP) for cutting off the power input to the coil of the relay in the occurrence of a failure in the first switch, so that the charging/discharging line may be prevented from being in an uncontrolled state due to the occurrence of a failure in a circuit component.
US09054535B2
A charging device for charging an energy storage device is described. The charging device includes a memory for storing a plurality of state machines and a processing device coupled to the memory. The processing device is configured to select a state machine of the plurality of state machines and to operate the charging device in accordance with the selected state machine.
US09054534B2
A battery-powered device can be simultaneously coupled to a non-battery power supply and to information signals from a battery. Power contacts on the device are coupled to the power supply, while one or more information contacts on the battery are coupled to corresponding contacts on the device.
US09054531B2
The present disclosure relates to distributed line flow processing for a network having nodes with branches coupling adjacent ones of the nodes and components coupled to the nodes. In one embodiment, the disclosed process includes receiving an objective function having component variables, nodal output variables and branch flow variables for the network. Next, the component variables, nodal output variables and branch flow variables are initialized with initial values, and then values for the branch flow variables are calculated using a distributed Newton method. Finally, values for the component variables and the nodal output variables are calculated using values calculated for the branch flow variables until the values of the component variables, the nodal output variables, and the branch flow variables converge within a predetermined threshold range.
US09054530B2
Some embodiments provide interrupter systems comprising: a first electrode; a second electrode; a piston movably located at a first position and electrically coupled with the first and second electrodes establishing a closed state, the piston comprises an electrical conductor that couples with the first and second electrodes providing a conductive path; an electromagnetic launcher configured to, when activated, induce a magnetic field pulse causing the piston to move away from the electrical coupling with the first and second electrodes establishing an open circuit between the first and second electrodes; and a piston control system comprising a piston arresting system configured to control a deceleration of the piston following the movement of the piston induced by the electromagnetic launcher such that the piston is not in electrical contact with at least one of the first electrode and the second electrode when in the open state.
US09054520B2
In a particular embodiment, an apparatus includes an electrostatic discharge (ESD) clamping transistor coupled to a ground terminal of a device. The apparatus further includes a switch coupled between a body terminal of the ESD clamping transistor and the around terminal.
US09054508B2
An electrical junction box includes a frame, a bus bar and a relay to be mounted to the frame, a junction terminal interconnecting a plate-like terminal portion of the bus bar and a plate-like terminal portion of the relay. The junction terminal includes a tubular portion having a pair of opposing walls and a spring portion arranged in the tubular portion such that the plate-like terminal portion of the bus bar inserted into the tubular portion from one side is sandwiched between the spring portion and one opposing wall and the plate-like terminal portion of the electronic component inserted into the tubular portion from the other side is sandwiched between the spring portion and the other opposing wall. The frame includes a receiving portion allowing the junction terminal to enter only when it is in correct position and an engagement portion holding the junction terminal inserted into the receiving portion.
US09054505B2
A half-pipe main body is formed so as to extend in the axial direction, has an area for installing a wire harness therein, and has a semi-circular structure in terms of the cross-sectional shape of the outer circumferential surface perpendicular to the axial direction. An anti-rotation section having a planar bottom surface is provided at the bottom of the outer circumference of the half-pipe main body. A pair of ribs is formed on the outer circumference of the half-pipe main body along the circumferential direction. Also, the ribs are formed, with a distance therebetween in the axial direction, on respective two side surfaces of the half-pipe main body that are separated by the anti-rotation section.
US09054498B2
A method of fabricating an (Al,Ga,In)N laser diode, comprising depositing one or more III-N layers upon a growth substrate at a first temperature, depositing an indium containing laser core at a second temperature upon layers deposited at a first temperature, and performing all subsequent fabrication steps under conditions that inhibit degradation of the laser core, wherein the conditions are a substantially lower temperature than the second temperature.
US09054484B2
A wiring is located on a multilayer ceramic substrate. A ceramic block is located on the multilayer ceramic substrate. Electronic parts, including a semiconductor laser, are located on a surface of the ceramic block. A wiring located on the surface of the ceramic block connects some of the electronic parts to the wiring. A metallic cap with a glass window is located on the multilayer ceramic substrate. This metallic cap covers the ceramic block and the electronic parts, including the semiconductor laser.
