US09306289B1
An apparatus includes first and second antenna elements each having a tapered width end, with the tapered width ends being separated by a gap. A portion of the edge of the tapered width end of the each antenna element has a thickness less than a thickness of the remainder of the respective antenna element. Such portion may be the portion of the edge of the antenna elements closest to a feed point of the antenna elements, and may be angled to a point or a flat edge. The thickness of the tapered width ends increases along the width and/or the height of the respective antenna element as the antenna element extends from the feed point.
US09306280B2
A mobile terminal that includes a first antenna element disposed in proximity to a first side of the mobile terminal, a second antenna element disposed in proximity to a second side of the mobile terminal, and a third antenna element disposed in proximity to a third side of the mobile terminal. The mobile terminal further including a switching mechanism that switches between a first connection mode in which the first and second antenna elements are feed elements and the third antenna element is a parasitic element, and a second connection mode in which the first and third antenna elements are feed elements, and a control unit that controls the switching mechanism to switch between the first connection mode and the second connection mode in accordance with a predetermined condition.
US09306273B2
Disclosed herein are example embodiments of a dielectrically loaded multifilar antenna for circularly polarised radiation the antenna having a plurality of operating frequencies in excess of 200 MHz. In one embodiment, the antenna comprises: an electrically insulative core having proximal and distal surface portions and, between the proximal and distal surface portions, a laterally directed side surface portion; a pair of feed nodes; at least four elongate generally helical conductive radiating elements located on the core; and, arranged between and coupling together the feed nodes and the radiating elements, a phasing ring formed by a closed loop, wherein the phasing ring is resonant at least two of the operating frequencies, the elongate antenna elements being coupled to the phasing ring at respective spaced apart coupling locations and extending from the phasing ring in a direction away from the feed nodes.
US09306268B2
An electronic device and a method for manufacturing an outer housing of the electronic device are provided. The electronic device includes an outer housing including a portion including a base including a non-conductive material and a plurality of islands formed on or above the base, wherein the plurality of islands include metallic materials, wherein the plurality of islands are spaced apart from each other, and wherein the plurality of islands form a two-dimensional (2D) pattern. The method includes injection-molding a base and forming a plurality of islands on or above the base, wherein the plurality of islands include metallic materials, and wherein the plurality of islands are spaced apart from each other to form a 2D pattern.
US09306254B1
Substrate-free mechanical structural systems comprised of interconnected subsystems of electronic and/or electromechanical components are provided.
US09306253B2
Provided is an electrolyte solution capable of further increasing the output of a lithium air battery, the electrolyte solution for a lithium air battery having a total bonding strength between Li2O2 is no less than 0.14.
US09306251B2
A battery pack includes batteries, a fan unit, a case housing the batteries and the fan unit, an air circulation passage formed in the case, an air introduction passage that makes communication between a suction part of the fan unit and outside of the case, and an air discharge passage that makes communication between the outside and an inside of the case. The air circulating passage includes a blow-off side passage that makes communication between a blowoff part of the fan unit and battery passages through which the circulating air flows to exchange heat with the batteries, and a suction side passage that makes communication between the battery passages and the suction part of the fan unit. At least one of the blow-off side passage and the suction side passage is an in-duct passage formed inside a duct disposed in the case.
US09306247B2
A method is provided for detecting when a vehicle mounted battery pack is damaged from an impact with a piece of road debris or other obstacle. Positioned within the battery pack is a plurality of deformable cooling conduits located between the lower surface of the batteries within the battery pack and the lower battery pack enclosure panel. One or more sensors are incorporated into the cooling conduits which monitor coolant flow rate or pressure. When the cooling conduits deform, a change in coolant flow/pressure occurs that is detected by the sensors integrated into the conduit's coolant channels. A system controller, coupled to a sensor monitoring subsystem, may provide any of a variety of responses when cooling conduit deformation is detected.
US09306242B2
A moss guard for a lead-acid battery cell includes a body and a plurality of fingers extending from a side of the body. The plurality of fingers are configured to substantially cover the top surfaces of negative electrodes between the negative electrodes and a positive strap. An end of at least one of the plurality of fingers distal to the body includes a lock, and the lock is configured to resiliently deflect between an engaged position and a disengaged position. The lock is configured to fix the moss guard with respect to positive lugs while in the engaged position.
US09306240B2
A solid polymeric electrolyte having a pattern, and a lithium battery including the same, includes a polymer matrix having a mesh structure and being formed of a cured photo-crosslinking agent; inorganic particles substantially uniformly distributed in the polymer matrix; and a liquid electrolyte comprised of a lithium salt and an organic solvent impregnated between the polymer matrix and the inorganic particles. The liquid electrolyte and the cured photo-crosslinking agent are present in a weight ratio ranging from 50:50 to 99:1. The liquid electrolyte containing the cured photo-crosslinking agent and the inorganic particle are present in a weight ratio ranging from 10:90 to 90:10. The solid polymeric electrolyte has properties suitable for a printing process to provide the pattern including a thickness ranging from about 10 nm to about 500 μm and, prior to curing the photo-crosslinking agent, a viscosity ranging from 100-10,000 poise under a shear rate condition of 1 sec−1.
US09306239B2
The present invention is directed to a starch-based battery system. The starch-based battery system uses a rheological and replaceable starch gluten electrolyte that generates colloidal starch gel adhesive contacted with and/or attached on electrodes to generate current for powering electronic devices. The starch-based battery system that includes control circuit and standard cap module replaces a conventional dry cell battery or is integrated with electronic devices to power, for example, flash-light, lighting ornaments or magnetic actuated motion products and toys. In other embodiments of the invention, the starch-based battery system is integrated into a device for attracting aquatic life forms in an aquatic environment, wherein the starch-based battery powers a light source and/or sound source and also the starch gluten electrolyte acts as bait for attracting aquatic life forms within the aquatic environment.
US09306237B2
The present invention relates to a cable-type secondary battery having a horizontal cross section of a predetermined shape and extending longitudinally, comprising: a core for supplying lithium ions, which comprises an electrolyte; an inner electrode, comprising an open-structured inner current collector surrounding the outer surface of the core for supplying lithium ions, an inner electrode active material layer formed on the surface of the inner current collector, and an electrolyte-absorbing layer formed on the outer surface of the inner electrode active material layer; a separation layer surrounding the outer surface of the inner electrode to prevent a short circuit between electrodes; and an outer electrode surrounding the outer surface of the separation layer and comprising an outer electrode active material layer and an outer current collector.
US09306236B2
Disclosed herein is a cable-type secondary battery having a horizontal cross section of a predetermined shape and extending longitudinally, comprising: a core for supplying lithium ions, which comprises an electrolyte; an inner electrode, comprising an open-structured inner current collector surrounding the outer surface of the core for supplying lithium ions, an inner electrode active material layer formed on the surface of the inner current collector, and a first electrolyte-absorbing layer formed on the outer surface of the inner electrode active material layer; a separation layer surrounding the outer surface of the inner electrode to prevent a short circuit between electrodes; a second electrolyte-absorbing layer formed on the surface of the separator; and an outer electrode surrounding the outer surface of the second electrolyte-absorbing layer and comprising an outer electrode active material layer and an outer current collector.
US09306227B2
A flow field plate for use in a fuel cell includes a non-porous plate body having a flow field that extends between first and second ends of the non-porous plate body. The flow field includes a plurality of channels having channel inlets and channel outlets, a fluid inlet portion that diverges from the first end to the channel inlets, and a fluid outlet portion that converges from the channel outlets to the second end. A fuel cell including the flow field plate includes an electrode assembly having an electrolyte between an anode catalyst and a cathode catalyst. The flow field of the flow field plate is side by side with the electrode assembly. A method of processing a flow field plate includes forming the flow field in a non-porous plate body.
US09306214B2
In a lithium ion battery having a discharge capacity of 30 Ah or more and 125 Ah or less, the positive electrode composite has the following configuration: The positive electrode composite contains a mixed active material of layered lithium nickel manganese cobalt composite oxide (NMC) and olivine lithium iron phosphate (LFP), a density of the positive electrode composite is 2.0 g/cm3 or more and 2.6 g/cm3 or less, and an application quantity of the positive electrode composite is 100 g/m2 or more and 200 g/m2 or less. Furthermore, a weight ratio (NMC/LFP) of the mixed active materials is set to 10/90 or more and 60/40 or less. Alternatively, when a discharge capacity is defined as X and the weight ratio is defined as Y, the relation of Y<−0.0067X+1.84 (30≦X≦125) is satisfied.
US09306210B2
A lithium-metal-oxide positive electrode having a layered or spinel structure for a non-aqueous lithium electrochemical cell and battery is disclosed comprising electrode particles that are protected at the surface from undesirable effects, such as electrolyte oxidation, oxygen loss or dissolution by one or more lithium-metal-polyanionic compounds, such as a lithium-metal-phosphate or a lithium-metal-silicate material that can act as a solid electrolyte at or above the operating potential of the lithium-metal-oxide electrode. The surface protection significantly enhances the surface stability, rate capability and cycling stability of the lithium-metal-oxide electrodes, particularly when charged to high potentials.
US09306205B2
A rechargeable battery according includes a plurality of electrode assemblies including a first electrode assembly and a second electrode assembly, a case housing the plurality of electrode assemblies, a cap assembly coupled to the case, and a first safety member including a first conductive plate between the first electrode assembly and the case, a second conductive plate between the second electrode assembly and the case, and a safety fuse between the first conductive plate and the second conductive plate and coupling the first and second conductive plates together.
US09306202B2
A separator for a secondary battery and a secondary battery including the same, the separator including a porous substrate; a patterned fabric layer on at least one side of the porous, the patterned fabric layer having patterns; and a polymer coating layer on the patterned fabric layer.
US09306198B2
A power tool has a mechanism for forcing a battery pack at least partially from a cavity that receives a battery pack. A biasing member is in the cavity. A member for retaining the biasing member is also in the cavity. The biasing member forces the battery pack at least partially from the cavity. When the battery pack is locked onto the frame, the biasing member is in a compressed condition and when the battery pack is an unlocked position, the biasing member forces the battery pack at least partially from the frame.
US09306194B2
Disclosed is a battery module assembly for a vehicle's battery pack, which has four battery modules, among which two battery modules are arranged in parallel and two battery modules are stacked and provided on the two battery modules arranged in parallel, wherein cylindrical secondary battery cells respectively included in the battery modules are electrically connected in parallel by means of plates respectively disposed at tops of the two battery modules arranged in parallel, wherein the two battery modules arranged in parallel are electrically connected in parallel by means of a lower metal plate disposed on the two battery modules arranged in parallel, wherein cylindrical secondary battery cells respectively included in the battery modules are electrically connected in parallel by means of metal plates respectively disposed at tops and bottoms of the two battery modules stacked on the two battery modules arranged in parallel, and wherein the four battery modules are electrically connected in series. Therefore, it is possible to provide a stable and economic battery module assembly including a plurality of secondary battery cells.
US09306190B2
A display device is provided that comprises a pattern positioned on a substrate, the pattern comprising a multi-layered structure comprising a conductive layer and at least one light-blocking layer in whole or in part; and a bank positioned on the pattern, the bank comprising a light-absorbent material.
US09306189B2
An organic light emitting display device, including: a substrate; a display unit formed on the substrate; and an encapsulation layer formed on the display unit, in which the encapsulation layer includes a lower layer formed on the display unit, at least one pattern layer formed on the lower layer, and an upper layer formed on the pattern layer, and the lower layer includes at least one of an inorganic film and an organic film, and the pattern layer includes an uneven pattern having a plurality of protrusions which are spaced apart from each other, formed on the lower layer, and a filling layer disposed on the uneven pattern, and the upper layer includes at least one of an inorganic film and an organic film.
US09306183B2
Described herein are organic photovoltaic (OPV) cells using gold complex(es) with as chemical structure of Structure I as active material: wherein, wherein R1-R15 are independently hydrogen, halogen, hydroxyl, an unsubstituted alkyl, a substituted alkyl, cycloalkyl, an unsubstituted aryl, a substituted aryl, acyl, alkoxy, acyloxy, amino, alkylamino, nitro, acylamino, aralkyl, cyano, carboxyl, thio, styryl, aminocarbonyl, carbamoyl, aryloxycarbonyl, phenoxycarbonyl, hydroxyalkyl, or an alkoxycarbonyl group. The OPV cell can be fabricated by thermal deposition or solution process such as spin coat and printing.
