US08972523B2
A device receives, from a user device and via a first device, a first request for content, and determines whether the content is stored in memory. The device identifies first other requests for the content, received via the first device over a time period, and second other requests for the content, received via a second device over the time period, when the content is stored in the memory. The device identifies a first quantity of the first other requests and a second quantity of the second other requests, and determines whether the first quantity or the second quantity is greater than a threshold. The device transmits the content, to the user device and via the first device, when the first quantity is not greater than the threshold, and transmits, to the second device, an instruction to store the content when the second quantity is greater than the threshold.
US08972511B2
In some embodiments, a non-transitory processor-readable medium includes code that causes a processor to receive, at a compliance device, a message from a source communication device addressed to a destination communication device. The code causes the processor to analyze at a context engine, the content of the message to determine a first risk level associated with a preference of an organization. The code further causes the processor to analyze at a regulatory engine, the content of the message to determine a second risk level associated with a regulatory standard of a specific industry and to define a composite risk level based on the first risk level and the second risk level. The code further causes the processor to send a notification to an administrator if the composite risk level satisfies a criterion, and to send the message to the destination communication device irrespective of the composite risk level.
US08972507B1
An agent-assisted and directed web-channel customer care apparatus, method, and computer program is provided to receive, from a first device, an inbound message via an inbound messaging channel and create a web session utilizing a web session server. Session identification is received from the web session server and a unique identifier is transmitted to the first device in order for a second device to connect to an agent device via a web session. Communications is simultaneously maintained with the first and second device via the inbound messaging channel and the web session.
US08972503B2
Systems and methods are provided for at least partially automating content generation of blog entries chronicling an entity's interaction with a multiuser environment. The same may combine automatic data generation with user-generated and/or user-edited or created narrative. The systems and methods may be employed for automatically generating and publishing descriptions, such as posting blog articles. In one implementation, a system automatically posts blog articles with automatic screenshots and automatically-generated descriptive copy of events that occur within a video game, such as in a massive multiplayer online role-playing game.
US08972501B2
Systems and methods for the transmission of content are provided. A user group is defined and a group data structure corresponding to the user group is stored. An item of content is received and stored as a child data structure of a parent data structure of the group data structure. In response to this storage, the item of content is automatically transmitted to all other users of the user group.
US08972497B2
In one example a method includes: selecting, by a computing device, a message description that indicates a pre-defined operator is associated with a message data field; receiving, by the computing device, information associated with the message data field; responsive to determining that the information indicates the message data field does not include data, determining, by the computing device, whether to include, in a second message that is associated with the message description, a data value for the message data field of the second message based on the pre-defined operator that is associated with the message data field, wherein the data value is stored by the computing device and is associated with the message data field.
US08972494B2
A computer implemented method, data processing system, and computer program product for scheduling calendaring entries within the context of an instant messaging client. The instant messaging client receives input from a user to schedule an instant messaging chat session with one or more invitees, wherein the one or more invitees are selected from a list of contacts in the instant messaging client. The instant messaging client provides a scheduling interface to the user, wherein the scheduling interface allows the user to define properties for the instant messaging chat session. Responsive to receiving user input defining the instant messaging chat session, an entry is created in the user's calendaring system to form a scheduled instant messaging chat session, wherein the entry is based on the properties defined in the scheduling interface.
US08972493B2
Aspects of the present invention include using a single network identifier for delivering multiple versions of a content object. In some embodiments, a plurality of versions of the content object are created and associated with the single network identifier. When an edge server in a CDN receives a request for the content object, the edge server queries a policy server for a preferred version of the content object to deliver to an end user.
US08972492B2
An image processing apparatus connected to a Web server and including a Web browser for displaying an operation screen provided by the Web server and a processing unit that, when requested to execute image processing by the Web server based on access from the Web browser, executes the requested image processing, where it is determined, depending on a destination of access by the Web browser, whether or not to supply information about the image processing apparatus to the destination of access, and if it is determined that the information about the image processing apparatus should be supplied, the information about the image processing apparatus is supplied to the destination of access made by the Web browser.
US08972487B2
Various embodiments of systems and methods for automated test framework for testing enterprise services consumer technologies are described. According to one aspect, an enterprise service client is generated based on the WSDL document of an enterprise service. The generation of the client includes generation of source code files and other client artifacts. The client artifacts are compiled and the client is configured to connect to the server system hosting the enterprise service. Real test data is loaded into a non-persistent memory and executed against the server system of the enterprise system. If no exception occurs, the test call is assumed successful. If the test calls to this enterprise service are successful, the service is marked as compatible with the different clients that performed the test calls.
US08972471B2
An arithmetic module is provided, including a first adder, a first shifter coupled to the first adder, a multiplier coupled to the first shifter for receiving an external coefficient signal, a digit alignment unit coupled to the multiplier, a second adder coupled to the digit alignment unit, and a second shifter coupled to the second adder. The arithmetic module reduces the overall computation time effectively, as compared with a scalar processor, by employing a serial data connection design, and also significantly reduces power consumption of the digital signal processor by requiring fewer input and output ends than those of a multi-issue processor.
US08972464B2
A file operations engine is provided that manages many user interactions with their files via a computer system. The operation engine may provide a user with the option to keep both files that have a file name conflict. It may further permit the user to rename a file involved with a file name conflict. The operations engine may also automatically rename one of the files of a file name conflict by appending a character to a root of the filename. The character may include the lowest integer available for the root in a destination for the files. The operations engine may provide the option to keep both files as part of a pre-calculation of potential errors for a requested operation. The operations engine may place file name conflicts in an error queue and permit the user to select an option to keep both files after the conflict is encountered.
US08972463B2
A computer implemented method for functional integration of metadata for a plurality of databases, includes: creating a single set of classes and instances for the classes for metadata of at least one relational data schema and at least one non-relational data schema for the plurality of databases; defining semantic relationships between the instances based on the structural information in the relational data schema and the non-relational data schema for the plurality of databases; associating the semantic relationships with a property class; creating a single set of triples for the semantic relationships between the instances; storing the single set of triples in a file; and using the set of triples stored in the file to navigate between the plurality of databases to formulate a response to a query.
US08972461B2
Content is dynamically assembled at the edge of the Internet, preferably on content delivery network (CDN) edge servers. A content provider leverages an “edge side include” (ESI) markup language that is used to define Web page fragments for dynamic assembly at the edge. Dynamic assembly improves site performance by caching objects that comprise dynamically-generated pages at the edge of the Internet, close to the end user. Instead of being assembled by an application/web server in a centralized data center, the application/web server sends a page template and content fragments to a CDN edge server where the page is assembled. Each content fragment can have its own cacheability profile to manage the “freshness” of the content. Once a user requests a page, the edge server examines its cache for the included fragments and assembles the page on-the-fly.
US08972458B2
A computer-implemented method for managing comment data generated when interacting with a page module is disclosed. At least one comment data being expressed by a user when interacting with the page module is detected and analyzed identify a context for the comment data. If the comment data is identified to be associate with a context, tagging the comment data with a context association, and if the comment data is not associated with a context then maintaining the comment data associated only with the page module. The comment data is then populated in the other page modules that were identified to have a context association with the comment data. The populating enables display presentation of the comment data made at the page module at the one or more page modules having the context association.
US08972456B2
Various embodiments of systems and methods for analyzing software-usage information are described herein. Traffic numbers are obtained from data stored in a database using measurement objects that are associated with one or more keys. The measurement objects output the traffic numbers and the one or more keys are related to elements of the data. Identifiers and categories are assigned to the measurement objects. The categories represent attributes of a software product. A data structure comprising the identifiers, the traffic numbers, and the categories is generated and stored. The stored data structure and a header comprising one or more fields are used to generate a report.
US08972454B2
A screen capture application captures image data by receiving a signal defining a display area for which image data is to be captured, accessing metadata relating to components within the defined display area, and, for components within the display area, storing an image of the component and storing associated position data. The screen capture application may store positional relationships between the components within the defined display area, the positional relationships including ordering of the components relative to each other. The screen capture application may store the components as a plurality of layers within a layered image file. The screen capture application may store the component images in respective files and store the position data in a control file. The control file may include details of the respective component image files.
US08972435B2
Query suggestions are generated based on a Breadth-First-Search having a configurable decaying radius. A computer system receives an initial set of semantically similar queries. The computer system expands the set to include related terms. The set of related terms is included in the initial set. The expansion process is repeated for each query or related term in the set. The radius may be reduced for each subsequent related term added to the query. The process may stop when the radius reaches a specified threshold, e.g., a predetermined number of queries or terms for the set is reached. The set includes the related terms and search queries. The set may be used for, among other things, suggesting related terms to a researcher, improving search engine performance, or selecting appropriate advertisements.
US08972424B2
A system and related method for the electronic processing of text onto a two-dimensional coordinate system to analyze the attitudinal mindset associated with the text. The system and related method may also be employed to generate text based on a desired attitudinal mindset to impart. The system includes a computer system embodying functions that enable a user to analyze the text. The system includes one or more functions to parse attitudinal words and objective words and associate two-dimensional coordinates with the subjective words. The system further includes one or more functions for mapping the associated two-dimensional coordinates to show the geographic locations of each attitudinal word of the text in relation to each other attitudinal word of the text. The system decomposes attitudinal words into attitudinal equivalence and reference category and enables the generation of a report of the mindset associated with the analyzed text.
US08972419B2
In an item selecting apparatus performing a selection of an item to be recommended for each user, it is performed to calculate, with respect to each usage registration of an item by a user, an elapsed value as a difference between a time point of creating the item or staring providing of the item and a predetermined time point, acquire a usage characteristics of each user based on the elapsed value and calculate a freshness value representing a degree of freshness about each item. Further, using correspondence rules of different characteristics corresponding to the usage item on the correspondence rule corresponding to the usage characteristics of each user, calculate a priority of the item for each user, based on the novelty index and performing a selection of the item.
US08972417B2
Disclosed in some examples are methods, systems and machine readable medium for recommending an out-of-network communication by determining a set of potential recommended members of a social networking service based upon one or more recommendation criteria. In some examples the recommendation criteria may include: a profile similarity to a previous target of an out-of-network communication, a degree of correspondence between an interest and intent of the sending member, and a likelihood of response.
US08972410B2
Provided are, among other things, systems, methods and techniques for identifying related objects in a computer database. In one representative implementation: (a) a feature vector that describes an existing object is obtained; (b) comparison scores are generated between the feature vector and various sample vectors; (c) a set that includes at least one designated vector is identified from among the sample vectors by evaluating the generated comparison scores; (d) a computer database is searched for matches between label(s) for the designated vector(s) and labels for representative vectors for other objects represented in the computer database; and (e) at least one related object is identified based on the identified match(es).
US08972405B1
A system is provided for managing data sets in a cloud processing and/or federated environment. In an embodiment, the system described herein may be used in connection with cloud processing of big data sets. The term “big data,” as used herein, may be generally defined to describe data sets so large and complex that they become difficult to work with using on-hand database management tools. The system described herein enables the persistent storage of semantic technology statements for big data sets for processing in a cloud processing and/or federated environment.
US08972403B2
Embodiments of the invention relate to organizing data records in a relational database. An aspect of the invention includes creating index items for a plurality of data records. Each index item includes a counter and the creating results in a plurality of counters. The numerical values of counters in corresponding index items are updated for data records in the plurality of data records that are subjected to random access. The plurality of data records are reorganized based upon the numerical values of the plurality of counters.
US08972401B2
Defeating click-through cloaking includes retrieving a search results page to set a browser variable, inserting a link to a page into the search results page and clicking through to the page using the inserted link. Investigating cloaking includes providing script associated with a suspected spam URL, modifying the script to de-obfuscate the script and executing the modified script to reveal cloaking logic associated with the script.
US08972395B1
A computer-implemented method is provided for enabling Internet users to interact with a graphical search interface by: generating a multi-dimensional search space having a plurality of vertices, based on the initial and related search parameters, wherein each vertex is populated with and represents one of the initial or related search parameters; generating a matrix of hyperlinks within the multi-dimensional search space, each hyperlink having coordinates within the search space defining a relevance of the hyperlink to each of the initial and related search parameters; displaying a graphical interface projecting the multi-dimensional search space, along with user elements by which the user may adjust a relative weight of one or more of the initial and related search parameters by interacting with one or more of the hyperlinks; and displaying a plurality of search results automatically updated in real time based on the user-adjusted weights of the initial and related search parameters.
US08972387B2
Provided are techniques to search for an entity in an entity resolution system. Search input comprising one or more attribute values of one or more attribute types is received. A resolution search is performed to generate a search result set comprising one or more entities and zero or more generic attribute values for generating additional entities. In response to determining that the resolution search generated at least two generic attribute values, one or more query searches are performed for a unique generic group by generic attribute type to identify the additional entities, wherein the unique generic group comprises a subset of the search input and includes at least two generic attribute types; the identified additional entities are combined with the entities in the search result set; and the search result set is returned.
US08972384B2
Architecture that inserts one or more label items in search result entries. In addition to the typical search result caption (title, snippet, and link), the architecture includes the label component of one or more of the label items in the result entry. The number and type of label annotations are based on the query. When a particular label item is selected (e.g., hover, mouse click), a presentation component (e.g., expansion object, pop-up window) launches proximate to a label item in response to interaction with the label item and presents additional information from the target webpage. The additional information can include an action and data related to the search result entry and the target webpage. The data can be obtained from a data source other than the target webpage.
US08972376B1
Techniques for optimized web domains classification based on progressive crawling with clustering are disclosed. In some embodiments, optimized web domains classification based on progressive crawling with clustering includes crawling a domain (e.g., a web site domain) to collect data for a subset of pages (e.g., web pages) of a corpus of content associated with the domain; classifying each of the crawled pages into one or more category clusters, in which the category clusters represent a content categorization of the corpus of content associated with the domain (e.g., a URL content categorization for the domain, host of that domain, and/or directory of that domain); and determining which of the one or more category clusters to publish for the domain.
US08972371B2
A local search engine geographically indexes information for searching by identifying a geocoded web page of a web site and identifying at least one geocodable web page of the web site. The system identifies a geocode contained within content of the geocoded web page of the web site. The geocode indicates a physical location of an entity associated with the web site. The system indexes content of the geocoded web page and content of the geocodable web page. The indexing including associating the geocode contained within content of the geocoded web page to the indexed content of the geocoded web page and the geocodable web page to allow geographical searching of the content of the web pages.
US08972365B2
A storage system having a plurality of storages. The each of the storages include a memory and a processor coupled to the memory. The processor executes a process including transmitting an update request for data which is commonly stored in the plurality of storages according to a predetermined transmission order indicating a path to transfer the update request. The process includes updating data when receiving an update request from another storage. The process includes changing the predetermined transmission order to a transmission order in which one or more storages included in the path are excluded according to the number of times the update request for the data is received.
US08972359B2
A method and apparatus for compression of complex data signals within a telecommunications base station. The method includes representing a sample of a complex value discrete time signal using 2(L−N)−S mantissa bits and 2N+S exponent bits to realize peak output signal to noise ratios over a wider dynamic range compared to a conventional L-bit uniform quantization format. The increases in dynamic range and peak output SNR is achieved without increasing the average number of data bits per sample and with relatively simple computational effort.
US08972350B2
Selective tuple versioning is used on a file system providing file system snapshots using selective tuple versioning for maintaining the state of the file system. The selective tuple versioning works by adding a snapshot table to associate with a file system table by storing a timestamp and a snapshot identification (ID) relating to a snapshot created for preserving past nodes in the file system.
US08972338B2
A log file contains operation records, each operation record is of a certain type, and each operation record is associated with a transaction. A plurality of operation records is read from the log file into a record store. Records of the plurality of operation records of each operation record type are sampled at a predefined sampling rate. Operation records in the plurality of operations records are identified that are associated with completed transactions of which the sampled operation records are associated. The identified operation records are then extracted from the record store into a data store.
US08972337B1
A bloom filter is generated for efficient query processing for unsorted data in a column of a columnar database. Bloom filters represented as bitmaps are generated for data blocks storing data for a column of a columnar database table. An indication of a query directed toward the column is received and the bloom filter for each data block is examined to determine which ones of the data blocks do not need to be read in order to service the query for the select data. Data is then read from the data blocks storing data for the column excepting the ones which do not need to be read.
US08972336B2
A system and method for mapping columns from a source file to a target file. The header for each source column is evaluated heuristically to see if the header matches a predefined entity. The contents of a group of cells in the source column are evaluated probabilistically to determine a probability that the cell contents correspond to at least one of the predefined entities. A score is assigned to the likelihood that the column corresponds to one or more predefined entities. If the score meets a threshold, then the correspondence between the source column and one or more predefined entities is mapped. If the score fails to meets the threshold, then the correspondence between the source column and one or more undefined entities is mapped. Finally, each source column is transformed into a target column in accord with the map.
US08972335B2
A system and method of extracting information from electronic data sources that includes generating a list of file names containing the information to be extracted. Each file name in the list is read into memory, the file that corresponds to the file name is read into memory, and the information is extracted from the file by executing a series of programming instructions. The information is saved to an extracted file, and one or more file names in the list is identified to correspond to an extracted file.
US08972333B2
Embodiments of the invention may help improve the accuracy of individually tailored prognoses in dealing with individual patient prognoses for cancer, diabetes, multiple sclerosis, heart disease, and/or other diseases. Alternate embodiments of the invention may be useful in improving the accuracy of predictions in a variety of other contexts and fields. A method according to various embodiments of the invention includes generating a univariate impact reflecting index (UIRI) based on an indicator, the indicator having a monotonic relationship to a focal conclusion, wherein the UIRI spaces subscales of the indicator according to a magnitude of impact of the indicator to the focal conclusion.
US08972320B2
Smart containers are disclosed. A system for managing content comprises an interface to receive an operation associated with an instance of a smart container. The smart container comprises a logical structure configure using a definition to manage associated content. The system for managing content comprises a processor configured to determine whether the operation is allowable based at least in part on a policy; and in the event that the operation is allowable, perform the operation. A memory is coupled to the processor and is configured to provide the processor with instructions.
US08972311B2
A platform to facilitate transferring spectrum rights is provided that includes a database to ascertain information regarding available spectrum for use in wireless communications. A request for spectrum use from an entity needing spectrum may be matched with available spectrum. This matching comprises determining a pattern in user requests overtime to optimize spectrum allocation. The Cloud Spectrum Services (CSS) process allows entities to access spectrum they would otherwise not have; it allows the end user to complete their download during congested periods while maintaining high service quality; and it allows the holder of rental spectrum to receive compensation for an otherwise idle asset.
US08972302B2
Unique identification information is prerecorded on a disc. The identification information is registered to a server along with user's license when he or she buys the disc. When an terminal unit reproduces data from the disc, identification information is read and transmitted to the server through the Internet. The server creates a key that controls to reproduce data from the disc in accordance with the license identified by the identification information and transmits the key to the terminal unit along with the user's license information for the disc. The terminal unit controls to reproduce contents of the disc in accordance with key and license information transmitted from the server. The license for each disc is managed in accordance with the identification information. Thus, different services can be provided for individual discs.
US08972297B2
The systems and methods described herein allow greater access to a banking platform via a mobile device. The customer can initiate a financial transaction using a mobile device, a bank can inform the customer of the nearest financial transaction terminal to perform that service, and the customer can complete that financial transaction at the financial transaction terminal using the mobile device as a user interface. While conventional systems may use a mobile device to transmit payment information at a point of sale terminal of a brick-and-mortar merchant, the embodiments described herein can allow a customer to conduct a transaction at a financial transaction terminal using the mobile device to initiate a transaction at a location away from a financial transaction terminal, to locate the nearest financial transaction terminal providing the required services, and as a user interface while communicating with the financial transaction terminal.
US08972293B2
Apparatus and methods for auditing a transaction record are provided. The transaction record may correspond to a credit card transaction. The auditing may include identifying a surcharge violation. The surcharge violation may be an unlawful surcharge. The auditing may identify patterns of double surcharging. Transaction-level auditing may include ensuring that a surcharge is returned upon a product return. A mobile wallet application may allow consumers to access and/or report merchant surcharge compliance activity. Functionality may include surcharge receipt scanning for use in crosschecking authenticity of a consumer report. Additional crosscheck functionality provided by geographic location support. Embodiments may include a registry for merchants that certify their surcharge calculations.
US08972292B2
Embodiments of the invention relate to systems, methods, and computer program products for annotating financial transactions. For example, one embodiment of the invention provides a financial institution's computer apparatus having a memory communicably coupled to a processor. In one embodiment, the memory device includes information regarding a plurality of bank accounts stored therein, and the processing device is configured to receive an indication of a transaction involving a first bank account stored in the memory device, send a request for ancillary information about the transaction to a party associated with the first bank account, receive ancillary information, such as a photograph of a product purchased in the transaction, from the party associated with the first bank account, and associate, in the memory device, the received ancillary information with the transaction.
US08972287B1
A system and method for aggregating demand is provided. At least one seller may sponsor a deal room to aggregate selling goods/services from a plurality of buyers. The demand aggregation system can include a dashboard for allowing the at least one seller to set up DealRooms, price curves, offers, products, customers, and/or customer groups, for example. The dashboard can include a plurality of wizards for configuring such information. The demand aggregation system can also include seller displays for notifying buyers of changes in prices relative to ship dates and times of order. The demand aggregation system can also include a predictive modeling and reporting function. An algorithm is employed to utilize product information to post a probability chart on a product price point.
US08972283B2
A wearable mobile scanner system processes a retail store purchase in a convenient, time efficient and reliable manner. The wearable mobile scanner system includes a forearm portion and a hand portion. The forearm portion comprises a main body member and at least one strap member and is adapted to secure the forearm portion upon a user's forearm. The hand portion comprises a central forehand member, a palm member, and a forefinger aperture, wherein the hand portion is aligned with the forearm portion and wherein the hand portion is adapted to receive a hand of the user. A trigger member is located on the forefinger aperture in communication with a USB scanner input device mounted on the central forehand member of the hand portion. A system integrated therein enables store level real-time inventory management and a fully functioning mobile POS for selling merchandise throughout the store and beyond its walls.
US08972275B2
Methods for optimizing social media are disclosed. Such methods may include identifying at least one keyword utilized for at least one webpage, identifying social media correspondence referencing the at least one keyword, analyzing content collected from the social media to determine a frequency of references to the at least one keyword and generating at least one report including information based on the analysis. The report may include recommendations for optimizing social media by, for example, purchasing paid posts or links on a social media website. Systems for performing the methods are also disclosed.
US08972266B2
A speaker intent analysis system and method for validating the truthfulness and intent of a plurality of participants' responses to questions. A computer stores, retrieves, and transmits a series of questions to be answered audibly by participants. The participants' answers are received by a data processor. The data processor analyzes and records the participants' speech parameters for determining the likelihood of dishonesty. In addition to analyzing participants' speech parameters for distinguishing stress or other abnormality, the processor may be equipped with voice recognition software to screen responses that while not dishonest, are indicative of possible malfeasance on the part of the participants. Once the responses are analyzed, the processor produces an output that is indicative of the participant's credibility. The output may be sent to proper parties and/or devices such as a web page, computer, e-mail, PDA, pager, database, report, etc. for appropriate action.
US08972264B2
A method and apparatus for utterance verification are provided for verifying a recognized vocabulary output from speech recognition. The apparatus for utterance verification includes a reference score accumulator, a verification score generator and a decision device. A log-likelihood score obtained from speech recognition is processed by taking a logarithm of the value of the probability of one of feature vectors of an input speech conditioned on one of states of each model vocabulary. A verification score is generated based on the processed result. The verification score is compared with a predetermined threshold value so as to reject or accept the recognized vocabulary.
US08972261B2
A computer-implemented system and method for voice transcription error reduction is provided. Speech utterances are obtained from a voice stream and each speech utterance is associated with a transcribed value and a confidence score. Those utterances with transcription values associated with lower confidence scores are identified as questionable utterances. One of the questionable utterances is selected from the voice stream. A predetermined number of questionable utterances from other voice streams and having transcribed values similar to the transcribed value of the selected questionable utterance are identified as a pool of related utterances. A further transcribed value is received for each of a plurality of the questionable utterances in the pool of related utterances. A transcribed message is generated for the voice stream using those transcribed values with higher confidence scores and the further transcribed value for the selected questionable utterance.
US08972260B2
In accordance with one embodiment, a method of generating language models for speech recognition includes identifying a plurality of utterances in training data corresponding to speech, generating a frequency count of each utterance in the plurality of utterances, generating a high-frequency plurality of utterances from the plurality of utterances having a frequency that exceeds a predetermined frequency threshold, generating a low-frequency plurality of utterances from the plurality of utterances having a frequency that is below the predetermined frequency threshold, generating a grammar-based language model using the high-frequency plurality of utterances as training data, and generating a statistical language model using the low-frequency plurality of utterances as training data.
US08972259B2
A method and system for teaching non-lexical speech effects includes delexicalizing a first speech segment to provide a first prosodic speech signal and data indicative of the first prosodic speech signal is stored in a computer memory. The first speech segment is audibly played to a language student and the student is prompted to recite the speech segment. The speech uttered by the student in response to the prompt, is recorded.
US08972245B2
Provided are techniques for text prediction using environment hints. A list of words is received, wherein each word in the list of words has an associated weight. For at least one word in the list of words, an environment weight is obtained from an environment dictionary. The associated weight of the at least one word is updated using the obtained environment weight. The words in the list of words are ordered based on the updated, associated weight of each of the words.
US08972235B2
Apparatus and methods for simulation of bore hole fractures are disclosed. A device for simulating a fracture in a subterranean formation comprises a housing, an inlet for directing a sample fluid to the housing, and a first disk and a second disk positioned within the housing. The second disk is movable relative to the first disk to form an adjustable gap between the first disk and the second disk and the sample fluid flows through the adjustable gap. A common collector receives at least a portion of the sample fluid that flows through at least one of the first disk and the second disk.
US08972231B2
A reservoir prediction system is disclosed that uses a kernel-based ensemble Kalman filter (EnKF) capable of representing non-Gaussian random fields characterized by multi-point geostatistics. The EnKF uses only the covariance and cross-covariance between the random fields (to be updated) and observations, thereby only preserving two-point statistics. The kernel-based EnKF allows the creation of nonlinear generalizations of linear algorithms that can be exclusively written in terms of dot products. By deriving the EnKF in a high-dimensional feature space implicitly defined using kernels, both the Kalman gain and update equations are nonlinearized, thus providing a completely general nonlinear set of EnKF equations, the nonlinearity being controlled by the kernel. By choosing high order polynomial kernels, multi-point statistics and therefore geological realism of the updated random fields can be preserved.
US08972228B2
Techniques for evaluating cardiac electrical dyssynchrony are described. In some examples, an activation time is determined for each of a plurality of torso-surface potential signals. The dispersion or sequence of these activation times may be analyzed or presented to provide variety of indications of the electrical dyssynchrony of the heart of the patient. In some examples, the locations of the electrodes of the set of electrodes, and thus the locations at which the torso-surface potential signals were sensed, may be projected on the surface of a model torso that includes a model heart. The inverse problem of electrocardiography may be solved to determine electrical activation times for regions of the model heart based on the torso-surface potential signals sensed from the patient.
US08972227B2
The present system and method for simulating particles and waves is useful for calculations involving nuclear and full spectrum radiation transport, quantum particle transport, plasma transport and charged particle transport. The invention provides a mechanism for creating accurate invariants for embedding in general three-dimensional problems and describes means by which a series of simple single collision interaction finite elements can be extended to formulate a complex multi-collision finite element.
US08972204B2
Sensing particular gases in a mixture uses precise modulated heating. Sensor relative responses are compared at different temperatures and compared with known relative responses to identify gases and concentrations. Heater current sensors provide feedback control and microprocessor inputs. A processor controls complex impedances and varied frequencies in the sensors. Sensor responses at varied complex impedances and at varied frequencies are compared with known responses at those impedances and frequencies to determine existence and concentration of particular gases. Heater and sensor buses are separate or combined.
US08972200B2
The present subject matter discloses a system and a method for compression of genomic data. In one embodiment, the method for compression of genomic data includes obtaining modified genomic data from genomic data based at least in part on intermediary data identified from the genomic data. In one implementation, the modified genomic data includes a plurality of primary characters. The genomic data may then be modified to generate one or more most-frequent character files based at least on a most-frequent character and a second most-frequent character from among the plurality of primary characters. Further, based at least on the one or more most-frequent character files and the modified genomic data, a least-frequent characters file may be created from the modified genomic data.
US08972193B2
A method of estimating a parameter of a formation contacting a borehole with an instrument that includes a mandrel and a pad includes providing a measurement voltage to the pad; applying a biasing voltage to the mandrel while the measurement voltage is applied to the pad; measuring a received current during at least a portion of time the measurement voltage is provided; and estimating the parameter based on the received current.
US08972187B1
For a segment of a route, a navigation data gathering system and method may progressively increment the precision of data analysis in proportion to the number of people actively on a route segment. Navigation data may be anonymized to preclude the possibility of correlating navigation data with personal data to track users or infer private information. Further, the system or method may determine if information for a route segment can be used at all based on the number of users of that segment. If the number of users does not exceed a threshold, the information collected on that route may not be used for other purposes. Thus, the system and method may use navigation data related to a busy section of an interstate highway at the level of precision with which the data is gathered, but reduce the level of precision of data available for a rarely used road segment.
US08972181B2
A system and method for providing fluent interaction between connectivity applications, personal information management applications and navigation applications. The present invention enables a user to launch navigation application directly from a “Contacts” application. This invention also enables the same result to be achieved in reverse, enabling direct access from a navigation application to contact information, eliminating the need for the user to manually access and enter information.
US08972180B1
A mobile device operable in multiple navigation modes and includes navigation devices, a mode selection module, and a power management module. The navigation devices provide respective data associated with at least one of movement, a position, and a location of the mobile device. Each of the navigation devices is individually operable in an active mode and at least one of an inactive mode and a sleep mode. The mode selection module receives the respective data and selects one of the navigation modes based on the data received from one of the navigation devices. Each of the navigation modes corresponds to different ones of the navigation devices operating in the active mode. The power management module, based on the selected one of the navigation modes, transitions the navigation devices between the active mode and the at least one of the inactive mode and the sleep mode.
US08972178B2
Techniques are disclosed for reporting occupied and unoccupied parking spaces are disclosed. The techniques include determining that a mobile computing device has entered a parking area and determining whether the mobile computing device has entered a pedestrian mode. The pedestrian mode is indicative of a user of the mobile computing device parking a vehicle and exiting the vehicle. When the mobile computing device has entered the pedestrian mode, the technique includes determining a first location of the mobile computing device at a first time corresponding to the mobile computing device entering the pedestrian mode, and providing an occupied notification to a remote computing device, the occupied notification including the first location and indicating that a parking spot corresponding to the first location is occupied. Techniques are further disclosed for reporting unoccupied parking spaces to the mobile computing device.
US08972174B2
A method for providing navigation information, a machine-readable storage medium, a mobile terminal and a server are provided. The method includes generating a preview image captured by a camera and location information of the mobile terminal; transmitting the preview image and location information to a server, receiving, from the server, route guide information generated based on the preview image and the location information, and displaying the route guide information to a user.