US09054479B2
Designs and techniques for constructing and operating femtosecond pulse lasers are provided. One example of a laser engine includes an oscillator that generates and outputs a beam of femtosecond seed pulses, a stretcher-compressor that stretches a duration of the seed pulses, and an amplifier that receives the stretched seed pulses, amplifies an amplitude of selected stretched seed pulses to create amplified stretched pulses, and outputs a laser beam of amplified stretched pulses back to the stretcher-compressor that compresses their duration and outputs a laser beam of femtosecond pulses. The amplifier includes a dispersion controller that compensates a dispersion of the amplified stretched pulses, making the repetition rate of the laser adjustable between procedures or according to the speed of scanning. The laser engine can be compact with a total optical path of less than 500 meters, and have a low number of optical elements, e.g. less than 50.
US09054476B1
A rotary appliance base assembly for supporting an appliance includes a base that may be positioned on a support surface. A platform is operationally coupled to the base so the platform supports an appliance. A column is coupled to the platform. An electrical outlet is coupled to the column so the appliance is operationally coupled to the electrical outlet. A tubular coupling member is coupled to the column. The electrical outlet is operationally coupled to the tubular coupling member. A power cord is coupled to the base. An end of the power cord is operationally coupled to the tubular coupling member so the power cord remains stationary when the platform is moved.
US09054467B2
Electrical connector including a module assembly having a contact module. The contact module has a module body and signal conductors held by the module body. The module assembly has a shroud-engaging face. The signal conductors have respective signal members disposed along the shroud-engaging face. The electrical connector also includes a connector shroud that couples to the module assembly. The connector shroud has a mating side, a loading side, and a mating axis extending therebetween. The connector shroud includes contact passages that extend therethrough. The loading side interfaces with the shroud-engaging face. The connector shroud couples to the module assembly in first or second rotational positions about the mating axis. The contact passages align with the signal members for each of the first and second rotational positions.
US09054466B2
An integrated circuit assembly includes a main board unit mounted fixedly on and connected electrically to an external circuit board, a daughter board unit disposed on and connected detachably to the main board unit, and an integrated circuit device mounted fixedly on and connected electrically to the daughter board unit. When the daughter board unit is connected to the main board unit, the integrated circuit device is connected electrically to the external circuit board via the main board unit and the daughter board unit.
US09054465B2
An electrical communication switch, an electrical communication outlet, an electrical communication companion device, and an electrical communication system are provided. The electrical communication switch includes a user-controlled switch having a plurality of switch leads and a controller. The controller is coupled to the user-controlled switch. The controller is configured to determine a change of state of the switch, and upon determining the switch has changed state to a new state, to send a signal. The electrical communication outlet includes a socket having a plurality of socket slots, at least one controlled switch, and a controller. The controller is coupled to said at least one controlled switch and is configured to receive a signal and to change a state of at least one of said at least one controlled switch pursuant to the signal.
US09054461B2
An electronic component including a terminal holding unit which holds a plurality of terminals, a metallic shell which houses the terminal holding unit inside thereof, the metallic shell including an insulation opening where a connection object which connects with the terminals is inserted and contact terminals which are adjacent to the metallic shell, each of the contact terminals including a contact plane which faces an insertion direction of the connection object into the metallic shell. A plate-like leg for fixating the metallic shell to a substrate is formed at each of side surfaces of the metallic shell.
US09054460B2
Communications plugs are provided which include a printed circuit board having a plurality of elongated conductive traces and a plurality of plug blades. Each plug blade has a first section that extends along a top surface of the printed circuit board and a second section that extends along a front edge of the printed circuit board. Additionally, each plug blade may have a thickness that is at least twice the thickness of the elongated conductive traces. The plug blades may be low profile plug blades that are manufactured separately from the printed circuit board.
US09054453B2
To provide a connector with which a terminal can be easily connected to a substrate without soldering. A connector (10) is configured such that a contact portion (13b) formed at a terminal (13) so as to be elastically deformable in the vertical direction is brought into contact with the upper surface of an LED substrate (3) and is thereby made conductive with the LED substrate (3), and such that a locking portion (14c) of each of locking members (14) is locked to the lower surface of a mounting substrate (4), and thereby the contact portion (13b) of the terminal (13) is held in a state of being in press-contact with the upper surface of the LED substrate (3). Thereby, the terminal (13) can be easily connected to the LED substrate (3) without soldering, and hence the mounting work of the connector (10) can be performed very easily.