US09306180B2
A stretchable substrate including a plurality of islands that are disposed in a planar lattice pattern and spaced apart from each other, and a plurality of bridges that connect two adjacent islands. An aperture is formed between a pair of bridges, which are adjacent and parallel to each other, and the plurality of bridges are capable of stretching and contraction, and the shapes of the islands remain unchanged during the stretching and contraction of the bridges.
US09306165B2
Methods of forming memory cells comprising phase change and/or chalcogenide materials are disclosed. In one aspect, the method includes providing a lower line stack extending in a first direction, the lower line stack comprising a sacrificial line over a lower conductive line. The method further includes forming a chalcogenide line extending in the first direction by selectively removing the sacrificial material of the sacrificial line and replacing the sacrificial line with a chalcogenide material.
US09306153B2
A thermoelectric conversion element includes a magnetic layer which has a component magnetized in an in-plane direction, an electromotive layer which includes a material with spin orbit coupling, and a spin injection layer. The spin injection layer is provided between the magnetic layer and the electromotive layer and magnetically coupled to both the magnetic layer and the electromotive layer. A magnetic moment per unit volume of the spin injection layer is smaller than the magnetic moment per unit volume of the magnetic layer.
US09306151B2
Threshold gates and related circuitry are disclosed. In one embodiment, a threshold gate includes a threshold realization element and a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) element. The MTJ element is switchable from a first resistive state to a second resistive state. To realize a threshold function with the MTJ element, the threshold realization element is configured to switch the magnetic tunnel junction element from the first resistive state to the second resistive state in accordance with the threshold function. In this manner, the threshold gate may implement a threshold function that provides an output just like a complex Boolean function requiring several Boolean gates.
US09306149B2
Provided is a piezoelectric material that achieves both high piezoelectric performance and high Curie temperature. In addition, provided are a piezoelectric element, a liquid discharge head, an ultrasonic motor, and a dust removing device, which use the piezoelectric material. The piezoelectric material includes a perovskite-type metal oxide that is expressed by the following general formula (1): xBaTiO3-yBiFeO3-zBi(M0.5Ti0.5)O3 (1), where M represents at least one type of element selected from the group consisting of Mg and Ni, x satisfies 0.25≦x≦0.75, y satisfies 0.15≦y≦0.70, z satisfies 0.05≦z≦0.60, and x+y+z=1 is satisfied.
US09306146B2
A method of manufacturing fiber based and syntactic foam based composite type thermally insulating materials that retain high performance thermoelectric properties, and which can be used as thermoelectric generators or Peltier coolers for a wide range of industrial, commercial, residential and military applications.
US09306145B2
Methods for synthesis of thermoelectric materials are disclosed. In some embodiments, a method of fabricating a thermoelectric material includes generating a plurality of nanoparticles from a starting material comprising one or more chalcogens and one or more transition metals; and consolidating the nanoparticles under elevated pressure and temperature, wherein the nanoparticles are heated and cooled at a controlled rate.
US09306140B1
A semiconductor light-emitting device includes first and second semiconductor layer and a light-emitting layer between the first and second semiconductor layers. These layers are on a conductive substrate. A first electrode and a first electrode pad, which are electrically connected to each other, are the first semiconductor layer. A second electrode is between the substrate and the second semiconductor layer. A portion of the second electrode is not covered by the first semiconductor, second semiconductor, and light-emitting layers. A second electrode pad is on the exposed portion of the second electrode. The second electrode pad has a planar area that is less than a planar area of the first electrode pad. A third electrode is on a second surface of the conductive substrate such that the conductive substrate is between the third electrode and the second electrode. The third electrode is electrically connected to the second electrode pad.
US09306137B2
A method of producing the crystalline substrate having a concave-convex structure includes: (A) forming a transfer film by forming a concave-convex film on a support film on the surface having a concave-convex pattern thereon so that thickness of the residual film of the concave-convex film is 0.01 to 1 μm, the concave-convex pattern of the support film having concave parts with a width of 0.05 to 100 μm, a depth of 0.05 to 10 μm, and a ratio of the depth of the concave part to the width of the concave part of up to 1.5, (B) disposing the transfer film on the crystalline substrate, and transferring the concave-convex film onto the crystalline substrate to produce a crystalline substrate having the concave-convex film thereon, (C) etching the crystalline substrate having the concave-convex film thereon to form a concave-convex structure on the surface of a crystalline substrate.
US09306136B2
A batwing beam is produced from an optical emitter having a primary LED lens over a number of LED dies on a package substrate. The LED lens includes a batwing surface formed by rotating a parabolic arc about an end of the parabolic arc over a center of the optical emitter. A center of each of the LED dies is mounted to the package substrate about the focus of a parabola whose arc forms the batwing surface, for example, between about 0.5 to 1.5 of a focal distance from the vertex of the parabola. The batwing surface reflects light from the number of LED dies through total internal reflection (TIR) or through a reflectivity gel coating.
US09306133B2
An optical semiconductor device in which an optical semiconductor element connected to a silver-plated copper lead frame is sealed with an addition curing silicone resin composition, the addition curing silicone resin composition having (A) organopolysiloxane that contains an aryl group and an alkenyl group and does not contain an epoxy group; (B) organohydrogenpolysiloxane that has at least two hydrosilyl groups per molecule and an aryl group, the organohydrogenpolysiloxane that contains 30 mol % or more of an HR2SiO0.5 unit in a constituent unit having an amount that a molar ratio of the hydrosilyl group in the component (B) with respect to the alkenyl group in the component (A) is 0.70 to 1.00; and (C) a hydrosilylation catalyst having a catalytic amount.
US09306127B2
A light emitting device includes an electrically conductive member provided with a reflective film; a light emitting element mounted on the reflective film; and a protective film continuously covering a surface of the light emitting element and a surface of the reflective film. A thickness of the protective film on the reflective film in a vicinity of the light emitting element is substantially equal to a thickness of the protective film on the reflective film in the region except for the vicinity of the light emitting element.
US09306125B2
A light-emitting device, according to one embodiment, comprises: a light-emitting structure comprising a first conductive semiconductor layer, an active layer which is underneath the first conductive semiconductor layer, and a second conductive semiconductor layer which is underneath the active layer; a reflective electrode, which is arranged under the light-emitting structure; and an electrode which is arranged inside the first conductive semiconductor layer and comprises a conductive ion injection layer.
US09306117B2
A transfer-bonding method for light emitting devices including following steps is provided. A plurality of light emitting devices is formed over a first substrate and is arranged in array, wherein each of the light emitting devices includes a device layer and an interlayer sandwiched between the device layer and the first substrate. A protective layer is formed over the first substrate to selectively cover parts of the light emitting devices, and other parts of the light emitting devices are uncovered by the protective layer. The device layers uncovered by the protective layer are bonded with a second substrate. The interlayers uncovered by the protective layer are removed, so that parts of the device layers uncovered by the protective layer are separated from the first substrate and are transfer-bonded to the second substrate.
US09306113B2
A light emitting device comprises a body of an indirect bandgap semiconductor material. A junction region is formed between a first region in the body of a first doping kind and a second region of the body of a second doping kind of first concentration. A third region of the second doping kind of a second concentration is spaced from the junction region by the second region. The second concentration is higher than the first concentration. A terminal arrangement is connected to the body for, in use, reverse biasing the first junction region into a breakdown mode, thereby to cause emission of light. The device is configured such that a depletion region associated with the junction region reaches through the shaped region to reach the third region, before the junction enters the breakdown mode.
US09306111B2
A method of manufacturing (AgxCu1-x)2ZnSn(SySe1-y)4 thin films, the method comprising: providing a thin film comprising Ag and/or Cu, the thin film further comprising Zn and annealing the thin film in an atmosphere comprising S and/or Se, and further comprising Sn.
US09306107B2
Methods for forming a photovoltaic device include forming a buffer layer between a transparent electrode and a p-type layer. The buffer layer includes a doped germanium-free silicon base material. The buffer layer has a work function that falls within barrier energies of the transparent electrode and the p-type layer. An intrinsic layer and an n-type layer are formed on the p-type layer. Devices are also provided.
US09306099B2
A material including: graphene; and an inorganic material having a crystal system, wherein a crystal plane of the inorganic material is oriented parallel to the (0001) plane of the graphene. The crystal plane of the inorganic material has an atomic arrangement of a hexagon, a tetragon, or a pentagon.
US09306096B2
The present invention discloses an electrically conducting composition that include a charge transporting oligomer selected either from oligoanilines and/or oligothiophenes and electron accepting dopants; and further contain conductivity enhancing substances such as ionic liquids, or a nanoparticle, dissolved in a mixture of at least two solvents to achieve the desired formulation for making the electrically conductive layer for organic electronic devices.
US09306088B1
A method for manufacturing back contact solar cells, comprising steps of: (a) providing a silicon substrate doped with phosphorus; (b) doping the front surface and the rear surface of the substrate homogeneously with boron in a blanket pattern, thereby forming a front side p+ region on the front surface and a rear side p+ region on the rear surface; (c) forming a silicon dioxide layer on the front surface and the rear surface; (d) depositing a phosphorus-containing doping paste on the silicon dioxide layer of the rear surface in a second pattern; (e) heating the silicon substrate in order to locally diffuse phosphorus into the rear surface of the silicon substrate, thereby forming a rear side n+ region on the rear surface of the silicon substrate beneath the phosphorus-containing doping paste; and (f) removing the silicon dioxide layer from the silicon substrate.
US09306087B2
A method for manufacturing a photovoltaic cell with a locally diffused rear side, comprising steps of: (a) providing a doped silicon substrate, the substrate comprising a front, sunward facing, surface and a rear surface; (b) forming a silicon dioxide layer on the front surface and the rear surface; (c) depositing a boron-containing doping paste on the rear surface in a pattern, the boron-containing paste comprising a boron compound and a solvent; (d) depositing a phosphorus-containing doping paste on the rear surface in a pattern, the phosphorus-containing doping paste comprising a phosphorus compound and a solvent; (e) heating the silicon substrate in an ambient to a first temperature and for a first time period in order to locally diffuse boron and phosphorus into the rear surface of the silicon substrate.
US09306086B2
A solar cell according to an embodiment of the invention includes a substrate of a first conductive type, an emitter region of a second conductive type opposite the first conductive type, which is positioned at the substrate, an anti-reflection layer including a first opening exposing the emitter region and a plurality of second openings which expose the emitter region and are separated from one another, a first electrode which is positioned on a first portion of the emitter region exposed through the first opening and is connected to the first portion, a first bus bar which is positioned on a second portion of the emitter region exposed through the plurality of second openings and is connected to the second portion and the first electrode, and a second electrode which is positioned on the substrate and is connected to the substrate.
US09306080B2
An optical wiring substrate includes an insulation layer including a resin, and a conductor layer formed on the insulation layer and including a metal and an inclined surface inclined relative to an optical axis of an optical fiber. A first wiring pattern and a second wiring pattern are formed in the conductor layer, the first wiring pattern including a first connecting part to which a first electrode of a photoelectric conversion element is connected, and the second wiring pattern including a second connecting part to which a second electrode of the photoelectric conversion element is connected. A distance between the first wiring pattern and the second wiring pattern is narrowest between the first connecting part and the second connecting part. A distance between the first connecting part and the second connecting part is less than a dimension of the conductor layer in a thickness direction thereof.
US09306074B2
Provided is a semiconductor device including a transistor having excellent electrical characteristics (e.g., on-state current, field-effect mobility, or frequency characteristics) or a semiconductor device including a transistor with high reliability. In the channel width direction of a channel-etched transistor in which an oxide semiconductor film is between first and second gate electrodes, the first and second gate electrodes are connected to each other through an opening portion in first and second gate insulating films. In addition, the first and second gate electrodes surround the oxide semiconductor film in a cross-section in the channel width direction, with the first gate insulating film provided between the first gate electrode and the oxide semiconductor film and the second gate insulating film provided between the second gate electrode and the oxide semiconductor film. Furthermore, the channel length of the transistor is 0.5 μm or longer and 6.5 μm or shorter.