US08972171B1
Systems and methods provide a route and turn-by-turn directions based on estimates of current and future traffic along the route. A client device may request turn-by-turn directions between an initial and a final location. A server may identify a plurality of routes between the locations. Each route of the plurality of routes may be divided into route segments. For each route segment of a particular route, the server may estimate a travel time. The travel time may be based on estimated vehicle volume data generated from information received from other vehicles. The server may estimate a total travel time for the particular route. The server may repeat this estimate for each of the plurality of routes between the locations and select the route with the lowest estimated travel time. Based on the selected route, the server may generate turn-by-turn directions and transmit the directions to the client device for display.
US08972168B2
Embodiments for determining a route a consumer takes while traversing a retail store are disclosed. The embodiments include determining a store location of a retail store and a map corresponding to the layout of the retail store, receiving waypoint data including a plurality of positions within the map corresponding timestamps, determining a route in response to the waypoint data, and providing the route and the map for display.
US08972162B1
Described herein are devices, systems, and methods for managing the power consumption of an automotive vehicle, and thereby for optimizing the power consumption of the vehicle. The devices and systems for managing the power consumption of the vehicle typically include power management logic that can calculate an applied power for the vehicle engine based on information provided from the external environment of the vehicle, the operational status of the vehicle, one or more command inputs from a driver, and one or more operational parameters of the vehicle.
US08972159B2
Systems, methods, software, and apparatuses for coordinating traffic proximate to a potential conflict zone, such as a roadway intersection, where travel conflicts, such as crossing traffic, can arise. Coordination involves forming an ad-hoc network in a region containing the conflict zone using, for example, vehicle-to-vehicle communications and developing a dynamic traffic control plan based on information about vehicles approaching the conflict zone. Instructions based on the dynamic traffic control plan are communicated to devices aboard vehicles in the ad-hoc network, which display one or more virtual traffic signals to the operators of the vehicles and/or control the vehicles in accordance with the dynamic traffic control plan.
US08972157B2
A stop control system for an internal combustion engine, which is capable of restarting the engine automatically stopped, in optimum timing, thereby making it possible to positively prevent occurrence of fogging of window glass of a vehicle compartment and improve fuel economy. The engine is connected to a compressor of an air conditioner. According to the stop control system, during idle stop, window glass temperature is calculated, and according to the calculated window glass temperature, limit humidity below which fogging of the window glass does not occur is set. When determining compartment humidity becomes equal to or higher than the limit humidity, the idle stop is terminated and the engine is restarted. When the weather is rainy or snowy, the determining compartment humidity is corrected. When vehicle compartment temperature is not lower than a first predetermined temperature, the window glass temperature is corrected.
US08972151B2
Disclosed herein is a two-cycle engine that includes an exhaust port which is opened and closed at one end portion in a longitudinal direction of a cylinder; a scavenging port which is opened and closed at the other end portion in the longitudinal direction of the cylinder; and a fuel injection port which injects a fuel into the cylinder provided between the exhaust port and the scavenging port, wherein the fuel begins to be injected in a state in which at least any one of the exhaust port and the scavenging port is opened.
US08972149B2
A control system for a machine is disclosed. The control system may have an engine configured to combust a mixture of fuel and air and generate a mechanical power output and a flow of exhaust, and a sensor configured to generate a signal indicative of the machine moving between zones having different air characteristics. The control system may also have a controller in communication with the engine and the sensor. The controller may be configured to selectively adjust operation of the engine based on the signal in an amount related to the air characteristics.
US08972147B2
When employing an adaptive cruise-with-braking (ACB) system to control host vehicle braking reaction distance, a plurality of trigger conditions (e.g., environmental parameters) are monitored. If one or more of the monitored parameters exceeds a predefined threshold, a trigger event is detected, and at least one of a braking reaction distance (BRD) and a following distance limit shape (FDLS) are adjusted. The BRD and FDLS adjustments may be predefined according to the type and/or magnitude of the trigger event. Trigger events may be weighted or prioritized such that higher priority trigger event types correspond to larger BRD reductions, etc. Monitored trigger conditions may include adverse weather, dangerous road terrain or topography, high traffic density, erratic forward vehicle behavior, and the like.
US08972143B2
A data communication system for a vehicle includes an interface gateway device that is configured to be communicatively coupled with a data acquisition module and a client module. The interface gateway device is further configured to receive a value of a data parameter related to operation of the vehicle from the data acquisition module and to communicate the value to the client module for performing a function for the vehicle. The interface gateway device also is configured to determine when either of the data acquisition module or the client module is communicatively coupled with the interface gateway device and to implement respective communication configurations associated with the data acquisition module or the client module to receive the value of the data parameter from the data acquisition module or communicate the value of the data parameter to the client module.
US08972141B2
A method to control braking of an aircraft on a landing runway including: selecting a dummy runway state corresponding to a level of adhesion of wheels of the aircraft to a runway which is lower, over an entire speed range of the aircraft while braking on a runway, than an adhesion level of the wheels of the aircraft to the landing runway; calculating a set point of a deceleration value for the aircraft on the landing runway based on the landing runway for the selected dummy runway state, wherein the calculated set point corresponds to maximum braking value of the aircraft, and controlling the braking of the aircraft using the set point.
US08972140B2
A disc brake apparatus, in which, at the time of a parking brake release operation, a control unit configured to control driving of an electric motor drives the electric motor so as to cause a piston holding mechanism to stop holding a piston, detects separation of a brake pad from a disk, and then stops driving the electric motor after driving the electric motor by a predetermined amount based on a current value of the electric motor.
US08972139B2
A control system that performs control of an electric motor is described. The control system may include a rotating body inertia torque computing unit that uses a rotational state of a vehicle wheel when braking is applied to the wheel to calculate an inertia torque of rotating bodies residing within a span behind the wheel, among members that rotate by the driving force of the electric motor. The control system also may include a controller that performs control of the electric motor to cancel the inertia torque of the rotating bodies based on the calculation result from the rotating body inertia torque computing unit.
US08972136B2
Discloses is a method of controlling a four-wheel drive vehicle equipped with a torque distribution device capable of changing a torque distribution amount for secondary driven wheels according to an input current to be applied thereto. This method comprises the steps of: applying, to the torque distribution device, a current value corresponding to a target torque distribution amount; and, performing a current changing control for increasing and reducing the input current to the torque distribution device. The step of performing a current changing control includes causing the input current to the torque distribution device to be temporarily increased to a value greater than the current value corresponding to the target torque distribution amount, and then returned to the current value corresponding to the target torque distribution amount, and repeating the temporary increasing of the input current at least at intervals of a predetermined time.
US08972130B2
An ECU determines whether or not there is an abnormality (shift pattern abnormality) in a combination of shift signals provided from a shift position sensor. After occurrence of the shift pattern abnormality is determined, ECU determines whether or not a first condition that a shift pattern has changed into a normal pattern of a drive range, a second condition that a brake is ON and a vehicle is in a stop state is satisfied, and a third condition that an accelerator is OFF are satisfied. When occurrence of the shift pattern abnormality is determined, ECU stops generation of driving force of the vehicle and prohibits switching to the drive range. When ECU determines that the above-mentioned first to third conditions are satisfied after occurrence of the shift pattern abnormality is determined, ECU switches the shift range to the drive range indicated by the shift pattern.
US08972126B2
A method for control of a vehicle gearbox which is automatically controlled by a control system. The control system's choice of transmission ratio is influenceable by the vehicle's driver. The control system chooses an initial transmission ratio for moving off stationary. The method includes determining a first initial transmission ratio by using the control system, and determining a second initial transmission ratio indicated by the vehicle driver. The gearbox is set to the second initial transmission ratio indicated by the driver when the second ratio is higher than the first initial transmission ratio determined by the control system.
US08972124B2
A work vehicle includes an engine, an idling stop execution portion, a determination portion, a counting portion, and an idling stop time period adjustment portion. The engine can rotate in a first idling state and a second idling state in which the engine rotates at the number of rotations higher than a prescribed number of rotations. The idling stop execution portion performs an idling stop operation for stopping the engine. The determination portion determines whether or not stop has been made from the second idling state. The counting portion counts the number of times of stop of the engine from the second idling state. An idling stop time period adjustment portion makes a prescribed time period of the second idling state longer than a current time period, when the number of times of stop of the engine is equal to or greater than the prescribed number of times.
US08972118B2
A method of and a control unit arranged for controlling an internal combustion engine connected to a torque converter arranged to operate in a torque converter mode or a lock up mode are provided. The method includes determining whether the torque converter mode or the lock up mode is presently in operation and selecting to control an engine speed (N) in dependence of an operator input when the torque converter mode is present, and selecting to control an engine output power and/or engine output torque in dependence of operator input to the accelerator unit when the lock up mode is present.
US08972117B2
A vehicular light distribution control system (100) controls a light distribution of headlights (3). The control system includes the following parts. The vehicle detecting part (10) detects an anterior vehicle driving in front of an occupants vehicle. The unirradiated region setting part (12) sets a region where the anterior vehicle detected by the vehicle detecting part (10) exists as an unirradiated region. The vehicle motion estimating part (13) estimates an ensuing motion of the anterior vehicle detected by the vehicle detecting part (10). The unirradiated region adjusting part (14) adjusts a size of the unirradiated region set by the unirradiated region setting part (12) depending on an estimated result 15 of the vehicle motion estimating part (13).
US08972115B1
A motor driven power steering (MDPS) may include: a vehicle speed sensor configured to sense vehicle speed; a temperature sensor configured to sense a temperature of a power pack; a current sensor configured to sense an amount of current applied to the MDPS; a storage unit configured to store a thermal resistance value based on the vehicle speed with respect to the temperature of the power pack; and a control unit configured to calculate an estimated temperature by reflecting the thermal resistance value based on the vehicle speed with respect to the temperature of the power pack and the current amount applied to the MDPS into a temperature estimation function, and drive a motor according to the calculated estimated temperature.
US08972108B2
A method and an apparatus for controlling a semi-active suspension system (1) for motorcycles are described. According to the present invention, the damping forces applied to controllable force generators (2, 3), such as controllable shock absorbers, provided to the front and the rear semi-active suspensions of a motorcycle are jointly controlled. In particular, the pitch velocity (Vp) of the suspended mass (Ms) is taken into account so as to jointly control the front and rear suspension systems of a motorcycle. The present invention allows the optimization of the global adherence of the motorcycle to the road surface and of the driving and the travelling comfort of the vehicle.
US08972104B2
An electrical control unit, or ECU, for a vehicle actuation system is described. The electrical control unit determines a current consumption of a current controlled actuator and comprises an input to receive an input signal from the current controlled actuator, an adder to add a bias signal to the input signal, an amplifier to generate an amplified signal by amplifying the signal output by the adder, a subtractor to subtract a signal representative of the bias signal from the amplified signal, and a determining unit to determine the current consumption from the signal output by the subtractor.
US08972102B2
A golf ball tracking system comprising at least one golf ball including an RFID device, wherein the RFID device contains golf ball information, such as a unique identifier. The system includes an RFID reader capable of reading the golf ball information from the RFID device. A positioning system, such as GPS, is associated with the reader and is capable of determining the location of the reader. A computer is interconnected with the RFID reader and the positioning system that is capable of receiving the golf ball information from the reader and location information from the positioning system. The computer is operative to record the golf ball information and associated location information. The system may further comprise a plurality of readers separated by at least one blocker that is made of metal screen.
US08972100B2
A system, method, and computer-readable medium to facilitate treatment of a damaged vehicle by gathering crash information, estimating an extent of vehicle damage, and requesting transport of the damaged vehicle from the crash site to a treatment facility.
US08972092B2
In an apparatus for controlling an unmanned autonomous operating vehicle having an electric motor supplied with power from a battery for operating an operating machine, and magnetic sensors for detecting intensity of a magnetic field of an area wire and controlled to run about in an operating area defined by the area wire through wheels driven by the prime movers to perform an operation using the operating machine and to return to a charging device installed on the area wire so as to charge the battery, there is provided with a turn-back portion formed by bending the area wire at an appropriate position and again bending the area wire to return in a same direction with a predetermined space so as to divide the operating area into a plurality of parts and vehicle running is controlled to be prohibited from going across the turn-back portion.
US08972088B2
A vehicle control system to control operation of a vehicle includes a powertrain system operable according to a plurality of operating modes that drive the vehicle. A sensor is mounted to the vehicle to detect a quality of air surrounding the vehicle. A vehicle control module is configured to select an operating mode of the powertrain system. The operating mode is selected to reduce at least one emission exhausted from the vehicle that contributes to a low air quality measure by the sensor.
US08972087B2
A vehicle control system includes: a controller that configured to obtain an index on the basis of a running condition of a vehicle and that configured to vary a running characteristic of the vehicle on the basis of the index, wherein the controller is configured to relatively delay a variation in the index in response to a variation in the running condition when the variation in the index decreases quickness of a behavior of the vehicle as compared with when the variation in the index increases the quickness of the behavior of the vehicle, and to correct the running characteristic on the basis of the index so that energy efficiency of a driving force source of the vehicle varies within a predetermined range depending on control over power output from the driving force source.
US08972076B2
A driving assistance apparatus that assists driving of a vehicle, includes: a vehicle speed sensor; a communication unit that obtains traffic light information relating to a change in a display condition of a traffic light disposed in an advancement direction of the vehicle; a position calculation unit that calculates relative position information between the vehicle and a traffic light location where the traffic light is disposed; and a passage assistance control unit. The passage assistance control unit detects an operating condition of the vehicle at an intersection location before the traffic light, calculates a corrected vehicle speed on the basis of the operating condition and a current vehicle speed, and determines whether or not the vehicle is permitted to pass through the traffic light location on the basis of the corrected vehicle speed, the relative position information between the vehicle and the traffic light location, and the traffic light information.
US08972065B2
The current application is directed to an intelligent control system that includes intelligent thermostats and remote servers that spread call-home events over time to avoid large peak computational and communications loads on intelligent-control-system servers. The spreading of call-home vents over time is effected by use of call-home splay values pseudorandomly generated for intelligent thermostats.
US08972059B2
In an automatic operation system including: a positioning robot having a holding tool and an inertial sensor at a tip end portion of an arm thereof; a working robot having an operation tool at a tip end portion of an arm thereof; and a robot control device, a positioning correcting method of the present invention includes: conveying and positioning the holding tool, which holds a work, by the positioning robot at a positioning reference position of the holding tool corresponding to an operation position of the work; detecting a displacement amount of the holding tool from the positioning reference position by the robot control device based on an inertial force of the inertial sensor when the working robot carries out a predetermined operation with respect to the work; and correcting based on the detected displacement amount the positioning reference position of the holding tool to a position of the holding tool before the holding tool is displaced.
US08972057B1
A method of automatic path planning for at least one robot within a confined configuration space, the robot including an arm having a plurality of joints and an end effector coupled to the arm. The method includes entering a plurality of process points into a computer, each process point being a location wherein the arm is to be positioned to perform a task, calculating one or more inverse kinematic solutions for each process point, clustering the inverse kinematic solutions into a set of clusters, and generating collision free paths between the clusters in the confined configuration space.
US08972055B1
Methods and systems for selecting a velocity profile for controlling a robotic device are provided. An example method includes receiving via an interface a selection of a robotic device to control, and receiving via the interface a request to modify a velocity profile of the robotic device. The velocity profile may include information associated with changes in velocity of the robotic device over time. The method may further include receiving a selected velocity profile, receiving an input via the interface, and determining a velocity command based on the selected velocity profile and the input. In this manner, changes in velocity of the robotic device may be filtered according to a velocity profile selected via the interface.
US08972049B2
A method for rapidly and accurately dispensing a predetermined number of discrete items, the method comprising: operating a conveyor to transport multiple items towards an imaging device, wherein the items are arranged in a single layer and at least some of the items are transported in parallel; operating the imaging device to continuously capture images of an area immediately below an end of the conveyor, so that items falling off the conveyor are recorded in the images while in trajectory; processing the images in real time, to continuously determine the number of falling items; stopping the conveyor before the number of falling items has reached the predetermined number, while continuing to determine the number of falling items until items cease to fall off the conveyor innertially; and automatically dispensing an additional amount of items, to complete the predetermined number of items.
US08972045B1
In an infrastructure that uses a mobile order fulfillment system, robotic drive units may be dispatched and instructed to bring inventory holders to a workstation where at least one of the inventory holders is packed and prepared for shipment. The robotic drive units are then instructed to move the prepared inventory holder to a transport vehicle such as a truck. Fiducial marks may be removably placed within the transport vehicle to aid navigation of the robotic drive units. At a destination facility, additional robotic drive units may be instructed to move the inventory holders from the truck and place the inventory holders at appropriate storage locations.
US08972040B2
An optimum cutting feed rate of a machine tool is calculated at the outset and a tool path as well as the optimum cutting feed rate calculated is directly output to a driving unit of the machine tool. A relative movement between the work and a tool is made to occur along the tool path at the optimum cutting feed rate for each part of the tool path. To this end, a control system includes a CL data generating unit 32, a CL data memory 33, a driving capability data memory 34, a cutting feed rate data generation unit 35, a cutting feed rate data memory 36, and a controller 42.
US08972036B2
Only a wafer for QC check may be transferred and a production wafer may prevent from being transferred into an assigned process chamber whose QC check is not completed after a maintenance task, and the production wafer may be processed the assigned process chamber after the completion of the QC check. The wafer for QC check is transferred while inhibiting a transfer of the production wafer into the assigned process chamber, and the production wafer is transferred into each of the process chambers of the plurality except the assigned process chamber.
US08972023B2
Apparatus and methods for detecting lead migration through the use of measured artifactual data about the tissue in the vicinity of the lead.
US08972013B2
An implantable medical system includes an implantable medical device (IMD) and an electrode coupleable to the IMD. The electrode is operative to deliver a first electrical signal from the IMD to a neural structure. The system includes a sensor coupleable to the IMD. The sensor is operative to sense a physiological parameter. The physiological parameter may include at least one of a neurotransmitter parameter, a neurotransmitter breakdown product parameter, a neuropeptide parameter, a norepinephrine parameter, a glucocorticoid (GC) parameter, a neuromodulator parameter, a neuromodulator breakdown product parameter, an amino acid parameter, and a hormone parameter. The IMD includes a controller operative to change a parameter of the first electrical signal based upon at least one sensed physiological parameter to generate a second electrical signal and to apply the second electrical signal to the neural structure.
US08972010B2
The present invention generally relates to implantable medical devices, such as pacemakers, and, in particular, to a method and an implantable medical device capable of detecting the presence of noise caused by external noise sources. Voltages and/or impedances are measured over one or several electrode configurations. Based on the measured voltages and/or impedances, noise parameters are calculated, which are compared with reference values to detect the presence of noise. In another aspect of the invention, at least two different electrode configurations with different noise pick-up areas are used in the measurement. Relations between the noise parameters of the at least two vectors are calculated and compared with reference relations to detect the presence of noise.
US08971994B2
A method for displaying a position of a medical device, such as a catheter, during insertion thereof into a patient. In one example embodiment, the method includes obtaining a first set of detected position data relating to a location marker, such as a permanent magnet, then determining a possible first position thereof. A first confidence level relating to a match between the first set of detected position data and a first set of predicted position data is assigned. A determination is made whether the first confidence level meets or exceeds a first threshold. If the first confidence level meets or exceeds the first threshold, a determination is then made whether the first position of the location marker is within a first detection zone. If the first position of the location marker is within the first detection zone, the first position of the location marker is displayed.
US08971990B2
Nonlinear elastography systems and methods are provided. The elastography system includes a data acquisition module, such as an imaging device, and associated system control circuitry. The data acquisition module is configured to acquire various data, such as displacement and/or force data, from a material. A nonlinear transfer function is applied to the acquired data to generate information about the material's stiffness. In one implementation, a map representative of the material's stiffness is generated.
US08971985B2
What is disclosed is a system and method for estimating minute ventilation by analyzing distortions in reflections of structured illumination patterns captured in a video of a thoracic region of a subject of interest being monitored for respiratory function. Measurement readings can be acquired in a few seconds under a diverse set of lighting conditions and provide a non-contact approach to patient respiratory function that is particularly useful for infant care in an intensive care unit (ICU), sleep studies, and can aid in the early detection of sudden deterioration of physiological conditions due to detectable changes in chest volume. The systems and methods disclosed herein provide an effective tool for non-contact minute ventilation estimation and respiratory function analysis.
US08971981B2
Disclosed is an assembly for use with a portable therapeutic device. The assembly includes a mounting housing securable to skin of a patient, and a cannula subcutaneously insertable through a passageway provided within the housing. The cannula is configured to be inserted subsequent to securing of the housing to the skin of the patient.
US08971973B2
A device includes a device body comprising a user input interface for receiving user inputs, a member slidably engaged with the device body and slidable from a first position to a second position, and at least one processor configured, under the control of machine-readable code to detect incidences of user inputs via the user input interface, to detect the sliding of the member from the first position to the second position, and to be responsive to detecting a composite user input comprising a sliding of the member from the first position to the second position while a user input is incident via the user input interface to cause a first operation to be performed.
US08971972B2
Object of the invention is to provide a wireless communication terminal having power saving control function that does not affect performance during high-speed communication. The wireless communication terminal comprises a processor that has a power saving control function for reducing the operating clock under a predetermined condition; and a wireless communication unit capable of carrying out communication at a high or low data communication rate wherein, when communication is carried out at the high data communication rate such as HSDPA, the power saving control function of the processor is turned off and the switching of the operating clock to the low clock is prohibited.
US08971971B2
A mobile wireless communications device may include a portable device housing, wireless communications circuitry carried by the portable device housing, and a self-contained rechargeable battery pack carried by the portable housing for powering the wireless communications circuitry. The self-contained rechargeable battery pack may include a battery casing, at least one internal battery cell carried within the battery casing, internal battery circuitry carried within the battery casing, and at least one internal filter element carried within the battery casing and coupled to the internal battery circuitry.
US08971968B2
A method includes determining by a sensor of a mobile device that a first ambient sound level represents a quiet context for the mobile device, providing a audio signal to a speaker of the mobile device in response to determining that the first ambient sound level represents a quiet context, determining, by the sensor, that a second ambient sound level represents a first noisy context for the mobile device, wherein the second ambient sound level is louder than the first ambient sound level, modifying the audio signal into a beam forming audio signal in response to determining that the second ambient sound level represents the first noisy context, and providing the beam forming audio signal to the speaker.
US08971958B2
A portable personal medical device, e.g., a wearable insulin pump, is provided with a web server and is controllable over a network by a browser equipped client, thereby enabling comprehensive and comfortable control, operation and/or configuration of the device.
US08971955B2
Certain embodiments of the present disclosure provide a method for communicating by a multi-mode mobile station (MS) with first and second networks via first and second radio access technologies (RATs). The method generally includes measuring a time offset between frames of the first RAT and frames of the second RAT while maintaining a connection with the first network via the first RAT, sending a request to a base station of the first network to establish scan periods during which the MS may switch to the second network to monitor for paging messages, and switching to the second network to monitor for paging messages during a scan period without terminating the connection with the first network. The first RAT may comprise, for example, WiMAX, while the second RAT may comprise, for example, CDMA.
US08971953B2
In a method for dialing phone numbers using a portable communication device, the device includes a keypad including numeric keys and an LED driver. Each of the numeric keys is equipped with a first color LED light and a second color LED light. The LED driver drives the first LED light under each of the numeric keys to emit a first color light. The LED driver turns off the first LED light under the numeric key and turns on the second LED light under the numeric key to emit a second color light according to an LED control signal. The LED driver further turns off the second LED light and turns on the first LED light to emit the first color light when the digit input from the keypad is in a digital group.
US08971952B2
A second radio base station (1B) receives, from a first radio base station (1A), both interference information for each of a plurality of resource blocks and a traffic amount ratio. Then, the second radio base station (1B) corrects, based on the received traffic amount ratio, the also received interference information for each resource block. Further, the second radio base station (1B) controls, based on the interference information as corrected for each resource block, the transmission power of a radio terminal (2B).
US08971936B2
The present invention is directed to multimodal communications means for transmitting signals representing physiological, performance, and contextual information associated with a subject. In an exemplary embodiment, the multimodal communications means includes multiple radio subsystems (or modes) that enable connection to an external monitoring device to be acquired in a wide range of settings where a single radio mode would be ineffective. Additionally, combining the multimodal communications means of the invention with real-time data-processing allows the communications functionality to be engaged only when data determined to be relevant to the user is identified.
US08971925B2
A method for processing a product identifying code. The product identifying code that identifies a product is received from a wireless device. A location of the wireless device is received. An item that comprises information pertaining to the product is obtained. The obtained item is transmitted to the wireless device. The information pertaining to the product includes a name of each establishment of a plurality of establishments from which the product is available and informational selected from the group consisting of a contact address for each establishment, driving instructions to each establishment, a price of the product at each establishment, a geocoded location of one establishment of the plurality of establishments relative to the location of the wireless device, descriptive information specific to the product, and combinations thereof.
US08971907B2
A method in a user equipment for arranging a Physical Uplink Control Channel, PUCCH, transmission to a network node in a telecommunications system is provided. The PUCCH transmission comprises control information for downlink transmissions. The control information is Reed-Müller, RM, encoded using at least two RM codewords and transmitted using Alamouti encoded transmit diversity over at least two antenna ports. The control information comprises a first bit sequence and a second bit sequence. The user equipment arranges the first bit sequence and the second bit sequence, such that at least two bits from the first bit sequence and second bit sequence, that subsequently are Alamouti encoded together, originates from the same RM codeword of the at least two RM codewords. This is performed in order to enable control information encoded using one RM codeword to be processed independently from control information encoded using another RM codeword at the network node.
US08971906B2
A method, an apparatus, and a computer program product for wireless communication are provided. The apparatus is a first BS. The apparatus determines a first channel between a second BS and a first UE served by a third BS, determines a second channel between the first base station and the first UE, and determines a first direction vector to be used by the second base station for sending a data transmission. The apparatus transmits a set of resource blocks to a second UE served by the first base station with a second direction vector determined based on the first channel, the second channel, and the first direction vector to be used by the second base station.
US08971905B2
The invention discloses a method for performing assignment for a call. The method includes: if a user initiates a call, assigning a target bearer for the call and obtaining an identifier of the target bearer; determining at least one target base station according to the identifier of the target bearer and an identifier of a base station accessed by the user, wherein the coverage of the target bearer of the at least one target base station overlaps with the coverage of a bearer, on which the call is initiated, of the base station accessed by the user, and obtaining identifier of the at least one target base station; and sending the identifier of the target bearer and the identifier of the at least one target base station to the user. The invention is capable of improving the success rate of the assignment.
US08971899B2
The invention relates to a method for determining a path between a first radio station and an access point of a radio communications system, whereby the radio communications system comprises additional radio stations. A frequency band subdivided into a number of subbands is used in order to communicate between, the radio stations. At least one subband for communicating is assigned to each radio station. The path extends over one or more of the additional radio stations so that information between the first radio station and the access point can be transmitted over the path. The path is at least partially determined by a radio installation apparatus on request of the first radio station. The radio installation additionally transmits, to at least a portion of the radio stations of the path, respective path identification information, subband information and radio station identification information.
US08971897B2
A centralized-control base station connected to a first transceiving unit and a second transceiving unit includes a first signal quality obtaining unit configured to obtain both uplink signal quality from a mobile station to the first transceiving unit and downlink signal quality from the first transceiving unit to the mobile station; a second signal quality obtaining unit configured to obtain both uplink signal quality from the mobile station to the second transceiving unit and downlink signal quality from the second transceiving unit to the mobile station; and a control unit configured to allow downlink data to be transmitted from the first transceiving unit, downlink feedback information to be received by the second transceiving unit, uplink data to be received by the second transceiving unit, and uplink feedback information to be transmitted from the first transceiving unit, when the downlink signal quality from the first transceiving unit to the mobile station is better than the downlink signal quality from the second transceiving unit to the mobile station and the uplink signal quality from the mobile station to the second transceiving unit is better than the uplink signal quality from the mobile station to the first transceiving unit.
US08971887B2
Examples of the invention allow a content service provider to utilize one or more overlapping wireless networks in a given area to efficiently and cost effectively deliver content and services to a mobile device contained within a terminal. Examples of the invention analyze the characteristics of each wireless network such as cost, latency, security, and bandwidth, the terminal capabilities, and the requested service to determine the most efficient manner to deliver services over one or more wireless networks in a given area. In addition, the service provider re-analyzes the efficiency of service delivery when the mobile device enters a new mobile area. Therefore, sustaining efficient content and service download throughout delivery.
US08971880B2
It is described a method of sending an association level indication to neighboring base stations by a serving base station to indicate to the neighbor base station to report a particular ranging parameter set corresponding to the association level indication for a user equipment requesting scanning of neighbor base stations. According to an embodiment, the ranging parameters of the ranging parameter set are provided to the user equipment in single message or are provided in two or more messages, e.g. in the case of network assisted association reporting.
US08971879B2
A mobile communication method comprises a step in which a first radio base station, finds another radio base station provided in a particular user network when provided in the particular user network; a step in which the first radio base station and the other radio base station found thereby constitutes a group; a step in which a number of mobile stations that can be connected to the group at the same time is decided; and a step in which the number of mobile stations connected at the same time to the first radio base station and other radio base station belonging to the group is restricted based on the decided number of mobile stations that can be connected at the same time.
US08971874B2
Test systems for characterizing devices under test (DUTs) are provided. A test system for testing a DUT in a shunt configuration may include a signal generator and a matching network that is coupled between the signal generator and the DUT and that is optimized to apply desired voltage/current stress to the DUT with reduced source power. The matching network may be configured to provide matching and desired stress levels at two or more frequency bands. In another suitable embodiment, a test system for testing a DUT in a series configuration may include a signal generator, an input matching network coupled between the DUT and a first terminal of the DUT, and an output matching network coupled between the DUT and a second terminal of the DUT. The input and output matching network may be optimized to apply desired voltage/current stress to the DUT with reduced source power.
US08971872B2
An alternative access point for M2ME's is provided by introducing an extended M2ME, a M2ME/Femto, which is able to operate as a Femto cell in addition to operating as an M2ME is provided. The M2ME/Femto is configured to recognize a connectivity disruption in a conventional wireless connection to a home operator and to respond to such a disruption by providing for an alternative, fixed connection between the M2ME/Femto and the home operator. A M2ME configured to access the M2ME/Femto when required due to a connectivity disruption and a node of a home operator configured to set up an alternative fixed connection between the M2ME/Femto and the node when required due to a connectivity disruption at the wireless connection is also provided.
US08971858B2
A method of transmitting contact information to an approved mobile communication device includes receiving an input representative of desired contact information located on a first web page and an input representative of the identity of a desired mobile communication device. The method also includes saving information representative of the desired contact information in a contact information database. The method also includes determining whether the desired mobile communication device is an approved device and transmitting to the desired mobile communication device information representative of a notification to send the information representative of the desired contact information. The method also includes receiving an input from the desired mobile communication device information representative of an acceptance to receive the information representative of the desired contact information, and transmitting to the desired mobile communication device information representative of the desired contact information.
US08971852B2
An apparatus for performing communication by a dual network terminal is disclosed. The dual network terminal is a dual network and dual standby terminal, and the apparatus includes a 3G wireless communication subsystem, a 2G wireless communication subsystem and an identity identification module. The 2G wireless communication subsystem is connected with the identity identification module and the 3G wireless communication subsystem respectively, the 3G wireless communication subsystem is connected with the 2G wireless communication subsystem, and the 3G wireless communication subsystem and the 2G wireless communication subsystem include one virtual identity identification card administration module respectively. A method for performing communication by a dual network terminal is further disclosed, including: the 2G wireless communication subsystem reading information in the identity identification card in the identity identification module, storing the information in its own first virtual identity identification card administration module, and communicating with the 2G network by using the information.