US09054452B2
An electrical connector assembled component includes a first connector and a second connector, which can fit and separate to/from each other along an axis. The first connector includes a first housing, and the second connector has a second housing. The first housing has a flexible section formed with a slit groove that penetrates in the radial direction in the fitting tube, and the flexible section has a locking section that protrudes inward in the radial direction from the cylindrical fitting surface. The second housing includes a locked section, in which there is formed an engaging step-like section that contacts with the locking section in the fitting process so as to elastically flex and displace the locking section to allow movement in the fitting direction to the locking position and locks with the locking section in the connector-removal direction.
US09054449B2
A cable retention system for a power distribution unit includes a tether and a tether mount. The tether has an elongate portion and an attachment portion, and the attachment portion includes a channel therein. The tether mount has a base at a proximal end and a head at a distal end. The base is adapted to attach the proximal end of the tether mount to the power distribution unit. The tether is adapted to be secured to the tether mount by snap-fitting the head of the tether mount into the channel of the attachment portion.
US09054444B2
An electronic device includes a housing, a system connector accessible at an external surface of the housing, and a hinged door to selectively expose or cover the system connector. The electronic device may also include a mechanism coupled to the hinged door that pivotally biases the door from an open position, in which the system connector can receive an external connector, to a partially closed position in which the hinged door at least partially covers said system connector. The hinged door is to slide along the housing if the hinged door is moved from the partially closed position to a fully closed position.
US09054443B2
A connector includes a connecter housing and a case. A housing fixing portion of the case includes a first rib which extends in a circumferential direction of the housing fixing portion. The connector housing includes a second rib which extends in a circumferential direction. An inner circumferential groove which extends in the circumferential direction is formed on an inner circumferential face of the first rib. Vertical protrusions which extend in an inserting direction of the second rib into the inner circumferential groove are formed at a plurality of positions on at least one of vertical side walls defining the inner circumferential groove. Top parts of the vertical protrusions are deformed so as to engage the second rib with the inner circumferential groove when the second rib is inserted into the inner circumferential groove.
US09054441B2
A connector has contacts, a housing holding the contacts, and a holder member fixed to the housing and is adapted to be fitted with a mating connector along a predetermined fitting direction. The housing has a first lateral portion on a side fitted with the mating connector and a second lateral portion on the other side opposite thereto. Each of the contacts has contact press-fit portions press-fitted into the housing from the side of a second lateral portion. The holder member has a restricting portion which is arranged adjacent to the contact on the side of the second lateral portion in the fitting direction and which restricts movement of the contact toward the second lateral portion.
US09054438B2
A connector terminal includes a main body, a support leg, and a resilient portion. The main body includes a contact portion making contact with a first side of a male connector terminal of a male electric connector, a spring portion facing the contact portion and making contact with the second side of the male connector terminal, a support portion supporting the spring portion, and a space-limiter (joint portion) restricting a space between the contact portion and the support portion from spreading. The support leg is adapted to be fixed at one of the ends thereof. The resilient portion connects the other end of the support leg and the contact portion to each other and is resiliently deformable in accordance with deflection of the main body.
US09054435B2
In one aspect, a conversion terminal device for electrically coupling dissimilar metal components is provided. The device includes a body having a first layer coupled to a second layer. The first layer is formed from a first metal and the second layer is formed from a second metal different from the first metal. The body includes a first connector portion and a second connector portion. The first connector portion is configured to couple to a first electrical component made of the first metal, and the second connector portion is configured to couple to a second electrical component made of the second metal to facilitate electrically coupling the first electrical component and the second electrical component.
US09054425B2
The present invention provides a high-performance and small sized helical antenna element and array thereof for use in an aircraft communication system or the like, where stringent spatial restrictions and gain requirements generally apply. The performance of the array is enhanced by increasing the lateral distances between the antenna elements over a portion of the elements where the windings thereof have high current amplitude. The sweeping envelope of the array is maintained small by recovering the initial distancing over a portion of the elements where the windings thereof have low current amplitude.
US09054424B1
An apparatus and method for modifying an electromagnetic beam. A metamaterial structure is positioned relative to a transmitting device such that an electromagnetic beam transmitted by the transmitting device passes through the metamaterial structure. The electromagnetic beam has a wavefront with a Gaussian intensity profile. The wavefront of the electromagnetic beam is modified as the electromagnetic beam passes through the metamaterial structure such that the Gaussian intensity profile of the wavefront is changed to a Bessel intensity profile.