US09306073B2
Disclosed is a semiconductor device including an insulating layer, a source electrode and a drain electrode embedded in the insulating layer, an oxide semiconductor layer in contact with the insulating layer, the source electrode, and the drain electrode, a gate insulating layer covering the oxide semiconductor layer, and a gate electrode over the gate insulating layer. The upper surface of the surface of the insulating layer, which is in contact with the oxide semiconductor layer, has a root-mean-square (RMS) roughness of 1 nm or less. There is a difference in height between an upper surface of the insulating layer and each of an upper surface of the source electrode and an upper surface of the drain electrode. The difference in height is preferably 5 nm or more. This structure contributes to the suppression of defects of the semiconductor device and enables their miniaturization.
US09306062B2
A semiconductor device has a body layer disposed in a semiconductor substrate, cell regions arranged around a surface layer part of the body layer, and trenches arranged in a grid pattern for separating the cell regions from each other. A gate insulating film covers inner walls of the first trenches and an inner wall of the second trench, and a gate electrode is filled in the first trenches and the second trench covered by the gate insulating film. A cell circumferential region is disposed to surround an outer side of the second trench. An interlayer insulating film is disposed on the cell regions, the first trenches, and the second trench. A gate contact hole is disposed in the interlayer insulating film at an intersection of the first trenches arranged in the grid pattern. A gate wiring is connected to the gate electrode via the gate contact hole.
US09306058B2
An integrated circuit includes a transistor in a semiconductor substrate having a main surface. The transistor includes a source region, a drain region, a channel region, a drift zone, a gate electrode, and a gate dielectric adjacent to the gate electrode. The gate electrode is disposed adjacent to at least two sides of the channel region. The channel region and the drift zone are disposed along a first direction parallel to the main surface between the source region and the drain region. The gate dielectric has a thickness that varies at different positions of the gate electrode.
US09306054B2
A method of fabricating a semiconductor device is provided. A plurality of first gate electrode structure is formed on a substrate. A recess is formed in the substrate, wherein the recess is formed between two adjacent first gate electrode structures of the plurality of first gate electrode structure. A diffusion prevention layer includes a first material and is formed on the recess of the substrate. A first pre-silicide layer includes a second material different from the first material and is formed on the diffusion prevention layer. A metal layer is formed on the first pre-silicide layer. The first pre-silicide layer and the metal layer are changed to a first silicide layer by performing an annealing process to the substrate. The diffusion prevention layer prevents metal atoms of the metal layer from diffusing to the substrate, and the first silicide layer comprises a monocrystalline layer.
US09306040B2
A nonvolatile memory device includes a substrate comprising a first word line formation area, a second word line formation area, and a support area interposed between the first and second word line formation areas; a first stacked structure disposed over the substrate of each of the first and second word line formation areas and having a plurality of interlayer dielectric layers and a plurality of conductive layers that are alternately stacked therein; a second stacked structure disposed over the substrate of the support area and having the plurality of interlayer dielectric layers and a plurality of spaces that are alternately stacked therein; a channel layer disposed in the first stacked structure; and a memory layer interposed between the channel layer and each of the plurality of conductive layers.
US09306028B2
An electronic device comprises an insulator, a local first gate embedded in the insulator with a top surface of the first gate being substantially coplanar with a surface of the insulator, a first dielectric layer formed over the first gate and insulator, and a channel. The channel comprises a bilayer graphene layer formed on the first dielectric layer. The first dielectric layer provides a substantially flat surface on which the channel is formed. A second dielectric layer formed over the bilayer graphene layer and a local second gate formed over the second dielectric layer. Each of the local first and second gates is capacitively coupled to the channel of the bilayer graphene layer. The local first and second gates form a first pair of gates to locally control a first portion of the bilayer graphene layer.
US09306027B2
The characteristics of a semiconductor device are improved. A semiconductor device is formed so as to have a channel layer formed over a substrate, a barrier layer, a trench penetrating through the barrier layer in an opening region, and reaching some point of the channel layer, a gate electrode arranged in the trench via a gate insulation film, and an insulation film formed over the barrier layer outside the opening region. Then, the insulation film has a lamination structure of a Si-rich silicon nitride film, and a N-rich silicon nitride film situated thereunder. Thus, the upper layer of the insulation film is set as the Si-rich silicon nitride film. This enables the improvement of the breakdown voltage, and further, enables the improvement of the etching resistance. Whereas, the lower layer of the insulation film is set as the N-rich silicon nitride film. This can suppress collapse.
US09306008B2
The present disclosure relates to a semiconductor device including an oxygen gettering layer between a group III-V compound semiconductor layer and a dielectric layer, and a method of fabricating the semiconductor device. The semiconductor device may include a compound semiconductor layer; a dielectric layer disposed on the compound semiconductor layer; and an oxygen gettering layer interposed between the compound semiconductor layer and the dielectric layer. The oxygen gettering layer includes a material having a higher oxygen affinity than a material of the compound semiconductor layer.
US09306007B2
According to one embodiment, a semiconductor device includes a structural body, an insulating film, and a control electrode. The structural body has a first surface, and includes a first semiconductor region including silicon carbide of a first conductivity type, a second semiconductor region including silicon carbide of a second conductivity type, and a third semiconductor region including silicon carbide of the first conductivity type. The structural body has a portion in which the first semiconductor region, the second semiconductor region, and the third semiconductor region are arranged in this order in a first direction along the first surface. The insulating film is provided on the first surface of the structural body. The control electrode is provided on the insulating film. The structural body has a buried region provided between the second semiconductor region and the first surface. The buried region is doped with a group V element.
US09305999B2
A stack pad layers including a first pad oxide layer, a pad nitride layer, and a second pad oxide layer are formed on a semiconductor-on-insulator (SOI) substrate. A deep trench extending below a top surface or a bottom surface of a buried insulator layer of the SOI substrate and enclosing at least one top semiconductor region is formed by lithographic methods and etching. A stress-generating insulator material is deposited in the deep trench and recessed below a top surface of the SOI substrate to form a stress-generating buried insulator plug in the deep trench. A silicon oxide material is deposited in the deep trench, planarized, and recessed. The stack of pad layer is removed to expose substantially coplanar top surfaces of the top semiconductor layer and of silicon oxide plugs. The stress-generating buried insulator plug encloses, and generates a stress to, the at least one top semiconductor region.
US09305996B2
After the formation of a first interlayer insulating, an etching stopper film made of SiON is formed thereon. Subsequently, a contact hole extending from the upper surface of the etching stopper film and reaching a high concentration impurity region is formed, and a first plug is formed by filling W into the contact hole. Next, a ferroelectric capacitor, a second interlayer insulating film, and the like are formed. Thereafter, a contact hole extending from the upper surface of the interlayer insulating film and reaching the first plug is formed. Then, the contact hole is filled with W to form a second plug. With this, even when misalignment occurs, the interlayer insulating film is prevented from being etched.
US09305993B2
A method of manufacturing a semiconductor structure with a high voltage area and a low voltage area is provided. The method includes the following steps: providing a substrate of a first conductivity type; forming a second doped region of a second conductivity type in the substrate by a first implantation; forming a first doped region of a first conductivity type in the second doped region by a second implantation; forming an insulating layer on the substrate; forming a resistor on the insulating layer, wherein the resistor is electrically connecting the high voltage area and the low voltage area; and forming a conductor electrically connected to the resistor. The step of forming a first doped region defines the high voltage area and the low voltage area.
US09305992B2
An inductor may be formed from a conductive path that includes intertwined conductive lines. There may be two, three, or more than three intertwined conductive lines in the conductive path. The conductive lines may be formed from conductive structures in the dielectric stack of an integrated circuit. The dielectric stack may include metal layers that include conductive traces and may include via layers that include vias for interconnecting the traces. The intertwined conductive lines may be formed from the conductive structures in the metal and via layers. In crossover regions, the conductive lines may cross each other without electrically connecting to each other. Vias may be used to couple multiple layers of traces together to reduce line resistance.
US09305988B2
In a light-emitting device, supply of current is controlled using a transistor having a normal gate electrode (a first gate electrode) and a second gate electrode for controlling threshold voltage. The light-emitting device comprises one or more switches for selecting conduction or non-conduction between the first gate electrode and a drain terminal of the transistor. When the threshold voltage of the transistor is acquired, the first gate electrode and the drain terminal of the transistor are brought into conduction with the switch, and the threshold voltage of the transistor is shifted by controlling the potential of the second gate electrode.
US09305985B2
An organic light-emitting diode (OLED) display and method of manufacturing the same are disclosed. In one aspect, the OLED display includes a first substrate including a display area, a display unit formed in the display area and including an insulating layer, and a second substrate formed over the display layer. A sealant material is interposed between the first and second substrates and substantially seals the first and second substrates to each other. At least one hole is formed in a first portion of the insulating layer and at least one recess is formed in a second portion of the insulating layer. The sealant is substantially filled in the hole and the recess.
US09305972B2
According to one embodiment, a memory includes a semiconductor layer including a trench which extends in a first direction, the trench having a first portion with a first depth and a second portion with a second depth deeper than the first depth, a gate insulating layer covering the semiconductor layer in the first portion, an element isolation layer covering the semiconductor layer in the second portion, the element isolation layer extending in a second direction from the second portion, a gate electrode provided on the gate insulating layer in the first portion and the element isolation layer in the second portion, the gate electrode filling the trench, and a third impurity region provided in the semiconductor layer directly below the second portion, the third impurity region being continuous in the first direction.
US09305971B2
A semiconductor device comprises a semiconductor wafer; a piezoelectric resonator formed on the wafer, and an active circuit also formed on the wafer. The active circuit (e.g., a frequency divider) is electrically connected to the piezoelectric resonator.
US09305969B2
A solid-state imaging device 1A includes a CCD-type solid-state imaging element 10 having an imaging plane 12 formed of M×N pixels that are two-dimensionally arrayed in M rows and N columns, N signal readout circuits 20 arranged on one end side in the column direction for each of the columns with respect to the imaging plane 12, and N signal readout circuits 30 arranged on the other end side in the column direction for each of the columns with respect to the imaging plane 12, a semiconductor element 50 for digital-converting and then sequentially outputting as serial signals electrical signals output from the signal readout circuits 20 for each of the columns, and a semiconductor element 60 for digital-converting and then sequentially outputting as serial signals electrical signals output from the signal readout circuits 30 for each of the columns.
US09305965B2
The present invention provides a solid-state imaging apparatus which has hollow portions provided around each of color filters and achieves the prevention of the peeling of each of the color filters. The solid-state imaging apparatus having a plurality of light receiving portions provided on a semiconductor substrate includes: a plurality of color filters arranged correspondingly to each of the plurality of light receiving portions; and hollow portions formed around each of the plurality of color filters, wherein each of the color filters has one peripheral part contacting with adjacent one or more of the color filters.
US09305963B2
A system for use in identifying a user includes a portable emitter transported with the user. The emitter includes a quantum cascade laser configured to emit a thermal beam identifying a location of the user in response to a command, the thermal beam having a wavelength between approximately 2 μm and approximately 30 μm.
US09305961B2
A wafer-level packaging method of BSI image sensors includes the following steps: S1: providing a wafer package body comprising a silicon base, an interconnect layer, a hollow wall and a substrate; S2: cutting the wafer package body via a first blade in a first cutting process to separate the interconnect layer of adjacent BSI image sensors; and S3: cutting the wafer package body via a second blade in a second cutting process to obtain independent BSI image sensors. As a result, damage of the interconnect layer and the substrate may be decreased to improve performance and reliability of the BSI image sensor.
US09305956B2
An optical assembly includes a solid spacing layer between a plenoptic microlens array (MLA) and a pixel-level MLA, avoiding the need for an air gap. Such an assembly, and systems and methods for manufacturing same, can yield improved reliability and efficiency of production, and can avoid many of the problems associated with prior art approaches. In at least one embodiment, the plenoptic MLA, the spacing layer, and the pixel-level MLA are created from optically transmissive polymer(s) deposited on the photosensor array and shaped using photolithographic techniques. Such an approach improves precision in placement and dimensions, and avoids other problems associated with conventional polymer-on-glass architectures. Further variations and techniques are described.