US08971851B2
Methods, systems, and computer programs for performing key agreement operations in a communication system are described. In some aspects, a wireless network operator receives a mobile device identifier and accesses a secret key associated with the mobile device. A message authentication code function is evaluated based on the secret key to produce an output value. A session key and a challenge value are obtained based on the output value. In some aspects, a mobile device accesses a secret key in response to receiving the challenge value from the wireless network operator. A message authentication code function is evaluated based on the secret key to produce an output value. A response value and a session key are obtained based on the output value. The response value is transmitted to the wireless network operator.
US08971844B2
A charging monitoring method includes triggering a quota monitoring procedure for a consumption amount of an international roaming subscriber when it is determined that a service request is specific to the international roaming subscriber. The quota monitoring procedure is performed in a charging network element of an intelligent network system. The method also includes monitoring the consumption amount of the international roaming subscriber through the quota monitoring procedure to determine whether the consumption amount reaches a preset quota. If the consumption amount reaches the preset quota, the method includes rejecting the service request according to a rejection instruction returned by the charging network element. If the consumption amount does not reach the preset quota, the method includes approving the service request according to an approval instruction returned by the charging network element.
US08971838B2
A method of performing a switching procedure of an eCall device from a first state of activity to a second state of activity whereby details of the switching procedure are preferably stored in a report file. The report file is preferably stored in a storage unit which can be part of a database. Furthermore, the present invention relates to an eCall device being adapted for performing a switching procedure from a first state of activity to a second state of activity and relates to a backend unit being adapted for supporting a switching procedure of an eCall device from a first state of activity to a second state of activity. Beyond the present invention relates to an eCall system being adapted for performing a switching procedure of an eCall device from a first state of activity to a second state of activity.
US08971836B2
Disclosed is a method of adjusting the receive frequency of a radio frequency (RF) receiver die (4), the RF receiver die (4) comprising a mixer (8) with an associated local oscillator (10) and a first low-noise amplifier (6) arranged to operate over a first frequency range, the method comprising affixing a second low-noise amplifier (40) arranged to operate over a second frequency range to the RF receiver die (4).
US08971831B2
The present disclosure relates to a front-end system for a radio device, the front-end system comprising a low-noise amplifier (LNA), arranged for receiving a radio frequency input signal (RFIN) and arranged for outputting an amplified radio frequency signal (RFOUT), wherein the low-noise amplifier comprises a first differential amplifier, and a mixer (MIX), arranged for down-converting the amplified radio signal (RFOUT) provided by the low-noise amplifier (LNA) to a baseband signal (BB), by multiplying the amplified radio signal (RFOUT) with a local oscillator (LO) frequency tone, said low-noise amplifier (LNA) and said mixer (MIX) being inductively coupled.
US08971824B2
A radio frequency unit and an integrated antenna are provided. The radio frequency unit includes a duplexer, a power amplifier circuit board, and a transceiver circuit board. The duplexer connects to the power amplifier circuit board and the transceiver circuit board. The power amplifier circuit board connects to the transceiver circuit board. The power amplifier circuit board and the transceiver circuit board are respectively located at two end portions of the duplexer. The power amplifier circuit board and the transceiver circuit board are projected onto the same plane along a direction being vertical to the power amplifier circuit board with their projections on the same plane non-overlapped each other.
US08971821B2
A test system may include a wireless test chamber with metal walls lined with pyramidal absorbers. A trapdoor may be provided in a wall opening to accommodate a robotic arm. The robotic arm may have grippers that grip a device under test or a support structure that is supporting a device under test. The robotic arm may move the device under test to a docking station for automatic battery charging during testing. When it is desired to perform wireless tests on a device under test, the robotic arm may move the device under test through the trapdoor into an interior portion of the test chamber. A turntable and movable test antenna may be used to rotate the device under test while varying angular orientations between test antenna and device under test. Emitted radiation levels can be measured using a liquid filled phantom and test probe on a robotic arm.
US08971818B2
A method for partitioning a communications network includes selecting, by a controller, a starting communications controller for a first region in the communications network according to an interference level. The method also includes including, by the controller, a first neighboring communications controller in the first region if an average inter-cell interference level of the starting communications controller and the first neighboring communications controller exceeds a first threshold and closing the first region if the average inter-cell interference level of the starting communications controller and the first neighboring communications controller fails to exceed the first threshold. The method further includes storing information about the first region in a memory.
US08971817B2
To appropriately effect a coordination with a plurality of communication parties that perform a millimeter wave communication.Transmission and reception beams of the respective terminal stations are directed to an access point, a valid communication link based on the second communication method is utilized as a link for a high speed data transmission between the access point and the respective terminal stations. Of course, the communication link based on the first communication method between the access point and the respective terminal stations is valid and is utilized as a link for the coordination. As the transmission and reception beams are not directed between the terminal stations, the communication link based on the second communication method is invalid, but the valid communication link based on the first communication method can be utilized as the link for the coordination.
US08971807B2
The present invention relates to a system and method for improving directed connectable advertising in a low energy Bluetooth device. The host on the Bluetooth device configures an advertisement interval length, an advertisement window length, and a number of attempts. The advertisement window length is equal to or shorter than the advertisement interval length, which may be less than 1.28 seconds. Next, advertising packets are transmitted for the length of the advertising window on three advertising channels. Packets are transmitted consecutively, with no more than a 3.75 millisecond delay between packets, until the end of the advertisements window. After transmitting, a link layer of the Bluetooth device decrements the number of attempts. Once all attempts have been exhausted, the advertisements end. Otherwise, the link layer waits for the end of the advertisement interval. The link layer generates a pseudorandom delay between 0 and 10 milliseconds, and waits for this time to pass before initiating another advertisement interval with transmission during the advertisement window. If a connection is made at any point, the advertisement may be ended.
US08971803B2
A wireless media player and a related system and methodology are disclosed. One aspect of the wireless media player system pertains to a virtual connector system, apparatus, and method for the automatic establishment of wireless connectivity with other electronic devices. In one embodiment, the media player device employs the use of integrated Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology to exchange communication settings, media capability, and other parameters with an external device that also has integrated RFID technology. The automatic exchange of settings and other information via a proximity-based RFID data exchange allows a media player to quickly establish a secure communication link with another device via a commonly supported wireless protocol such as Ultra Wideband (UWB) or Bluetooth. Another aspect of the media player system pertains to a method of using the captured media capability of the connecting device to customize certain menu options and software parameters in the media player.
US08971797B2
The subject matter disclosed herein relates to a system and method for acquiring signal received from satellite vehicles (SVs) in a satellite navigation system. In one example, although claimed subject matter is not so limited, information processed in acquiring a signal from a first SV may be used in acquiring a signal from a second SV.
US08971794B2
In some examples, a method of transmitting data in a radio communication system is described. The method can include dividing data intended for a communication receive node into a high priority code stream and a low priority code stream. The method can also include transmitting the high priority code stream to the communication receive node and a relay node. The method can also include transmitting the low priority code stream to the communication receive node. The relay node may be configured to receive, amplify and forward the high priority code stream to the communication receive node. The communication receive node may be configured to receive the high priority code stream substantially during first time intervals and may be further configured to receive both the low priority code stream and the amplified high priority code stream substantially during second time intervals interleaved with the first time intervals.
US08971783B2
A fixing device includes an irradiation section that irradiates a recording medium with light, the recording medium having thereon an image formed by an image forming material to be fixed by absorbing light and being transported along a transporting path, and a preventing member that is provided with a first hole that allows the light to pass therethrough, and prevents the image forming material irradiated with the light from adhering to the irradiation section.
US08971782B2
Fixing device, image forming apparatus incorporating same, and method for heating fixing rotary body
A fixing device includes an induction heater constructed of an exciting coil, a first pair of degaussing coils, and a second pair of degaussing coils. A controller turns off the exciting coil while the controller turns on one of the first pair of degaussing coils and the second pair of degaussing coils and at the same time turns off the other one of the first pair of degaussing coils and the second pair of degaussing coils, and then turns on the exciting coil for an extra time period corresponding to reserved power not supplied to the exciting coil while the exciting coil is turned off.
US08971767B2
A charge applying member includes a conductive roller and a shaft. The conductive roller includes a first region in contact with a member to be charged and facing an image forming region of the member to be charged and a second region next to a longitudinal end of the first region and facing a region of the member to be charged outside the image forming region and is configured to apply a charge to the member to be charged. The shaft formed of a metallic material inserted into the conductive roller and configured to be given a voltage from a power supply. A region plated with a metal having a lower ionization tendency than the shaft is formed as a plated region on a surface portion of the shaft corresponding to the first and second regions and a non-plated region is formed on a surface portion of the shaft corresponding to the second region.
US08971760B2
A process cartridge is detachably mountable to a main assembly of an electrophotographic image forming apparatus. The cartridge includes an electrophotographic photosensitive drum, a developing roller, a drum unit containing the drum, a developing unit containing the roller and being movable so the roller contacts and is spaced from the drum, and a first force receiver receiving a force from a main-assembly first force applier by movement of a door from open to closed positions when mounting the cartridge and a second force receiver movable from a stand-by position by movement of the first force receiver by a force received from the first force applier. The second force receiver takes a projected position receiving a force from the second force applier to move the developing unit so the roller moves out of contact with the drum, the projected position being higher than the stand-by position.
US08971751B2
A piezoelectric transducer driver configured to drive a piezoelectric transducer for converting an inputted alternating-current voltage, includes: a drive circuit configured to generate the alternating-current voltage to be inputted into the piezoelectric transducer; a frequency controller configured to control a frequency of the alternating-current voltage as a drive frequency to be applied to the piezoelectric transducer; and a pulse generation circuit configured to generate a drive pulse having a switching frequency corresponding to the drive frequency, and to output the drive pulse to the drive circuit. The drive circuit includes a switching element configured to generate the alternating-current voltage by executing a switching operation corresponding to a pulse width of the drive pulse, and the pulse generation circuit changes the pulse width depending on the switching frequency.
US08971749B2
An optical sensor is disclosed. The optical sensor includes an irradiating system which irradiates a linearly polarized light; a first photodetecting system including a first photodetector which is arranged on an optical path of a light which is specularly reflected from a subject; a second photodetecting system including an optical element which is arranged on an optical path of a light which is diffuse reflected from the subject within an incident face in the subject and which separates a linearly polarized component in a second polarizing direction which is orthogonal to a first polarizing direction and a second photodetector which receives a light separated by the optical element, wherein an angle of taking in the light in the first photodetector and an angle of taking in the light in the second photodetector are mutually different.
US08971743B2
An image forming apparatus including a latent image bearing member, a charger, a latent image forming device, a developing device, and a transfer device is provided. The transfer device is adapted to transfer a toner image formed on the latent image bearing member onto an intermediate transfer member or a recording medium by action of a transfer elected field in a transfer position where the latent image bearing member faces the transfer device. When a non-charged portion of the latent image bearing member that has not been charged to a predetermined potential by the charger passes through the transfer position, a strength of the transfer electric field is lowered than that in transferring the toner image.
US08971742B2
Provided is an image forming apparatus which enables control to change a longitudinal magnification of an image transferred on a sheet in a sheet conveyance direction by changing a rotation speed of a second transfer section while prohibiting misalignment of transfer without requiring a changing time of the longitudinal magnification which causes the decreasing of productivity.
US08971737B2
An image forming apparatus includes an image bearing member, a first conductive member, a bias application device, and a control portion, and performs image formation on a surface of the image bearing member while making the image bearing member rotate. The image forming apparatus is capable of executing a heating-up mode in which, at the time of non-image formation, in a state where the image bearing member is made to rotate at a velocity lower than that used at the time of image formation, an alternating current bias having a frequency higher than that used at the time of image formation and a peak-to-peak value twice or more as large as a discharge start voltage between the first conductive member and the image bearing member is applied to the first conductive member to cause a surface of the image bearing member to be heated up.
US08971736B2
A collection device including: an accommodation part configured to accommodate therein collected adhering substance; and a detection part configured to detect an amount of the adhering substance in the accommodation part and including, a moving member configured to move from a first position to a second position, the accommodation part being capable of accommodating therein the adhering substance when the moving member is arranged at the first position and being full of the adhering substance when the moving member is in the second position, and a restraining member configured to restrain the moving member from moving from the first position to the second position when the moving member is arranged at the first position, and restrain the moving member from moving from the second position to the first position when the moving member is arranged at the second position.
US08971723B2
A method is provided for detecting the skew between parallel light signals generated from a serial data stream. The method can be used with polarization multiplexed signal, as well as with wavelength division multiplexed signals, spatial division multiplexed signals, phase modulated signals, or intensity modulated signals. The method can be used with direct detection schemes as well as with coherent detection schemes. The method is provided with: imprinting dips between a fixed number of transmitted symbols of the parallel signals; detecting an electrical signal related to the dips for each parallel signal; and comparing the electrical signals in delay.
US08971717B1
An optical system has an optical emitter that transmits an optical signal through an optical fiber. An optical detector detects light from the fiber and provides an analog signal indicative of such light. A crosstalk cancellation element is configured to receive an electrical signal from the optical emitter and to adjust such signal in order to form a cancellation signal that models the optical and/or electrical crosstalk affecting the analog signal. The cancellation signal is subtracted from the analog signal thereby removing optical and/or electrical crosstalk from the analog signal.
US08971711B2
The present invention discloses a method for assigning and processing a label in an optical network. The method includes: learning that a label switched path is required to be established in an optical network; generating a label, in which the label is used for indicating that a first optical channel data unit is multiplexed to a second optical channel data unit; the label includes a tributary slot type indication field that is used for indicating a tributary slot type of the second optical channel data unit, and the label further includes a tributary slot assignment indication field that is used for indicating a tributary slot occupied in the second optical channel data unit into which the first optical channel data unit is multiplexed; and sending the label to a node on the label switched path by a signaling message of GMPLS.
US08971696B2
A rotational shake compensation calculation unit in an image capturing apparatus calculates rotational shake produced by apparatus rotation about an axis orthogonal to an optical axis of an imaging optical system, thereby calculating a compensation amount for image shake. A translational shake compensation calculation unit calculates a compensation amount for image shake resulting from translational shake produced in a travel direction of the apparatus along a direction orthogonal to an optical axis of the optical system. An estimating device estimates translational shake using a vibration model. A translational shake compensation amount calculation unit calculates a translation shake compensation amount based on the estimation amount and varies the translation shake compensation amount in response to the compensation range of the shake compensation unit of the focal distance of the optical system. The compensation amounts for translational shake and rotational shakes are combined, thereby controlling shake compensation unit driving.
US08971695B2
A heater is provided with a heater core having a source of thermal energy in a heat exchange relationship with a heat exchanger. A fan moves air through the heater core from an air inlet to an air outlet. The heater core is thermally insulated by an air jacket from an exterior case.
US08971692B2
An information processing device includes an API (Application Programming Interface) only for reading/writing of an offset value, which is data providing disparity to a graphics image to generate an image for the left eye and an image for the right eye from the original image, arranged to store the offset value in an internal storage region that is a storage region inside of a reproducer configured to reproduce images, and to read out the offset value stored in the internal storage region.
US08971683B2
A multimode optical fiber includes: (i) a graded index glass core having a radius R1 in the range of 20 microns to 50 microns, a maximum relative refractive index Δ1MAX in the range between 0.5% and 3%; a graded index having a profile with (a) by an alpha (α) parameter wherein 1.9≦α≦2.2, and (b) a deviation from the alpha profile in at least one region of the core, such that the difference in the refractive index delta of the core from that determined by the core alpha value, at the radius R1 is less than 0.001, and (ii) a cladding surrounding and in contact with the core, wherein the fiber has an bandwidth greater than 5000 MHz-km at a wavelength λ where λ≧800 nm.
US08971679B2
An apparatus for passive alignment of optical devices comprises a substrate including a trench in a top surface thereof, where the trench has a first end positioned at an edge of the substrate and a second end positioned at an interior region of the substrate, and a lens disposed on the top surface of the substrate adjacent to the second end of the trench. The apparatus further includes a top holder having a longitudinal indentation in a bottom surface thereof for mounting an optical fiber. The longitudinal indentation is sized to fit a top portion of the optical fiber such that a bottom portion of the optical fiber extends below the bottom surface of the top holder when the optical fiber is mounted therein. One or both of the substrate and the top holder include one or more spacer features configured for three-dimensional (3D) alignment of the lens with the optical fiber when the top holder is brought into contact with the substrate.
US08971676B1
A chip package includes an optical integrated circuit (such as a hybrid integrated circuit) and an integrated circuit that are adjacent to each other on the same side of a substrate in the chip package. The integrated circuit includes electrical circuits, such as memory or a processor, and the optical integrated circuit communicates optical signals with very high bandwidth. In addition, an input/output (I/O) integrated circuit is coupled to the optical integrated circuit between the substrate and the optical integrated circuit. This I/O integrated circuit includes high-speed I/O circuits and energy-efficient driver and receiver circuits and communicates with optical devices on the optical integrated circuit. By integrating the optical integrated circuit, the integrated circuit and the I/O integrated circuit in close proximity, the chip package may facilitate improved performance compared to chip packages with electrical interconnects.
US08971664B2
A method for generating a super-resolution image from at least two input images, represented by digital samples. The super-resolution image having a final resolution higher than an initial resolution of one of at least two input images. The method including obtaining, for each input image of the at least two input images, a distortion model to register the input image on a reference grid at the final resolution. The method including warping each input image into a warped image according to the distortion model. Computing warped coordinates respectively for digital samples of the input image. Wherein, the contribution of each digital sample of the input image to the warped image is weighted. The weight applied to each digital sample depending on the warped coordinates of the digital sample. Combining the warped images in order to generate a combined warped image having the final resolution.
US08971645B1
A system, apparatus, and method for video categorization using heterogeneous signals are disclosed. One aspect of the disclosed embodiments is a method for categorizing a plurality of video streams. The method includes determining a plurality of features of at least some of the plurality of video streams, determining a category of a first video stream of the plurality of video stream based on its plurality of features, identifying, using a processor, a relationship between the first video stream and a second video stream of the plurality of videos, the relationship having an associated weight, and updating, using the processor, the category of the first video stream based on a first message determined using the associated weight.
US08971640B1
Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for graphical overlay object translation. One of the methods includes receiving a first plurality of first feature points, each first feature point being associated with a plurality of feature descriptors and a respective location on the first digital image. The method includes receiving a second plurality of second feature points, each second feature point being associated with a plurality of feature descriptors and a respective location on the second digital image. The method includes determining the translation offset for the second digital image from the first digital image by matching locations of the first feature points with locations of the second feature points without regard to the feature descriptors.
US08971639B2
Examples disclosed herein relate to creating an image collage in a semantic theme based shape. For example, a processor may determine a semantic theme associated with an image collection, select a shape associated with the semantic theme, and create a collage of at least a subset of the image collection in the selected shape. The processor may output the created collage.
US08971636B2
Disclosed is an image creating device including a first obtaining unit which obtains an image including a face, a first extraction unit which extracts a face component image relating to main components of the face in the image and a direction of the face, a second obtaining unit which obtains a face contour image associated to the face in the image and a second extraction unit which extracts a direction of a face contour in the face contour image. The image creating device further includes a converting unit which converts at least one of the face component image and the face contour image based on the both directions of the face and the face contour and a creating unit which creates a portrait image by using at least one of the face component image and the face contour image being converted by the converting unit.
US08971633B2
An apparatus, a content retrieval method and a program facilitate recognizing content details of a moving image by displaying a retrieval result for each of a plurality of images. A metadata extracting unit extracts metadata of a representative image from content supplied from a content input unit and stores the metadata in a metadata database. An image feature quantity extracting unit extracts image feature quantity from content and stores it in an image feature quantity database while extracting image feature quantity from a retrieval image. A retrieving unit compares the image feature quantity of the retrieval image with the image feature quantity stored in the image feature quantity database and specifies a still image which is similar to the retrieval image. An output unit reads metadata of the content, generates display data necessary for performing timeline displaying, and generates display data for displaying a retrieval result on a timeline.
US08971626B1
Systems, articles of manufacture, and methods for generating an equalized image using properties of the two-dimensional Weibull distribution.
US08971625B2
According to various embodiments, a dolly zoom effect is generated using light field image data. The dolly zoom effect simulates an in-camera technique wherein a camera moves toward or away from the subject in such a way that the subject is kept at the same size throughout the effect. The effect causes the relative size of foreground background elements to change while foreground elements such as the subject remain the same size. By varying a parameter while projecting the light field image, the size of each object in the projection image scales depending on its relative depth as compared with the depth of the target subject, thus simulating the dolly zoom effect without any need to physically move the camera.
US08971619B2
A method and device for extracting color features, relating to the field of image processing includes converting an original image into sub-images corresponding to channels in a color space, dividing the sub-images into a plurality of cells with identical size, and calculating the color histograms of each of the plurality of cells. A cell and neighboring cells thereof are defined as the effective scope of the cell, and a feature vector of the cell is determined according to a degree of similarity of the color histograms of every two neighboring cells in the effective scope. The feature vectors of the cells in the sub-images are concatenated to obtain feature vectors of the sub-images, and a feature vector of the original image is obtained according to the feature vectors of the sub-images.
US08971615B2
An invention is disclosed for classifying a graphic—e.g. as text or non-text. In embodiments, machine learning is used to generate a solution for classifying graphics of a graphic based on providing the machine learning system a plurality of graphics that are already classified. The way to determine a classification is then used by a remote presentation session server to classify tiles of frames to be transmitted to a client in a remote presentation session. The server encodes the tiles based on their classifications and transmits the encoded tiles to the client.
US08971609B2
Embodiments herein exploit the optical sectioning capability of reflectance confocal microscopy to non-invasively survey the dermal-epidermal junction (DEJ), noting the irregularities associated with malignancy. Methods are provided to aid a clinician in diagnosing melanoma through pattern recognition to extract pertinent diagnostic information from large 3D confocal images. Identifying the combination of pagetoid melanocytes and DEJ breakdown increases the accuracy of detection. A method may be used to process a 3D confocal volume of images taken by a clinician of a suspicious lesion and deduce the depth location z of the first reflective surface (FRS) at each x-y position. This FRS is where the most superficial melanin resides. In this manner, the stratum corneum and epidermis are digitally stripped and no longer distract the clinician from the more diagnostically relevant pigmented cell network. The FRS is putatively either the DEJ for benign nevi or the depth of a pagetoid melanocyte at x,y above the DEJ. Thus by creating a 3D surface plot of the FRS for each lateral x,y point, the presence of pagetoid cells is identified by a discreet jump in the FRS above the level of the DEJ. The DEJ map may also be used to determine if breakdown of the DEJ is occurring.
US08971606B2
A method is provided for automatic identification of the contours of at least one portion of a predefined bone on the basis of a plurality of images representing parallel sections through a measurement volume including the portion of bone and which are obtained by a medical imaging technique. The method includes: a step of obtaining at least one shape of closed contour in at least one of the filtered images; a step of associating with each of the shapes a tag selected within a predefined bone-related nomenclature; a step of classifying the shapes so as to form at least one group of shapes delimiting a common volume isolated in space; a step of selecting the shapes of the group of target shapes.
US08971592B2
A method is described for determining eye location on a frontal face digital image in order to validate the frontal face as such and determine points of reference. The method consists of the following steps: obtain a frontal face digital image that is W pixels wide and H pixels high in grayscale, where the top left vertex of the digital image is considered to be the reference source; detect each eye, starting from a search subimage of the frontal face digital image, delivering approximate coordinates if both eyes have been detected, or an arbitrary predetermined value to indicate no eye detection; locate the iris of each eye, if both eyes have been detected, starting from the approximate coordinates, validating the frontal face digital image by delivering eye positions; or, validate the frontal face digital image if one or both eyes have not been detected by submitting a search subimage defined by an area resulting from centering a square of area L in the original image, where L=0.8×W, delivering coordinates for the eyes.
US08971591B2
A server determines a plurality of faceprints representing a plurality of users to be recognized at a client device. Each faceprint contains a number of reference images for a given user that are used to recognize facial images of the user detecting in media captured at the client device. The faceprints delivered to the client device are determined for the client device based on the users likely to be detected in images captured at the client device. The reference images with a given faceprint delivered to the client device are selected by the server based on their recognition value in identifying the users likely to be detected in images captured at the client device.
US08971588B2
A system and method for contactless handprint capture is disclosed that includes an image capture device to capture whole handprint images of a subject hand at each of a plurality of different focal distances, with the image capture device including an imaging camera and an electro-optics arrangement having a plurality of light modulating elements and polarization sensitive optical elements having differing optical path lengths based on polarization states. A control system is coupled to the image capture device to cause the device to capture the handprint images at each of the different focal distances, with each handprint image having a depth-of-focus that overlaps with a depth-of-focus of handprint images at adjacent focal distances such that redundant handprint image data is captured. The control system registers each handprint image with positional data and creates a composite handprint image from the handprint images captured at the different focal distances.
US08971582B2
An improved system and method for capturing and uploading pertinent information related to a motor vehicle that is accurate, simple to use, and may be implemented on a wide-array of mobile devices in a cost-effective manner. Methods are also disclosed for users of the mobile devices to send identifying information to a database, where the identifying information is compared to other motor vehicle identifying information located the database.
US08971580B2
An invention for identifying a spatial location of an event within video image data is provided. Disclosed are embodiments for generating trajectory data of a trajectory of an object for a plurality of pixel regions of an area of interest within video image data, the generating comprising: identifying one or more pixel regions from the plurality of pixel regions containing trajectory data; performing a multi-point neighborhood scan within the one or more pixel regions from the plurality of pixel regions containing trajectory data; and generating a transition chain code based on the multi-point neighborhood scan. Embodiments further generate a set of compressed spatial representations of the trajectory data of the trajectory of the object for an event based on the transition chain code, and generate a lossless contour code of the trajectory data of the trajectory of the object for the event based on the transition chain code.
US08971574B2
A method of performing facial recognition and tracking of an image captured by an electronic device includes: utilizing a camera of the electronic device to capture an image including at least a face; displaying the image on a display screen of the electronic device; determining a degree of orientation of the electronic device; and adjusting an orientation of scanning lines used to scan the image for performing face detection so that the orientation of the scanning lines corresponds to the orientation of the electronic device.
US08971573B2
A method for tracking a moving vehicle includes detecting the vehicle by acquiring a series of temporal related image frames. In an initial frame, the detecting includes locating a reference feature representative of a vehicle. The method further includes setting the reference feature as a full-size template. The method includes tracking the vehicle by searching a current frame for features matching the full-size template and at least one scaled template. The tracking further includes setting as an updated template one of the full-size and scaled templates closest matching the feature. The method includes repeating the tracking using the updated template for each next frame in the series.
US08971567B2
The present disclosures relates generally to digital watermarking and data hiding. One claim recites a smartphone comprising: a camera to capture video of a display that is rendering video, in which the video comprises a first watermark signal embedded in a first portion of the data, a second watermark signal embedded in a second portion of the data, and a third watermark signal embedded in a third portion of the data, in which at least two of the first watermark signal, second watermark signal and third watermark signal are inversely related to one another; electronic memory for buffering data representing captured video; one or more electronic processors programmed for: applying a first perspective distortion to the data representing the captured video to yield first perspective distorted video; and analyzing the first perspective distorted video to detect digital watermarking, in which a second perspective distortion is applied to the data representing the captured video to yield second perspective distorted video when the analyzing does not detect digital watermarking, and then performing analyzing the second perspective distorted video to detect digital watermarking. Of course, other claims are provided too.
US08971551B2
In some embodiments, a virtual bass generation method including steps of: performing harmonic transposition on low frequency components of an input audio signal (typically, bass frequency components expected to be inaudible during playback of the input audio signal using an expected speaker or speaker set) to generate transposed data indicative of harmonics (which are expected to be audible during playback, using the expected speaker(s), of an enhanced version of the input audio which includes the harmonics); generating an enhancement signal in response to the transposed data; and generating an enhanced audio signal by combining (e.g., mixing) the enhancement signal with the input audio signal. Other aspects are systems (e.g., programmed processors) and devices (e.g., devices having physically-limited bass reproduction capabilities, such as, for example, a notebook, tablet, mobile phone, or other device with small speakers) configured to perform any embodiment of the method.
US08971550B2
A signal processing device includes: a detection unit generating a digital detection signal corresponding to motion of a diaphragm of a speaker to output the digital detection signal; a gain adjustment unit generating a digital feedback signal by multiplying the outputted digital detection signal by again coefficient to output the generated digital feedback signal; a combining unit combining the outputted digital feedback signal with a digital audio signal; a storage unit storing plural gain coefficients; and a control unit performing control so that a given gain coefficient is selected from the plural gain coefficients and that the selected gain coefficient is used for the multiplication.
US08971544B2
A method for adjusting the performance of an electroacoustic transducer includes receiving, by gain adjustment circuit, a displacement signal corresponding to a relative motion between a magnetic structure of the electroacoustic transducer and a voice coil of the electroacoustic transducer. The method includes detecting, by the gain adjustment circuit, a displacement signal value of the displacement signal as one of meeting or exceeding a displacement signal threshold. The method includes modifying, by the gain adjustment circuit, a loop gain of an active noise reduction loop associated with the electroacoustic transducer when the displacement signal value of the displacement signal one of meets or exceeds the displacement signal threshold.
US08971535B2
A key manager provides a way to separate out the management of encryption keys and policies from application domains. The key manager may create cipher objects that may be used by the domains to perform encryption or decryption, without exposing the keys or encryption/decryption algorithms to the domains. A master key managed by the key manager may be used to encrypt and decrypt the domain keys that are stored under the control of the key manager. The key manager supports the rekeying of both the master key and the domain keys based on policy. Multiple versions of domain keys may be supported, allowing domains to access data encrypted with a previous version of a domain key after a rekeying.
US08971527B2
A device having a physical unclonable function includes an integrated circuit and a phase change memory embedded in the integrated circuit and including a plurality of cells, where the phase change memory is set in a manner that creates a phase variation over the plurality of cells, and where the phase variation comprises the physical unclonable function. In another embodiment, a device having a physical unclonable function includes a phase change memory embedded in the device and comprising a plurality of cells, where the phase change memory is set in a manner that creates a phase variation over the plurality of cells, and where the phase variation comprises the physical unclonable function, and a measurement circuit for extracting the physical unclonable function from the phase change memory.
US08971523B2
A method of echo cancellation, particularly for use in high definition applications, splits an input signal and reference signal into M single-sided sub-band. The subbanded signals are downsampled at a downsampling rate N, where N≦M, adaptively filtered, and recombined to produce an output signal. The sub-bands are preferably oversampled such that N
US08971517B2
Embodiments are disclosed herein for processing agent interactions. In a particular embodiment, a method provides receiving interaction data describing states and transitions between states within interaction sessions. The method further provides identifying business processes based on the interaction data and identifying instances of the business processes. The method further provides storing the instances and generating a model from the instances.
US08971516B1
Embodiments of the invention are directed to a system, method, or computer program product for providing a unified representation of all customer relationships with an entity. This representation focuses on customer products in arrears that are to be recovered. The invention presents automatic communication history tracking to aid in providing an overarching view of all customer relationships to a representative. This automatic communication history tracking monitors all communications, manual or automatic, incoming or outgoing. The tracking monitors the date, time, disposition, and the like of all customer communications. As such, the invention allows the representative to make decision and take appropriate actions immediately based on the entire relationship, including customer communication history. The invention takes this information and incorporates it with all of the customer's relationships and external factors to provide a holistic customer service experience for a customer with accounts in arrears.