US09054423B2
A magnetic permeability enhanced metamaterial is used to enhance the antenna array of a Multiple Input Multiple Output (MIMO) communication system. A rectangular patch antenna array is formed including a stack of a plurality of unit cells, where each unit cell includes an inductive loop of magnetic permeability enhanced metamaterials embedded in a host dielectric substrate. The use of such metamaterials permits the antenna arrays to be made smaller, and have less mutual coupling, when using a metamaterial substrate. The measured channel capacities of the antenna arrays are similar for the metamaterial and conventional substrates; however, the capacity improvement when using MIMO relative to single antenna communication systems is greater for antennas on metamaterial substrates.
US09054421B2
An apparatus includes an antenna element that operates in at least first and second non-overlapping frequency bands and has geometric elements arranged to define empty spaces in the antenna element to provide first and second winding current paths through the antenna element, the first and second winding current paths circumventing the empty spaces and respectively corresponding to the first and second frequency bands to provide the antenna element with multi-band behavior. The apparatus further includes a ground plane, with the antenna element being electrically coupled to the ground plane. The antenna element provides a substantially similar impedance level and radiation pattern in the first and second frequency bands. The geometric elements are arranged such that the antenna element does not comprise a group of single band antennas that respectively operate in the first and second frequency bands, and the antenna element is not a fractal type antenna element.
US09054409B2
Systems are provided for positioning passive reflectors, such a lens/mirror assemblies, and other types of reflectors that need to be pointed in a particular direction. The systems can effectuate control of both the elevation and azimuth angles of the reflector. The systems can be configured so that a mount can rotate so as to vary the azimuth angle of the reflector by 360° or more without a need to reverse the direction of rotation of the reflector, and without the use of slip rings, RF rotary joints, or electrical cable wraps.
US09054396B2
The present invention provides a quick charge method belonging to the field of the battery and particularly relates to a quick charge method for lithium ion battery and polymer lithium ion battery. During a battery is being charged, the battery stops charging when the battery is charged to a charge limit voltage, and the charge limit voltage between two poles of the battery is set to be U=2U0−Us, and Us is a stabilized voltage which the voltage of the battery falls back to after the voltage of the battery is charged to U0 at a constant current, U0 is a standard charge cutoff voltage used by a low rate constant current-constant voltage charging mode which is normally accepted by the industries, and the stabilized voltage Us is selected as follows: timing begins when the battery stops charging at the constant current, and from a certain time segment, when the drop of an open-circuit voltage of the battery is less than a certain value within the certain time segment, which means that the voltage of the battery is stable, and a voltage corresponding to the first time point of this time segment is selected as the stabilized voltage Us of the battery.
US09054394B2
Batteries employing an oxygen (air) electrode, particularly those in which the oxygen electrode is combined with an alkali metal or alkaline earth metal negative electrode useful I for bulk energy storage, particularly for electric utility grid storage, as well as for electric vehicle propulsion. Batteries have an electrochemically reversible oxygen positive having a porous mixed metal oxide matrix for receiving and retaining discharge product and a dense (non-porous) separator element which conducts oxygen ions and electrons in contact with a source of oxygen.
US09054379B2
A cathode composite material includes a cathode active material particle having a surface, and a continuous aluminum phosphate layer coated on the surface of the cathode active material particle. A material of the cathode active material particle is spinel type lithium manganese oxide. The present disclosure also relates to a lithium ion battery and a method for making the cathode composite material.
US09054372B2
A novel anode for a lithium battery cell is provided. The anode contains silicon nanoparticles embedded in a solid polymer electrolyte. The electrolyte can also act as a binder for the silicon nanoparticles. A plurality of voids is dispersed throughout the solid polymer electrolyte. The anode may also contain electronically conductive carbon particles. Upon charging of the cell, the silicon nanoparticles expand as take up lithium ions. The solid polymer electrolyte can deform reversibly in response to the expansion of the nanoparticles and transfer the volume expansion to the voids.