US09305947B2
Image sensors are provided including a substrate defining a plurality of pixel regions, the substrate having a first surface and a second surface opposite the first surface. The second surface of the substrate is configured to receive light incident thereon and the substrate defines a deep trench extending from the second surface of the substrate toward the first surface substrate and separating the plurality of pixel regions from each other. In each of the plurality of pixel regions of the substrate, a photoelectric conversion region is provided. A gate electrode is provided on the photoelectric conversion region and a negative fixed charge layer covering the second surface of the substrate and at least a portion of a sidewall of the deep trench is also provided. The image sensors further include a shallow device isolation layer on the first surface of the substrate. The shallow device isolation layer defines an active region in each of the pixel regions and the negative fixed charge layer contacts the shallow device isolation layer.
US09305946B2
A photoelectric conversion apparatus includes a plurality of pixels arranged in a matrix, a plurality of signal processing units each corresponding to a column of the matrix, and a signal line. Each of the plurality of signal processing units includes a first capacitance and a second capacitance that hold a signal, a switch provided between the signal line and the first capacitance, a capacitance adjustment unit electrically connected to the second capacitance, and a connection unit configured to electrically connect the first capacitance provided to one of signal processing units to the second capacitance provided to another one of the signal processing units.
US09305944B2
Provided is a method to manufacture a liquid crystal display device in which a contact hole for the electrical connection of the pixel electrode and one of the source and drain electrode of a transistor and a contact hole for the processing of a semiconductor layer are formed simultaneously. The method contributes to the reduction of a photography step. The transistor includes an oxide semiconductor layer where a channel formation region is formed.
US09305943B2
An array substrate, a repairing method thereof and a display device, wherein the array substrate includes: a plurality of gate lines and a plurality of data lines provided in a display region, gate lead lines provided in a non-display region and respectively connected to the gate lines and a gate driver IC, and data lead lines provided in the non-display region and respectively connected to the data lines and a data driver IC. The array substrate further includes: at least one first repairing line provided in a same layer as the gate lead lines, and at a position corresponding to a data lead line; and/or, at least one second repairing line provided in a same layer as the data lead lines, and at a position corresponding to a gate lead line.
US09305942B2
TFT array substrate having metal oxide part and method for manufacturing the same and display device
Embodiments of the present invention provide a TFT array substrate and a method for manufacturing the same and a display device. The TFT array substrate comprises: a base substrate; gate lines, gate electrodes, a gate insulating layer and a semiconductor active layer formed on the base substrate; a metal barrier layer formed on the semiconductor active layer, the metal barrier layer covering the semiconductor active layer; source electrodes and drain electrodes formed on the metal barrier layer, with a metal oxide part being formed between the source electrode and the drain electrode to insulate the source electrode and the drain electrode from each other; and a protection layer formed on the gate insulating layer and the source and drain electrodes, wherein the metal oxide part is formed by oxidizing a part of the metal barrier layer located between the source electrode and the drain electrode.
US09305939B2
A semiconductor device has: a first transparent electrode, a drain electrode, and a source electrode formed on a substrate; an oxide layer joined electrically to the source electrode and the drain electrode and containing a semiconductor region; an insulating layer formed on the oxide layer and the first transparent electrode; a gate electrode formed on the insulating layer; and a second transparent electrode formed so as to overlap at least a part of the first transparent electrode with the insulating layer interposed therebetween. The oxide layer and the first transparent electrode are formed of the same oxide film.
US09305926B2
A semiconductor device includes a semiconductor device may include, but is not limited to, a semiconductor substrate, an isolation electrode, a gate electrode, a gate insulating film, and a first insulating film. The semiconductor substrate has a first groove and a second groove. An isolation electrode is positioned in the first groove. The gate electrode is positioned in the second groove. The gate insulating film is adjacent to the gate electrode. The first insulating film is adjacent to the isolation electrode. The isolation electrode is greater in threshold voltage than the gate electrode.
US09305922B2
A method of manufacturing a semiconductor device comprises forming an interlayer insulating film on a semiconductor substrate, the interlayer insulating film including a trench, forming a work function metal layer in the trench, forming an insulating film on the work function metal layer, forming a sacrificial film on the insulating film and filling the trench, forming a sacrificial film pattern with a top surface disposed in the trench by etching the sacrificial film, forming an insulating film pattern by selectively etching a portion of the insulating film which is formed higher than the sacrificial film pattern, and forming a work function metal pattern with a top surface disposed in the trench by selectively etching a portion of the work function metal layer which is formed higher than the insulating film pattern.
US09305916B1
An Electro-Static-Discharge (ESD) protection circuit uses Silicon-On-Insulator (SOI) transistors with buried oxide but no parasitic substrate diode useable for ESD protection. A filter voltage is generated by a resistor and capacitor. When a VDD-to-VSS ESD positive pulse occurs, the filter voltage passes through an n-channel pass transistor and inverted to drive a gate of a big SOI transistor that shunts ESD current. A second path is used for a VSS-to-VDD ESD positive pulse. The filter voltage passes through a p-channel pass transistor to the gate when the positive ESD pulse is applied to VSS. The big SOI transistor can connect between VDD and VSS for a power clamp, and the gates of the n-channel and p-channel pass transistors connect to VDD. A small diode may be added between VDD and VSS to generate a small triggering current to activate grounded-gate transistors near I/O pads for full-chip Pad-based ESD protection.
US09305914B2
In the high-voltage transistor, which is suitable for an ESD-protection circuit, there is no doped well or at most a portion of a second well (3) of a second conductivity type opposite a first conductivity type under a contact region (4) for the drain between a first well (2) and a semiconductor material of the substrate (1), said semiconductor material being undoped or being doped for the first conductivity type. Said portion has a lower thickness than a thickness which would provide a good insulation of the first well from the substrate and which would provide a high-breakdown voltage.
US09305911B2
Embodiments of methods for forming microelectronic device packages include forming a trench on a surface of a package body in an area adjacent to where first and second package surface conductors will be (or have been) formed on both sides of the trench. The method also includes forming the first and second package surface conductors to electrically couple exposed ends of various combinations of device-to-edge conductors. The trench may be formed using laser cutting, drilling, sawing, etching, or another suitable technique. The package surface conductors may be formed by dispensing (e.g., coating, spraying, inkjet printing, aerosol jet printing, stencil printing, or needle dispensing) one or more conductive materials on the package body surface between the exposed ends of the device-to-edge conductors.
US09305910B2
A semiconductor device includes an insulating substrate having a first conductive pattern on a first insulating substrate; a first semiconductor element having one surface fixed to the first conductive pattern; a printed circuit board having a conductive layer on a second insulating substrate and a plurality of metal pins fixed to the conductive layer; and a third insulating substrate. A portion of pins constituting the metal pins is fixed to other surface of the first semiconductor element, and the printed circuit board with the metal pins is sandwiched between the insulating substrate having the first conductive pattern and the third insulating substrate.
US09305909B2
A semiconductor apparatus includes a plurality of stack dies which are formed with a predetermined number of channels. The semiconductor apparatus also includes a base die configured to initialize a channel not electrically coupled with the stack dies.
US09305888B2
Some embodiments relate to a semiconductor module having an integrated antenna structure that wirelessly transmits signals. The semiconductor module has a first die having a first far-back-end-of-the-line (FBEOL) metal layer with a ground plane connected to a ground terminal. A second die is stacked onto the first die and has a second FBEOL metal layer with an antenna exciting element that extends to a position that is vertically over the ground plane. One or more micro-bumps are vertically located between the first FBEOL metal layer and the second FBEOL metal layer. The one or more micro-bumps provide a radio frequency (RF) signal between the first FBEOL metal layer and the antenna exciting element of the second FBEOL metal layer. By using micro-bumps to connect the first and second die, the FBEOL metal layers are separated by a large spacing that provides for good performance of the integrated antenna structure.
US09305887B2
A method of forming a seal ring structure includes the following steps. A substrate is provided, and the substrate includes a seal ring region. A metal stack is formed in the seal ring region. A first dielectric layer covering the metal stack is formed. A part of the first dielectric layer is removed to form an opening to expose the metal stack, and at least a side of the opening is not perpendicular to a top surface of the first dielectric layer. A conductive layer is formed to fill the opening. A second dielectric layer is formed to continuously cover the first dielectric layer and the conductive layer, and the second dielectric layer has a v-shaped surface totally overlapping the conductive layer.
US09305886B2
Integrated circuits and methods for fabricating integrated circuits are provided. In one example, a method for fabricating an integrated circuit includes fabricating a crack-stop structure that extends through a plurality of metallization layers above a semiconductor substrate. The plurality of metallization layers includes a first metallization layer and a second metallization layer that overlies the first metallization layer. Fabricating the crack-stop structure includes forming a first via-bar overlying and coupled to a first metal line of the first metallization layer that is disposed in a first ILD layer of dielectric material. The first via-bar is disposed in a second ILD layer of dielectric material and has a first width. A second metal line of the second metallization layer that is in the second ILD layer is formed overlying and coupled to the first via-bar. The second metal line has a second width that is from about 1 to about 5 times the first width.
US09305875B2
A method of manufacturing a semiconductor device includes forming a barrier metal film on a surface of at least one of a first electrode of a wiring board and a second electrode of a semiconductor element, providing a connection terminal between the first and second electrodes, the connection terminal being made of solder containing tin, bismuth and zinc, and bonding the connection terminal to the barrier metal film by heating the connection terminal and maintaining the temperature of the connection terminal at a constant temperature not lower than a melting point of the solder for a certain period of time.
US09305872B2
A power supply system has a QFN leadframe with leads and a pad. The pad surface facing a circuit board has a portion recessed with a depth and an outline suitable for attaching side-by-side the sync and the control FET semiconductor chips. The input terminal of the control FET and the grounded output terminal of the sync FET are coplanar with the un-recessed portion of the pad (switch node terminal) so that all terminals can be directly attached to contacts of a circuit board. A driver-and-control chip is vertically stacked to the opposite pad surface and encapsulated in a packaging compound.
US09305868B2
A semiconductor package, a substrate and a manufacturing method thereof are provided. The substrate comprises a conductive carrier, a first metal layer and a second metal layer. The first metal layer is formed on the conductive carrier and comprises an lead pad having an upper surface. The second metal layer is formed on the first metal layer and comprises a bond pad. The bond pad overlaps and is in contact with the upper surface of the first metal layer. The upper surface of the lead pad is partially exposed. A part of the bond pad overhang outward from the edge of the lead pad.
US09305866B2
Electronic devices including intermetallic columns within vias are provided. Vias are filled with one or more pastes containing metal particles. Thermal treatment of the pastes within the vias converts the particles within the pastes to one or more intermetallic compounds that do not melt during next level packaging.
US09305865B2
Methods of manufacturing semiconductor devices and semiconductor devices with through-substrate vias (TSVs). One embodiment of a method of manufacturing a semiconductor device includes forming an opening through a dielectric structure and at least a portion of a semiconductor substrate, and forming a dielectric liner material having a first portion lining the opening and a second portion on an outer surface of the dielectric structure laterally outside of the opening. The method further includes removing the conductive material such that the second portion of the dielectric liner material is exposed, and forming a damascene conductive line in the second portion of the dielectric liner material that is electrically coupled to the TSV.
US09305860B2
A cycling heat dissipation module is used for removing the heat generated by a heat-generating element of a circuit board and includes at least one main body and at least one conducting pipe. The main body has a chamber and a heat guiding part. The chamber is filled with a fluid and has a wall to divide the chamber into a first compartment and a second compartment adjacent to each other. The heat guiding part is used for conducting the heat generated from the heat generating element. The conducting pipe has a first end, a second end and a heat exchanging section. The fluid is pushed into the heat-exchanging section by the pressure difference after absorbing the heat of the heat guiding part, and then moved to the second compartment.
US09305859B2
In a bump-on-leadframe semiconductor package a metal bump formed on a integrated circuit die is used to facilitate the transfer of heat generated in a semiconductor substrate to a metal heat slug and then to an external mounting surface. A structure including arrays of thermal vias may be used to transfer the heat from the semiconductor substrate to the metal bump.