US08971514B2
A system may include a failed route avoidance device. The failed route avoidance device may receive a notification that a record, of a call that failed to be extended to a contact agent in a customer network, is inserted into a failed call list; determine whether an identifier for the contact agent associated with the call is to be placed in an avoidance list based on a response code that a network element sends, to a call router that received the call, when the a connection from the call at the call router to the contact agent fails to be established; generate an avoidance record when the failed route avoidance device determines that the identifier for the contact agent is to be placed in the avoidance list; and send the avoidance record to a configuration device that inserts the avoidance record into the avoidance list.
US08971512B1
A method and apparatus are disclosed of transmitting live event notification information to a user device. One example method may include retrieving event user preference information from an event user database based on prestored user preferences. The method may also include transmitting an initial event notification message to an end user communication device based on the event user preference information to notify the end user of an upcoming event and receiving a response message from the end user communication device indicating a current availability of the end user. The user device may receive notification information via more than one communication channel and respond in a number of different ways.
US08971509B2
A system for processing phone calls comprising a network of servers in communication with telephonic communication devices, and software stored on and executable by the servers, the software being configured to receive inputs from a user, generate an ordered set of PBX Feature definitions executable by the server network in a distributed fashion to perform respective PBX Feature tasks related to telephone calls, and write the PBX Feature definitions to a distributed database system that is accessible by the servers. The ordered set may evaluate the current state of a phone call, and each PBX feature definition may perform a respective task responsive to the evaluated state. Each PBX Feature definition is executable to define and store a new state of the phone call. Each PBX Feature definition generated by the software is configured to be combined with any other PBX Feature definition generable by the software.
US08971503B1
A system and method are provided for operating a call order center, comprising: obtaining voice training data for a call center service representative (CCSR) for phrases associated with an ordering process or products associated with the call order center; receiving customer call for an order by the CCSR on a telephone; activating a voice recognition system that accesses the CCSR voice training data via a switch; during a telephone call, issuing commands and providing data by the CCSR associated with the order to the voice recognition system that are translated and entered into an ordering system by the voice recognition system; and deactivating the voice recognition system via the switch. A role can be assigned to or deassigned from an employee based on their location relative to a particular location point within a work area.
US08971501B2
A system and method assists an emergency medical dispatcher in responding to emergency calls by generating a determinant level code. A computer implemented method to determine Code Hierarchy Bias generates a determinant level sub-code that can be stored and analyzed with the determinant level code to determine the nature of Code Hierarchy Bias, to reveal hidden signs, symptoms, and conditions, to improve the accuracy and usefulness of determinant level codes, and to tailor emergency medical response structure for a more efficient use of emergency response personnel and resources.
US08971495B2
An imaging system can include an imaging capturing portion, an image processing unit, a main power supply and a supplemental power supply. The image capturing portion can include a source that emits an emission signal towards a target to be imaged, and a receiver that receives the emission signal emitted by the source. The image processing unit can receive the received emission signal from the imaging capturing portion and generate image data based on the received emission signal. The main power supply can be coupled to the imaging capturing portion and the imaging processing unit for providing operational power thereto. The supplemental power supply can be coupled to the main power supply and the imaging processing unit. The supplemental power supply can be charged by the main power supply in a first mode and provide operational power to the imaging processing unit in a second mode.
US08971493B2
A medical imaging system adaptively acquires anatomical images using a shape adaptive collimator including multiple different portions of X-ray absorbent material automatically adjustable to alter the dimensions of a spatial cross section of an X-ray beam of radiation into a non-rectangular shape, in response to a control signal. The synchronization processor provides a heart rate related synchronization signal derived from a patient cardiac function related parameter. The synchronization signal enables adaptive variation in timing of image acquisition within an individual heart cycle and between successive heart cycles of each individual image frame of multiple sequential image frames. The X-ray image acquisition device uses the shape adaptive collimator for acquiring anatomical images of the region of interest with reduced patient X-ray exposure in response to the synchronization signal. A display processor presents resultant images.
US08971490B2
An image guided treatment is performed to treat a target. To perform the image guided treatment, measurement data indicative of target motion is acquired. A timing of one or more x-ray images is determined based on the measurement data. Treatment may be performed on the target using the position of the target.
US08971487B2
A mobile scanning system and methods for inspecting contents of a container. Multiple detector plates are arrayed along an arcuate member coupled to a conveyance with wheels, capable of road travel. A source generates high-energy penetrating radiation that irradiates each of the detector plates from a single position. The arcuate member is disposed, during the course of operation of the system, in a vertical plane. The system has one actuator for rotating the arcuate member about a horizontal pivot into a horizontal plane, and a second actuator for further rotating the arcuate member, once rotated into the horizontal plane, about a vertical pivot, so that the arcuate member is contained, for purposes of transport, entirely within a volume defined by a rectangular prism that does not extend horizontally outward from the conveyance beyond any of its wheels.
US08971485B2
A drive-through scanning system comprises a radiation generating system arranged to generate radiation at two different energy levels and direct the radiation towards a scanning volume, detectors arranged to detect the radiation after it has passed through the scanning volume, and a controller arranged to identify a part of a vehicle within the scanning volume, to allocate the part of the vehicle to one of several categories, and to control the radiation generating system and to select one or more of the energy levels depending on the category to which the part of the vehicle is allocated.
US08971482B2
An apparatus for imaging an object comprising: an imaging device configured to image the object while the object is supported on a support, the support comprising a base for positioning on a surface, wherein the object and the support are stationary relative to the surface, and further wherein the imaging device is adapted to move relative to the surface, and hence relative to the object and to the support, during imaging; the imaging device comprising a housing having a bottom notch sized to accommodate the base of the support, whereby to allow the base of the support to extend into the housing during imaging.
US08971476B2
A zirconium alloy nuclear reactor cylindrical cladding has an inner Zr substrate surface (10), an outer volume of protective material (22), and an integrated middle volume (20) of zirconium oxide, zirconium and protective material, where the protective material is applied by impaction at a velocity greater than 340 meters/second to provide the integrated middle volume (20) resulting in structural integrity for the cladding.
US08971471B2
A decoder includes a buffer configured to incrementally transport a synchronous data stream through a path of the decoder. A control circuit is configured to control a depth parameter associated with the buffer and to provide a substantially predictable delay of the synchronous data stream through the path of the decoder.
US08971461B2
Systems and methodologies are described that facilitate integrating a list-sphere decoding design in a multiple input-multiple output (MIMO wireless communication environment. According to various aspects, optimal rank selection and CQI computation for an optimal rank can be performed in conjunction with a non-linear receiver, such as a maximum life (ML) MMSE receiver, a non-linear receiver with a list-sphere decoder, and the like. Optimal rank selection can be performed using a maximum rank selection protocol, a channel capacity-based protocol, or any other suitable protocol that facilitates rank selection, and CQI information can be generated based in part on effective SNRs determined with regard to a selected optimal rank.
US08971444B2
A receiver may comprise a complex mixer for converting the modulated signal to a complex modulated signal comprising a first in-phase component and a first quadrature component. The receiver may further comprise a digital demodulator. The digital demodulator may comprise at least one processor circuit programmed for applying a phase differencer for generating an output function in terms of a phase difference of the complex modulated signal. Applying the phase differencer may comprise converting the first in-phase component to a function of a phase difference of the first in-phase component expressed in digital time, and converting the first quadrature component to a function of the phase difference of the first quadrature component expressed in digital time. The at least one processor circuit of the digital demodulator may also be programmed for applying a four quadrant inverse tangent to the output function to generate the information signal.
US08971438B2
Systems, methods, and devices for simplified beamforming are provided. In one aspect, a plurality of signals from a signal transmitter are received over a wireless network on one or more receive antennas. One or more phase differences are then determined that maximize a signal to noise ratio of the plurality of received signals. Data representing the one or more phase differences is then transmitted to the signal transmitter.
US08971432B2
A transmission method for transmitting a first modulated signal and a second modulated signal in the same frequency at the same time. Each signal has been modulated according to a different modulation scheme. The transmission method applies precoding on both signals using a fixed precoding matrix, applies different power change to each signal, and regularly changes the phase of at least one of the signals, thereby improving received data signal quality for a reception device.
US08971429B2
Systems, apparatus and methods for determining a cyclic shift diversity (CSD) mode are presented. Examples use two different autocorrelations to determine a current CSD mode. Specifically, a delay-based autocorrelation and a cyclic shift-based autocorrelation are each computed then compared to each other, for example, by taking a difference of the two autocorrelations. A multipath signal leads to similar autocorrelations, where as a signal with a CSD mode enabled leads to dissimilar autocorrelations. By examining the number of peaks in the delay-based autocorrelation or the autocorrelation difference, a current CSD mode may be determined.
US08971424B2
A method for a receiver to estimate phase of a carrier wave, including receiving a carrier wave carrying pilot symbols and data symbols extending between the pilot symbols, determining phase of the carrier wave at received pilot symbols, and interpolating the phase of the carrier wave at points between pilot symbols based, at least in part, on an estimated phase of demodulated data symbols. Apparatus for estimate phase of a carrier wave, including a unit for determining phase of the carrier wave at received pilot symbols, and a unit for interpolating the phase of the carrier wave at points between pilot symbols based, at least in part, on an estimated phase of demodulated data symbols. Related apparatus and methods are also described.
US08971420B2
A method and system for sequentially reorganizing signals received on a set of sensors, including a network of aerials or sensors, a high-precision clock, controlling a sequencer and suitable for accurately pacing the switching and acquisition times between each aerial, the sequencer is suitable for controlling an antenna switch, an the antenna switch linked to a single-channel radiofrequency receive module, an acquisition card, and a processing model.
US08971411B2
When a block (MB22) of which motion vector is referred to in the direct mode contains a plurality of motion vectors, 2 motion vectors MV23 and MV24, which are used for inter picture prediction of a current picture (P23) to be coded, are determined by scaling a value obtained from averaging the plurality of motion vectors or selecting one of the plurality of the motion vectors.
US08971390B2
A communication device includes an application data interface, a first communication layer and a physical media interface. The first communication layer includes a first entity configured to process application data and a second entity configured to process operations, administrations and maintenance data. The communication device further includes a switching device. In a first power mode, the switching device couples the application data interface to the first entity of the first communication layer. In a second power mode, the switching device couples the application data interface to the second entity of the first communication layer.
US08971389B2
Provided is a millimeter wavelength range transceiver device which can improve phase noise characteristics and which can also independently calibrate each respective local oscillator of a transmission unit and a reception unit. This millimeter wavelength range transceiver device comprises a transmission unit (10), a reception unit (20), and a reference frequency signal generator (30). The transmission unit (10) comprises a transmission-use local oscillator (11) comprising an injection-locked oscillator, a transmission-use mixer (12) for mixing the signal from the transmission-use local oscillator and a transmission baseband signal, and a transmission-use amplifier (13) for amplifying the signal from the transmission-use mixer to a transmission-use antenna (15). The reception unit (20) comprises a reception-use amplifier (25) for amplifying a signal from a reception-use antenna (24), a reception-use local oscillator (22) comprising an injection-locked oscillator, and a reception-use mixer (23) for mixing the signal from the reception-use local oscillator and the signal from the reception-use amplifier in order to output a reception baseband signal. A reference frequency signal generator (30) injects a reference frequency signal into the transmission-and-reception-use local oscillators (11 and 22).
US08971383B2
Systems and methods for generating a CDMA signal s(t) comprising N components involves assigning to each of the N components one unique spreading sequence an selected from a set of M spreading sequences with M≧N, modulating the symbols dn of each component on the assigned unique spreading sequence an, and combining the N symbols dn each being spread with its own unique spreading sequence an to a CDMA signal s(t). The assigned spreading sequences an are selected such that all selected pairs within the set of N spreading sequences are orthogonal or very close to be orthogonal so that cross-correlation components between all spreading sequences an are close to zero or zero.
US08971357B2
An exemplary technique is provided for synchronizing master and slave clocks of a packet-switched network. The network contains at least two equipments that are connected to one another via an aggregated connection made up of at least two links and that are located between the master and slave clocks to enable them to transmit synchronization packets to one another using a timestamp protocol. The technique includes (a) obtaining a distribution of the synchronization packets in at least one subset of the links that transport these synchronization packets, and (b) transmitting to the slave clock first information representative of that distribution, second information representative of timestamps associated with the synchronization packets, and third information representative of packet transmission times over the at least one subset of links, to synchronize the slave clock to the master clock as a function of at least the first, second, and third information transmitted.
US08971349B2
A method and device for performing contention resolution between a mobile communication terminal and a base station. The method according to an embodiment includes initiating a random access procedure by a medium access control (MAC) layer of the mobile communication terminal, including starting a contention resolution timer; and stopping the contention resolution timer and determining that the random access procedure was successfully completed upon receipt from the base station of a physical downlink control channel (PDCCH) transmission addressed to a cell-radio network temporary identity (C-RNTI) of the mobile communication terminal and containing a UL grant.
US08971347B2
There is provided a method of configuring the downlink component carrier between one or more linkage methods for PHICH reception on User Equipment (UE), which is configured for carrier aggregation, over a mobile communication network. This method includes (a) providing an indicator, and (b) determining whether the PHICH carrier linkage should be dynamic linkage or cell specific, based on the value of the indicator.
US08971341B2
An application gateway including application service programming logically positioned on a user premises side of a network demarcation forming an edge of the wide area network at a user premises can provide managed services to a user and one or more endpoint devices associated with the application gateway. The application gateway can be controlled remotely by the application service provider through a service management center and configured to execute an application service provided from the application service provider. The application gateway executes the application service at the user premises independent of application services executing on the application service provider's network. An application service logic manager can communicate with an application service enforcement manager to verify that the request conforms with policy and usage rules associated with the application service in order to authorize execution of the application service on the application gateway, either directly or through endpoint devices.
US08971334B2
A method and system is implemented in a network node that functions as a controller for a domain in a split architecture network. The domain comprises a plurality of flow switches, where the plurality of flow switches implement a data plane for the split architecture network and the controller implements a control plane for the split architecture network that is remote from the data plane. The method and system configure the plurality of flow switches to efficiently handle each type of broadcast packet in the domain of the split architecture network without flooding the domain with the broadcast packets to thereby reduce a number of broadcast packets forwarded within the domain.
US08971331B2
A method, an apparatus, and a computer program for selecting one or more radio communication schemes for an end-to-end connection. Peers of the end-to-end connection negotiate (304), during establishment or operation of the end-to-end transport connection, about at least one transmission parameter of the end-to-end transport connection. Then, the peers select (306), amongst a plurality of wireless communication schemes supported by the wireless end-device, at least one wireless communication scheme capable of complying with the negotiated transmission parameters and, thus, available for use in the end-to-end transport connection.
US08971328B2
A hierarchical distributed routing architecture including at least three levels, or layers, for receiving, processing and forwarding data packets between network components is provided. The core level router components receive an incoming packet from a network component and identify a distribution level router component based on processing a subset of the destination address associated with the received packet. The distribution level router components that receiving a forwarded packet and identify a transit level router component based a second processing of at least a subset of the destination address associated with the received packet. The transit level router components receive the forwarded packet and forward the packet to a respective network. The mapping, or other assignment, of portions of the FIB associated with the distributed routing environment is managed by a router management component.
US08971327B2
A device for connecting base station(s) to a cellular label switched network in a cellular network. The cellular network includes: base station(s), the connecting device(s); cellular label switched network(s); and service area(s). The base station(s) communicates with mobile terminals using wireless technology. The wireless technology uses a protocol layer architecture that includes at least one of the following: a wireless physical layer; a wireless medium access control protocol layer; a radio link control layer; and a network layer. The connecting device(s) include: a first interface to connect to the base station(s); a second interface to connect to cellular label switched network(s); and a label forwarding layer that: forwards packets between base station(s) and cellular label switched network(s); attaches label(s) to packets and removes label(s) from packets. A service area divided into a multitude of cells through which mobile terminals can move through and communicate with base station(s).
US08971318B2
A multistage relay communication system 100 includes a trunk network 1 and branch networks 2 (2a, 2b), each of which includes one or more communication apparatuses 4. The communication apparatus 4 can switch between a trunk mode to operate in the trunk network 1 and a branch mode to operate in the branch network 2. In the trunk network 1, the communication apparatus 4 carries out fixing of a communication path and redundancy of data based on a path table in order to achieve real-timeness and a data arrival rate. Meanwhile, in the branch network 2, when a communication failure occurs, the communication apparatus 4 autonomously searches for a communication path and constructs a path table, in order to at least secure a data arrival rate even if real-timeness is impaired within an allowable range.
US08971315B2
Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) telephone calls at an information handling system are managed based upon data transfer allocations associated with an information handling system wireless wide area network (WWAN) account to reduce data transfer overages at the WWAN account. If data transfer associated with a WWAN account approaches an allocation threshold, VoIP telephone calls associated with the information handling system that would use WWAN data transfer are instead configured to proceed through a WWAN telephone call with a WWAN telephone number that does not use data transfer.
US08971314B2
An SS7-based call protocol conversion gateway that translates between circuit-switched SS7 protocols and session initiation protocol (SIP) oriented protocol, allowing an E911 call initiated over a switched network to be routed by a VoIP network. The SS7-based call protocol conversion gateway provides a PSAP with MSAG quality (street address) information about a VoIP dual mode phone user without the need for a wireless carrier to invest in building out an entire VoIP core. Thus, wireless carriers may continue signaling the way they are today, i.e., using the J-STD-036 standard for CDMA and GSM in North America, yet see benefits of a VoIP network core, i.e., provision of MSAG quality location data to a PSAP.
US08971306B1
A method of operating an access point includes storing, for each of a plurality of channels, a corresponding first value and second value. A first channel is selected according to a channel polling scheme. A first beacon is transmitted over the first channel to announce commencement of communication over the first channel. Subsequent to the first beacon but prior to a second beacon, data is exchanged with a wireless client over the first channel. The method includes, in response to a first time period based on the first value corresponding to the first channel expiring, transmitting the second beacon over the first channel to announce conclusion of communication over the first channel. The method includes, in response to a second time period based on the second value corresponding to the first channel expiring, transmitting a third beacon over the first channel to announce commencement of communication over the first channel.
US08971305B2
Systems and methodologies are described that facilitate scrambling of downlink reference signals utilizing a pseudo-random sequence (PRS) corresponding to a primary synchronization code (PSC) and secondary synchronization code (SSC) combination. Utilization of the combination allows for orthogonal sequencing to be removed from the scrambling. This can be beneficial, for example, where resources required for orthogonalizing the reference signal outweigh the benefit of utilizing the orthogonal sequences. In such scenarios, selective scrambling can be utilized such that the orthogonal sequence or instead the PSC/SSC combination can be provided to leverage advantages of both mechanisms in the given scenarios.
US08971303B2
A channel sounding method in a wireless local area network (WLAN) system is provided. The method, performed by a transmitter, includes transmitting a null data packet announcement (NDPA) frame to a receiver to initiate a channel sounding procedure; transmitting a null data packet (NDP) to the receiver and receiving a feedback frame. The feedback frame includes a plurality of segment frames and a channel feedback report. The channel feedback report is split into a plurality of feedback segments. Each of the plurality of feedback segments is respectively included in each of the plurality of segment frames. The each of the plurality of segment frames includes a first-segment subfield indicating whether the each of the plurality of feedback segment included is a first segment and a remaining-segment subfield indicating the number of remaining feedback segments.
US08971296B2
A wireless communication terminal apparatus wherein even when a SC-FDMA signal is divided into a plurality of clusters and the plurality of clusters are then mapped to respective discontinuous frequency bands (when C-SC-FDMA is used), the improvement effect of system throughput can be maintained, while the user throughput can be improved. In the apparatus, a DFT unit (210) subjects a symbol sequence of time domain to a DFT process, thereby generating signals of frequency domain. A setting unit (211) divides the signals input from the DFT unit (210) into a plurality of clusters according to a cluster pattern that is in accordance with an MCS set, an encoding size, or the number of Ranks occurring during MIMO transmissions, which is indicated in those signals input, and then maps the plurality of clusters to the respective ones of a plurality of discontinuous frequency resources, thereby setting a constellation of the plurality of clusters in the frequency domain.
US08971287B2
A method performs wireless communication between a motor vehicle and at least one other communication partner, especially a further motor vehicle and/or a stationary communication partner. A predetermined transmission frequency is used via which the motor vehicle and/or the communication partner transmit a communication-partner-specific identification signal cyclically between transmission breaks.
US08971284B2
The present invention reduces the amount of control information for specifying the transmission method for simultaneously transmitting the uplink data and the reception quality information as well as the uplink data and the ACK/NACK, reduces delay occurring in changing the transmission method, and realizes the mapping of the uplink data and the reception quality information and that of the uplink data and the ACK/NACK, in compliance with modulation scheme and coding rate of the uplink data specified by the base station apparatus. In the mobile communication system where the base station apparatus allocates, to the mobile station apparatus, resources wherein the base station apparatus transmits, to the mobile station apparatus, control information for specifying a transmission format for the mobile station apparatus to transmit information using the uplink, while the mobile station apparatus simultaneously transmits, to the base station apparatus, the uplink data and the reception quality information based on the specified transmission format in case of having received the control information from the base station apparatus.
US08971282B2
Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for allocating a pool of shared Internet bandwidth. One of the methods includes providing a first communications channel having a first bandwidth, the first bandwidth being shared by a first group of first users, providing a second communications channel having a second bandwidth different than the first bandwidth, the second bandwidth being shared by a second group of second users, detecting that at least one first data connection for a particular first user in the first group has satisfied a first predetermined condition, and moving, based on the detecting, the at least one first data connection for the particular first user from the first communications channel to the second communications channel.
US08971279B2
A method and apparatus for performing semi-persistent scheduling (SPS) deactivation in a wireless mobile communication system are disclosed. A base station (BS) transmits a downlink control channel to a user equipment (UE), and deactivates the SPS when a binary field indicating resource allocation information contained in the downlink control channel is entirely filled with ‘1’.
US08971277B2
In a wireless communication system for performing wireless communication using a white space, a receiving station includes an interference suppression processing part which performs processing to reduce interference which is received by the signal transmitted from a transmitting station at a frequency of the white space, a receiving quality estimation part which estimates communication quality of the communication using the frequency of the white space based on the signal processed by the interference suppression processing part, and a receiving quality informing part which transmits to the transmitting station the communication quality information estimated by the receiving quality estimation part.
US08971275B2
A base station transmits a first unicast control message configuring transmission parameters of a first carrier for a wireless device. The base station transmits at least one second unicast message configuring measurement parameters of a second carrier. The measurement configuration comprises a first and a second measurement subframe allocation bitmap for the second carrier. The base station receives first and second channel state information from the wireless device. The base station transmits data packets to the wireless device. The data packets are encoded and modulated based on the first and second channel state information.
US08971269B2
A method for an SS to perform network entry in a multi-carrier wireless environment that has a primary carrier and at least one secondary carrier associated with a BS, the method comprising: a. sensing a carrier in an area serviced by the BS; b. determining if the carrier is a primary carrier or a secondary carrier; and c. performing the network entry if the determining establishes that the sensed carrier is a primary carrier and not a secondary carrier.
US08971265B2
In a communication system including a mobile station that transmits a data signal and a plurality of base stations receiving the data signal transmitted by the mobile station, the communication system includes: as the base stations, at least, one first base station having a first signal detector detecting the data signal transmitted by the mobile station; and, at least, one second base station having a second signal detector that detects the data signal received by the station per se, using the detection result which the first base station has detected from the data signal transmitted by the mobile station. As a result, it is possible to provide a communication system and the like capable of providing good transmission characteristics in the uplink cooperative communication without addition of CPs having a longer length than usual.
US08971263B2
A method manages bearers over a first wireless link between a self-backhauled base station and a base station, where the self-backhauled base station serves one or more user equipments (UEs) via one or more second wireless links in a network. The method is implemented at the self-backhauled base station and includes identifying changes in numbers and/or characteristics of UE bearers multiplexed onto a backhaul bearer associated with the first wireless link. The method further includes dynamically reconfiguring resources allocated to the backhaul beare.
US08971254B2
A network node is disclosed that communicates with a user equipment node in a communications system. The network node repetitively transmits first uplink transmission power control, TPC, commands on a first physical channel with a first channel configuration while repetitively transmitting second uplink TPC commands on a second physical channel with a second channel configuration. The first and second uplink TPC commands control uplink transmission power from the user equipment node to the network node. Related user equipment nodes and methods are disclosed.
US08971241B2
Techniques for supporting operation of relay stations in wireless communication systems are described. In an aspect, a bitmap may be sent by a base station and/or a relay station to identify subframes of at least two types in multiple radio frames. For example, the bitmap may indicate whether each subframe covered by the bitmap is of a first type or a second type. UEs may use the bitmap to control their operation. For example, a UE may perform channel estimation or measurement for the subframes of the first type and may skip channel estimation and measurement for the subframes of the second type. In another aspect, a base station may transmit data and/or control information on resources not used by a relay station to transmit a reference signal. This may avoid interference to the reference signal from the relay station, which may improve performance for UEs communicating with the relay station.
US08971240B2
Method and apparatus for performing radio link timer management in a wireless communications network
A method and apparatus for performing radio link timer (RLT) management in a wireless network. The method and apparatus examine the frame error rates (FERS) associated with decoded speech or data frames and determine how many speech or data frames are unacceptable. If the number of speech or data frames that is unacceptable exceeds a preset threshold value, a determination is made that the call should be released. This process is performed in both the uplink and downlink directions and determinations as to whether the call should be released are made by the mobile station (MS), the base station system (BSS) or mobile switching center (MSC) for the downlink direction and by the base station system (BSS) for the uplink direction. If a determination is made that the number of unacceptable speech or data frames exceeds the preset threshold, the call is released.
US08971239B2
A mobile device includes: multiple interfaces that are configured to support a various access technology such as 3G or Wi-Fi etc. A public land mobile network (PLMN) selector that generates a list for each of the PLMN networks that provide coverage to the mobile device. A PLMN selection policy parameter that is set to True or False to allow or prohibit the selection of PLMN networks by the mobile device based on the generated list where the generated list includes information as to different access technologies and selection priorities supported on the PLMN access networks providing coverage to the mobile device. In particular, when the PLMN selection policy parameter is set to True, multiple PLMN registrations are allowed; and when the A PLMN selection policy parameter is set to False, multiple PLMN registrations are prohibited.
US08971238B2
A method for controlling a wireless router and a wireless router includes: detecting whether the wireless router has a connection with a terminal; and if the wireless router has no connection with any terminal, turning off the wireless router. By using the method for controlling a wireless router and the wireless router provided in embodiments of the present invention, whether the wireless router has a connection with a terminal may be detected; and the wireless router is turned off when the wireless router has no connection with any terminal. In this way, the wireless router may be automatically turned off in an idle state, which saves energy resources and avoids unnecessary consumption.
US08971235B2
Wireless sinks, such as displays, may receive wirelessly transmitted audio/video information in clone mode. In one embodiment, the same audio/video stream may be provided to a plurality of sinks daisy chained from a wireless receiver.
US08971223B2
Systems and methods for saving power by a personal area network (PAN) coordinator are described herein. A PAN coordinator is provided to form a wireless PAN with one or more devices. Further, the PAN coordinator enters a sleep state to save power. The wireless PAN is available when the PAN coordinator enters an active state.
US08971217B2
Aspects of the present invention are directed at sending a data item from a sending client to a receiving client. In accordance with one embodiment, a method provides controls for generating an audio-based command to send a data item from a sending client to a receiving client. More specifically, the method includes receiving an audio stream at the sending client from a sending party. As the audio stream is being received, a determination is made regarding whether a command to send a data item to the receiving client was received. If a command to send a data item is included in the audio stream, the method identifies the data item that is the object of the command and then transmits the data item to the receiving client over the network.
US08971210B1
A configurable network adapter has N analog front ends, each generating a receiver output and a transmitter input. In a first mode of operation, the analog front end receiver outputs are coupled to a MIMO equalizer, which is coupled to an outer receiver and to a first MAC input, with the first MAC having an output coupled to an outer transmitter, a MIMO modulator, and to the analog front end transmitter inputs. In a second mode of operation, one or more of the analog front ends is directed to a SISO modulator fed by a second outer transmitter coupled to a second MAC transmitter output. An associated one or more of the analog front end receivers is coupled to a SISO equalizer, and thereafter to an outer receiver and to the second lower MAC, thereby providing a first mode for a single MIMO adapter and a second mode for a MIMO plus independent PAN interface.
US08971201B2
A time-frequency resource allocation planner for planning allocation of time-frequency resources to sustain communication links from a common transmitter (TX) to multiple receivers (RX1, . . . , RXK) in a wireless OFDMA communication system includes a resource block selector configured to select a set (RBS) of time-frequency resource blocks (RB) for transmission of one packet for each communication link. A communication link quality measure provider is configured to determine a gain-to-interference-plus-noise ratio measure (Gk) for each communication link. A transmit power and transmit rate estimator, connected to the resource block selector and the communication link quality measure provider, is configured to jointly estimate, within the selected set of time-frequency resource blocks, transmit power (Pk) and transmit rate (Rk) of the packets as functions of determined gain-to-interference-plus-noise ratio measures, to at least approximately minimize expected transmitter energy consumption.
US08971198B2
The present invention is directed to a method of controlling a communications link and apparatus configured to perform this method. This invention is particularly related to but in no way limited to MIMO (multiple inputs multiple outputs) wireless communications systems. The method comprises the steps of determining at the receiver the quality of the communications link and based on this, selecting a group of transmission parameters and an element from this group. These selections are then communicated to the transmitter. The transmission parameter may be the transmission configuration such as the modulation and coding scheme. The invention minimises the required feedback signalling from the receiver to the transmitter by exploiting temporal correlation of the parameter being controlled, whilst allowing rapid selection of the parameter.
US08971196B2
Network traffic information from multiple sources, at multiple time scales, and at multiple levels of detail are integrated so that users may more easily identify relevant network information. The network monitoring system stores and manipulates low-level and higher-level network traffic data separately to enable efficient data collection and storage. Packet traffic data is collected, stored, and analyzed at multiple locations. The network monitoring locations communicate summary and aggregate data to central modules, which combine this data to provide an end-to-end description of network traffic at coarser time scales. The network monitoring system enables users to zoom in on high-level, coarse time scale network performance data to one or more lower levels of network performance data at finer time scales. When high-level network performance data of interest is selected, corresponding low-level network performance data is retrieved from the appropriate distributed network monitoring locations to provide additional detailed information.
US08971195B2
In one embodiment, an originating node in a full-mesh computer network receives a trigger to determine integrity of the full-mesh network's data-paths. The originating node determines an ordered list of nodes in the full-mesh computer network. The originating node then sends echo requests to each non-originating node of the ordered list. The originating node may later receive consolidated echo responses from at least some non-originating nodes to which an echo request was sent. Each consolidated echo response indicates a response from the respective non-originating node, and any responses to subsequent echo requests sent by that particular non-originating node to subsequent nodes. The originating node may then use these responses to determine a connectivity status of the full-mesh computer network.