US09054368B2
The present disclosure discloses a current fuse device. The current fuse device comprises: an insulating box having a cavity; a first conductor fixed to the insulating box with a first outer end and a first inner end; a second conductor fixed to the insulating box with a second outer end and a second inner end; and at least one elastic member disposed on at least one of the first conductor and the second conductor and inside the cavity. The elastic member forms an electrical connection between the first inner end of the first conductor and the second inner end of the second conductor. The elastic member has an elastic potential energy to break the electrical connection when a short circuit occurs.
US09054362B2
A fixed oxide fuel cell includes: a plurality of separators each having first and second opening portions, the separators being stacked such that a membrane electrode assembly is interposed between the separators and that the first opening portions are aligned coaxially in communication with each other to constitute a fuel gas manifold while the second opening portions are aligned coaxially in communication with each other to constitute an oxidant gas manifold, fuel gas and oxidant gas being supplied to the membrane electrode assembly via the fuel gas and oxidant gas manifolds; and silver plate layers provided between the separators for sealing joints in the fuel gas and oxidant gas manifolds.
US09054360B2
The present invention relates to an integrated high-voltage battery housing. More particularly, it relates to an integrated high-voltage battery housing adapted to secure safety against side impact collisions while reducing the weight of a vehicle by integrating a connecting structure between a battery housing and a side member of a chassis of the vehicle. In particular, the integrated high-voltage battery housing includes: a bottom housing configured to receive a battery; a battery fixing bracket configured to fix the battery to a top surface of the bottom housing; and a plurality of flanges extending from an upper end edge of a side wall of the bottom housing and each having a coupling aperture for coupling the flange to a chassis side member. A protruding reinforcing portion extends transversely between opposite sides of the bottom housing on a bottom surface of the bottom housing.
US09054359B2
A battery pack includes a plurality of battery units, each comprising a plurality of battery cells, a case providing a space to accommodate the battery cells, and a plurality of electrode terminals that are electrically connected to the battery cells and protrude out of the case. Bus bars connect electrode terminals of adjacent battery units. Short circuits are prevented by surrounding each bus bar with an insulating protection unit.
US09054352B2
A solid oxide fuel cell stack with a uniform flow distribution structure and a metal sealing member is provided, in which fuel and air introduced into the solid oxide fuel cell stack are preheated to a predetermined temperature by heat exchangers provided therein and uniformly distributed over the entire anode and cathode reaction surfaces of unit cells to improve the use efficiency of a fuel cell and in which the sealing of the fuel cell stack is effectively maintained even under high temperature and high pressure conditions to ensure the safety of the fuel cell and increase its durability.
US09054349B2
Bipolar plates useful for fuel cell applications include a plate body having a channel-defining surface that is at least partially coated with a hydrophilic layer. This hydrophilic layer comprises residues of a silane-coupling agent in a sufficient amount such portions of the first hydrophilic layer have a contact angle less than a predetermined value.
US09054341B2
The present disclosure relates to a large area organic light emitting diode display and a method for manufacturing the same. A photoresist is deposited across first and second pixel areas of the display. The photoresist is patterned to generate a patterned photoresist by stripping away first portions of the photoresist in the first pixel areas while keeping second portions of the photoresist in the second pixel areas. An organic emission layer is deposited across the first and second pixel areas over the patterned photoresist. An electron transport layer is deposited across the first pixel areas and the second pixel areas over the organic emission layer. Portions of the organic emission layer and the electron transport layer in the second pixel areas are removed by stripping away the second portions of the photoresist while keeping portions of the organic emission layer and the electron transport layer in the first pixel areas.
US09054339B2
An organic light emitting transistor includes: a first electrode positioned on a substrate; a gate electrode positioned on the first electrode and including an opening formed at a center region; a first auxiliary layer positioned within the opening; an organic emission layer positioned on the first auxiliary layer and the gate electrode; a second auxiliary layer positioned on the organic emission layer; and a second electrode positioned on the second auxiliary layer.
US09054336B2
An organic light-emitting display device including: a substrate; an organic emission unit that is formed on the substrate and includes a laminate of a first electrode, an organic emission layer, and a second electrode; at least one organic layer that is formed on the substrate; and at least one inorganic layer that is formed on the substrate, contacts the organic layer in a planar direction, and contacts an environmental element to surround at least one border of the environmental element.