US09305857B2
A first cooling unit is provided for an exothermic member and has a capability of cooling the exothermic member to a temperature less than an ambient temperature of the exothermic member by absorbing heat from the exothermic member. A second cooling unit has a capability of cooling the exothermic member by blowing air onto the exothermic member. A temperature of the exothermic member is detected. It is determined that whether or not the exothermic member is in a supercooled state based on a detection result. The cooling capability of the first cooling unit is decreased and the cooling capability of the second cooling unit is increased, when the exothermic member is in the supercooled state.
US09305856B2
A semiconductor device including a dielectric layer formed on the surface of a post-passivation interconnect (PPI) structures. A polymer layer is formed on the dielectric layer and patterned with an opening to expose a portion of the dielectric layer. The exposed portion of the dielectric layer is then removed to expose a portion of the PPI structure. A solder bump is then formed over and electrically connected to the first portion of the PPI structure.
US09305850B2
A method and an apparatus of etching a semiconductor wafer are provided. The etching apparatus of a semiconductor wafer having a marker inside includes: a monitoring device capable of monitoring a surface of the semiconductor wafer so as to detect the marker; a nozzle capable of jetting a mixed gas that contains hydrogen fluoride and ozone onto the surface of the semiconductor wafer; a regulator capable of adjusting at least one of hydrogen fluoride concentration and ozone concentration in the mixed gas; and a controller capable of determining whether the marker is detected by the monitoring device and terminating the etching process.
US09305848B2
A process of forming an integrated circuit containing elongated contacts which connect to three active areas and/or MOS gates, and elongated contacts which connect to two active areas and/or MOS gates and directly connect to a first level interconnect, using a litho-freeze-litho-etch process for a contact etch mask. A process of forming an integrated circuit containing elongated contacts which connect to three active areas and/or MOS gates, and elongated contacts which connect to two active areas and/or MOS gates and directly connect to a first level interconnect, using a litho-freeze-litho-etch process for a first level interconnect trench etch mask. A process of forming the integrated circuit using a litho-freeze-litho-etch process for a contact etch mask and a litho-freeze-litho-etch process for a first level interconnect trench etch mask.
US09305847B2
A method of manufacturing a semiconductor device is provided. The method includes the following steps. A substrate including a first transistor having a first conductivity type, a second transistor having a second conductivity type and a third transistor having the first conductivity type is formed. An inner-layer dielectric layer is formed on the substrate, and includes a first gate trench corresponding to the first transistor, a second gate trench corresponding to the second transistor and a third gate trench corresponding to the third transistor. A work function metal layer is formed on the inner-layer dielectric layer. An anti-reflective layer is coated on the work function metal layer. The anti-reflective layer on the second transistor and on the top portion of the third gate trench is removed to expose the work function metal layer. The exposed work function metal layer is removed.
US09305843B2
An embodiment of the invention provides a chip package which includes: a first chip; a second chip disposed on the first chip, wherein a side surface of the second chip is a chemically-etched surface; and a bonding bulk disposed between the first chip and the second chip such that the first chip and the second chip are bonded with each other.
US09305830B2
A method of fabricating a semiconductor device includes forming a stacked structure in which 2n (here, n is an integer which is 2 or more) deposited sacrificial layers and 2n deposited insulating layers disposed on the 2n deposited sacrificial layers respectively are alternately deposited in a third direction perpendicular to a first direction and a second direction on a substrate having an upper surface extending in the first and second directions which are perpendicular to each other. Methods include forming a recess group including 2n−1 first recesses penetrating 20 through 2n−1 deposited sacrificial layers and forming a buried insulating layer group including 2n−1 buried insulating layers filling the 2n−1 first recesses respectively. A contact plug group including 2n contact plugs penetrating an uppermost deposited insulating layer of the 2n deposited insulating layers and the 2n−1 buried insulating layers may be formed.
US09305828B2
One or more embodiments of the invention concerns a method of forming a semiconductor layer having uniaxial stress including: forming, in a surface of a semiconductor structure having a stressed semiconductor layer and an insulator layer, at least two first trenches in a first direction delimiting a first dimension of at least one first transistor to be formed in the semiconductor structure; performing a first anneal to decrease the viscosity of the insulating layer; and forming, in the surface after the first anneal, at least two second trenches in a second direction delimiting a second dimension of the at least one transistor.
US09305825B2
A method of manufacturing a semiconductor device includes forming a plurality of fins by forming a plurality of first device isolating trenches repeated at a first pitch in a substrate, forming a plurality of fin-type active areas protruding from a top surface of a first device isolating layer by forming the first device isolating layer in the plurality of first device isolating trenches, forming a plurality of second device isolating trenches at a pitch different from the first pitch by etching a portion of the substrate and the first device isolating layer, and forming a second device isolating layer in the plurality of second device isolating trenches, so as to form a plurality of fin-type active area groups separated from each other with the second device isolating layer therebetween.
US09305821B2
An apparatus for manufacturing an integrated circuit having a thick film metal layer includes an applicator configured to selectively apply a paste on a heat-conducting substrate. The paste includes particles of a first metal constituent of particles having sizes substantially within a narrow predetermined range about a predetermined size. The apparatus further includes a radio frequency (RF) generator to selectively inductively coupling RF energy into the paste. The first metal particles of the predetermined size are inductively couplable with the RF energy, and the frequency of the RF energy corresponds to a coupling frequency of the first metal particles of the predetermined size so that the inductive heating of the first metal particles is substantially maximized.
US09305805B2
Provided are methods of etching a substrate using atomic layer deposition apparatus. Atomic layer deposition apparatus including a gas distribution plate with a thermal element and remote plasma are discussed. The thermal element is capable of locally changing the temperature of a portion of the surface of the substrate to vaporize an etch layer deposited on the substrate.
US09305803B2
Provided are a plasma processing apparatus with a radio-frequency power supply supplying temporally modulated intermittent radio-frequency power which can be controlled with high precision in a wide repetition frequency band, and a plasma processing method using the plasma processing apparatus.A plasma processing apparatus includes: a vacuum vessel; a plasma generating section plasma in the vacuum vessel; a stage installed in the vacuum vessel and mounted with a sample; and a radio-frequency power supply applying temporally modulated intermittent radio-frequency power to the stage, wherein the radio-frequency power supply has two or more different frequency bands and temporally modulates the radio-frequency power by a repetition frequency which has the same range of analog signals used in each of the frequency band.
US09305801B2
A method of forming a semiconductor device can be provided by forming a mask pattern including non-metallic first spaced-apart portions that extend in a first direction on a lower target layer and non-metallic second spaced-apart portions that extend in a second direction on the lower target layer to cross-over the non-metallic first spaced-apart portions at locations. The lower target layer can be etched using the mask pattern.
US09305800B2
Methods for fabricating integrated circuits are provided. In one example, a method for fabricating an integrated circuit includes forming assisting etch resistant fill topographical features that overlie a semiconductor substrate and that define an assisting etch resistant fill confinement well using a photomask. The photomask defines an assisting lithographically-printable mask feature. A block copolymer is deposited into the assisting etch resistant fill confinement well. The block copolymer is phase separated into an etchable phase and an etch resistant phase. The assisting etch resistant fill topographical features direct the etch resistant phase to form an etch resistant plug in the assisting etch resistant fill confinement well.
US09305794B2
An etching method is disclosed. A substrate is provided. An etching is performed to form at least one opening in the substrate. An auxiliary etching layer is formed in the opening to cover at least one etching residue. The auxiliary etching layer includes a media, a carrier and an etching component encapsulated by the carrier. A treatment process is performed to the auxiliary etching layer. The treatment process includes applying an energy to the auxiliary etching layer or exposing the auxiliary layer to a gas, so that the carrier breaks in the treatment and thereby the etching component is released to etch the etching residue.
US09305791B2
Combinatorial workflow is provided for evaluating materials and processes for current selector devices in a cross point memory array. Blanket layers, metal-insulator-metal devices, and compete memory structures are combinatorially fabricated on multiple regions of a substrate, with each region having a different material and process condition for the current selector devices. The current selector devices are then characterized, and the data are compared to obtain the optimum materials and processes.
US09305789B2
A semiconductor device comprising at least one active layer on a substrate and a a Schottky contact to the at least one active layer, the Schottky contact comprising a body of at least titanium and nitrogen that is electrically coupled with the at least one active layer.
US09305781B1
A method includes forming a multilayered structure by providing a substrate having a semiconductor layer disposed on a top surface thereof, the semiconductor layer containing misfit dislocations and associated threading dislocations. The method further includes depositing a tensile strained dielectric layer on a top surface of the semiconductor layer to induce a compressive strain in the semiconductor layer and annealing the multilayered structure to cause the misfit dislocations and associated threading dislocations to propagate within the semiconductor layer. The method further immobilizes the propagating misfit dislocations and associated threading dislocations in a predetermined portion of the semiconductor layer. A multilayered structure formed by the method is disclosed wherein a semiconductor layer contains misfit dislocations and associated threading dislocations that are immobilized within a predetermined portion of the semiconductor layer, where other portions of the semiconductor layer surrounding the predetermined portion are locally strain relaxed portions.
US09305776B2
Disclosed is a gallium nitride crystal substrate having a top surface, a bottom surface, regions of higher oxygen concentrations measured by SIMS, and other regions of lower oxygen concentrations measured by SIMS. The top surface is a C-plane surface. The ratio of the highest oxygen concentration to the lowest oxygen concentration is equal to or more than fifty.
US09305774B2
A stable and minute processing method of a thin film is provided. Further, a miniaturized semiconductor device is provided. A method for processing a thin film includes the following steps: forming a film to be processed over a formation surface; forming an organic coating film over the film to be processed; forming a resist film over the organic coating film; exposing the resist film to light or an electron beam; removing part of the resist film by development to expose part of the organic coating film; depositing an organic material layer on the top surface and a side surface of the resist film by plasma treatment; etching part of the organic coating film using the resist film and the organic material layer as masks to expose part of the film to be processed; and etching part of the film to be processed using the resist film and the organic material layer as masks.
US09305766B2
The present invention provides a method for aligning nanowires which can be used to fabricate devices comprising nanowires that has well-defined and controlled orientation independently on what substrate they are arranged on. The method comprises the steps of providing nanowires (1) and applying an electrical field (E) over the population of nanowires (1), whereby an electrical dipole moment of the nanowires makes them align along the electrical field (E). Preferably the nanowires are dispersed in a fluid during the steps of providing and aligning. When aligned, the nanowires can be fixated, preferably be deposition on a substrate (2). The electrical field can be utilized in the deposition. Pn-junctions or any net charge introduced in the nanowires (1) may assist in the aligning and deposition process. The method is suitable for continuous processing, e.g. in a roll-to-roll process, on practically any substrate materials and not limited to substrates suitable for particle assisted growth.
US09305765B2
An induction RF fluorescent lamp, comprising a bulbous vitreous portion filled with a working gas mixture, a power coupler comprising at least one winding of an electrical conductor for receiving an alternating voltage, and an electronic ballast providing appropriate voltage and current to the power coupler and operating at a frequency greater than 5 MHz wherein the electronic ballast comprises an EMI filter, an AC-to-DC converter, a DC bus, an input choke inductor and a DC-to-AC inverter.
US09305760B2
An electron source for electron-induced dissociation in an RF-free electromagnetostatic cell for use installation in a tandem mass spectrometer is provided. An electromagnetostatic electron-induced dissociation cell may include at least one magnet having an opening disposed therein and having a longitudinal axis extending through the opening, the magnet having magnetic flux lines associated therewith, and an electron emitter having an electron emissive surface comprising a sheet, the emitter disposed about the axis at a location relative to the magnet where the electron emissive surface is substantially perpendicular to the magnetic flux lines at the electron emissive surface.
US09305759B2
An ion source able to ionize liquid and gaseous effluents from interfaced liquid or gaseous separation techniques and from direct introduction of the analyte to the entrance of the ionization region. The liquid effluents from sources such as a liquid chromatograph are ionized by inlet ionization methods and the gaseous effluents from sources such as a gas chromatograph are ionized by a corona or Townsend electrical discharge, or an alpha or beta emitter, or by inlet ionization, or by photoionization. Ionization occurs in an intermediate pressure region linking atmospheric pressure and the vacuum of the mass analyzer. The source has the ability to ionize compounds from both liquid and gaseous sources, which facilitates ionization of volatile compounds separated by gas chromatography, volatile or non-volatile compounds separated by liquid chromatography, or infused into the ionization. The ionization methods can be achieved with a single configuration or with separately optimized configurations.