US08971194B2
Techniques for adaptively controlling wireless transition timers associated with wireless transition states in relation to use of applications by user equipment (UE) are presented herein. A UE can include a transition management component (TMC) that can adaptively control wireless transition timers associated with wireless states based on application type, session content, or other factors. The TMC monitors data flow associated with an application and, for a current or subsequent communication session, controls the length of wireless transition timers and switching between wireless states to improve UE, application, and/or network performance while maintaining QOE for the user. The TMC can access a timer look-up table that maps wireless transition timers to application type, content type, user behavior, or other factors. The TMC also can desirably control maintaining persistence or always-on connections by controlling switching between wireless states using the adapted wireless transition timers.
US08971185B1
One or more computer readable media, methods and systems that allow phone calls involving a mobile telephone to be to be conducted using VOIP technology with header compression of the voice packets and dynamically adjustable tiered subscriber service. A dynamic, tiered-subscriber service allows the bandwidth allotted to users subscribing to different levels of service to be adjusted between sessions to accommodate changing network conditions. Header compression involves compressing the voice packet header into a reduced number of bites. Embodiments of the present invention enable simultaneous header compression and dynamic tiered-subscriber service through a new call flow set up that includes a new policy. The new policy is given preference over the other installed policies and includes new attribute value pairs that enables both header compression and dynamic bandwidth adjustments.
US08971179B2
A communication management apparatus that manages transmission of data in a network in which plural communication nodes are connected via a transmission line in a ring shape, the apparatus including: a network-presence checking unit that transmits a network-presence-check frame in broadcast and generates network connection information indicating a connection state among the connection nodes from a received network-presence-check acknowledge frame, a token-circulation-order determining unit that determines token circulation order; a setup processing unit that performs setup processing for notifying each of the communication nodes of a token circulation destination; a data-frame-communication processing unit that performs transmission and reception of a data frame using a token frame; and a line-connection managing unit that disables, when the network has a ring configuration, any one of ports of any one of the communication nodes to prevent a connection state of the network from becoming a ring shape.
US08971178B1
A transmitter beamforming technique for use in a MIMO wireless communication system determines (i) a partial description of a reverse channel without determining a full dimensional description of the reverse channel and (ii) a partial description of a forward channel without determining a full dimensional description of the forward channel. A correction matrix is developed from the partial description of the reverse channel and a partial description of the forward channel. The correction matrix is used to process signals to be transmitted via the forward channel, and a steering matrix is used to perform beamforming in the forward channel.
US08971173B1
In some embodiments, an apparatus includes a first controller configured to be operatively coupled within a network having a set of network nodes, a forwarding gateway and a configuration entity. The first controller is configured to manage session state and node state associated with the set of network nodes independent of the forwarding gateway. The first controller is configured to fail over to a second controller when the first controller fails, without the forwarding gateway failing over and without the configuration entity failing over.
US08971171B2
A transmission system for transmitting data over a channel in the form of a digital signal comprising bits of data, the system comprising an encoder for encoding the data prior to transmission, the encoder producing coding in the form of an overhead, and a decoder for decoding the data after transmission, characterised in that a first portion only of the data is encoded, the second portion remaining uncoded, the system further comprising a partitioner for partitioning the overhead from the uncoded data portion of the signal, after the first portion data has been encoded.
US08971166B1
A method and terminal apparatus are described for performing channel interleaving at a terminal in a multiple-input multiple-output (MIMO) wireless communication system. A number of columns C of an interleaver matrix are assigned as a number of symbols for transmitting data per subframe (Nsymb). A number of rows R of the interleaver matrix is defined as H · L · log 2 Q C , where H is a number of modulation symbols per layer, L is a number of layers and Q is a modulation order. Input vector sequences are written into entries of the interleaver matrix, row by row. Each of the entries has a size of L·log2 Q bits. Output bit sequences are generated by reading out the entries of the interleaver matrix, column by column. The output bit sequences are modulated by a unit of log2 Q bits, to generate modulation symbols. The modulation symbols are mapped to the L layers, and transmitted by using the L layers.
US08971154B2
A method and apparatus for synchronizing a system time in an electronic device are provided. The method may include: when the electronic device is executing a boot process, disabling an external time obtaining function of the electronic device for obtaining an external reference time, obtaining an internal clock time from an internal clock unit of the electronic device and synchronizing a system time of the electronic device with the internal clock time; and when the electronic device has completed the boot process, enabling the external time obtaining function to obtain the external reference time.
US08971148B2
A first exemplary aspect of the present invention is a word line selection circuit where address decode signals composed of a power supply voltage and a first voltage lower than a ground voltage are input, and that a word line selection signal composed of the first voltage and a second voltage higher than the power supply voltage is output not via a level shift circuit according to the address decode signals.
US08971146B2
In one embodiment, a memory includes a plurality of bit lines and a write driver for driving a driven bit line selected from the plurality of bit lines during a write operation. The write driver is coupled to an internal node. A first stage clamping circuit is operable to clamp the internal node to a clamping voltage if the write operation is not enabled and is further operable to unclamp the internal node during the write operation. The memory further includes a multiplexer for selectively coupling the driven bit line to the internal node. A second stage clamping circuit is operable to clamp the plurality of bit lines to a clamping voltage if the write operation is not enabled and is further operable to unclamp the driven bit line during the write operation.
US08971138B2
A method of screening complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor CMOS integrated circuits, such as integrated circuits including CMOS static random access memory (SRAM) cells, for n-channel transistors susceptible to transistor characteristic shifts over operating time. For the example of SRAM cells formed of cross-coupled CMOS inverters, static noise margin and writeability (Vtrip) screens are provided. Each of the n-channel transistors in the CMOS SRAM cells are formed within p-wells that are isolated from p-type semiconductor material in peripheral circuitry of the memory and other functions in the integrated circuit. Forward and reverse body node bias voltages are applied to the isolated p-wells of the SRAM cells under test to determine whether such operations as read disturb, or write cycles, disrupt the cells under such bias. Cells that are vulnerable to threshold voltage shift over time can thus be identified.
US08971135B2
A semiconductor memory device includes an input/output circuit configured to receive an address and data from an exterior, and a peripheral circuit configured to receive the address through the input/output circuit and generate a chip selection signal based on the address. The input/output circuit may include a control pad circuit configured to apply or block at least one data strobe signal in response to the chip selection signal, and one or more input/output pad circuits configured to transfer the data to the peripheral circuits in response to the at least one data strobe signal.
US08971127B2
A method of charging a floating gate in a nonvolatile memory cell comprises bringing a substrate channel within the memory cell to a first voltage, bringing a control gate to a programming voltage, and floating the substrate channel voltage while the control gate is at the programming voltage. Memory devices include state machines or controllers operable to perform the described method, and operation of such a state machine, memory device, and information handling system are described.
US08971120B2
According to one embodiment, a semiconductor memory device includes memory cells, word lines, a driver circuit, and a control circuit. The memory cells are stacked above a semiconductor substrate, and each includes a charge accumulation layer and control gate. The word lines are coupled to the control gates. The driver circuit repeats a programming operation to write data in a memory cell coupled to a selected word line. In the programming operation, a first voltage is applied to the selected word line, a second voltage to a first unselected word line, and a third voltage to a second unselected word line. The control circuit steps up the first voltage and steps down the second voltage in repeating the programming.
US08971112B2
Method of programming a multi-level memory cell may include transferring one or more values between an auxiliary latch of the multi-level memory cell and a most significant bit (MSB) latch of the multi-level memory cell and/or between the auxiliary latch and a least significant bit (LSB) latch of the multi-level memory cell while programming the multi-level memory cell.
US08971110B2
A method is provided for programming a multi-level cell flash memory device. The programming method includes programming a first memory cell of the multi-level call flash memory device to one of first through i-th program states, wherein i is a positive integer, by applying a first program pulse to the first memory cell in a first type programming operation, and programming a second memory cell to one of i+1-th through j-th program states, wherein j is an integer equal to or greater than three, by applying a second program pulse to the second memory cell in a second type programming operation. At least one of a second step voltage, a second bit-line forcing voltage and a second verification operation of the second type programming operation is different from a first step voltage, a first bit-line forcing voltage, and a first verification operation of the first type programming operation, respectively.
US08971105B2
Subject matter disclosed herein relates to memory operations regarding changing an order of program bits to be programmed into a memory array.
US08971104B2
A resistive memory array is programmed such that particular adjacent pairs of memory cells along a bit line having a back-to-back relationship are programmed together. The memory cells having the back-to-back relationship share a continuous chalcogenide material and a SiN material.
US08971102B2
The present disclosure concerns a method for writing to a MRAM cell comprising a magnetic tunnel junction formed from a storage layer having a storage magnetization; a reference layer having a reference magnetization; and a tunnel barrier layer included between the sense and storage layers; and a current line electrically connected to said magnetic tunnel junction; the method comprising: passing a heating current in the magnetic tunnel junction for heating the magnetic tunnel junction; passing a field current for switching the storage magnetization in a written direction in accordance with the polarity of the field current. The magnitude of the heating current is such that it acts as a spin polarized current and can adjust the storage magnetization; and the polarity of the heating current is such as to adjust the storage magnetization substantially towards said written direction.
US08971098B1
A latch-based array includes a plurality of columns and rows. Each column comprises a plurality of slave latches that all latch in parallel a master-latched data output from the column's master latch during normal operation. In a fault-testing mode of operation, one of the slaves in the column latches an inverted version of the master-latched data output while the remaining slave latches in the column latch the master-latched data output. In this fashion, the slave latches are decorrelated in a single write operation.
US08971096B2
A multiport bitcell including a pair of cross-coupled inverters is provided with increased write speed and enhanced operating voltage range by the selective isolation of a first one of the cross-coupled inverters from a power supply and ground during a write operation. The write operation occurs through a write port that includes a transmission gate configured to couple a first node driven by the first cross-coupled inverter to a write bit line. A remaining second cross-coupled inverter in the bitcell is configured to drive a second node that couples to a plurality of read ports.
US08971095B2
A write circuit in a memory array includes a global data line, a switching circuit, and a first local data line coupled with the switching circuit and with a first plurality of memory cells. The global data line is configured to receive data to be written to the memory cell from outside of the memory array. The switching circuit is configured to electrically couple the global data line with the first local data line to transfer the data to be written to a memory cell of the first plurality of memory cells to the first local data line. The memory cell of the first plurality of memory cells is configured to receive data on the first local data line.
US08971093B2
According to one embodiment, a memory device includes a semiconductor layer connected between a first conductive line and one end of a third conductive line, resistance change elements connected between second conductive lines and the third conductive line respectively, a select FET having a select gate electrode, and using the semiconductor layer as a channel, and a control circuit executing a write/erase of at least one of the resistance change elements, and executing a recovering operation which adjusts a threshold voltage shift of the select FET after the write/erase.
US08971088B1
A method for programming a non-volatile memory device includes providing an as-fabricated state-change device having an aluminum doped zinc oxide material first electrode, a p++ polysilicon material second electrode, and a zinc oxide (ZnO) material state-change material there between. A first amplitude bias voltage is applied to the first electrode of the as-fabricated state-change device causing the ZnO material to change form an as-fabricated state to a first state. A second amplitude bias voltage having an opposite polarity having an amplitude similar to the first amplitude is applied to cause the ZnO to change from the first state to a second state substantially similar as the as-fabricated state. A third amplitude bias voltage having a same polarity to the first bias voltage and having an amplitude dissimilar to the first bias voltage is applied to cause the ZnO to change from the second state to a third state.
US08971084B2
A semiconductor memory cell includes a set of circuit structures, each having column input/output circuits. The semiconductor memory cell further includes a set of replicas corresponding to the column input/output circuits. The set of replicas are non-functional and fills an empty space next to the column input/output circuits and hence, provides context protection for the column input/output circuits.
US08971082B2
A power conditioning unit for delivering power from a power source to a mains utility supply, the power conditioning unit comprising a plurality of input terminals for connecting to the power source, a plurality of output terminals for connecting to the mains utility supply, a voltage increasing converter connected to the input terminals, a voltage reducing converter connected to the voltage increasing converter and a dc-to-ac converter connected to the voltage reducing converter and to the output terminals.
US08971080B2
A circuit arrangement includes a rectifier circuit having a first and a second load terminal, a first semiconductor device having a load path and a control terminal and a plurality of n, with n>1, second semiconductor devices, each having a load path between a first load terminal and a second load terminal and a control terminal. The second semiconductor devices have their load paths connected in series and connected in series to the load path of the first semiconductor device. The series circuit with the first semiconductor device and the second semiconductor devices are connected between the load terminals of the rectifier circuit. Each of the second semiconductor devices has its control terminal connected to the load terminal of one of the other second semiconductor devices. One of the second semiconductor devices has its control terminal connected to one of the load terminals of the first semiconductor device.
US08971079B2
An inverter device includes an inverter circuit, a control circuit, a first drive circuit, a second drive circuit, first and second photocouplers, and a signal switching part. The signal switching part directly transmits the first and second signals outputted from the first photocoupler and the second photocoupler to the corresponding first and second drive circuits respectively when at least one of the first and second signals is an OFF command.
US08971072B2
An electromagnetic connector is disclosed that is configured to form a first magnetic circuit portion comprising a first core member and a first coil disposed of the first core member. The electromagnetic connector is configured to mate with a second electromagnetic connector, where the second electromagnetic connector is configured to form a second magnetic circuit portion comprising a second core member and a second coil disposed of the second core member. The first core member and the second core member are configured to couple the first coil to the second coil with a magnetic circuit formed from the first magnetic circuit portion and the second magnetic circuit portion when the electromagnetic connector is mated with the second electromagnetic connector. The magnetic circuit is configured to induce a signal in the first coil when the second coil is energized.
US08971069B2
In one embodiment, an input capacitor balancing circuit for a power supply is provided. The circuit includes an input capacitance operable to filter input power for the power supply. The input capacitance has a first capacitor and a second capacitor coupled in series between an input voltage and a first node. A voltage divider circuit is coupled to the input voltage and operable to generate a divided voltage therefrom. A buffer circuit is operable to receive the divided voltage and, if the first capacitor and the second capacitor are not balanced, to provide current to the input capacitance to balance the first capacitor and the second capacitor.
US08971064B2
An electricity generating installation includes an electricity generation unit of a gas turbine, steam turbine or combined-cycle type, wherein the electricity generation unit is coupled to a generator and is connected to a distribution network, an energy storage unit configured to store kinetic energy and electrical energy, and a standby electricity generation unit. The installation further includes a controller configured to manage the operation of the energy storage unit and configured to manage the connection of the energy storage unit to the electricity generation unit and to the network. The controller receives a series of information originating from the network, the energy storage unit, the electricity generation unit and a network operator in order to control the generation of electricity to be delivered to the network and to auxiliary systems of the installation from the energy storage unit.
US08971058B2
A high-efficiency high step-up ratio direct current converter with an interleaved soft-switching mechanism is provided. The direct current converter includes a voltage-multiplier circuit and an active clamping circuit. The voltage-multiplier circuit includes two isolating transformers, two main switches disposed on a primary side of the two isolating transformers, four diodes disposed on a secondary side of the two isolating transformers and four capacitors disposed on the secondary side of two isolating transformers, configured to boost a voltage of a direct-current power to a desired voltage value. The active clamping circuit, electrically connected to the voltage-multiplier circuit, includes two active clamp switches and a clamp capacitor to lower a voltage surge of the two main switches so that the two main switches and the two active clamp switches can be soft switched on.
US08971055B2
A circuit breaker includes a housing, a rigid circuit board, and a flexible circuit board. The rigid circuit board is enclosed within the housing and has a main surface for supporting an electronic component. The flexible circuit board has a first end that is directly attached to an edge of the rigid circuit board.
US08971048B2
An electronics package comprising a plurality of mutually parallel, vertically spaced circuit boards of generally circular configuration and electrically connected by a flex circuit comprising a trunk extending circumferentially around the circuit boards and having a branch extending to each circuit board. An electronics package precursor structure and a method of configuring the electronics package from the precursor structure is also disclosed.
US08971046B2
A junction box is affixed to, and electrically coupled with, a solar panel. The junction box is configured to releaseably engage and disengage accessory modules, thereby allowing accessory modules to be replaced or exchanged easily. Accessory modules are electrically coupled with other accessory modules in the solar panel string. The furthest downstream accessory module is connected to a wire harness, which is connected to a central combiner box.
US08971043B2
Described embodiments include a portable electronic device. The device includes a shell housing components of the portable electronic device having a heat-generating component. The device includes a heat-rejection element located at an exterior surface of the shell. The heat-rejection element is configured to reject heat received from the heat-generating component into an environment in thermal contact with the heat-rejection element. The device includes a controllable thermal coupler configured to regulate heat transfer to the heat-rejection element. The device includes an activity monitor configured to infer a user touch to the shell in response to a detected activity of the portable electronic device. The device includes a thermal manager configured to regulate heat transfer by the controllable thermal coupler to the heat-rejection element in response to the inferred user touch.
US08971035B2
Provided is an electronic apparatus capable of reducing dependence of a connection state between a hard disc device and a connector on degree of fastening of a screw. A hard-disc-insertion opening serving as an opening through which a hard disc device is inserted into a housing is formed in a front plate portion of the housing. A connector of a circuit board is arranged facing the hard-disc-insertion opening on a back side of the hard-disc-insertion opening. A fastener for fixing the hard disc device to an electronic apparatus is inserted into the housing through a bottom plate portion of the housing.
US08971031B2
A display system includes a continuous flexible display, and two main display supports, hingeable with respect to each other and each structurally configured to support a respective portion of the flexible display. The two main display supports are rotatable in opposite directions connected to each other by a respective hinge of a hinge mechanism. The main display supports are rotatable between a configuration for fixing the flexible display in a closed storage position and a planar configuration for fixing the flexible display in an open position. The two main display supports are coupled with each other by a movement synchronizing coupling enabling during movement between the closed and open position a mutual substantially synchronized rotating of the main display supports at substantially equal but opposite angles.
US08971029B2
Embodiments of the present invention disclose a multi-display hinge assembly. According to one embodiment, the multi-display hinge assembly includes a first housing and second housing in addition to a hinge that rotatably connects the first housing with the second housing. Still further, a coupling element is configured to join an edge of the first housing with an edge of the second housing when the first housing and the second housing are placed along the same plane.
US08971018B2
The present invention discloses a new construction of ultracapacitor utilizing particles of transition metal nitride having negligible amount of halide impurities. The construction is expected to attain high specific energy density by using transition metal nitride particles and higher reliability by avoiding potential corrosion of metal components with halide impurities. The transition metal nitride particles are preferably synthesized by basic ammonothermal process, which utilizes supercritical ammonia with alkali metal mineralizers. Transition metal nitride such as vanadium nitride, molybdenum nitride, titanium nitride, nickel nitride, neodymium nitride, iron nitride, etc. can be synthesized in supercritical ammonia with reducing mineralizers such as potassium, sodium, lithium, magnesium, calcium, and aluminum. Since supercritical ammonia has characteristics of both gas and liquid, it can over complicated fine structure or fine particles. The new method is suitable for forming a protective coating on complicated structure or forming micro- to nano-sized particles.
US08971016B1
A monolithic ceramic capacitor includes an outer electrode arranged on a ceramic element body including inner electrodes, and a dielectric layer present between a pair of the inner electrodes adjacent in a stacking direction and extending to one of a pair of end surfaces of the ceramic element body that defines an inter-electrode dielectric layer. A gap extending in a direction connecting the inner electrodes sandwiching the inter-electrode dielectric layer is present in about 5% to about 90% of inter-electrode dielectric layers in the ceramic element body at a position near or adjacent to at least one of the pair of end surfaces of the ceramic element body.
US08971015B2
An electronic component includes a laminate including a plurality of insulating layers that are laminated on each other. A capacitor conductor is embedded in the laminate and includes an exposed portion exposed between the insulating layers at a predetermined surface of the laminate. An external electrode is provided on the predetermined surface by direct plating so as to cover the exposed portion. An outer edge of the external electrode is spaced away from the exposed portion by about 0.8 μm or more.
US08971012B2
The present invention relates to a variable-area capacitor for a micromechanical sensor, a micromechanical comb grid capacitor accelerometer and a micromechanical comb grid capacitor gyroscope. Among them, the variable-area capacitor structure comprises of a movable and a fixed electrodes in each capacitor unit; a front surface of aforesaid movable electrode is parallel to that of aforesaid fixed electrode; the front surface of aforesaid movable electrode is in a rectangular shape, and the front surface of the fixed electrode is in a triangular or sawteeth shape or the front surface of the movable electrode is in a triangular or sawteeth shape, and the front surface of the fixed electrode is in a rectangular form; the triangular front surface is only overlapped with one long side of aforesaid rectangular front surface. Micromechanical sensors with variable-area capacitor structures of the invention can adjust elasticity coefficient as compared with present technology.
US08971004B2
A high accuracy on-chip thermal sensor includes an integrated circuit and sensing elements. The thermal sensor finds application in various mobile and battery powered devices and includes a processor that analyzes a measured temperature signal and decides if the thermal sensor operates in low or high power operational mode, or if the device's CPU is to be reset. A method utilizing the thermal sensor includes making comparisons to two threshold temperatures and operating at low power mode below the first threshold temperature, high power mode between the two threshold temperatures and causing reset if the second threshold temperature is exceeded. Low power operational mode includes a lower clock frequency, lower bias current and lower power consumption. Higher power operational mode is used when the upper threshold temperature is being approached and includes a higher data sampling frequency and more accurate temperature control and uses higher power.
US08971001B2
In general terms, embodiments of the present invention relate to an overvoltage protection circuit. In some embodiments, the overvoltage protection circuit includes: (a) an input receiving node configured to receive an input voltage; (b) an input transmitting node; (c) an input switch formed between the input receiving node and the input transmitting node, and configured to selectively electrically connect the input receiving node to the input transmitting node based on a switch control signal, where the input switch is configured to cut off an electrical connection between the input receiving node and the input transmitting node when the switch control signal is in an inactive state (e.g., a logic low state “L”); and (d) a control signal generation block configured to sense a transmission voltage of the input transmitting node and generate the switch control signal in the inactive state when the transmission voltage rises to a reference voltage or higher.
US08970998B2
The present invention relates to compound semiconductor ESD protection devices of three types. The device comprises a multi-gate enhancement mode PET (E-PET). For the type I compound semiconductor ESD protection device, the source electrode is connected to the plural gate electrodes through at least one first resistor, and the drain electrode is connected to the plural gate electrodes through at least one second resistor. For the type II compound semiconductor ESD protection device, at least one of the plural gate electrodes are connected to at least one of the inter-gate regions between two adjacent gate electrodes through at least one fourth resistor. For the type compound semiconductor ESD protection device, the plural gate electrodes are connected to the source or drain electrodes through at least one seventh resistor. Any two gate electrodes in the three types of compound semiconductor ESD protection devices can be connected by a resistor.
US08970986B2
A magnetic head includes a main magnetic pole, a trailing shield that forms a magnetic circuit with the main magnetic pole, a spin torque oscillator that is provided between the main magnetic pole and the trailing shield, a first cooling layer that partially has a Heusler structure, and a second cooling layer that is provided on the first cooling layer and mainly comprised of silver. The first cooling layer and the second cooling layer are provided either between the main magnetic pole and spin torque oscillator or between the trailing shield and the spin torque oscillator, with either of the two cooling layers being disposed closer to the spin torque oscillator. A third cooling layer may be formed to be in contact with the first cooling layer.
US08970984B1
A spindle includes a fixed member, a hub rotatably attached to the fixed member, and a bearing between the rotatable hub and the fixed member. The bearing including a bearing lubricant. A seal reduces migration of the bearing lubricant away from the bearing. The seal includes an immobile cylindrical surface of the fixed member, and a rotatable cylindrical surface of the hub. One of these surfaces includes a plurality of grooves. The immobile cylindrical surface and the rotatable cylindrical surface are concentric about the hub rotation axis. The rotatable cylindrical surface faces and is separated from the immobile cylindrical surface by a gas-filled radial clearance of not less than 50 microns.
US08970981B2
A hard disk drive uses a second, reference burst field in a preamble to estimate burst phase and burst magnitude. Such estimations are used for position error signal integration and repeatable runout correction. Gain error is also derived from such estimations. Information contained in a preamble field is used in conjunction with the reference burst phase estimation to synchronize servo address marks.
US08970979B1
A disk drive is disclosed comprising a servo control system configured to control an actuator for actuating a head over a disk. Servo sectors are sampled at a servo sample frequency fs to generate a position error signal PES(k) that is filtered with a compensator to generate a first control signal u1(k). A first discrete-time sinusoid comprising a sinusoid frequency of fs+Δf is added to the first control signal u1(k) to generate a second control signal u2(k). The second control signal u2(k) is applied to the actuator, and a frequency response of the actuator is determined at the frequency |Δf|. The frequency response of the actuator is determined at the frequency fs+Δf based at least in part on the frequency response of the actuator at the frequency |Δf| and a measured signal of the servo control system when applying the second control signal u2(k) to the actuator.
US08970977B1
A disk drive is disclosed comprising a head actuated over a disk, a spindle motor operable to rotate the disk, and a ramp near an outer periphery of the disk. When an emergency condition is detected, the head is unloaded onto the ramp, and failure analysis data identifying a cause of the emergency condition is logged.
US08970974B2
A lens adapter is provided, comprising a cylindrical base, one end of the base is provided with a first mounting seat for connecting with a lens and a manual aperture controlling ring sheathed on the base, the other end of the base is provided with a second mounting seat for connecting with a camera. The lens adapter also comprises an adjusting mechanism connected to a lens aperture controlling rod and the manual aperture controlling ring. The manual aperture controlling ring is adjusted by the adjusting mechanism to make the rotation angle of the manual aperture controlling ring linearly proportional to the size variation of the lens aperture. The lens adapter allows the rotation angle of the manual aperture controlling ring linearly proportional to the size variation of the lens aperture in a manner of synchronously changing, thus facilitating the user to control the lens aperture.
US08970973B2
A lens actuating device includes a fixed member, an adjustable member, a driving unit and a movable support unit. The adjustable member is movably disposed in the fixed member along an optical axis, and has a lens module disposed therein. The driving unit is disposed between the fixed member and the adjustable member to provide a driving force for the adjustable member. The movable support unit is disposed at one side of the adjustable member opposite to the driving unit and has a first guiding structure formed on an inner side of the fixed member parallel to the optical axis, a second guiding structure, and a plurality of rolling members. The rolling members are configured into two rows and are disposed between the first and second guiding structures to fix the seconding guiding structure such that the displacement of the adjustable member is constrained along the optical axis.
US08970972B2
A camera lens is formed with a casing and a lens stack having at least one lens element, the lens stack arranged within the casing. A spring arrangement is pre-compressed to exert a clamping force between the casing and the lens stark basically in a direction of an optical axis of the at least one lens element.
US08970969B2
An image lens, in the order from the object side to the image side thereof, includes a first lens including a first surface and a second surface, a second lens including a third surface and a fourth surface, a third lens including a fifth surface and a sixth surface, a fourth lens including a seventh surface and a eighth surface, a fifth lens including a ninth surface and a tenth surface, and an image plane. The image lens satisfies the following formulas: (1) D/TTL>0.94; (2) D/L>1.21; wherein D is the maximum image diameter of the image plane; TTL is a total length of the image lens, and L is a distance from an outmost edge of the tenth surface to an optical axis of the image lens along a direction perpendicular to the optical axis.
US08970967B2
The zoom lens includes, in order from an object side to an image side, a first lens unit having a negative refractive power, a rear unit including one or more lens units, a distance between every adjacent lens units varies during zooming, and an aperture diaphragm on the image side of the first lens unit, a combined focal length of the rear unit at a wide-angle end being positive. One lens unit LG on the object side of the aperture diaphragm is made of a solid material, and includes an optical element GnNL having a negative refractive power and another optical element having a positive refractive power, and the predetermined conditions are satisfied.
US08970964B2
A projection objective lens system includes from an object plane to an image plane: a first lens group (S1) with a positive refractive power; a second lens group (S2) with a negative refractive power; a third lens group (S3) with a positive refractive power; a fourth lens group (S4) with a negative refractive power; and a fifth lens group (S5) with a positive refractive power being divided into two sub-lens groups. An aperture stop (AS) is provided between the two sub-lens groups. The following conditions are met: 0.12<|L/f|<0.4, and ΔR/R<1%, wherein, f is an effective focal length of the system, L is a distance between the object and image planes, ΔR represents a difference between radii at the aperture stop of a marginal field beam bundle and a central field beam bundle, and R represents a radius at the aperture stop of a central field beam bundle.
US08970961B2
A multifunction optical element including an image generating module that generates an image, and couples the image into a multifunction glass that has a coupling in area and a coupling out area. The image produced is coupled into the multifunction glass via the coupling in area, guided in the multifunction glass to the coupling in area, and coupled out via the coupling out area, in such a way that the user can perceive the coupled out image superimposed on the surroundings when the holding device is placed on the head of the user. The coupling out area has a Fresnel structure which receives light from the coupling-in-area via a folded beam path and couples the image out of the multifunction optical element. The coupling out element has an imaging property.
US08970949B2
An optical body includes a first optical layer having a concave-convex surface, a wavelength-selective reflecting layer formed on the concave-convex surface, and a second optical layer formed on the wavelength-selective reflecting layer to embed the concave-convex surface, the wavelength-selective reflecting layer having a multilayer structure formed by successively stacking at least a first high refractive index layer, a metal layer, and a second high refractive index layer, wherein, given that optical film thicknesses of the first high refractive index layer and the second high refractive index layer are x and y, respectively, and a geometrical film thickness of the metal layer is z, x, y and z satisfy the following formula (1): z ≤ 12.1 exp { - 1 2 ( x - 120 145.17 ) 2 - 1 2 ( y - 120 123.14 ) 2 } ( 1 )
US08970948B2
Disclosed are systems and methods for using a semiconductor optical amplifier (SOA) as an optical modulator for pulsed signals. In accordance with the principles of the invention, the SOA can be biased with a negative voltage to suppress transmission and improve modulator extinction and biased with a positive pulsed signal with sufficient amplitude to forward bias the amplifier (SOA), both transmitting the carrier and increasing its amplitude by means of a gain provided by the SOA under forward biased conditions. In addition, the forward bias voltage may be selected to compensate for losses within the SOA.
US08970947B2
Embodiments of auto-cladded optical fibers are described. The fibers may have a refractive index profile having a small relative refractive index change. For example, the fiber may include an auto-cladded structure having, e.g., a trough or gradient in the refractive index profile. A beam of light propagating in the fiber may be guided, at least in part, with the auto-cladded structure. In some embodiments, the optical fiber may be all glass. In some embodiments, the optical fiber may include a large-core or an ultra large-core.
US08970946B2
An optical signal processing apparatus includes an input unit to which signal light is input; a wave coupling unit that couples the signal light from the input unit and pump light having a waveform different from that of the signal light; a first nonlinear optical medium that transmits light coupled by the wave coupling unit, the light being the signal light and the pump light; a dispersion medium that transmits the light that has been transmitted through the first nonlinear optical medium; and a second nonlinear optical medium that transmits the light that has been transmitted through the dispersion medium.
US08970937B2
Disclosed herein are novel electrochromic materials. The electrochromic materials produce various colors. The electrochromic materials can be used to form red electrochromic layers in a simple manner. Therefore, the electrochromic materials are suitable for use in the fabrication of RGB full-color electrochromic devices. Also disclosed herein are electrochromic devices fabricated using the electrochromic materials.