US09054335B2
A first device is provided. The first device includes an organic light emitting device, which further comprises a first electrode, a second electrode, and an organic emissive layer disposed between the first and second electrode. Preferably, the second electrode is more transparent than the first electrode. The organic emissive layer has a first portion shaped to form an indentation in the direction of the first electrode, and a second portion shaped to form a protrusion in the direction of the second electrode. The first device may include a plurality of organic light emitting devices. The indentation may have a shape that is formed from a partial sphere, a partial cylinder, a pyramid, or a pyramid with a mesa, among others. The protrusions may be formed between adjoining indentations or between an indentation and a surface parallel to the substrate.
US09054334B2
An organic EL device includes a first substrate including a cathode layer (a first electrode layer), an organic layer formed on the cathode layer, an anode layer (a second electrode layer) formed on the organic layer, and a second substrate joined to the anode layer by an adhesive layer. The anode layer is provided so as to extend to an outer peripheral side of a region where the organic layer is present, the second substrate and the adhesive layer are not present in a portion which faces a region at an outer peripheral side of the extended anode layer, and the cathode layer and the extended anode layer are exposed from the second substrate to constitute a cathode taking-out portion and an anode taking-out portion, respectively.
US09054325B2
Thin layers or films of metal oxides are used as a semiconductor material of solar cells and they are coated with a sensitizer to achieve the high absorption of sunlight. Various dyes have been used as sensitizers in solar cells. Rylene monoimide derivatives are developed as photosensitizers for dye-sensitized solar cells and as photodetectors. The Rylene monoimide derivatives have very good quantum efficiencies, particularly in the NIR region of the absorption spectrum.
US09054322B2
Provided is an organic electroluminescence device that provides high efficiency and a long lifetime. The device includes an aromatic amine including at least one substituent A having dibenzofuran and at least one substituent B selected from groups having dibenzofuran or carbazole. The substituent A and the substituent B include groups different from each other and are bonded to the same or different nitrogen atoms in the molecule. The molecules of the aromatic amine hardly crystallize, improving yield in producing the organic electroluminescence device. The device includes an organic thin film layer formed of one or more layers including at least a light emitting layer, the organic thin film layer being interposed between a cathode and an anode. The aromatic amine is contained in at least one layer, particularly a hole transport layer, in the organic thin film layer.
US09054320B2
The invention provides a 1,2,4-triazole-based derivative, a production process and use thereof, and an organic electroluminescent device. The invention belongs to the technical field of organic electroluminescence, and can give a blue light-emitting material having a higher luminescence efficiency. The 1,2,4-triazole-based derivative has a molecular structure of the following general formula, wherein A group represents an aromatic heterocyclic group having a carbon atom number of 8-18, a fused-ring aromatic group having a carbon atom number of 9-15, a fluorenyl group, or a triarylamino group. The 1,2,4-triazole-based derivative mentioned in the invention can be used in organic electroluminescent device.
US09054317B2
In a multilayer organic device (10) comprising a substrate bearing an anode (12) and a cathode (20), wherein located between the anode (12) and the cathode (20) is at least a first layer (16) comprising a first organic semiconductor material; and a second layer (18) over the first layer (16) comprising a second organic semiconductor material; the first organic semiconductor material is a polymer and the second organic material is a polymer or an oligomer, the average molecular weight of the first organic semiconductor material being higher than the average molecular weight of the second organic semiconductor material.
US09054311B2
An electronic device includes: a first-member that includes a through-hole; a second-member that includes a connection-hole and that is in contact with the first-member in a state where the through-hole and the connection-hole are in communication with each other; a first-locking-surface that is formed on the first-member while extending radially outside of the through-hole and that faces a side opposite to the connection-hole-side; a second-locking-surface that is formed in the second-member while extending radially outside of the connection-hole and that faces a side opposite to the through-hole-side; and an adhesive-portion including a shaft-portion with which the through-hole and the connection-hole are filled, a first-large-diameter portion that is formed at an end of the shaft-portion and secured to the first-locking-surface, and a second-large-diameter portion that is formed at the other end of the shaft-portion and secured to the second-locking-surface.