US09305747B2
The invention relates to a maskless lithography system for patterning a target using a plurality of charged particle beamlets. The system comprises an electron optical column including a blanker array for modulating the beamlets. The blanker array includes receivers for receiving data signals and blanker elements for modulating the beamlets in accordance with the data signals. The system further comprises a data path comprising a preprocessing system for processing pattern data and a plurality of transmission channels for transmitting processed pattern data to the blanker elements. The data path further comprises a pattern streaming system for receiving pattern data and generating data signals. First and second channel selectors connect a subset of selected transmission channels for pattern data transmission. The first channel selector is connected between the preprocessing system and the transmission channels. The second channel selector is connected between the channels and the blanker elements.
US09305746B2
A method of assembling a nozzle/skimmer module includes coupling a nozzle assembly and skimmer cartridge assembly in a rigid tandem configuration to more accurately control the formation of the Gas Cluster Ion Beam (GCIB). The nozzle/skimmer module is pre-aligned before installation in a production GCIB processing system to more accurately position the GCIB.
US09305739B2
An x-ray tube includes a frame forming a first portion of a vacuum enclosure, a rotating subsystem shaft positioned within the vacuum enclosure and having a first end and a second end, wherein the first end of the rotating subsystem shaft is attached to a first portion of the frame, a target positioned within the vacuum enclosure and attached to the rotating subsystem shaft between the first end and the second end, the target positioned to receive electrons from an electron source positioned within the vacuum enclosure, and a thermal compensator mechanically coupled to the second end of the rotating subsystem shaft and to a second portion of the frame, the thermal compensator forming a second portion of the vacuum enclosure.
US09305737B2
A filament for a light bulb includes a tube and a filament material within the tube, wherein the filament material is configured to be in a liquid state while the light bulb is in use.
US09305736B2
Provided is a phosphor for a dispersion-type EL that may be manufactured in a simple process and may provide stable, high brightness and light emission efficiency. The phosphor for a dispersion-type EL according to the present invention includes a mixture of an electron-accepting phosphor particle (4A) and an electron-donating phosphor particle (4B). The electron-accepting phosphor particle (4A) includes a base particle and an acceptor element added thereto, and the electron-donating phosphor particle (4B) includes a base particle and a donor element added thereto. For example, the base particle is a ZnS particle, the acceptor element is Cu, and the donor element is Cl or Al.
US09305735B2
An x-ray window comprising a polymer and carbon nanotubes and/or graphene. The carbon nanotubes and/or graphene can be embedded in the polymer. Multiple layers of polymer, carbon nanotubes, and/or graphene may be used. The polymer with carbon nanotubes and/or graphene can be used as an x-ray window support structure and/or thin film.
US09305730B2
A polarized electromagnet in a remote control relay includes a pair of armatures into which opposite ends of the plunger in a forward/backward movement direction are respectively inserted and fixed; a yoke to which one of the armatures becomes closer than the other when the plunger is at a stop position; an auxiliary yoke which contacts with one magnetic pole of a permanent magnet whose the other magnetic pole contacting with the yoke, the auxiliary yoke becoming closer to the other of the armatures than the one of the armatures; and a gap maintaining portion for maintaining a gap between the other of the armatures and the auxiliary yoke. When the plunger is at the stop position, the other of the armatures and the auxiliary yoke comes close to each other with the gap, a space is provided between the one of the armatures and the yoke.
US09305723B2
One aspect of the present invention, a strip type off-circuit tap changer includes an insulating rod and a support, where an operation positioning device is arranged on the support, a rack mobile frame is disposed on the insulating rod, the rack of the rack mobile frame is engaged to a drive gear of the operation positioning device, columnar fixed contacts are longitudinally arranged at a spacing on the insulating rod, the rack mobile frame is connected to a moving contact frame, and a moving contact assembly is arranged on the moving contact frame and fits with the fixed contacts on the insulating rod, the moving contact assembly is formed by an annular moving contact and an elastic pin, and the annular moving contact spans between two adjacent columnar fixed contacts.
US09305721B2
A switch comprising: a cover; a base; and a push button comprising: an elastic touch piece formed in a sidewall of a sliding part of the push button, wherein the push button is vertically and slidably installed in a space formed by assembling the cover to the base, wherein a free end of the elastic touch piece is configured to abut the base when the push button is pushed, and the free end is configured to abut the cover when the pushed push button is returned.
US09305720B2
An electrical signal switch connector structure is provided, mainly including an insulating case, an elastic terminal, a fixing terminal, and a shielding case. The insulating case respectively accommodates the elastic terminal and the fixing terminal. The elastic terminal has an elastic arm, and the elastic arm of the elastic terminal has a cutting gap. The fixing terminal has a fixing arm, and the elastic arm of the elastic terminal is elastically pressed against the fixing arm of the fixing terminal. An inlet hole of the insulating case is used for passing a terminal of a butting connector therein, and the shielding case wraps the insulating case profile such that an ambient extraneous matter is not attached to the elastic arm of the elastic terminal.
US09305719B2
A tap-changer selector for uninterrupted switching between two winding taps of a tapped transformer has fixed contacts arranged circularly in several horizontal planes at a selector housing and a centrally extending rotatable drive shaft in an interior of the selector housing and in each of the horizontal planes of the fixed contacts carries at least one movable contact for connection thereof. The selector housing consists of a plurality of honeycomb segments, and the honeycomb segments are arranged adjacent to one another in the circle in a horizontal plane. A plurality of honeycomb segments arranged in a plane in the circle are arranged vertically one above the other and the honeycomb segments have mounting regions and are so interconnectible by these mounting regions to form when at least two honeycomb segments are connected a mechanically positive connection between at least two mounting regions of the individual honeycomb segments.
US09305707B2
In a ceramic electronic component, a first internal electrode includes a first opposed section and a first extraction section. The first opposed section is opposed to a second internal electrode with a ceramic layer interposed therebetween. The first extraction section is located closer to a first end surface than the first opposed section. The first extraction section is connected to a first external electrode. The number of cross-linked sections per unit area in the first extraction section is less than the number of cross-linked sections per unit area in the first opposed section.
US09305705B2
There is provided a multilayer ceramic electronic component including a ceramic body having internal electrodes formed therein, external electrodes formed on external surfaces of the ceramic body and connected to the internal electrodes, and a buffer layer formed on surfaces of contact between the internal electrodes and the external electrodes among external surfaces of the ceramic body, in an interior direction of the ceramic body, wherein when a thickness of the external electrode is denoted by T, a thickness of the buffer layer is denoted by t, a thickness of an active region is denoted by TA, and a thickness of the ceramic body is denoted by Tc, T≦10 μm, TA/TC>0.8, and t≦5 μm, so that a multilayer ceramic electronic component having excellent reliability may be realized.
US09305701B2
Apparatus comprises: an induction, coil (40) arrangement, the induction coil arrangement having a first set of at least one coil (41) with a first diameter and a second set of at least one coil (42) with a second diameter, the second diameter being different to the first diameter, a first tap (A) connected at a first end of the first set, a second tap (B) connected at connection common to a second end of the first set and a first end of the second set, and a third tap (C) connected at a second end of the second set; a power transmit arrangement (61) selectively connectable to a first combination of two of the first to third taps; and a power receive arrangement (62) selectively connectable to a second combination of two of the first to third taps, the second combination being different to the first combination.
US09305695B2
A current-compensated choke features several current paths and includes several windings that are connected in parallel and wound around a common core. The windings preferably are alternately wound on the core in such a way that windings of a common current path are not arranged directly one on top of another.
US09305693B2
A bistable electromagnetic actuating apparatus (1) having an actuating element (2), which forms an engagement region (4) at the end and can be moved axially between two end positions, in particular for engaging in a control groove in a cam of an internal combustion engine, and having a coil device (11) which is provided in a stationary manner relative to the actuating element (2) and is designed to exert a force on said actuating element, wherein the actuating element (2) has permanent magnets (5) which are designed to interact with a core region (3) which is provided in a stationary manner relative to the actuating element (2), and wherein the coil device (11) is designed to generate a counterforce, which counteracts a retaining force of the permanent magnets (5) and releases said permanent magnets from the core region (3), in response to an electronic actuation signal, and wherein a spring is arranged such that it applies a spring force to the actuating element (2) in an axial direction which faces away from the core region (3).
US09305690B2
A composite ferrite composition comprises a magnetic material and a non-magnetic material. A mixing ratio of said magnetic material and said non-magnetic material is 20 wt %:80 wt % to 80 wt %:20 wt %. Ni—Cu—Zn based ferrite is used as the magnetic material. Oxides of Zn, Cu, and Si are at least included in a main component of said non-magnetic material. Borosilicate glass is included in a subcomponent of said non-magnetic material.
US09305689B2
An injection molding composition includes a ferrite powder which is a collection of ferrite particles, a first binder and a second binder, wherein a softening point of the second binder is lower than that of the first binder, a weight and a specific surface area of the ferrite powders are represented by Wp and S, and a weight and a density of the first binder and the second binder is represented by Wb1, Wb2, and Db1, Db2, and a hypothetical thickness Tb1 of the first binder is 0.6 to 3.0, and a hypothetical thickness Tb2 of the second binder is 5.0 to 16.0. In the composition, it is preferable that coated ferrite particles covering the outer circumference of the ferrite particles with the first binder and the second binder exist. Tb1 [nm]=(Wb1×103)/(Db1×Wp×S) formula (1) Tb2 [nm]=(Wb2×103)/(Db2×Wp×S) formula (2).
US09305684B2
The substrate gap supporter (30) according to one embodiment of the present invention comprises a body (31) having a hexahedron shape and made of an insulator, metal foils (32a) and (32b) installed on opposite side surfaces of the body (31) to expose the upper portions of both side surfaces and cover the lower portions of both side surfaces, and a substrate (210) attached to the bottom surface of the body (31). According to the present invention, the gap supporter can be made through an automated process, thus precisely controlling size. Since the gap supporter is attached to the surface of the substrate, there is little possibility for a height difference to occur. And also, because the gap supporter can be installed in an automated process, it is suitable for a mass production process.
US09305678B2
To provide a composition for a wire coating member containing a non-crosslinked material at a low cost, which has superior flame retardancy, and is excellent in heat resistance, wear resistance and flexibility, and to provide an insulated wire and a wiring harness containing the composition. The composition contains (A) polypropylene, (B) a polyolefin elastomer, (C) a bromine flame retardant, (D) an antimony trioxide, (E) magnesium hydroxide, either one of (F) (F1) a zinc sulfide and (F2) a zinc oxide and (F3) mercaptobenzimidazole, and (G) a hindered phenolic antioxidant. The insulated wire includes a conductor and an insulation coat made from the composition, wherein the insulation coat has a thickness of 0.5 mm or less, and the insulated wire has an external diameter of 4 mm or less. The wiring harness includes the insulated wire.
US09305673B2
Systems produce desired isotopes through irradiation in nuclear reactor instrumentation tubes and deposit the same in a robust facility for immediate shipping, handling, and/or consumption. Irradiation targets are inserted and removed through inaccessible areas without plant shutdown and placed in the harvesting facility, such as a plurality of sealable and shipping-safe casks and/or canisters. Systems may connect various structures in a sealed manner to avoid release of dangerous or unwanted matter throughout the nuclear plant, and/or systems may also automatically decontaminate materials to be released. Useable casks or canisters can include plural barriers for containment that are temporarily and selectively removable with specially-configured paths inserted therein. Penetrations in the facilities may limit waste or pneumatic gas escape and allow the same to be removed from the systems without over-pressurization or leakage. Methods include processing irradiation targets through such systems and securely delivering them in such harvesting facilities.
US09305671B2
An electrical power system for a nuclear power facility includes an active alternating current (AC) power bus configured to be electrically coupled to a plurality of engineered safety feature (ESF) loads of a plurality of nuclear power systems, each of the ESF loads configured to fail to a safe position upon loss of primary AC power; a critical battery system electrically coupled to the active AC bus, the critical battery system comprising a plurality of valve regulated lead acid (VRLA) batteries; and a primary AC power source electrically coupled to the active AC bus.