US08970925B2
A scanner for automatically detecting a scan target includes a transparent scan region configured to support the target, an image sensor including a light source for irradiating light toward the scan region and a light receiving element array for sensing the incident light through the scan region, a drive unit configured to linearly move the sensor across the scan region, and a control unit that controls the sensor and the drive unit. The control unit controls the light source of the sensor and the drive unit such that the sensor moves to a detection position and then the array senses the incident light through the scan region with the light source turned on and off. The control unit compares output signals of the array obtained by turning on and off the light source and automatically determines, based on the comparison, whether the target is placed in the scan region.
US08970923B2
A scanning device has a controller which is configured to judge whether the scanning device is to be operated in a conveyed sheet scanning mode in which the controller controls a conveying unit to convey a sheet and control the scanning unit to scan images on the sheet being conveyed, or in a held sheet scanning mode in which the sheet stationarily held by a sheet table is scanned, to display functions related to the conveyed sheet scanning mode on a display unit in a first prioritized manner when the controller judges that the scanning device is to be operated in the conveyed sheet scanning mode, and to display functions related to the held sheet scanning mode on the display unit in a second prioritized manner when the controller judges that the scanning device is to be operated in the held sheet scanning mode.
US08970922B2
An image forming apparatus, comprising: a housing; an image formation unit configured to form an image on a recording medium; a stacking tray configured such that the recording medium on which an image has been formed by the image formation unit is stacked; a discharge unit configured to discharge, to the stacking tray, the recording medium on which an image has been formed by the image formation unit; and a reading device comprising a reading unit configured to read out an image formed on a document and a reversing unit configured to reverse a conveying direction of the document, and wherein the reading device is disposed on a lower side in a vertical direction with respect to the stacking tray and on a downstream side in a discharging direction of the recording medium discharged from the discharge unit with respect to the discharge unit.
US08970918B2
A document management system including a two dimensional code region detection portion that detects a two dimensional code region included in image data, obtained by scanning a document to be managed; a two dimensional code decoding portion that decodes document management information included in the two dimensional code; a layout analysis portion that analyzes a layout of the document; a low resolution portion that obtains data in which a background image becomes low resolution; a two dimensional code character and background processing portion that changes the content of the document; a two dimensional code character encoding portion that encodes the two dimensional code; a background encoding portion that encodes data of the background image; a document filing portion that generates a document file; and a file management portion that adds document management information, decoded by the two dimensional decoding portion, to the document file formed by the document filing portion.
US08970902B2
A VDP workflow system and method are disclosed. The system includes an image memory to store a photograph image. The system also includes a VDP document tool to access the photograph image from the image memory and to generate a VDP document comprising the photograph image. The system further includes a red-eye removal tool to process the VDP document to discover red-eye artifacts and to remove the red-eye artifacts from the photograph image on the VDP document based on a programmable red-eye sensitivity value.
US08970897B2
An image processing apparatus and an image processing method are provided for allowing a user to achieve a desired image quality while controlling toner consumptions. An amount of toner reduced is calculated based on a set toner reduction rate. For objects other than an object specified as an excluded object to which toner reduction is not applied, a toner reduction rate for achieving the calculated amount of toner saved is calculated.
US08970896B1
A method comprising using at least one hardware processor for: analyzing text in a digital document, to identify a text segment referring to a figure of the digital document; mapping said text segment to said figure; identifying, in said text segment, reference to one or more non-grayscale colors of said figure, to determine a level of importance of said one or more colors to legibility of said figure; and printing said digital document in accordance with the level of importance.
US08970892B2
Disclosed is a memory control device, including: an address mapping unit configured to assign a main scanning address and a sub-scanning address to a column address, a row address and a bank address of an SDRAM, to assign lower N bit(s) (N is a positive integer) for indicating an address corresponding to a burst size of a burst transfer among the main scanning address, to lower bit(s) of the column address, and to assign predetermined number of bit(s) arranged successively to an upper bit side of the lower N bit(s) among the main scanning address, to the bank address; and an access executing unit configured to read or write one line of image data in the main scanning direction by carrying out the burst transfer successively multiple times in a multibank operation while the sub-scanning address is changed at an end of the burst transfer.
US08970888B2
An image processing system includes an image capturing apparatus and a server apparatus. The image capturing apparatus includes: an image capturing unit that captures an image of a printout produced by printing print data; an extracting unit that extracts identification information by decoding encoded information extracted from the captured image; a transmitting unit that transmits the extracted identification information to the server apparatus, and a display control unit that causes a display unit to display the captured image and related information transmitted from the server apparatus. The server apparatus includes: an identifying unit that identifies the print data stored in the storage unit in a manner associated with the identification information received from the image capturing apparatus; and a transmitting unit that transmits the related information related to the identified print data to the image capturing apparatus.
US08970887B2
An image forming system includes an image forming apparatus and an external terminal. The image forming apparatus generates first display data for a first operation screen that includes a key image for receiving an instruction to execute an external terminal program, on the basis of program information regarding the types of external terminal programs that are programs installed in the external terminal, and transmits the first display data to the external terminal. The external terminal displays the first operation screen on a display unit of the external terminal on the basis of the first display data.
US08970886B2
A write operation supporting apparatus 1 includes a camera 3 that images a placed document 10 as a reading target within an imaging area 6 and a projector 4 that displays information toward the imaging area 6. A control device 5 of the write operation supporting apparatus 1 displays, by the projector 4, operation supporting information for supporting an information writing operation using the document 10 toward the imaging area 6, based on positional information of the document 10 on the imaging area 6 acquired by the camera 3, with relative position relation with the medium 10 on the imaging area 6 maintained.
US08970882B2
Instead of receiving all pieces of job information accumulated in a server, some pieces of job information are acquired in addition to a total number of pieces of job information, and pieces of job information which can be displayed on one screen, and the latest information is acquired from the server as a scroll operation is performed.
US08970878B2
Apparatuses, systems and methods are provided for reducing consumption of paper and other resources in connection with printing, copying, etc, by converting a document suitable for combined-page print, to a combined-page output, even when the user has not specified combined-page output.
US08970877B2
An electronic message is received from a sender having a destination address indicative of a request to print data included in the message. A printer is determined to fulfill the request based at least in part on the sender address and a printer characteristic. The data to be printed is sent to the printer for fulfillment of the request.
US08970869B2
An image forming apparatus which logs into an external webmail server by using a web browser included in the image forming apparatus, the webmail is written on a webpage of the webmail server, a file to be attached to the webmail is selected, and the selected file is attached to the webmail so as to send the webmail to the webmail server.
US08970854B2
A document management system includes a storage section, a reference electronic manuscript acquisition section, an edit part identification section and a document editing processing section. The storage section stores at least one of an electronic manuscript and an electronic document generated by combining plural electronic manuscripts. The reference electronic manuscript acquisition section acquires a reference electronic manuscript used for identifying a reference position of an edit part in an edit electronic document that is an electronic document to be edited and is read from the storage section. The edit part identification section identifies the edit part in the edit electronic document based on the reference electronic manuscript. The document editing processing section performs editing processing for the edit part identified by the edit part identification section, in units of electronic manuscripts.
US08970852B2
A laser projector for chassis alignment has a laser light source emitting a laser light beam, an optical element which generates a structured laser light pattern when it is irradiated by the laser light beam, a detector which is situated in such a way that it is irradiated by a sub-area of the structured laser light pattern and generates an output signal which is correlated with the radiation, and an evaluation unit which compares the output signal generated by the detector with at least one predefined setpoint value and turns off the laser light source if it detects a significant deviation of the output signal from the setpoint value.
US08970849B2
This invention realizes accurate positional offset correction between a plurality of tomograms captured by using a tomography apparatus. The invention is a tomography apparatus which corrects the positional offsets between a plurality of two-dimensional tomograms constituting a three-dimensional tomogram. This apparatus includes a tomogram analysis unit (120) which extracts feature amounts representing the tissue of a measurement target, a tomogram selection unit (140) which selects a standard two-dimensional tomogram from the plurality of two-dimensional tomograms based on the feature amounts, and a tomogram position correction unit (150) which calculates the positional offset amount between the nth two-dimensional tomogram adjacent to the standard two-dimensional tomogram and the (n−1)th two-dimensional tomogram.
US08970848B2
A motion detector 220 calculates the Doppler frequency shift amount based on the movement velocity of an eye E. A drive controller 230 calculates the modulation frequency of the intensity of output light M based on this Doppler frequency shift amount. A light source unit 201 outputs the light M in which the intensity is modulated with this modulation frequency. The light M is divided into a signal light S and a reference light R. Interference light L is generated by superimposing the signal light S passing through the eye E and the reference light R. Two polarized components of the interference light L have a phase difference of 180°, resulting from a quarter-wave plate 207. The polarized components L1, L2 which are divided by a polarization beam splitter 211 are detected by CCD 212, 213. A computer 250 forms a tomographical image based on these detection results.
US08970841B2
An Advanced Laser Fluorometer (ALF) can combine spectrally and temporally resolved measurements of laser-stimulated emission (LSE) for characterization of dissolved and particulate matter, including fluorescence constituents, in liquids. Spectral deconvolution (SDC) analysis of LSE spectral measurements can accurately retrieve information about individual fluorescent bands, such as can be attributed to chlorophyll-a (Chl-a), phycobiliprotein (PBP) pigments, or chromophoric dissolved organic matter (CDOM), among others. Improved physiological assessments of photosynthesizing organisms can use SDC analysis and temporal LSE measurements to assess variable fluorescence corrected for SDC-retrieved background fluorescence. Fluorescence assessments of Chl-a concentration based on LSE spectral measurements can be improved using photo-physiological information from temporal measurements. Quantitative assessments of PBP pigments, CDOM, and other fluorescent constituents, as well as basic structural characterizations of photosynthesizing populations, can be performed using SDC analysis of LSE spectral measurements.
US08970839B2
A detection device includes an optical device, a suction section adapted to suck the fluid sample in the optical device, a light source adapted to irradiate the optical device with light, a light detection section adapted to detect light emitted from the optical device, and a control section adapted to perform drive control on the suction section. The optical device emits light reflecting the fluid sample to be adsorbed. The control section sets a suction flow velocity of the fluid sample on the optical device to V1 in a first mode including a period of performing detection by the light detection section, sets the suction flow velocity of the fluid sample on the optical device to V2 (V2>V1) in a second mode, and switches between the first mode and the second mode based on a signal from the light detection section.
US08970836B2
An invention being applied is a defect detecting apparatus that has: an illuminating optical system with a laser light source for irradiating a sample on whose surface a pattern is formed with light; a detecting optical system with a sensor for detecting light generated from the sample illuminated by the illuminating optical system; and a signal processing unit that extracts a defect from an image based on the light detected by the detecting optical system, in which an amplification rate of the sensor is dynamically changed during a time when the light is detected by the detecting optical system.
US08970818B2
A lithographic apparatus includes a substrate table constructed to hold a substrate, and a projection system configured to project a patterned radiation beam onto a target portion of the substrate. A surface of a component of the lithographic apparatus that is in a vacuum environment in use is provided with a repeating structure configured to increase the effective thermal accommodation coefficient of the surface.
US08970814B2
The present invention provides a liquid crystal display device and a manufacturing method thereof. The liquid crystal display device includes a TFT substrate, a CF substrate opposite to and parallel with the TFT substrate, liquid crystal interposed between the TFT substrate and the CF substrate, spacers arranged between the TFT substrate and the CF substrate, and an enclosing resin frame arranged between the TFT substrate and the CF substrate and located along edges of the TFT substrate and the CF substrate. The TFT substrate and the CF substrate have inside surfaces that oppose the liquid crystal and are both provided with alignment layers. The alignment layers include flexible alignment films, which are in the form of thin membranes and are positioned on the inside surfaces of the TFT substrate and the CF substrate by being stuck thereto.
US08970803B2
The present invention provides a slim bezel liquid crystal display device, which includes a rear enclosure, a front enclosure mating the rear enclosure, and a liquid crystal display module arranged inside the rear enclosure. The rear enclosure forms a retention plate. The retention plate functions to retain a lower end of the liquid crystal display module so as to fix the liquid crystal display module in the rear enclosure. The slim bezel liquid crystal display device uses an inverted L-shaped retention plate mounted at a lower end portion of a rear enclosure to retain a liquid crystal display module in position so as to fix the liquid crystal display module in the rear enclosure. The structure is simple and assembling is easy so as to effectively achieve bezel slimming and device thinning of a liquid crystal display device.
US08970799B2
A liquid crystal display device includes a pair of transparent substrates facing each other through a liquid crystal layer disposed therebetween; a gate insulating film formed so as to cover a gate electrode formed in the pixel regions, disposed closer to the liquid crystal layer, of one of the transparent substrates; a semiconductor film provided on the gate insulating film, for forming a thin-film transistor; a first electrode provided on the semiconductor film through the first insulating film and the second insulating film; a second electrode provided on the first electrode through a third insulating film; and a contact hole formed collectively in the first insulating film, the second insulating film, and the third insulating film on the first electrode, where a second electrode is formed on the contact hole. A floating electrode is formed in the peripheral region of the contact hole.
US08970796B2
Apparatuses and methods of field-line repeater structures for sense arrays are described. One apparatus includes a substrate, a capacitive-sense array with electrodes disposed on one or more sides of the substrate in one or more layers and a protective cover layer disposed to cover the capacitive-sense array. A coating film is disposed over the protective cover layer and a field-line repeater (FLR) structure of floating electrodes is disposed between the coating film and the protective cover layer.
US08970793B2
This display device (100) includes a display panel (2) including a substrate mounting member (5) covering a backlight source (4b) and a cover member (6) arranged to partially cover the rear surface of the substrate mounting member and to expose a region in the periphery of at least an outer peripheral portion (51) of the rear surface of the substrate mounting member. The substrate mounting member has a side surface portion (51a, 51b, 51c, 51d), while a corner portion (51e, 51f, 51g, 51h) of the outer peripheral portion formed by the side surface portion of the substrate mounting member has such a shape that adjacent ones of the side surface portion are bonded to each other without a clearance.
US08970791B2
Provided a circuit board including an input terminal to which a high-frequency signal is input, a high-frequency amplifier for amplifying the high-frequency signal input to the input terminal, at least one distributor distributing the high-frequency signal, a plurality of high-frequency processing circuits of which transmission path lengths for inputting each of the high-frequency signals distributed by the distributor into signal inputting sections of the plurality of high-frequency processing circuits are different from one another, and a plurality of attenuating devices which are mounted at previous stages of each of the plurality of high-frequency processing circuits and possess amounts of attenuation which increase with decrease of the transmission path lengths.
US08970789B2
There is provided a receiving apparatus. The receiving apparatus comprises, among other things, a transmitting unit that transmits a power-on command that instructs the transmitting apparatus detected by the detecting unit to turn on power when there is no connecting unit whose status signal has been changed from “unable” to “able” as a result of the determination made by the determining unit, the transmitting unit causing the determining unit to perform the determination again after transmitting the power-on command, and a control unit that, when there is a connecting unit whose status signal has been changed from “unable” to “able” as a result of the determination made by the determining unit, controls the selecting unit so as to select the connecting unit.
US08970788B2
A gain-determining method for grayscale white balance of a display apparatus comprising a panel is provided. The method first displays a white, a red, a green, and a blue images on the panel respectively and measures the chromatic values and luminance of the images. Next, the chromatic values and luminance of a target white image is inputted. Following, according to the measured chromatic values and luminance of the white, the red, the green and the blue images, a first set of color mixture ratios is calculated. Then, according to the chromatic values and luminance of the target white image and the chromatic values and luminance of the red, the green and the blue images, a second set of color mixture ratios is calculated. Finally, according to the first set and the second set of color mixture ratios, a red gain, a green gain and a blue gain are calculated.
US08970787B2
Disclosed are an image quality improvement device and method. The image quality improvement device includes a filter which separates an input video signal into a luminance signal and a chrominance signal, and a noise reduction unit which detects a motion in the input video signal by using the luminance signal separated by the filter, and thereby performing different filtering operations according to the existence of the motion.
US08970784B2
There is provided a driving apparatus which includes an acquisition section which acquires a parameter for driving an imaging element, which receives an optical image from a subject and outputs an imaging image as an electric signal, in an action mode which is desired by a user; a timing generation section which generates respective timings of the starting of each of a plurality of horizontal synchronization periods, where horizontal synchronization periods which are only different in terms of the number of clocks determined in advance are acquired in a mixed state, based on the parameter; and a driving control section which receives the optical image from the subject for each line which configures the imaging element by synchronizing the respective timings which are generated using the timing generation section.
US08970763B2
An image pickup apparatus which is capable of displaying a shooting azimuth for a user such that it can be intuitively understood with ease while keeping the amount of computations required to display a shooting azimuth small. When a though-the-lens image or a moving image from an image pickup sensor, which shoots a subject, is displayed on a TFT display, a shooting azimuth is displayed by a first azimuth display method based on shooting azimuth information, and when a though-the-lens image or a moving image from the image pickup sensor is not displayed on the TFT display, the shooting azimuth is displayed based on the shooting azimuth information by a second azimuth display method different from the first azimuth display method.
US08970758B2
An image pickup device is provided, capable of complete correction with data of once analog-to-digital conversion, and prevention of excess use of switches and analog devices and/or erroneous correction, including: an image sensor having a plurality of analog-to-digital converters determining conversion results from a digital signal of higher order bit through separate steps of two or more times; a first correction unit which has a correction factor for correcting nonlinear errors of the plurality of analog-to-digital converters so as to adapt to the analog-to-digital converters and corrects a nonlinear error of a digital signal output from respective analog-to-digital converters based on a correction factor corresponding to respective analog-to-digital converters, characterized in that the first correction unit corrects the nonlinear errors after converting the digital signals from the plurality of analog-to-digital converters into a serial output.
US08970756B2
A solid-state imaging apparatus includes a pixel array in which a plurality of pixels are arranged, wherein the pixel array has a region formed from one of an electrical conductor and a semiconductor to which a fixed electric potential is supplied, each pixel includes a photoelectric converter, a charge-voltage converter which converts charges generated by the photoelectric converter into a voltage, and an amplification unit which amplifies a signal generated by the charge-voltage converter by a positive gain and outputs the amplified signal to an output line, and the output line comprising a shielding portion arranged to shield at least part of the charge-voltage converter with respect to the region.
US08970755B2
The present invention may suppress feedthrough components in video imaging. Namely, TFT driving waveforms are plurally overlapped, and an integration period of capacitors C of amplification circuits is set so as to encompass a generation period of a feedthrough component (OFF), a generation period of a feedthrough component (ON), and a period in which charges (a signal component) are read out from storage capacitors of pixels by ON states of the TFTs. A number of driving waveforms to be overlapped is determined in accordance with a frame rate, the integration period and a reset period, or the like.
US08970747B2
In a color filter array of a color imaging element 26, a G filter 34G to which other G filters 34G are adjacent in horizontal and vertical directions and a G filter 34G to which another G filter 34G is not adjacent are determined as dense and sparse G filters, respectively. Defective information on a sparse G defective pixel corresponding to the sparse G filter is more preferentially registered than defective information on a dense G defective pixel corresponding to the dense G filter. Thereby, interpolation processing for a pixel value of the sparse G defective pixel is more preferentially performed than interpolation processing for a pixel value of the dense G defective pixel.
US08970735B2
A capturing device includes: an image sensor generating an image signal; a storage unit setting a second region in a first region; a timing adjusting unit adjusting a timing at which the image signal is read out to write the image signal in the storage unit, and a timing at which the image signal is read out from the storage unit; an image conversion processing unit performing a predetermined process on the image, alternately writing a first image signal corresponding to a full image or a second image signal corresponding to a partial image in the first region in a different frame period, and writing an image signal that is different from the image signal written in the first region in the second region; and an output unit converting and outputting the first and second image signals into an image signal in a predetermined format.
US08970723B2
An image processing device includes: an extractor configured to extract a region of interest which satisfies a specified condition from a first image frame; a size decision unit configured to decide an image size according to a size of the region of interest extracted by the extractor; and an image converter configured to change the size of an image frame to be processed according to the image size decided by the size decision unit to generate a transformed image frame. The extractor extracts a region of interest which satisfies the specified condition from the transformed image frame.
US08970722B2
An image processing apparatus such as a digital camera and a method of controlling the same is provided. In one embodiment, the digital camera generates an HDR image by combining two of a plurality of images to be combined for normal HDR processing. Before image combining operation, the digital camera converts the tone characteristics of at least one of the two images so as to assign more tone values to a tone area of an entire tone area of the HDR image which is not properly covered by either of the two images than before conversion.
US08970721B2
An image capture device includes: an array of pixels 200 including a plurality of pixels 20 which are arranged two-dimensionally on an imaging area; a pixel signal reading section 30 for reading a pixel signal from each pixel 20; and an image generating section 32 for generating an image based on the pixel signals having been read by the pixel signal reading section 30. The array of pixels is divided into M unit pixel blocks 40 (where M is an integer of 2 or more) each containing N pixels (where N is an integer of 2 or more). The pixel signal reading section reads the pixel signals from the N pixels 20 contained in each unit pixel block 40 at every time interval T, with respectively different timings.
US08970718B2
An image capture accelerator performs accelerated processing of image data. In one embodiment, the image capture accelerator includes accelerator circuitry including a pre-processing engine and a compression engine. The pre-processing engine is configured to perform accelerated processing on received image data, and the compression engine is configured to compress processed image data received from the pre-processing engine. In one embodiment, the image capture accelerator further includes a demultiplexer configured to receive image data captured by an image sensor array implemented within, for example, an image sensor chip. The demultiplexer may output the received image data to an image signal processor when the image data is captured by the image sensor array in a standard capture mode, and may output the received image data to the accelerator circuitry when the image data is captured by the image sensor array in an accelerated capture mode.
US08970710B2
A method and apparatus for measuring the quality of a video is provided. The method comprises: generating a frame loss pattern of the video by indicating whether each frame in the video is lost or successfully transmitted; and evaluating the quality of the video as a function of the generated t came loss pattern.
US08970708B2
An alignment suite includes first and second targeting devices and an optical coupler. The first targeting device is configured to perform a positional determination regarding a downrange target. The first targeting device includes an image processor. The second targeting device is configured to perform a targeting function relative to the downrange target and is affixable to the first targeting device. The optical coupler enables the image processor to capture an image of a reference object at the second targeting device responsive to the first and second targeting devices being affixed together. The image processor employs processing circuitry that determines pose information indicative of an alignment relationship between the first and second targeting devices relative to the downrange target based on the image captured.
US08970700B2
An imaging apparatus includes: an electronic circuit unit (30) including an imaging device (31) to acquire an object image formed by an imaging optical system (20); and a housing member (13) housing the electronic circuit unit (30). The electronic circuit unit (30) includes a thermally-conductive heat transfer member (37) in contact with an outer peripheral surface thereof which is in parallel with a fitting direction of the electronic circuit unit (30) into the housing member (13). The heat transfer member (37) includes a soft material portion (37b) in contact with the outer peripheral surface of the electronic circuit unit (37), and a plate portion (37a) in contact with the soft material portion (37b) and an inner peripheral wall surface of the housing member (13). The soft material portion (37b) is made of a shape-conformable member.
US08970698B2
The invention relates to a surveillance/monitoring system, comprising one or more peripheral devices for generating surveillance/monitoring signals and/or data, and a management system for controlling the peripheral devices. The management system comprises one or more applications, wherein each application is provided with an application-specific environment. The surveillance/monitoring system further comprises at least one value-added solution, each value-added solution comprising an external component and an application-independent adaption layer through which the external component communicates with the application-specific environment by implementing at least one first interaction request to the adaption layer according to a pre-defined application- independent interaction interface. The application-specific environment is configured to mediate at least one interaction between the value-added solution and the surveillance/monitoring system by matching the at least one first interaction request with at least one second interaction request from the surveillance/monitoring system and fulfilling the interaction if a match is found.
US08970694B2
A video processing system may include a display, at least one geospatial database, and a video processor. The video processor may cooperate with the display and the at least one geospatial database and be configured to display a georeferenced video feed on the display and defining a viewable area, and to overlay selected geospatially-tagged metadata onto the viewable area and relating to a geolocation outside the viewable area.
US08970677B2
A system for the vergence of images from a plurality of cameras, the system provides a first camera; a second camera disposed at some distance from that first camera; a focus adjustment whereby the focus of the first camera can be adjusted by a user; the focus adjustment being configured with a range finder whereby the distance from the first camera to a target is ascertained; a look up chart wherein divergence distance of images generated from the first camera from images of the second camera are provided for pre-calculated ranges; and a processor whereby the images generated by the first camera are superimposed on the images generated by the second camera by the divergence distance determined from the lookup.
US08970666B2
Systems and methods for low-scale and low-cost production of events. The system having a plurality of video cameras, each of the video cameras capturing a video stream, a video processing server receiving the video streams from the video cameras and generating a panoramic video stream from the video streams and a video production server selecting a region of interest based on a selection received from a user and generating a video broadcast including the region of interest, the region of interest being a portion of the panoramic video stream.
US08970664B2
A method of operating a display with gaps in between the pixels, a primarily transparent backlight and a camera is disclosed. In an embodiment, the method comprises capturing an image in the camera through the primarily transparent backlight and gaps in between the pixels of the transmissive display during a capture period, not capturing an image in the camera during the display period and making the gaps in between the pixels of the transmissive display opaque during the display period.
US08970661B2
Methods and systems for routing video in conferencing are disclosed. A device receives one or more data streams from a media source, where each data stream associated with a data stream identifier. A media source identifier is assigned to each data stream from the media source. The data stream identifiers are mapped to the media source identifiers. At least one of the data streams may be modified by replacing an associated data stream identifier with the media source identifier. The modified data streams are provided to a destination device. A request is received from a destination device for data streams associated with a media source identifier. One or more data stream identifiers are associated with the requested media source identifier. The one or more data streams may be associated with Application sharing/Desktop Sharing, a video quality, a video resolution, a video frame rate, or an audio quality.
US08970655B2
A videoconferencing unit for enhancing direct eye-contact between participants can include a curved fully reflective mirror to reflect the image of the near end to a camera. The curved mirror can be placed in front of the display screen near a location where images of faces/eyes of far end participants are to appear. In another example, the videoconferencing unit can include a disintegrated camera configuration that provides an air gap between a front lens element and a rear lens element. The front lens element can be located behind an aperture within the display screen. The air gap can provide an unobstructed path to light from projectors and therefore avoid any undesirable shadows from appearing on the display screen. In another example, the videoconferencing unit can include a combination of the disintegrated camera configuration and mirrors for providing direct eye contact videoconferencing.
US08970650B2
An image forming apparatus is provided that reduces main scanning jitter with a simple configuration and performs light amount control with high accuracy. The image forming apparatus includes: a laser emitting luminous flux; a main-scanning aperture portion shaping the luminous flux; a beam splitter splitting the luminous flux passed through the main-scanning aperture portion into a reflected beam and a transmitted beam; a rotary polygon mirror deflecting the transmitted beam so that the transmitted beam scans the surface of a photosensitive drum; and an optical box in which the laser, the main-scanning aperture portion, the beam splitter and the rotary polygon mirror are disposed. The main-scanning aperture portion is disposed so as not to block a deflected and transmitted beam. The beam splitter abuts against the main-scanning aperture portion so as not to block a deflected and transmitted beam deflected, and is positioned by abutting against the main-scanning aperture portion.
US08970643B2
A light emission control method controls a display that includes a display portion, a scanning portion, and a driving portion. The display portion includes light emitting elements in a matrix form. The scanning portion is connected to common lines. Each common line is connected to the anode terminals of corresponding elements in corresponding row so that the common lines are scanned. The driving portion is connected to driving lines. Each driving line is connected to the cathodes terminals of corresponding elements in a corresponding column. The driving portion can drive selected elements when the common line corresponding to the selected elements is scanned. The method displays an image in each cycle including frames. All common lines are scanned in each frame. A part of the rows in one frame in one cycle is/are driven. Other part is driven in a frame after the one frame in the one cycle.
US08970642B2
In one aspect, the display device includes a display unit including a plurality of pixels connected to scan lines, light emission control lines, and data lines, where each pixel is configured to emit light with a driving current corresponding to image data signals transmitted through the data lines based on light emission control signals transmitted through the light emission control lines. Each of the pixels includes subpixels, each configured to display one of a plurality of colors. The device also includes a controller configured to convert external video signals to image data signals, output the converted signals to a data driver, generate light emission driving control signals for controlling the light emission duty ratio of the light emission control signals, and calculate the pixel-on-ratio for each subpixel to reduce the driving current.
US08970640B2
The present invention provides a drive method for an electronic paper display. The method comprises to display a present image. Then, color data of pixels of the present image is gathered. The color data is compared to select one of a first color and a second color to be as a main color. Finally, a refresh image is displayed in the electronic paper display following the present image based on the main color.
US08970639B2
A two-stage digital-to-analog converter for outputting an analog voltage in response to a M-bit digital input code includes a one-bit serial charge redistribution digital-to-analog converter having a high reference voltage input node for receiving a high reference voltage and a low reference voltage input node for receiving a low reference voltage. A voltage selector sets the high reference voltage and low reference voltage to selected levels depending on at least a portion of the M-bit digital input code.
US08970638B2
A low-resolution image is displayed at higher resolution and afterimages are reduced. Resolution is made higher by super-resolution processing. In this case, the super-resolution processing is performed after frame interpolation processing is performed. Further, in that case, the super-resolution processing is performed using a plurality of processing systems. Therefore, even when frame frequency is made higher, the super-resolution processing can be performed at high speed. Further, since frame rate doubling is performed by the frame interpolation processing, afterimages can be reduced.
US08970631B2
A signal discriminating and monitoring circuit provides a full black detection circuit which detects a full black signal input during the change of the video signal and holds the detection result of the full black signal only during the specified time period. When a full black video signal is detected in the full black detection circuit, the signal discriminating and monitoring circuit detects whether the resolution of the video signal input has changed by determining whether the frequency of the horizontal synchronization signal included in the video signal of the next frame to be input changed above a preset value. When a change in the resolution of the video signal is detected, the change detected signal indicates that the detection result is output. When a scalar circuit receives the change detected signal, the video display signal is output as a constant value in order to set the display video in the static state.
US08970627B2
A method and an apparatus for setting a navigation screen update cycle in a mobile terminal are provided. In the method, at least one of a velocity of the mobile terminal and a map scale used by the mobile terminal is obtained. A screen update cycle is set with consideration of the at least one of the velocity and the map scale. A navigation screen display is updated according to the set screen update cycle.
US08970614B2
[Problem] The present invention provides an apparatus and a method, which can reduce required memory, for obtaining blur image in computer graphics.[Method of solution] The present invention performs processing leaving only the calculation results of the necessary column to obtain blur image without full memory of the SAT table. As a result, the present invention provides an apparatus and a method, which can reduce required memory, for obtaining blur image in computer graphics.
US08970604B2
A state display device capable of reducing a processing load applied to a microcomputer by performing part of a GUI process by hardware and a display method of the state display device are obtained. A rendering processing device starts a process in response to a rendering request stored in a rendering request region when a starting command is stored in a start/end instruction register. When a rendering request specified by an instruction address is a rendering termination request, the rendering processing means terminates the process performed in response to the rendering request, stores a termination factor in an interruption factor register, and issues an interruption to a central processing device.
US08970601B1
An animation sequence is generated, transmitted, and/or presented to a user. The animation sequence may depict a first object that moves relative to a second object. The second object may partially block the first object in a first portion of the animation sequence that includes a first frame and a second frame. Shape tweening between a masked image of the first object in the first frame and a masked image of the first object in the second frame may be implemented to depict the motion of the first object relative to the second object.