US09054310B2
A ceramic material having the general formula (BiXNayM<1>zLuM<2>V
US09054309B2
A piezoelectric material including a strontium calcium sodium niobate-based tungsten bronze structure metal oxide having a high degree of orientation is provided. A piezoelectric element, a liquid discharge head, an ultrasonic motor, and a dust cleaning device including the piezoelectric material are also provided. A piezoelectric material includes a tungsten bronze structure metal oxide that includes metal elements which are strontium, calcium, sodium, and niobium, and tungsten. The metal elements satisfy following conditions on a molar basis: when Sr/Nb=a, 0.320≦a≦0.430, when Ca/Nb=b, 0.008≦b≦0.086, and when Na/Nb=c, 0.180≦c≦0.200. The tungsten content on a metal basis is 0.40 to 3.20 parts by weight relative to 100 parts by weight of the tungsten bronze structure metal oxide. The tungsten bronze structure metal oxide has a c-axis orientation.
US09054304B2
A resistive memory device capable of preventing disturbance is provided. The resistive memory device includes a lower electrode formed on a semiconductor substrate, a variable resistor disposed on the lower electrode, an upper electrode disposed on the variable resistor, and an interlayer insulating layer configured to insulate the variable resistor. The interlayer insulating layer may include an air-gap area in at least a portion thereof.
US09054303B2
The present invention belongs to the technical field of semiconductor memories, in particular to a metal oxide semiconductor (MOS) transistor structure integrated with a resistance random access memory (RRAM). The MOS transistor structure comprises a MOS transistor and a RRAM formed on a substrate, wherein a gate dielectric layer of said MOS transistor extends to the surface of a drain region of said MOS transistor; and the part of the gate dielectric layer on the surface of the drain region of said MOS transistor faults a resistance-variable storage layer of said RRAM. In this invention, the high-quality dielectric layer of the MOS transistor and the resistance-variable storage layer of the RRAM are obtained by primary atomic layer deposition which integrates the RRAM and MOS transistor together without increasing steps. This process is simple and can combine the shallow trench isolation or field oxygen isolation and ion implantation or diffusion of source electrode and drain electrode to make integration convenient.
US09054283B2
According to an embodiment, a light emitting apparatus includes a substrate; at least two distinct electrodes on the substrate, wherein the at least two distinct electrodes are spaced from each other; a light emitting device on one of the at least two distinct electrodes; lenses including a first lens and a second lens on the substrate, wherein the second lens is disposed on the first lens, wherein an outermost portion of the second lens is spaced from the substrate; and a supporting unit configured to directly contact the second lens, wherein the supporting unit is formed of a non-conductivity material.
US09054280B2
In a light emitting module, a red phosphor is contained in a second phosphor layer so that the wavelength of a second phosphor layer after the wavelength conversion is longer than that of a first phosphor layer. And a blue phosphor and a yellow-green phosphor are contained in the first phosphor layer. The first phosphor layer is formed in an illumination area of light emitted from an LED chip, and the first phosphor layer converts the wavelength of the light from the LED chip and emits the wavelength-converted light from an emission surface. A part of the second phosphor layer is formed in a non-direct area where no light is illuminated from the LED chip and where light is illuminated from the first phosphor layer. The part of the second phosphor layer formed in the non-direct illumination area converts the wavelength of the light emitted from the first phosphor layer.
US09054273B2
A mobile device for generating electrical power may include a combustion chamber and a heat sink. A TEC module is in thermal communication with the combustion chamber and the heat sink to transfer thermal energy from the combustion chamber to the heat sink. A heat flux across the TEC module causes electrical power to be generated. The mobile device may also include a fuel delivery system to feed fuel into the combustion chamber. A control system may be included to at least monitor and control delivery of fuel to the combustion chamber by the fuel delivery system and to control a temperature gradient across the TEC module to control the electrical power produced by the thermal-to-electric energy conversion device.
US09054264B2
Systems and methods for solar cells with CIS and CIGS films made by reacting evaporated copper chlorides with selenium are provided. In one embodiment, a method for fabricating a thin film device comprises: providing a semiconductor film comprising indium (In) and selenium (Se) upon a substrate; heating the substrate and the semiconductor film to a desired temperature; and performing a mass transport through vapor transport of a copper chloride vapor and se vapor to the semiconductor film within a reaction chamber.
US09054263B2
The present disclosure relates to an apparatus and a method of drying the interior of solar modules. The apparatus and the method are particularly suitable for use with concentrator photovoltaic (CPV) modules. The drying apparatus comprises an absorber for drying and a heating device for heating a gas flowing therethrough and is connected to a solar cell via a connection, so that the dried gas is conducted into the solar cell.