US09305653B1
A method of operating a memory array is disclosed. The memory array includes a plurality of memory cells arranged in rows and columns, wherein a plurality of parallel memory strings correspond to respective ones of the columns, and a plurality of word lines are arranged orthogonal to the plurality of memory strings, each word line being connected to gate electrodes of a corresponding one of the rows of memory cells. The method includes performing a program operation that programs all of the memory cells on edge word lines located at opposite edges of the memory array, and that programs selected memory cells between the edge word lines in the memory array according to input data to be stored in the memory array. Each programmed memory cell has a threshold voltage at a program verify (PV) level.
US09305651B1
An efficient wide range bit counter is presented that can support a wide range of counts with scientific notation. The counting scheme is dynamically altered to maintain a balance between accuracy and performance and allows early termination to fit timing budgets. Two (or more) counters each track the number of occurrences of a corresponding subset of events, where, when none of the counters have reached their capacities, the total count is the sum of the counts for the subsets. If one of the counters reaches it capacity, the other counter is then used as an extension of this first counter and the total count is obtained by scaling the count of the extended counter. In case of early termination, the accumulated count can be compensated to approximate the full count.
US09305641B2
A resistance change memory has a resistance change device and a control circuit for controlling application of voltage to the resistance change device. The resistance change device has a first electrode, a second electrode, and a resistance change layer interposed between the first electrode and the second electrode. A material for the second electrode includes one of members selected from the group consisting of W, Ti, Ta, and nitrides thereof. During forming of the resistance change device, the control circuit performs a second forming treatment succeeding to a first forming treatment. The first forming treatment includes application of voltage such that the potential of the first electrode is higher than the potential of the second electrode. The second forming treatment includes application of voltage such that the potential of the second electrode is higher than the potential of the first electrode.
US09305632B2
A method and an apparatus are provided. The apparatus is a hardware module that controls a power mode of a plurality of modules. The apparatus receives an indication of a desired operational frequency. Based on the received indication, the apparatus determines to switch from a first power mode associated with a first set of modules to a second power mode corresponding to the desired operational frequency and associated with a second set of modules. The apparatus enables modules in the second set of modules that are unassociated with the first power mode, stops traffic through the plurality of modules upon expiration of a time period after enabling the modules in the second set of modules that are unassociated with the first power mode, routes traffic through the second set of modules, and disables modules in the first set of modules that are unassociated with the second power mode.
US09305630B2
One of a source and a drain of a first oxide semiconductor (OS) transistor is connected to a gate of a second OS transistor and one electrode of a first capacitor. One of a source and a drain of the second OS transistor is connected to one electrode of a second capacitor and one of a source and a drain of a Si transistor. The gate of the second OS transistor serves as a charge retention node. Charge injection and retention at this node is controlled by the first OS transistor. The other of the source and the drain of the second OS transistor is connected to a wiring applying a high potential, and a potential of the second capacitor that corresponds to the write data is maintained. A signal corresponding to the write data is read by the Si transistor.
US09305626B2
A magnetic random access memory (MRAM) array having a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) to be read using a magnetic state of the MTJ, the MTJ being read by applying a current there through. Further, the MRAM array has a reference MTJ, a sense amplifier coupled to the MTJ and the reference MTJ, the sense amplifier operable to compare the voltage of the MTJ to the reference MTJ in determining the state of the MTJ; a first capacitor coupled to the sense amplifier at a first end and to ground at a second end; and a second capacitor coupled to the sense amplifier at a first end and to ground at a second end, the first capacitor storing the, wherein short voltage pulses are applied to the first end of each of the first and second capacitors when reading the MTJ thereby makes the current flowing through the MTJ there through for small time intervals thereby avoiding read disturbance to the MTJ.
US09305623B2
A circuit comprises a first memory cell, a second memory cell, and a disturb control circuit. The first memory cell has a first port and a second port. The first port is associated with a first write assist circuit. The second port is associated with a second write assist circuit. The second memory cell has a third port and a fourth port. The third port is associated with a third write assist circuit. The fourth port is associated with a fourth write assist circuit. The disturb control circuit is configured to selectively turn on at least one of the first write assist circuit, the second write assist circuit, the third write assist circuit, or the fourth write assist circuit according to whether the first port, the second port, the third port, or the fourth port is determined to be write disturbed.
US09305621B2
Semiconductor systems are provided. The semiconductor system may include a controller and a semiconductor device. The controller may generate command signals and address signals. The semiconductor device may discharge electric charges of a first local line pair and a second local line pair during a predetermined period after a read operation begins according to a combination of the command signals, equalize and pre-charge levels of the first and second local line pairs when a pre-charge operation is executed or the address signals are inputted thereto. The semiconductor device may also sense and amplify data loaded on the first or second local line pair to output the amplified data through an input/output line after the read operation begins.
US09305614B2
Embodiments of the present invention include an apparatus, method, and system for integrating data processing logic with memory. An embodiment of a memory integrated circuit is designed to execute a task on the data in a memory array within a memory integrated circuit. The memory integrated circuit can include a memory array, a data access component, a data holding component, and a logic component. The data access component can be coupled to the memory array and configured to provide an address to the memory array. The data holding component can be coupled to the memory array and configured to temporarily store the data in the memory array located at the address. The logic component can be coupled to both the data access component and the data holding component, and be configured to execute a task using data received from the data holding component. The logic component can include combinational or sequential logic.
US09305613B2
A memory module can include a data buffer having a data bus interface and a dynamic random access memory (DRAM) coupled to the data buffer. The memory module may also include a switch connected in parallel with the data buffer, wherein the switch can selectively bypass the data buffer. In one example, the memory module also includes a registered buffer having an address bus interface, where the switch may selectively bypass the data buffer based on a program signal obtained from an address bus via the address bus interface.
US09305609B2
Devices and systems for powering up a memory device, for example, are disclosed. One such memory device includes power up circuitry configured to receive an external power supply and to provide an internal power supply to the memory device upon receipt of a command. The power up circuitry may be configured to provide the internal power supply limited to a peak current, or may be configured to provide the internal power supply not limited to a peak current. The memory device may be, for example, a synchronous dynamic random access memory (SDRAM) device or Flash memory.
US09305597B2
A method begins with a processing module of a centralized digital video storage (DVS) system storing, for playback, a plurality of sets of encoded data slices in storage units, where multi-media content is encoded to produce the plurality of sets of encoded data slices. The method continues with the processing module monitoring the storage units for a failure mode and monitoring a number of subscriber devices requesting playback of the multi-media content. The method continues with the processing module determining whether a sufficient number of unique combinations of a decode threshold number of encoded data slices per set of slices exists to service playback of the multi-media content. When the sufficient number of the unique combinations do not exist, the method continues with the processing module reassigning unique combinations of the decode threshold number of encoded data slices per set of encoded data slices to some of the subscriber devices.
US09305593B2
A method for enhancing read performance in an ARMR system includes: obtaining CTS information for a plurality of readers in a multi-reader head of the ARMR system, the CTS information defining a relationship between skew angle and CTS between respective combinations of subsets of the readers; determining, as a function of the CTS information, a subset of the readers which provides enhanced read performance among the readers for each of a plurality of skew angles; assigning a weight value to each of a plurality of read signals generated by a corresponding one of the readers for each of the skew angles, the weight value being indicative of a performance of the corresponding one of the readers relative to one another; and decoding information read from at least one target track of a magnetic storage medium being read as a function of the read signals and corresponding weight values.
US09305592B1
A reception terminal and a method for compensating for inter-symbol interference (ISI) in a two-dimensional (2D) data structure are provided. The method for compensating for ISI includes transmitting, from a transmission terminal, a plurality of source pixel values based on a source 2D data structure via a channel, receiving, at a reception terminal, a plurality of pixel values for compensation based on a 2D data structure, and compensating each of the plurality of pixel values for compensation to each of corresponding pixel values after compensation. The plurality of pixel values for compensation are changed values of the pixel values of the source pixels due to the ISI, and each of the pixel values after compensation is determined based on both of each of the pixel values for compensation and values of adjacent pixels thereof.
US09305583B1
A method provides a magnetic transducer having an air-bearing surface (ABS) location. An intermediate layer that includes a first sublayer in a side shield region and a second sublayer outside of the side shield region is provided. A trench is formed in the intermediate layer using multiple etches. A first etch removes part of the second sublayer, providing a first portion of the trench having a first sidewall angle. A second etch removes part of the first sublayer, providing a second portion of the trench having a second sidewall angle. The second sidewall angle is greater than the first sidewall angle. A main pole is provided in the trench and has a plurality of sidewalls. The sidewalls have the second sidewall angle in the second portion of the trench and at least one main pole sidewall angle corresponding to the first sidewall angle in the first portion of the trench.
US09305582B2
Various embodiments of the present invention provide systems and methods for determining changes in fly-height. For example, various embodiments of the present invention provide storage devices that include a storage medium having servo data thereon. A read/write head assembly is disposed in relation to the storage medium. A servo based fly-height adjustment circuit receives the servo data via the read/write head assembly, and calculates a first harmonics ratio based on the received data and compares the first harmonics ratio with a second harmonics ratio to determine an error in the distance between the read/write head assembly and the storage medium.
US09305581B2
Various embodiments of the present invention provide systems and methods for low overhead disk wobble compensation. As an example, a method for performing synchronous wobble compensation processing is disclosed. The method includes providing a medium that includes a servo data region and a user data region. The servo data region includes a clock recovery pattern and a location pattern. A detectable pattern is written to the user data region a known number of bit periods from the location pattern. The detectable pattern is read back, and a fractional processing delay is calculated. Based at least on the fractional processing delay and a known number of bit periods from the location pattern to the end of the servo data region, a wobble compensation pattern is written an integral number of bit periods from the location pattern.
US09305575B2
Disclosed herein is an apparatus that includes a near field transducer positioned adjacent to an air bearing surface of the apparatus; a first magnetic pole; and a heat sink positioned between the first magnetic pole and the near field transducer, wherein the heat sink includes a first and second portion, with the first portion being adjacent the near field transducer and the second portion being adjacent the first magnetic pole, the first portion including a plasmonic material, and the second portion including a diffusion blocking material.
US09305573B2
A thermally assisted magnetic recording head includes core that propagates laser light as propagation light, a near-field light generator that faces a portion of the core and extends to an air bearing surface (ABS), the near-field light generator coupled to the propagation light propagating through the core so as to generate a surface plasmon, propagating the surface plasmon to an end part facing the ABS, and generating near-field light at the end part to irradiate the near-field light to a magnetic recording medium, a main magnetic pole layer provided in the vicinity of the near-field light generator where an end part is positioned on the ABS, a laser diode that generates laser light of wavelength 890 nm to 1,000 nm and enters the laser light into the core, and a photodiode provided on a silicon substrate measures an intensity of the laser light entering from the laser diode to the core.
US09305572B2
Methods that include forming at least a portion of a near field transducer (NFT) structure; depositing a material onto at least one surface of the portion of the NFT to form a metal containing layer; and subjecting the metal containing layer to conditions that cause diffusion of at least a portion of the material into the at least one surface of the portion of the NFT; and devices formed thereby.
US09305570B2
Systems, methods, and apparatus for pitch trajectory analysis are described. Such techniques may be used to remove vocals and/or vibrato from an audio mixture signal. For example, such a technique may be used to pre-process the signal before an operation to decompose the mixture signal into individual instrument components.
US09305560B2
Example methods, apparatus and articles of manufacture to perform audio watermark decoding are disclosed. A disclosed example method includes receiving an audio signal including an audience measurement code embedded therein using a first plurality of frequency components, sampling the audio signal, transforming the sampled audio signal into a first frequency domain representation, determining whether the code is detectable in the first plurality of frequency components of the first frequency domain representation, and when the code is not detected in the first plurality of frequency components, examining a second plurality of frequency components of a second frequency domain representation to determine whether the code is detected, the second plurality of frequency components being offset from the first plurality of frequency components by a first offset, the first offset corresponding to a sampling frequency mismatch.