US08970598B1
A distributed execution environment includes various resources, such as instances of computing resources, hardware resources, and software resources. Values for attributes of the resources are collected. The collected attribute values for the resources are utilized to compute minhash values for the resources that describe the similarity between the resources. The computed minhash values are then utilized to generate a resource similarity visualization that provides a visual indication of the similarity between the resources.
US08970583B1
When rendering a three-dimensional (3D) image, a render list is generated. The render list is sorted according to proximity to a notional camera, where each element of the render list specifies geometry and texture of a portion of the 3D image, and where at least two elements of the render list correspond to different levels of detail (LODs). The render list is then traversed twice: in the first instance, the render list is traversed to render each element in the render list to a respective texture, which includes applying a depth management technique to account for occlusion; in the second instance, the render list is traversed in a back-to-front order to render each of the textures to a display buffer to generate the 3D image, which includes applying an image space manipulation technique to at least some of the textures.
US08970580B2
Provided is an apparatus, method and computer-readable medium rendering three-dimensional (3D) graphics. The 3D graphics rendering apparatus, method and computer-readable medium may predict a screen area to be updated in a subsequent frame based on at least one of object information of a current frame, rendered data of the current frame, and object information of the subsequent frame, and may extract rendering data of the predicted screen area from one of the current frame and the subsequent frame.
US08970578B2
Methods and systems utilizing the data provided by a non-contrast-enhanced CAC scan that is left unused by the “whole-heart” Agatston or volume scores. Agatston and volume scores summarize overall coronary calcium burden, but do not show the number of vessels involved, the geographic distribution of the lesions, the size and shape of the individual lesions and the distance of the lesions from the coronary ostium. The methods and systems described herein extract and use the enhanced information provided by 3-D CAC scan data and significantly increases its clinical predictive value by providing vessel and lesion specific CAC scores which are superior to the whole-heart Agatston and volume scores in predicting obstructive Coronary artery disease (CAD).
US08970576B2
A novel driving method is provided in which source line inverting drive or dot inverting drive is performed for a case of driving a plurality of source lines by one D/A converter circuit in a source signal line driver circuit of an active matrix image display drive that corresponds to digital image signal input. In a first driving method of the present invention, two systems of grey-scale electric power supply lines are supplied to a source signal line driver circuit in order to obtain output having differing polarities from a D/A converter circuit, switches for connecting to the two systems of grey-scale electric power supply lines are prepared in each D/A converter circuit, the grey-scale electric power supply lines connected to each D/A converter circuit are switched in accordance with a control signal input to the switches, and source line inverting drive or dot inverting drive are performed.
US08970572B2
A driving apparatus for a display device includes: a signal controller that generates a pre-clock signal, a charge sharing control signal and a scanning start signal; a clock signal generator that generates a clock signal swinging between a first voltage and a second voltage based on the pre-clock signal and the charge sharing control signal; and a gate driver that generates gate signals based on the scanning start signal and the clock signal, where the clock signal generator includes: a voltage generator that generates a third voltage; and a clock generator that receives one of the first to third voltages in response to the pre-clock signal and the charge sharing control signal, and outputs an output signal based on the one of the first to third voltages as the clock signal, where the third voltage is lower than the first voltage and higher than the second voltage.
US08970569B2
Computerized method for simulating looking into reflective mirror by operating the system in an idle mode and when presence of a user is detected in a field of view of the camera, switching the system to virtual mirror mode wherein the system performs the steps comprising: transforming the images captured by the camera to generate mirror images; storing the mirror images; displaying the mirror images on the monitor; and, determining whether the user has an existing account and, if so, opening the user account and displaying thumbnails corresponding to the user account on the monitor; if the user has no existing account, setting a temporary account and so long as the user is still in front of the monitor, enabling the user to control the temporary account; and, once the user exits the field of view, returning the system to idle mode.
US08970565B2
A stage of the shift register has (i) a set-reset type flip-flop which receives an initialization signal and (ii) a signal generating circuit which receives a simultaneous selection signal and which generates an output signal by use of an output of the flip-flop. In at least one example embodiment, the output of the flip-flop becomes inactive regardless of whether a setting signal and a resetting signal are active or inactive, as long as the initialization signal is active. The initialization signal becomes active before the end of the simultaneous selection, and then becomes inactive after the end of the simultaneous selection. This makes it possible to stabilize operation of the shift register after the end of simultaneous selection of a plurality of signal lines carried out by the display driving circuit at a predetermined timing.
US08970564B2
Disclosed herein are an apparatus and method for driving a liquid crystal display device. The apparatus includes a liquid crystal panel in which the same colors of three-color sub-pixels are arranged in the directions of a plurality of gate lines, a data driver for driving a plurality of data lines, a first gate driver for sequentially driving (4n−3)th and (4n)th gate lines among the gate lines during odd frame periods, a second gate driver for sequentially driving (4n−2)th and (4n−1)th gate lines among the gate lines during even frame periods, and a timing controller for generating different first and second gate control signals and a data control signal according to odd and even frame periods to supply the first and second gate control signals and the data control signal to the first and second gate drivers and the data driver, respectively.
US08970562B2
A temperature sensing apparatus (10) and associated method (60) wherein a temperature sensor (22) or a plurality of temperature sensors (22) is placed in or in near proximity to a liquid crystal display module (12) of a computer system (11, 11a, 11b). The temperature sensor(s) (22) are placed on, or in near proximity to the liquid crystal display module (12) at positions determined according to the requirements of a particular application. Temperature of the liquid crystal display module (12) is communicated digitally to an associated computer (14) by, for example, a bus such as an inter-integrated circuit interface bus (26). When the temperature exceeds a predetermined limit, remedial action, such as increasing fan speed, reducing speed and or power consumption of other components, or the like, is taken to reduce the temperature.
US08970561B2
A digital signature collection and authentication system includes an ink pen having an ultrasonic transmitter that transmits ultrasonic energy to a plurality of ultrasonic receivers. A computer triangulates the location of the pen versus time to generate the signature shape, and to generate velocity and acceleration data. The pen also includes a pressure sensitive tip to record pressure applied to the pen tip. The pen also includes a higher frequency burst transmitter useful to generate a time reference, and to transmit the pressure information. The computer packetizes the shape, velocity, acceleration, and pressure data with a time stamp and an IP address or phone number, encrypts the packet and sends it to a host computer for authentication. Other embodiments are described and claimed.
US08970553B2
Example embodiments are directed to light sensing circuits having a relatively simpler structure by using light-sensitive oxide semiconductor transistors as light sensing devices, and remote optical touch panels and image acquisition apparatuses, each including the light sensing circuits. The light sensing circuit includes a light-sensitive oxide semiconductor transistor in each pixel, wherein the light-sensitive oxide semiconductor transistor is configured as a light sensing device, and a driving circuit that outputs data. The light sensing circuit may have a relatively simple circuit structure including a plurality of transistors in one pixel. As a result, the structure and operation of the light sensing circuit may be simplified.
US08970544B1
A touch screen controller for a capacitive touch screen panel having row conductors intersecting column conductors to form pixels, the touch screen controller comprising: a transmitting unit configured to drive the row conductors with signals formed from an excitation matrix, and a receiving unit configured to sense signals from the column conductors and to determine the capacitance of the pixels using the sensed signals. In some embodiments, the receiving unit is configured to apply zero-ISI filtering to the sensed signals prior to the capacitance of the pixels being determined. In some embodiments, the transmitting unit is configured to spread each bit of the row drive signals with a pseudo-noise code, and the receiving unit is configured to de-spread the sensed signals with the pseudo-noise code. In some embodiments, the transmitting unit is configured to pulse shape the row drive signals.
US08970543B2
There are provided a touch sensing apparatus and a touch sensing method. The touch sensing apparatus includes a driving circuit unit applying a driving signal to at least one of a plurality of first electrodes; a sensing circuit unit generating an analog signal by detecting variations in capacitance in second electrodes intersecting the at least one of first electrodes to which the driving signal is applied; and a signal converting unit converting the analog signal into a digital signal, wherein the driving circuit unit controls a frequency of the driving signal according to electric noise and determines a level of the driving signal according to a dynamic range of the signal converting unit.
US08970539B2
An organic light emitting display apparatus including a substrate, a first touch sensing electrode layer on the substrate, a first protective layer on the substrate, the first protective layer covering the first touch sensing electrode layer, a ground layer on the first protective layer, the ground layer being electrically grounded, an insulating layer on the ground layer, and an organic light emitting device on the insulating layer.
US08970534B2
Provided is an electronic device including: a base; a panel; a support for supporting the panel with respect to the base; and a vibrator for causing the panel to vibrate at a given frequency. The support includes a first region located at a part corresponding to a node of vibration of the panel, and a second region located at a part other than the node of the vibration of the panel. The support has a rigidity that is smaller in the first region than in the second region.
US08970532B2
A touch sensor integrated type display device capable of reducing its thickness and simplifying its manufacturing process. The display device includes first electrodes, second electrodes, first connecting wires, and second connecting wires. The first electrodes are arranged on a substrate in parallel in a first direction, and the second electrodes are arranged in parallel in the first direction and a second direction crossing the first direction without contacting the first electrodes. Each first connecting wire is connected with at least one the first electrodes. Each second connecting wire connects the second electrodes to each other in the second direction. A touch driving voltage is supplied to the first connecting wires and a common voltage is supplied to the second connecting wires so that mutual capacitance is generated between the first electrodes and the second electrodes.
US08970531B2
A tactile sensation providing apparatus determines a touched object and stores touch information based on the object in a memory unit 16. When an object in current touch information does not match an object in previous touch information stored in the memory unit 16, the tactile sensation providing unit 12 provides a first tactile sensation. When these objects match each other, the tactile sensation providing unit 12, based on the current touch information and the previous touch information, provides the first tactile sensation or a second tactile sensation, which is different from the first tactile sensation and provided with lower power than that for providing the first tactile sensation.
US08970528B2
In order to provide an information input device that solves the misclick caused by a clickable touch sensor without using information corresponding to pressure of the user's finger, the information input device includes: a touch information detecting unit that detects a touch information item obtained when a finger of the user is in contact with the touch sensor; a touch information sequence storage unit configured to store the touch information item for a predetermined period; and a pressing start position estimating unit configured to estimate a pressing start position at which the user started to press the touch sensor with the finger, based on touch information items stored in the touch information sequence storage unit, when the switch was pressed down, the touch information items including the touch information item.
US08970519B2
A method for applying a first or second set of threshold values for touch sensor gesture recognition based on the presence of one of a plurality of predetermined conditions is described herein. The plurality of predetermined conditions can include one or more of a lift detection, a speed threshold detection, and a button press detection. Lift detection can be detected by one or more of an optical sensor, gyroscope, or accelerometer. Speed detection can be detected by one or more of an optical sensor, gyroscope, or accelerometer. Button detection can be detected by a mechanical button, pressure sensitive button, or a touch sensor.
US08970517B2
A display device having a touch screen panel includes a display panel includes a common electrode; a touch screen panel including a plurality of first conductive patterns that are formed on one surface of the display panel and arranged in a first direction, and a plurality of second conductive patterns that are electrically insulated from the plurality of first conductive patterns and arranged in a second direction to cross over the first conductive patterns; a power source circuitry to supply a first common voltage to the common electrode and to supply a pulse voltage to at least one of the plurality of first and second conductive patterns; and a common voltage feedback circuit to remove an induction voltage induced to the common electrode by the pulse voltage supplied to the at least one of the plurality of first and second conductive patterns.
US08970513B2
A touch panel is provided. The touch panel includes an electroactive polymer (EAP) actuator which is deformable when protruded or depressed locally at a part to which a driving voltage is applied; and a flexible touch sensor which is disposed on the EAP actuator. The flexible touch sensor is deformable locally in correspondence with a deformation of the EAP actuator, and senses an input according to a contact or pressing operation.
US08970510B2
The present invention relates to an embedded touch sensitive display, which includes a liquid crystal display (LCD), a touch sensing layer, a touch signal transfer circuit and a conductive media. The liquid crystal display comprises a top substrate, a bottom substrate, and a liquid crystal layer which is configured between the top substrate and the bottom substrate. The touch sensing layer is disposed below the top substrate of the LCD for generating touch signals after sensing an outside touch action, and the touch signal transfer circuit is disposed above the bottom substrate of the LCD. The conductive media is disposed between the touch sensing layer and the touch signal transfer circuit for transferring the touch signals between the touch sensing layer and the touch signal transfer circuit.
US08970505B2
Disclosed herein is a contact detecting device including: a contact responding section configured to produce an electric change in response to an object to be detected coming into contact with or proximity to a detecting surface; and a contact driving scanning section configured to scan application of driving voltage to the contact responding section in one direction within the detecting surface, and control output of the electric change in time series, wherein the contact driving scanning section performs a plurality of scans of different regions of the contact responding section in parallel with each other, and outputs a plurality of the electric changes in parallel with each other.
US08970494B2
A portable electronic device including a first input/output unit including a monostable display element, a second input/output unit including a bistable display element, a main setting unit configured to selectively set either one of the first and second input/output units as a main input/output unit and the other one of the first and second input/output units as a sub input/output unit, and a conversion unit configured to convert the sub input/output unit into a touch pad for inputting a command on the main input/output unit.
US08970488B2
An operation input device includes: angular velocity detecting means for detecting an angular velocity; relative velocity detecting means for contactlessly detecting a relative velocity to a target object; distance detecting means for detecting a distance to the target object; and computing means for computing an amount of movement based on the angular velocity, the relative velocity, and the distance.
US08970486B2
In one embodiment a method of operating a mobile device includes sensing either an orientation or a movement of the mobile device, determining a command based on the sensed orientation or sensed movement, sensing a proximity of an object in relation to at least a portion of the mobile device, and executing the command upon the proximity of the object being sensed. In another embodiment, a method of operating a mobile device governs a manner of interaction of the mobile device relative to one or more other mobile devices. In at least some embodiments, at least one of the mobile devices includes an accelerometer and an infrared proximity sensor, and operation of the mobile device is determined based upon signals from those components.
US08970477B2
A exemplary key assembly for a handheld device includes one or more L-shaped key structures each having a first member configured to receive an input keystroke and a second member substantially orthogonal to the first member; and a frame configured to receive the one or more L-shaped key structures, the frame having a wall aligned with the second member of the key structure, with the wall further comprising a switch for each of the one or more L-shaped key structures associated with an inner surface of the wall, wherein each switch is associated with an actuator associated with the second member of the corresponding key structure such that depression of a given key structure causes the actuator of the second member of the key structure to engage the switch of the wall.
US08970471B2
A computing device is disclosed. The computing device includes a light source configured to output light. The computing device also includes a light sensor configured to measure the level of light surrounding the computing device. The computing device further includes a control mechanism operatively coupled to the light source and light sensor and configured to adjust the level of output light based on the measured level of light surrounding the computing device.
US08970460B2
A voltage amplifier circuit (300) comprises: an input voltage generating unit (302) that generates an input voltage (VL1) based on a set value (SL); an operational amplifier (303) that amplifies the input voltage (VL1) such that the input voltage (VL1) becomes equal to a feedback voltage (VL3), thereby generating an output voltage (VL2); a feedback resistor unit (304) that performs a voltage division between the output voltage (VL2) applied to one end of the feedback resistor unit and a reference voltage (VL4) applied to the other end of the feedback resistor unit, thereby generating the feedback voltage (VL3); a selector control unit (305) that generates a selector control signal (SS) based on the set value (SL); and a selector (306) that selects, based on the selector control signal SS, the reference voltage (VL4) from a plurality of candidates (GND/VR).
US08970454B2
Disclosed is a level shifter that includes an input node; first and second voltage shifter circuits configured to generate an output clock of a second voltage domain in response to an input clock of a first voltage domain input via the input node, and an output node configured to output the output clock, wherein the first and second voltage shifter circuits have the same structure and are connected in parallel between the input node and an output node.
US08970453B2
According to one embodiment, a display apparatus includes an image data generation unit configured to generate image data and an image projection unit configured to project a light flux including an image toward a human riding in a vehicle. The image is based on the image data. The image data generation unit is configured to generate the image data relating to the image including a first display object indicating a travel direction of the vehicle at a travel direction change point when a distance between the travel direction change point and the vehicle is a first distance. The image data generation unit is configured to generate the image data relating to the image including a second display object displayed to correspond to a position of the travel direction change point when the distance is a second distance shorter than the first distance.
US08970448B2
In accordance with some embodiments of the inventions, a display system is disclosed for manipulation of images on tiled displays. The display system can include at least one discrete display device and a control module configured to allow a user to move a graphical representation of an image to a plurality of positions on the at least one discrete display device to thereby define a requested position. The control module can be configured to determine a difference between the requested position and a plurality of predetermined positions on the at least one discrete display device. The control module can also be configured to move and/or stretch the image toward one of the predetermined positions based on the determination of the determined difference.
US08970442B2
The present invention relates to an antenna device (10) for executing several functions, particularly a transmitting function, a receiving function, and an energy transmitting function, comprising a rod core (20) made from a material that can be magnetized, extending along a rod core axis (22) and at least one rod core winding (24) about the rod core axis (22), a charged core (30) from a material that can be magnetized, extending along a charged core axis (32), and at least one charged core winding (34) about the charged core axis (32), with the charged core axis (32) and the rod core axis (22) being arranged angular in reference to each other.
US08970439B2
An exemplary embodiment of the present invention provides a tunable liquid core patch antenna comprising a top-side patch, a ground plane, and a liquid core substrate positioned substantially between the top-side patch and the ground plane. The liquid core substrate can comprise a first liquid having a first dielectric constant and a second liquid having a second dielectric constant greater than the first dielectric constant. The first liquid and second liquid can form a mixture having an effective dielectric constant greater than the first dielectric constant and less than the second dielectric constant.
US08970433B2
An antenna assembly for a computing device is disclosed. The antenna assembly includes a first radiating element coupled to a feed point and a first ground point of a printed circuit board, and a second radiating element coupled to a second ground point of the printed circuit board. The first radiating element is positioned adjacent to the printed circuit board so as to form a first gap that extends between the first radiating element and the printed circuit board along at least a portion of the length of the first radiating element. The second radiating element is positioned adjacent to the printed circuit board so as to form a second gap that extends between the second radiating element and the printed circuit board along at least a portion of the length of the second radiating element. The two radiating elements are spaced apart by a third gap.
US08970422B2
An electromagnetic signal detector that interfaces with a mobile communication device that includes a communication element. The communication element transmits data between the electromagnetic signal detector and the mobile communication device via a first communication standard. A user interface of the mobile communication device communicates the data to a user of the electromagnetic signal detector. The mobile communication device communicates with a communication network via a second communication standard. The first communication standard differs from the second communication standard.
US08970412B2
A signal quantizer includes a summing junction, a loop filter, a quantizer and a reconstruction filter. The summing junction is responsive to an input signal and to a modulated signal and is operative to combine the modulated signal and the input signal to generate a summing junction output. The loop filter is responsive to the summing junction output and is operative to generate a loop filter output and has a first regenerative gain associated therewith. The quantizer is responsive to the loop filter output and is operative to generate the modulated signal. The reconstruction filter is responsive to the modulated signal and is operative to generate a quantized output signal and has a second regenerative gain associated therewith that is substantially equal to that of the loop filter.
US08970399B1
Methods, systems, and computer-readable storage media provide for selective Notice to Airmen (NOTAM) notifications to be made to the crew of an aircraft according to the relevance of the NOTAM to a selected phase of flight of the aircraft. According to embodiments described herein, NOTAMs are received and parsed for subject and status codes. The subject and status codes are used with the selected phase of flight to determine a relevance code each NOTAM according to a set of relevance rules. The relevance rules provide a level of relevance of the NOTAM to the phase of flight and trigger a type of notification according to that level of relevance.
US08970396B1
An hourmeter system and method for monitoring engine operation in power equipment. A programmable controller monitors and updates an indication of the running times of an engine. An interface circuit is coupled to the programmable controller and also coupled to a power source for starting the engine. The interface circuit includes a detector circuit for detecting presence of a periodic noise signal whose presence is indicative of operation of the engine. The programmable controller is programmed to accumulate times of engine operation in a memory and communicate those times of engine operation for display.
US08970395B2
The present invention relates to a method comprising providing an activation signal from a wireless communication unit to a measurement unit to switch the measurement unit from its inactive state to its active state; providing a measurement request signal to the measurement unit to request measurement of a filling level of a product in a tank; and thereafter switching the wireless communication unit from its active state to its inactive state. The measurement unit measures the filling level and provides a measurement ready signal to the wireless communication unit; the wireless communication unit is switched from its inactive state to its active state in response to the measurement ready signal received from the measurement unit; the wireless communication unit retrieves the value indicative of the filling level from the measurement unit; and wirelessly transmits the value indicative of the filling level to the remote device.
US08970389B2
A stir alarm device for monitoring a forced air in-bin grain stirring system and alerting an individual when the stirring system malfunctions. The stir alarm device may include a movement device which is movably secured to the stirring system, such that movement of the stirring system causes movement of the movement device. The stir alarm device may further include a detection mechanism for monitoring the movement of the movement device. The stir alarm may also include a signaling device operably attached to the detection mechanism, the signaling device for signaling a malfunction when an amount of movement detected by the movement detection mechanism is below a threshold for a predetermined period of time and may include methods or components to control the operation of the stir machine and/or drying system.
US08970370B2
A system and method for calibrating physical data sensing devices with physical data control devices is disclosed. The system and method are particularly useful for calibrating physical data sensing devices that measure physical data at periodic intervals different from the periodic intervals in which the physical data control device measure the physical data. The system and method provide a quick and accurate calibration between devices sampling at different rates.
US08970363B2
A supplemental control system for a materials handling vehicle comprises a wearable control device, and a corresponding receiver on the materials handling vehicle. The wearable control device is donned by an operator interacting with the materials handling vehicle, and comprises a wireless transmitter to be worn on the wrist of the operator and a travel control communicably coupled to the wireless transmitter. Actuation of the travel control causes the wireless transmitter to transmit a first type signal designating a request to the vehicle. The receiver is supported by the vehicle for receiving transmissions from the wireless transmitter.
US08970359B2
In a method and a device for wear diagnosis of a motor vehicle, driving events and driving conditions occurring during driving operation are detected, the detected driving events and driving conditions are assigned in each case a wear index value using a table which is stored in a memory of the motor vehicle and which adds up the wear index values assigned to the detected driving events and driving conditions in order to form a total wear index value, and the determined total wear index value is compared with a reference total wear index value derived from a stored characteristic curve.
US08970357B2
A vehicle-mounted surrounding object recognizing apparatus, comprising: a camera that captures an environment surrounding an own vehicle; and an image processing device; wherein the image processing device is configured to process an image captured by the camera to calculate an index value of a color component with respect to an image portion having a luminance value greater than a predetermined value, and determine whether the image portion is related to a light from a surrounding vehicle based on a relationship between the calculated index value of a color component and a predetermined threshold, and the predetermined threshold is changed according to a lighting status of a forward lighting device of the own vehicle.
US08970355B1
An article is worn by a user. A plurality of indicating devices are coupled to the article. A processing unit is communicatively coupled to the plurality of indicating devices. The processing unit selectively actuates at least one indicating device of the plurality of indicating devices based on positional data.
US08970353B2
Presenting comparative timing data to the audience of a sports or other competition multiple within an event, where timing or scoring data is stored during each heat, compared between heats, and displayed. Timing data includes lap times, split times, or other timing information. Timing data from each heat can also be compared with historical timing records such as Olympic, NCAA, or other records. A computing device coupled to timing equipment, storage, and a display operate to gather and store timing data from each heat, compare the timing data to generate comparative timing data, and present the comparative timing data to attendees. A software application running on the computing device allows a user to select particular timing data to compare with the current event timing data. Video and biographical information about a given competitor in the event can also be presented to the user.
US08970351B2
Systems and/or Methods are disclosed for acquiring data from a transceiver responsive to one or more signals that are received at the transceiver from one or more devices. In one embodiment, a transceiver is configured to transmit a signal responsive to having received a first signal from a first device, wherein the signal that is transmitted by the transceiver is configured to trigger a second device to transmit a second signal. The transceiver is further configured to transmit data responsive to having received the second signal that is transmitted by the second device. In other embodiments, a transceiver is configured to receive a signal from a first device over frequencies of a predetermined frequency band that the first device is authorized to use, to receive a signal from a second device over frequencies of the predetermined frequency band and to transmit data responsive to having received both the signal from the first device and the signal from the second device. The transceiver is further configured to require that both the signal from the first device and the signal from the second device be received at the transceiver before the data is transmitted. Analogous methods are also disclosed.
US08970347B2
In one embodiment, a human body communication apparatus includes a first human body communication terminal carried by a person, a second human body communication terminal and an authentication unit included in the first or second human body communication terminal. The first human body communication terminal includes a first detection unit to detect first living body physiological information of the carrying person. The second human body communication terminal includes a human body contact sensor and a second detection unit to detect second living body physiological information of the person who touches the human body contact sensor. The authentication unit acquires the first and second living body physiological information and determines a correlation between the first and second living body physiological information to permit communication between the first and second human body communication terminals in accordance with the correlation.
US08970342B2
The invention relates to a system and a method with at least one presence detector, wherein the presence detector has a radio transmitter. The system further comprises at least one radio receiver that is constructed in such a manner as to receive and evaluate signals of the presence detector transmitted via radio. The radio receiver further comprises at least one device that acts on downstream units as a function of the evaluation result.
US08970336B2
An electronic component capable of preventing the occurrence of magnetic saturation due to a magnetic flux surrounding each coil conductor and a method of manufacturing the electronic component are provided. The electronic component includes a laminate formed by stacking unit layers, where each unit layer includes a first insulating layer, and a coil conductor and second insulating layer formed on the first insulating layer. Each second insulating layer has a Ni content greater than a Ni content of each first insulating layer. Portions of the first insulating layers have a Ni content lower than a Ni content of the second portions after the laminate is calcined.
US08970332B2
An electrical plug and receptacle relying on magnetic force from an electromagnet to maintain contact are disclosed. The plug and receptacle can be used as part of a power adapter for connecting an electronic device, such as a laptop computer, to a power supply. The plug includes electrical contacts, which are preferably biased toward corresponding contacts on the receptacle. The plug and receptacle each have a magnetic element. The magnetic element on one of the plug or receptacle can be a magnet or ferromagnetic material. The magnetic element on the other of the plug or receptacle is an electromagnet. When the plug and receptacle are brought into proximity, the magnetic attraction between the electromagnet magnet and its complement, whether another magnet or a ferromagnetic material, maintains the contacts in an electrically conductive relationship.
US08970325B2
A BPF comprises a first resonator and a second resonator connected in order between input/output terminals. The resonators each include an inductor conductor and a capacitor conductor formed in a laminate. The inductor conductors of both resonators have one open end and the other short-circuited end. The BPF further comprises a connection conductor for interconnecting the inductor conductors of the two resonators. This connection conductor connects the inductor conductor of the first resonator at a position close to the open end with the inductor conductor of the second resonator at a position close to the open end.
US08970324B2
A multilayer component includes a dielectric ceramic material that can be co-sintered with a varistor ceramic to form a monolithic multilayer component according to the invention. The multilayer component therefore includes a layer of a varistor ceramic and another layer of a dielectric. Both layers can be arranged directly adjacent to one another in the multilayer component. In the multilayer component, metallizations are arranged on or between the ceramic layers. The metallizations are structured to form conductor sections and metallized areas. The metallizations form together with the ceramic layers alongside a varistor at least one further component selected from at least one of the component functions.
US08970320B2
A filter circuit includes a filter part connected between an input terminal and an output terminal and configured to have a passband, and a path connected in parallel with the filter part between the input terminal and the output terminal, the path having an impedance that enables a first signal passing through the path from the input terminal to the output terminal and a second signal passing through the filter part from the input terminal to the output terminal to have an opposite phase relationship in a frequency band outside of the passband and have almost equal amplitudes in the frequency band.
US08970308B2
A power circuit includes a RF transistor and an input match network coupled to an input to the RF transistor and to an input to the power circuit. The input match network includes a resistor, an inductor and a first capacitor coupled together in series between the input to the RF transistor and a ground, and a second capacitor coupled in parallel with at least the resistor. The value of the second capacitor is selected so that the resistor is bypassed over at least a portion of the high frequency range of the power circuit.
US08970289B1
An integrated circuit device can include at least a first bi-directional biasing circuit having a first substrate portion containing a plurality of first transistors; a first control digital-to-analog converter (DAC) to generate any of a plurality of first target values in response to a first target code; a first detect circuit configured to generate a difference value between the first target values and a first limit value; and at least a first charge pump circuit configured to drive the first substrate portion between a forward body bias voltage and a reverse body bias voltage for the first transistors in response to first target values. Embodiments can also include a performance monitor section configured to determine a difference between the voltage of the first substrate portion and a target voltage. Control logic can generate first code values in response to the difference between the voltage of the first substrate portion and the target voltage. Methods are also disclosed.
US08970281B2
A load driver includes a switching element connected to a load, a constant current generator that generates a constant current, and a driver circuit that turns on the switching element for an on-period, which depends on a value of the constant current and is shortened with an increase in the value of the constant current. The constant current generator supplies a first constant current having a first current value to the driver circuit during the on-period, and supplies a second constant current having a second current value smaller than the first current value after the on-period has elapsed and the switching element reaches an on state.
US08970276B1
Circuits and methods are introduced to allow for timing relationship between a clock signal and a synchronization signal to be observed. The observations may include observing the timing relationship between a capture edge of the clock signal and a transition of the synchronization signal. Based on the observations the timing of the synchronization signal transition may be adjusted. Observing the timing relationship may include providing a delayed synchronization signal and a delayed clock signal. The delayed synchronization signal may provide what happens before the capture edge of the clock signal. The delayed clock signal may provide what happens after the capture edge of the clock signal.
US08970265B2
An electronic circuit for driving an electronic switch includes a first voltage terminal coupled to receive a first voltage from a power supply and a second voltage terminal coupled to receive a second voltage from the power supply. A driver circuit is configured to drive the voltage at a control terminal of the electronic switch to an intermediate voltage level in order to turn on the electronic switch during a high or normal voltage condition. A clamp circuit is configured to clamp the voltage at the control terminal of the electronic switch to the second voltage terminal in order to turn on the electronic switch during a low voltage condition, so that the electronic switch can enhance power provided to a load during the low voltage condition. A low voltage detection circuit detects the low voltage condition and provides a signal to activate the clamp circuit.
US08970260B1
Various aspects of the disclosure are directed to methods and apparatuses involving communications. As consistent with one or more embodiments, first and second sets of multiple current drivers are implemented respectively in a high-side and a low-side circuit. Current is driven via an output port in the high-side circuit by activating the first set of multiple current drivers until a steady-state high voltage is detected, and by deactivating one of the current drivers in the first set when the steady-state high voltage is detected. Current is driven in the low-side circuit by activating the second set of multiple current drivers until a steady-state low voltage is detected, and by deactivating one of the current drivers in the second set when the steady-state low voltage is detected.
US08970256B2
The present disclosure relates to a differential sense amplifier comprising first and second cross-coupled inverters with first and second complimentary storage nodes. A first current control element changes a current through the first cross-coupled inverter based upon an output of a second cross-coupled inverter, and a second current control element changes a current through the second cross-coupled inverter based upon an output of the first cross-coupled inverter. Other devices and methods are also disclosed.
US08970254B1
Methods and systems according to one or more embodiments are provided for frequency detection. In an embodiment, a frequency detector is provided that includes a capacitor that discharges or charges responsive to binary states of an input signal.
US08970251B2
Disclosed is a programmable logic device (PLD) which can undergo dynamic configuration at a high speed. The PLD includes a plurality of programmable logic elements (PLEs) and a switch for selecting electrical connection between the PLEs. The switch includes a plurality of circuit groups each of which includes first and second transistors. The second transistors of the circuit groups are electrically connected in parallel with one another. In each of the circuit groups, the electrical conduction between a source and a drain of the second transistor is determined based on configuration data held at a node between the gate of the second transistor and a drain of the first transistor, which allows the selection of the electrical connection and disconnection between the programmable logic elements by the selection of one of the circuit groups.
US08970250B2
Some embodiments provide an IC with configuration context switchers. The IC includes several configurable circuits, each of which configurably performs one of several operations at any given time, based on the configuration data set that it receives at that time. The IC includes several storage circuits for storing several configuration data sets for each of the configurable circuits. The IC also includes a context switching interconnect circuit for switchably connecting the configurable circuit to different sets of storage circuits to receive different sets of configuration data sets. The context switcher includes one or more stages for re-timing the data coming from the configuration storage elements. The stages can include interconnect circuitry or storage circuitry. Some embodiments build one of the stages in the configuration data storage elements. Some embodiments encode the configuration data bits and hence utilize a decoder in the context switcher to decode the encoded configuration data.
US08970248B2
A termination network for a receiver device is provided to support both D-PHY signaling and N-factorial signaling. The first end of each of a plurality dynamically configurable switches is coupled to a common node. A first end of each of a plurality of resistances is coupled to a second end of a corresponding switch. A plurality of terminals receive differential signals and each terminal is coupled to a corresponding second end of a resistance. Each of a plurality differential receivers is coupled between two terminals of the termination network, wherein a first differential receiver and a second differential receiver are coupled to the same two terminals, the first differential receiver is used when the differential signals use a first type of differential signal encoding, the second differential receiver is used when the differential signals use a second type of differential signal encoding.
US08970245B2
A probing device for a TFT-LCD substrate, which includes a device body, a device body, a circuit board mounted on the device body, a plurality of motors mounted on the device body, and a plurality of probe pins respectively mounted to the motors. The motors and the probe pins are arranged in a one-to-one corresponding manner. The circuit board includes a programmable logic controller and a man-machine interface terminal electrically connected to the programmable logic controller. The plurality of motors and the plurality of probe pins are electrically connected to the programmable logic controller. The plurality of probe pins is set at locations corresponding to locations of panel inspection signal input pads of TFT substrates of various sizes. The programmable logic controller uses the motors to control the elevation and lowering of the probe pins.
US08970237B2
A system and method for low-cost, fault tolerant, EMI robust data communications, particularly for an EV environment.
US08970233B2
A controller for use with a nondestructive inspection system communicates with the nondestructive inspection system and with a robot for moving an inspection probe of the nondestructive inspection system relative to an object under inspection. The controller is configured to periodically generate estimated position information of the probe moving relative to the object under inspection and communicate the estimated position information to the nondestructive inspection system as the nondestructive inspection system collects inspection data from the probe. The controller receives actual position information from the robot, the actual position information indicating an actual position of the probe, and corrects the estimated position information based on the actual position information.
US08970229B2
A method includes actuating a drive electrode to couple a majority of charge to a first sense electrode, a dielectric panel overlying the drive electrode, the first sense electrode, and a second sense electrode. The sense electrodes are separated by coupling gaps, the second sense electrode shielded from the drive electrode by the first sense electrode. The first sense electrode and at least one of the drive electrode and the second sense electrode each include at least two electrode elements, which are arranged interleaved on the dielectric panel in the sequence: drive electrode element, first sense electrode element, second sense electrode element, first sense electrode element, drive electrode element. The method includes sampling the first and second sense electrodes to collect respective first and second signal samples, subtracting the second signal sample from the first signal sample to obtain a final signal, and outputting the final signal.
US08970223B2
An apparatus for testing a cable or other capacitive load object with a VLF alternating cosine square, rectangular or trapezoidal test voltage, includes one or two DC voltage sources and a switching arrangement controlled by a measuring and control unit, to produce the test voltage with alternating switched polarity. The apparatus further includes a choke coil serving as an energy store, which is controlled by a switching element to be activated if the voltage/time slope arising during the switch-over after a respective half-wave of the test voltage falls below a defined threshold value.
US08970220B2
A combination lighting tester tool. The combination lighting tester tool includes at least three independent testing tools for identifying and diagnosing a problem in a lighting system. For example, the tester includes a lamp testing function in which a high voltage test signal is generated and transmitted using an antenna. When the test signal is in proximity to a gas filled lamp, the voltage is of sufficient magnitude to ionize the gas inside the lamp, causing the lamp to illuminate. The tester also includes a ballast testing function in which the power lines or wires connecting a ballast to a lamp or lighting fixture are tested, and a filament tester for testing the filaments in a lamp for continuity or resistance. The tester also includes a worklight for illuminating an area under test and one or more display devices (e.g., LEDs, an LCD display, or the like) which provide an indication of, for example, a test being performed or a result of a test.
US08970215B2
A sensor device for sensing particles of a sample, the sensor device including a sensing unit adapted for sensing a detection signal indicative of the presence of the particles, a viscosity measurement unit adapted for measuring the viscosity of the sample, and a correction unit adapted for correcting the detection signal based on the measured viscosity.
US08970210B2
The disclosure relates to a magnetic position sensor in at least two directions, the sensor including at least one magnetized element and a probe including at least two magneto-sensitive elements located substantially on the same point and each measuring one of the components of the magnetic field generated by the magnetized element, the magnetized element being movable relative to the magneto-sensitive elements. The probe includes at least one processing circuit capable of carrying out angle and module calculations on the basis of algebraic combinations of the components of the magnetic field and providing at least two independent signals representing the position of the movable element along, respectively, one and the other of the two directions. According to the disclosure, the magnetization vector of the magnetized element is variable in relation to the normal vector on the surface of the magnetized element that is placed opposite the probe in at least one of the dimensions of the magnetized element so as to define a single position of the probe in relation to the magnetized element.
US08970204B1
A wireless phasing voltmeter determines the phase difference between the voltage carried by a reference electrical conductor and a field conductor. The voltage signal from the reference conductor is detected by a first unit and compared to a precision 60 Hz wave form generated from a first 1 pps GPS signal. The phase difference between the wave form and the reference conductor, represented by nine data bits, is used to modulate a radio frequency carrier wave and transmitted via simplex transmission to a second unit near an electrical conductor in the field. The second unit receives the modulated carrier wave, decodes the phase angle difference and compares it to a second phase angle difference between the voltage on the field conductor and a second precision 60 Hz wave form generated from a second 1 pps GPS signal. The difference between the two phase differences determines the phase of the field conductor.
US08970193B2
An inductor L2 is inserted in series between an input power supply E and a switching device Q1. An input smoothing capacitor C2 is provided between a connecting point of the inductor L2 and the switching device Q1 and a ground point. Herein, let L2 be an inductance value of the inductor, C2 be an electrostatic capacity of the input smoothing capacitor, and T1 be a time since the switching device Q1 is switched from an ON state to an OFF state until the switching device Q1 is switched to an ON state again according to an output signal from a drive circuit DR, then T1 is set so as to satisfy 0
US08970191B1
An apparatus includes a constant on-time or constant off-time (COT) switching regulator configured to generate an output signal. The switching regulator includes a switch that is turned on or off for a specified amount of time during each of multiple switching cycles. The apparatus also includes a modulator configured to modulate the specified amount of time that the switch is turned on or off during at least some of the switching cycles. The specified amount of time that the switch is turned on or off during each of the switching cycles could be equal to tON/OFF+ΔtMODF(ωMOD), where tON/OFF denotes a constant amount of time, ΔtMOD denotes an amplitude of the second signal, ωMOD denotes a frequency of the second signal, and F( ) denotes a modulation function. This could help to modulate switching noise over a range of frequencies and spread electro-magnetic interference generated by the switching regulator.
US08970187B2
A voltage generator is disclosed. The voltage generator includes an operational amplifier, an offset voltage tuner, and an output stage circuit. The operational amplifier receives an input voltage and adjusts an offset voltage of the operating amplifier according to a control signal. The offset voltage tuner provides the control signal. The output stage circuit generates an output voltage according to a voltage on an output terminal of the operational amplifier, and provides the output voltage to the operational amplifier.
US08970184B2
An apparatus, a method, and a computer program product are provided. The apparatus determines an input voltage and an input current of a power system driving a low power factor load, the input voltage varying based on a power cycle, determines at least a first portion of the power cycle at which the input current exceeds a threshold, and couples at least one substantially resistive load to the low power factor load during at least a second portion of the power cycle different from the at least a first portion of the power cycle.
US08970179B2
A method for charging multiple battery packs is disclosed, which comprises the steps of providing full output power of the power conversion unit to a first battery pack in a charging cycle at the control of a first control signal; monitoring in real-time the charging acceptance of the first battery pack and when the charging acceptance detected is less than the available full output power of the power conversion unit, charging a second battery pack by the remaining output power, i.e. the output power difference between the full available output power and the charging acceptance of the first patent pack, at the control of a second control signal. The service life of battery is extended and the efficiency of the PV module is increased in the system where in the method is implemented. A device for charging multiple battery packs is also disclosed.
US08970178B2
The present inventions, in one aspect, are directed to techniques and/or circuitry to applying a current pulse to the terminals of the battery during a charge, measuring a voltage at the terminals of the battery, determining a relationship of an open circuit voltage to an amount of charge in the battery using data which is representative of a state of health of the battery, calculating an open circuit voltage of the battery using the voltage measured at the terminals of the battery, a current applied to or removed from the battery and an impedance of the battery, and determining a state of charge of the battery using (i) the calculated open circuit voltage and (ii) the relationship of the open circuit voltage to the amount of charge.
US08970174B2
A semiconductor integrated circuit is capable of being supplied with battery current information and battery voltage information. The semiconductor integrated circuit includes a memory function, a current integrating function, a voltage-based state of charge operating function, a current-based state of charge operating function, a comparison determination function, a correcting function, and a resistance deterioration coefficient output function. The memory function stores the relation between a state of charge of a battery and an internal resistance deterioration coefficient thereof. The full charge capacity outputted from the correcting function and the internal resistance deterioration coefficient outputted from the resistance deterioration coefficient output function are stored in the memory function when a voltage-based state of charge and a current-based state of charge compared by the comparison determination function are determined to substantially coincide with each other.
US08970168B2
Charging circuit for energy store of a portable electrical device has a first resonance switching circuit with a first receiver coil for receiving an alternating magnetic field which induces an electric voltage in the first coil, and an electrical component connected to a terminal of the first coil. The first coil and the further electrical component determine a resonance frequency (f0) of the first resonance switching circuit, A second resonance circuitry is also provided and has a second receiver coil and a further electrical component which determine a resonance frequency (f1, fn) of the second resonance circuitry. The resonance frequency of the second resonance circuitry is an integer multiple of the resonance frequency of the first resonance switching circuit. Receiver coils of the resonance circuitry are disposed such that during operation they are permeated by the same magnetic field lines of the alternating magnetic field.
US08970161B1
A modulation control scheme for a series-connected dual active bridge (DAB) DC to DC converter in a maximum power point tracking charge controller used in a photovoltaic system controls operation of the converter in a forward direction power flow mode to control charging of a battery bank with electricity produced by the photovoltaic array. The modulation control scheme is also capable of operating the converter in a reverse direction power flow mode to control the flow of electricity from the battery bank to a DC load. The modulation control scheme divides the converter's operating range in each mode into five main cases of minimum root mean square (M-RMS) operating regions and seven main cases of full zero-voltage switching (F-ZVS) operating regions, as well as transition operating regions between adjacent main cases, based on applicable power level and value of voltage differential.
US08970159B2
Provided are a method for compensating instantaneous power failure in medium voltage inverter and a medium voltage inverter system by using the same, the method for compensating instantaneous power failure in medium voltage inverter including a plurality of power cells supplying a phase voltage to a motor by being connected to the motor in series, the method including decreasing an output frequency of the plurality of power cells by as much as a predetermined value at a relevant point where an input voltage of the plurality of power cells is less than a reference value, decreasing the output frequency at a predetermined deceleration gradient, and maintaining the output frequency during restoration of input voltage as long as a predetermined time, in a case the input voltage is restored.
US08970150B2
An apparatus detects the position of a rotor of an electric motor having three phases and a plurality of windings. The apparatus includes circuitry configured to connect at least two of said windings between first and second reference voltages according to a first current path disconnect said at least two windings, and allow the current stored in said two windings to be discharged through a second current path. The apparatus comprises a measuring circuit configured to measure the time period between the starting instant of storing the current in the two windings and the final instant of discharging the two windings and a rotor detector configured to detect the rotor position based at least in part on the measured time period.
US08970149B2
A motor circuit with power-off braking function includes a driving unit, a coil unit, and a braking unit. The driving unit includes a plurality of switch arms connected in parallel, with each switch arm having a series contact. The coil unit includes a plurality of coils and a central contact. Each coil includes an end connected to the series contact of one of the switch arms. The other end of each coil is connected to the central contact. The braking unit includes a brake loop switch coupled between the central contact of the coil unit and an end of the switch arms. When power is cut off, a plurality of brake loops is formed to share the transient current during braking.
US08970147B2
An apparatus in an electric vehicle including a propulsion electric motor powered by energy from an energy storage system, including a field oriented motor controller generating motor control signals for the electric motor, the motor control signals responsive to a flux command signal and a torque command signal; a torque command calculator, coupled to the motor controller, generating the torque command signal to command a desired torque; an optimal efficiency controller, coupled to the torque command calculator, generating an operating efficiency flux to operate the electric motor at a first determinable efficiency using a first power from the energy storage system while providing the desired torque; an excess dissipation controller generating an inefficient flux to operate the electric motor at a second determinable efficiency using a second power from the energy storage system independent of the desired torque wherein the second power is greater than the first power; and a mode controller setting the flux command signal using one of the optimal efficiency flux and the inefficient flux.
US08970136B2
A semiconductor light source lighting circuit includes a voltage step-down unit configured to generate a drive voltage lower than an input voltage by turning on or off a first switching element in a voltage step-down mode, a voltage step-up unit configured to generate the drive voltage higher than the input voltage by turning on or off a second switching element in a voltage step-up mode, and a controller. The controller includes a charge pump unit configured to repeat charging from the drive voltage to a second capacitor and discharging from the charged second capacitor to the first capacitor in the voltage step-up mode, and a switch drive unit configured to apply a voltage higher than the voltage at the other end of the first switching element to the control terminal of the first switching element by using a voltage of the charged first capacitor.
US08970130B1
A bedside lamp, features for such a lamp, and associated methodology. The lamp has at least two different sets of lighting elements, each having one or more groupings of LED lamp(s), where the one or more main LED lamp(s) provide the majority of the lighting when the lamp is at full brightness and no lighting during various reduced lighting states, and the one or more “auxiliary” LED lamp(s) provide less than a majority of the lighting when the lamp is at full brightness and all of the lighting during various reduced lighting states. The lamp has the means for the user to set a dimming time for which the lights dim from a set brightness to 0% brightness, and means to gradually dim the main and auxiliary LED lamp(s) according to the above description.
US08970120B2
A lamp driving apparatus and an illumination equipment using the same are provided. The provided lamp driving apparatus is responsible for driving a lamp. When any one of two terminals of the lamp is opened or the lamp is over-voltage, the provided driving apparatus stops driving the lamp, and thus achieving the purpose of open lamp and over-voltage protection/detection.
US08970118B2
The LED lighting tube compatible with an electronic ballast has two snubber circuits, a waveform conversion circuit, and at least one LED light string. The snubber circuits are connected to terminals of the LED lighting tube, and input terminals of each snubber circuit are connected to electrode pins of a corresponding terminal. Each snubber circuit has at least one resistor connected in series between the electrode pins of the corresponding terminal. The waveform conversion circuit has multiple rectifier diodes, and input terminals of the waveform conversion circuit are respectively connected to output terminals of the snubber circuits, with a recovery time of each rectifier diode being under 2.5 us. Two ends of the at least one LED light string are respectively connected to output terminals of the waveform conversion circuit, and each one of the at least one LED light string includes multiple LED units connected in series.
US08970113B2
A field emission device is configured as a heat engine, wherein the configuration of the heat engine is variable as a function of time. A method corresponding to a field emission device comprises applying an anode electric potential to an anode region that is greater than a cathode electric potential of a cathode region, applying a gate electric potential to a gate region to release a set of electrons from the cathode region, passing the set of electrons from the gate region to a suppressor region, applying a suppressor electric potential to decelerate the set of electrons between the suppressor region and the anode region, binding the set of electrons in the anode region, and varying at least one of the anode electric potential, gate electric potential, and suppressor electric potential as a function of time.
US08970101B2
A system including a base portion, which includes first and second sets of light emitting diodes (LEDs) to emit blue light having first and second wavelengths in first and second wavelength ranges in a spectrum of blue light, a glass layer arranged at a second predetermined distance from the base portion, and a plurality of coatings of first and second phosphors having a predetermined length arranged in an alternating pattern on a surface of the glass layer facing toward the LEDs. The LEDs of the first and second sets are arranged on the base portion in an alternating pattern and are separated from each other by a first predetermined distance. Centers of the coatings of the first and second phosphors respectively align with centers of corresponding LEDs in the first and second sets.
US08970099B2
The present disclosure relates to an ionization chamber with a built-in temperature sensor, which is especially adapted for devices, such as X-ray units, gamma irradiators and linear accelerators, whichever is used for performing radiation dose output measurement accordingly. In an embodiment, the ionization chamber comprises: a cavity, an inner electrode, a chamber wall, an outer electrode, a guard electrode and a calibrated temperature sensor for detecting real-time temperature inside the cavity of ionization chamber to be used in the correction process of radiation dose measurement signals. With the aforesaid device, not only the accuracy of measurement can be improved effectively, but also the time consumed in a radiation dose measurement period can be reduced greatly since it will no longer bear the disadvantage that the radiation dose measurement has to wait until the temperatures inside and outside the cavity of ionization chamber had reached a thermal equilibrium before the measurement.
US08970098B1
An ignition plug includes an insulator having an axial hole extending therethrough in the direction of an axis, a center electrode inserted into a forward end portion of the axial hole, and a metallic shell disposed externally of the insulator. The insulator includes a step portion engaged with an inner circumferential portion of the metallic shell and a leg portion extending forward from the forward end of the step portion. The porosity of the leg portion is 3.0% or less. Among three regions of the leg portion that are radially trisected in a cross section perpendicular to the axis, the outermost region is defined as a first region and the innermost region is defined as a second region. The porosity of the first region is equal to or more than 1.20 times the porosity of the second region.
US08970079B2
For an object on a bearing mounting having a magnetic bearing providing a magnetic field generally produced by an electromagnet, the bearing is regulated based on a position of the object relative to the bearing. The position of the object is determined by reference to an estimate of the inductance obtained using a least squares method, in which the electrical resistance of the bearing is taken into account. The resistance is subject to variations, for example due to temperature fluctuations; however, the electrical resistance can be estimated by regulating the inductance error, Δ{circumflex over (L)}={circumflex over (L)}2,sLS−{circumflex over (L)}1,sLS down to zero, where the resistance adjustment facility may be a low-pass filter and an integration controller.
US08970077B2
A rotary electric machine includes a rotor, a stator having coils wound to surround the rotor, a cylindrical ring member fixedly mounted on the stator by shrinkage fitting, and a frame disposed on the outside of the ring member with a gap created in between. The distance of the gap varies as a result of thermal expansion of the stator and the ring member. An outer surface of the ring member goes into contact with the frame when the stator and the ring member thermally expand, whereby the stator and the ring member are efficiently cooled.
US08970070B2
A wireless power transmission unit according to the present invention transmits power wirelessly from a power transmitting section 100 to a power receiving section 200 through a resonant magnetic field. The unit includes: the power transmitting section 100, which resonates at a resonant frequency f0; at least one relay section 300, which can resonate at a frequency that is selected from multiple frequencies including the resonant frequency f0; and a resonance control section 600 that outputs information that specifies a resonance condition to be imposed on the relay section 300 according to the arrangement of the power receiving section 200 and that makes the relay section 300 resonate on the resonance condition that has been specified in accordance with that information.
US08970068B2
A converter unit configured to couple to a photovoltaic panel (PV) may include a controller to sense an input voltage and input current obtained from the photovoltaic panel, and manage the output voltage of a corresponding power converter coupled to a DC bus to regulate the resultant bus voltage to a point that reduces overall system losses, and removes non-idealities when the panels are series connected. The controller may also perform input voltage management and regulation, including maximum power point tracking (MPPT) for the PV. The controller may probe the bus voltage using a probe waveform generated according to a pseudo-random bit sequence (PRBS), to provide a probe signal that is distinct from the control steps performed by the controller. A PV array may feature a respective converter unit coupled to each PV, with each respective controller using a different and unique seed for generating its PRBS.
US08970062B2
The power source apparatus has high-voltage-side power supply circuitry 4 that supplies driving battery 1 power to the first measurement circuit 2 and the second measurement circuit 3, isolation circuitry 5 that isolates output from the first measurement circuit 2 and the second measurement circuit 3 and outputs it to the vehicle-side, and low-voltage-side power supply circuitry 6 that supplies vehicle auxiliary battery 7 (12V) power to the isolation circuitry 5. The first measurement circuit 2, which is powered by the high-voltage-side power supply circuitry 4, outputs voltage signals to the vehicle-side via the first isolation circuit 5A, which is powered by the first low-voltage-side power supply circuit 6A, and the second measurement circuit 3, which is powered by the high-voltage-side power supply circuitry 4, outputs battery 10 error signals to the vehicle-side via the second isolation circuit 5B, which is powered by the second low-voltage-side power supply circuit 6B.
US08970056B2
An ocean wave energy system for generating power from ocean waves includes a platform supporting an array of hollow columns whose respective lower ends are in fluidic communication with ocean waves and whose respective upper ends are in air communication with a turbine arrangement such that wave motion occurring at the lower ends is operable to cause air movement within the columns for propelling the turbine arrangement to generate power output. The system further includes one or more position-adjustable and/or angle-adjustable submerged structures near the lower ends of the columns for forming ocean waves propagating in operation towards the lower ends of the columns to couple the waves in a controllable manner into the hollow columns.
US08970044B2
A method of manufacture of an integrated circuit packaging system includes: providing a substrate; mounting an integrated circuit over the substrate; forming an encapsulation over the integrated circuit, the encapsulation having an encapsulation interior sidewall; forming a peripheral non-horizontal conductive plate directly on the encapsulation interior sidewall; and forming a peripheral vertical conductor directly on the peripheral non-horizontal conductive plate and the substrate.
US08970027B2
One aspect of the present invention is a method of processing a substrate. In one embodiment, the method comprises forming an electrical conductor on or in the substrate by providing a mixture comprising metal particles and an electroless deposition solution and electrolessly depositing a metal matrix and co-depositing the metal particles. In another embodiment, the method comprises forming an electrical conductor on or in the substrate by providing a mixture comprising metal particles and an electrochemical plating solution and electrochemically plating a metal matrix and co-depositing the metal particles. Another aspect of the present invention is a mixture for the formation of an electrical conductor on or in a substrate. Another aspect of the present invention is an electronic device.
US08970026B2
A first set of electrically conductive cladding is disposed on an inner section of one external side of a package substrate. The first set electrically conductive cladding is fabricated with a first solder compound. A second set of electrically conductive cladding is disposed on an outer section of the one external side of the substrate. The second set of electrically conductive cladding consists of a second solder compound. The outer section can be farther away from a center of the one external side of the substrate than the inner section. During a reflow process, the first and second solder compounds are configured to become completely molten when heated and the first solder compound solidifies at a higher temperature during cool down than the second solder compound.
US08970024B2
A package includes a first package component having a top surface, a second package component bonded to the top surface of the first package component, and a plurality of electrical connectors at the top surface of the first package component. A molding material is over the first package component and molding the second package component therein. The molding material includes a first portion overlapping the second package component, wherein the first portion includes a first top surface, and a second portion encircling the first portion and molding bottom portions of the plurality of electrical connectors therein. The second portion has a second top surface lower than the first top surface.
US08970008B2
A wafer has a number of IC areas and a kerf area arranged between the IC areas. The kerf area has a dicing area, a crack stop structure arranged between an IC area and a dicing area, and a trench arranged between the crack stop structure and the dicing area. The crack stop structure includes an extended layer extending beyond the crack stop structure towards the dicing area.
US08970006B2
An embodiment of a die comprising: a semiconductor body including a front side, a back side, and a lateral surface; an electronic device, formed in said semiconductor body and including an active area facing the front side; a vertical conductive connection, extending through the semiconductor body and defining a conductive path between the front side and the back side of the semiconductor body; and a conductive contact, defining a conductive path on the front side of the semiconductor body, between the active area and the vertical conductive connection, wherein the vertical conductive connection is formed on the lateral surface of the die, outside the active area.
US08970005B2
According to one embodiment, there is disclosed a MEMS element. The MEMS element includes a lower electrode having a surface on which a plurality of minute convex portions are formed. A plurality of dielectric bumps are provided on the upper surface of the lower electrode and are thicker than heights of the convex portions. A dielectric layer is provided on the dielectric bumps and the lower electrode. An upper electrode is provided above the dielectric layer. The upper electrode is movable so as to vary capacitance between the upper electrode and the lower electrode.
US08970003B2
System and method for embedded passive integration relating to a multi-chip packaged device. The packaged device includes a capacitance layer that is configured for electrical coupling to a power supply and to a reference power supply. Further, the capacitance layer is configured for filtering the power supply and providing a filtered power supply. A semiconductor layer including a logic device is configured for electrical coupling to the filtered power supply.
US08969985B2
A semiconductor chip package and a method to manufacture a semiconductor chip package are disclosed. An embodiment of the present invention comprises a substrate and a semiconductor chip disposed on the substrate and laterally surrounded by a packaging material. The package further comprises a current rail adjacent the semiconductor chip, the current rail isolated from the semiconductor chip by an isolation layer, a first external pad, and a via contact contacting the current rail with the first external pad.
US08969976B2
A double-sided diaphragm micro gas-preconcentrator has a micro-gas chamber which is formed by bonding an upper silicon substrate with a lower silicon substrate. One or more suspended membranes are provided on every silicon substrate. The silicon where the suspended membrane is provided is completely removed for forming a cavity. A thin-film heater is deposited on every suspended membrane. A sorptive film is coated on an inner wall of every suspended membrane. Thus, the upper and lower sides of the preconcentrator in the present invention are suspended membranes, which improve the area of the sorptive film on the diaphragm. As a result, the preconcentrating factor is improved while keeping the small heat capacity, fast heating rate, and low power consumption features of the planar diaphragm preconcentrator.
US08969974B2
The present disclosure provides one embodiment of a field effect transistor (FET) structure. The FET structure includes shallow trench isolation (STI) features formed in a semiconductor substrate; a plurality of semiconductor regions defined in the semiconductor substrate and isolated from each other by the STI features; and a multi-fin active region of a first semiconductor material disposed on one of the semiconductor regions of the semiconductor substrate.
US08969973B2
A multi-gate semiconductor device with inter-gate conductive regions being connected to balance resistors is provided. The multi-gate semiconductor device comprises a substrate, a multilayer structure formed upon the substrate, a first ohmic electrode, a second ohmic electrode, a plural of gate electrodes, at least one conductive region, and at least one resistive component. When put into practice, the multi-gate semiconductor device is advantageous in reducing the voltage drop along the conductive region with a minimal change in device layout, improving the OFF-state linearity while retaining a low insertion loss, and minimizing the area occupied by the resistor and hence the total chip size.
US08969967B2
An integrated circuit includes a stack having a semiconductor substrate with a first type of dopant, an UTBOX type buried insulating layer, electronic components, formed in the substrate, ground planes disposed beneath the buried insulating layer so as to be respectively plumb with corresponding components, wells with the first type of dopant, the wells being respectively beneath corresponding ground planes, and a bias circuit enabling distinct voltages to be applied to the ground planes by the wells. The wells are separated from the substrate by a deep well with a second type of dopant. The wells are separated from each other by a separating structure, which is either a lateral well having a second type of dopant or a block of insulating material.
US08969964B2
A semiconductor device includes a gate stack formed on an active region in a p-type field effect transistor (pFET) portion of a silicon-on-insulator (SOI) substrate. The SOI substrate includes a n-type field effect transistor (nFET) portion. A gate spacer is formed over the gate stack. A source region and a drain region are formed within a first region and a second region, respectively, of the pFET portion of the semiconductor layer including embedded silicon germanium (eSiGe). A source region and a drain region are formed within a first region and a second region, respectively, of the nFET portion of the semiconductor layer including eSiGe. The source and drain regions within the pFET portion includes at least one dimension that is different from at least one dimension of the source and drain regions within the nFET portion.
US08969958B1
A split gate power transistor includes a doped substrate, a gate oxide layer on the substrate, and a split polysilicon layer over the gate oxide layer, which forms a polysilicon gate positioned over a channel region and a first portion of a transition region and a polysilicon field plate positioned over a second portion of the transition region and a shallow trench isolation region. The two polysilicon portions are separated by a gap. The field plate is electrically coupled to a source of the split gate power transistor. One or more body extension regions, each having the same doping type as the body substrate, extend at least underneath the edge of the field plate adjacent to the gap. The body extension regions force the portion of the transition region underneath the field plate into deep-depletion, thereby preventing the formation of a hole inversion layer in this region.
US08969946B2
A semiconductor device includes polysilicon layer and a metal silicide layer. The polysilicon layer is doped with carbon or phosphorous. The silicide layer is formed over the polysilicon layer.
US08969943B2
A semiconductor device with a nonvolatile memory is provided which has improved characteristics. The semiconductor device includes a control gate electrode, a memory gate electrode disposed adjacent to the control gate electrode, a first insulating film, and a second insulating film including therein a charge storing portion. Among these components, the memory gate electrode is formed of a silicon film including a first silicon region positioned over the second insulating film, and a second silicon region positioned above the first silicon region. The second silicon region contains p-type impurities, and the concentration of p-type impurities of the first silicon region is lower than that of the p-type impurities of the second silicon region.
US08969939B2
A semiconductor device includes an isolation layer defining an active region formed in a semiconductor substrate. A first recessing process is performed on the isolation layer to expose edge portions of the active region. A first rounding process is performed to round the edge portions of the active region. A second recessing process is performed on the isolation layer. A second rounding process is performed to round the edge portions of the active region.
US08969938B2
An ETSOI transistor and a capacitor are formed respectively in a transistor and capacitor region thereof by etching through an ETSOI and thin BOX layers in a replacement gate HK/MG flow. The capacitor formation is compatible with an ETSOI replacement gate CMOS flow. A low resistance capacitor electrode makes it possible to obtain a high quality capacitor or varactor. The lack of topography during dummy gate patterning are achieved by lithography in combination of which is accompanied with appropriate etch.
US08969935B2
Disclosed herein is a device that includes a semiconductor substrate having a first area, a plurality of cell transistors arranged on the first area of the semiconductor substrate, and a plurality of cell capacitors each coupled to an associated one of the cell transistors, the cell capacitors being provided so as to overlap with one another on the first area.