US09305555B2
Onboard information device mounted on vehicle to provide information for supporting passenger includes voice acquisition unit that continually detects and acquires voice the passenger utters while the onboard information device is operating; voice recognition unit that recognizes speech contents of the voice the voice acquisition unit acquires; vehicle state detector that detects vehicle state including environmental state in the vehicle, surrounding state of the vehicle or operating state of the vehicle; output controller that creates display data or voice data from the speech contents recognized by the voice recognition unit according to the vehicle state the vehicle state detector detects, and that controls output of the display data or voice data; and output unit that outputs the display data or voice data the output controller creates. It can perform effective conversation support in real time according to recognition result obtained by continually recognizing speech contents of the passenger.
US09305554B2
A method and device for recognizing an utterance. The method includes transmitting context data associated with a first device to a second device. A first speech recognition model is received from the second device. The first speech recognition model is a subset of a second speech recognition model present at the second device. The first speech recognition model is based on the context data. It is determined whether the utterance can be recognized at the first device based on the first speech recognition model. If the utterance cannot be recognized at the first device, then at least a portion of the utterance is sent to the second device. If the utterance can be recognized at the first device, then an action associated with the recognized utterance is performed.
US09305549B2
A method and apparatus to identify names, personalities, titles, and topics that are present in a repository and to identify names, personalities, titles, and topics that are not present in the repository, uses information from external data sources, notably the text used in non-speech, text-based searches, to expand the search terms. The expansion takes place in two forms: (1) finding plausible linguistic variants of existing search terms that are already comprehended in the repository, but that are present under slightly different names; and (2) expanding the existing search term list with items that should be there by virtue of their currency in popular culture, but which for whatever reason have not yet been reflected with content items in the repository.
US09305547B2
Disclosed herein are systems, computer-implemented methods, and computer-readable storage media for recognizing speech by adapting automatic speech recognition pronunciation by acoustic model restructuring. The method identifies an acoustic model and a matching pronouncing dictionary trained on typical native speech in a target dialect. The method collects speech from a new speaker resulting in collected speech and transcribes the collected speech to generate a lattice of plausible phonemes. Then the method creates a custom speech model for representing each phoneme used in the pronouncing dictionary by a weighted sum of acoustic models for all the plausible phonemes, wherein the pronouncing dictionary does not change, but the model of the acoustic space for each phoneme in the dictionary becomes a weighted sum of the acoustic models of phonemes of the typical native speech. Finally the method includes recognizing via a processor additional speech from the target speaker using the custom speech model.
US09305539B2
A plenum with features to disperse acoustic energy in an airflow while maintaining a relatively small pressure drop in the airflow is disclosed. A general structure of the plenum may include a perforated airflow passage surrounded by a substantially large space enclosed between the airflow passage and a plenum. The perforated airflow passage has a perforated wall that may allow the acoustic energy to be dispersed into the substantially large space when flowing through the airflow passage. Acoustic energy dispersing materials may also be disposed in the substantially large space and/or on the perforated wall to help disperse acoustic energy by, for example, absorbing the acoustic energy. The plenum can help disperse the acoustic energy while helping minimize the pressure drop in the airflow.
US09305534B2
An adaptive audio system for a motor vehicle is disclosed. The audio system is operable to retrieve a music item from a storage device, classify the music item in a predefined music category the basis of a determined audio profile, select a category from a plurality of predefined music categories on the basis of a current driving behavior of the driver, and output a music item included in the selected category via an output device. The driving behavior of the driver is understood to mean the mode or style in which the driver drives.
US09305523B2
Methods for editing contents in a touch screen electronic device are provided. One method detects user selection of a plurality of displayed contents to be combined within one contents region, such as a memo. Main contents and sub-contents are determined from the selected contents, based on a predetermined input gesture. The sub-contents are combined with the main contents, where a style of the sub-contents is automatically changed to a style of the main contents. Techniques for separating combined contents are also disclosed.
US09305520B2
An image display apparatus includes: a grayscale conversion device configured to perform grayscale conversion processing on input data to output data; and a display device configured to operate in accordance with the output data to display an image by pixels arranged in a two-dimensional matrix state, wherein the grayscale conversion device is configured to perform first error diffusion processing for converting N0-grayscale input data into N1-grayscale data (2
US09305512B2
The present invention discloses array substrate, display device and method for controlling refresh rate of an array substrate. The array substrate includes; a plurality of pixel structures each including gate line, data line, common electrode line, first switching element at intersection of the gate line and the data line, pixel electrode, second switching element, and first transparent electrode. Gate, source and drain of the first switching element are connected to the gate line, the date line and the pixel electrode, respectively. Gate, source and drain of the second switching element are connected to second switching controlling line, common electrode signal terminal and the first transparent electrode, respectively. A first storage capacitance is formed between the pixel electrode and the common electrode line and/or between the pixel electrode and the gate line, and a second storage capacitance is formed between the pixel electrode and the first transparent electrode.
US09305511B2
A common electrode voltage compensating method, apparatus and a timing controller, the method comprising making statistics for grey scale data of every pixel for displaying a display picture; calculating a grey scale shifting rate between two adjacent rows of pixels, and obtaining common electrode voltage compensation signal parameters based on the grey scale shifting rate; generating positive/negative polarity information of the common electrode voltage compensation signal parameters based on a pixel voltage polarity inversion signal; generating a common electrode voltage compensation control signal based on the common electrode voltage compensation signal parameters and the positive/negative polarity thereof. The common electrode voltage compensating method, apparatus and timing controller address the problem of display picture pixels grey scale shifting due to a reversion of the positive/negative polarity of grey scale voltage.
US09305507B2
An object of the present invention is to prevent screen burn-in in a liquid crystal display device that performs a plurality of types of frame-reversal driving. When any gate bus line is focused, among a plurality of pixel electrodes in a display unit, pixel electrodes provided in pixel formation portions to which a scanning signal is provided from the focused gate bus line are arranged in a staggered manner with the focused gate bus line centered. A latch strobe signal (LS) including pulses where in each pixel formation portion a length of a period (TA1) during which a positive polarity voltage is applied to a liquid crystal is longer than a length of a period (TA2) during which a negative polarity voltage is applied to the liquid crystal is provided to a source driver from a display control circuit.
US09305505B1
A display panel comprising a light guide plate; a main light source configured to emit light from a first lateral surface of the light guide plate in a first direction; a sub-light source configured to emit light from a second lateral surface vertical to the first lateral surface of the light guide plate in a second direction perpendicular to the first direction; and a liquid crystal panel provided in a front surface of the light guide plate and configured to output image information.
US09305503B2
A display panel includes a switch control circuit, a first pre-charge switch circuit and a second pre-charge switch circuit. The switch control circuit is used for comparing the most significant bits (MSBs) of data signals to generate switch control signals for controlling the first and second pre-charge switch circuits, such that data lines are pre-charged through the first and second pre-charge switch circuits respectively. A method for driving a display panel is also provided herein.
US09305501B2
A method to drive a display device includes: transmitting at least one data voltage to one or more of a plurality of data lines, scanning one or more of a plurality of gate lines to enable transmission of a gate signal in association with a first frame of a first hold section of a first still image section associated with display of a still image, and scanning one or more of the plurality of gate lines to enable transmission of the gate signal every frame of a first refresh section. The first still image section comprises the first refresh section.
US09305479B2
Provided is a detection circuit for dark points on a panel, comprising a preset voltage generation module and a selection circuit module, wherein the preset voltage generation module is connected with the selection circuit module and is used for transferring N preset voltages to the selection circuit module, and the selection circuit module comprises N inputting terminals for receiving the N preset voltages, respectively, an outputting terminal and a strobe switch for strobing the outputting terminal with one of the N inputting terminals, N≧2. The circuit according to the embodiments of the present disclosure can detect the dark point defect caused by remains in active layers effectively in a panel state and prevent the panels having such dark point defects from being incorporated into modules, so that a waste of cost is avoid and a detection capability in a detection procedure for the panel is increased.
US09305478B2
An OLED display device includes first and second group pixels that emit light during first and second fields, respectively; first and second scan lines respectively coupled to the first and second group pixels; and first and second power lines for respectively supplying first and second power voltages to the first and second group pixels. The first and second power lines are coupled with first electrodes of the respective storage capacitors of the first and second group pixels, and the first power voltage is supplied as a first level voltage for a first period during which the first group pixels concurrently emit light. The first and second power lines are coupled with first electrodes of the respective storage capacitors of the first and second group pixels, and the first power voltage is supplied as a first level voltage for a first period during which the first group pixels concurrently emit light.
US09305451B2
An improved seismic alarm system designed to alarm users of an upcoming seismic event and other natural disasters, and aid victims' survival after an earthquake. The seismic alarm system includes an accelerometer, a controller, an acoustic-to-electric transducer for acoustic pattern detection, and RF module to receive emergency radio signals. The alarm system has central controlling unit that sets off an alarm after processing signals from several module and components: accelerometer detects seismic P wave acceleration changes for early earthquake detection; acoustic-to-electric transducer detects human acoustics or predetermined acoustic patterns, then initiates an alarm that brings rescue attention to survivors; RF module is tuned to receive emergency radio signals.
US09305450B2
An interactive wireless life safety communications system is disclosed. A central coordination server is linked to a first network, over which there is a connection to at least one resident life safety device at a specific location or for specific resident. An alarm signal is generated by the resident life safety device upon detection of an alarm condition and transmitted to the central coordination server. A caregiver communications device is connected to the central coordination server over a second network, and is receptive to an alarm notification that is generated by the central coordination server in response to the alarm signal. The caregiver communications device is also receptive to a caregiver user input, from which an action status response is generated for transmission to the central coordination server.
US09305448B2
The instant invention provides a smart system for securing distribution lines from malicious activities in the electricity distribution system, ultimately influencing the power sector in a positive way. The system architecture comprises two major parameters including distribution box and service box contributing mainly to the focal purpose of the system. The system is designed intelligently to improve and impede the process of theft control. The distribution box is designed to provide a high frequency signal having high voltage spikes on the distribution lines.
US09305446B1
A security camera is provided. The security camera includes an outer two-part housing having a front cover and a back cover. A camera assembly is disposed internally within the housing. The camera assembly includes a camera module carried by a support body. A seal arrangement is provided which seals the camera assembly from a portion of the interior of the camera housing, as well as the exterior. The security camera does not require the use of a sealing compound around its mounting holes when surface mounting the security camera using the mounting holes as a result of the sealing arrangement.
US09305439B2
A computing device may include a policy agent configured to receive activity information, apply at least one display policy to the activity information, and determine at least one command based on results of the at least one display policy being applied to the activity information, and a multi-colored indicator unit, located on a non-display screen area of the computing device, configured to display at least one of a plurality of colors based on the at least one command.
US09305438B2
The invention provides for optional printing at a pont of sale (POS). The invention provides a system and computer implemented method for printing information at a POS relating to a purchase transaction at the POS, comprising printing a second alternative instead of a default print, or printing both a default and a second print, in both cases dependent upon the second print being timely delivered to the POS printer. Preferably, the second print depends upon processing business rules related to color in the print.
US09305426B2
The invention includes a system and method for planning and customizing a gaming vacation. Initially, a central controller receives preference and configuration data from a user at a user terminal. A preparation code is then determined and associated with the configuration data. The configuration data and the associated preparation code are transmitted from the central controller to a casino server. The central controller provides feedback regarding the user's requests. The feedback may include, for example, marketing offers for the user and/or configuring a gaming device according to the configuration data associated with a preparation code received from a user at the gaming device.
US09305421B2
A method of monitoring a power supply of a gaming terminal comprises receiving, at an input of the power supply of the gaming terminal, an input power from an electrical power source, converting the input power to one or more output powers, providing, at one or more outputs of the power supply, the one or more output powers to one or more components of the gaming terminal, measuring, via one or more sensors, at least one electrical characteristic of the input power and the one or more output powers, and storing, in a memory, the measured at least one electrical characteristic for each of the input power and the one or more output powers.
US09305417B2
An automatic supplying device of door hinges includes: a door hinge supplying device having the door hinges loaded in upward and downward directions and supplying the door hinges; and a transferring device provided on a rear surface of the door hinge supplying device and automatically transferring the door hinges. The door hinge is automatically supplied when it is mounted, which makes it possible to improve work efficiency. In addition, a cylinder driving scheme is used, which makes it possible to decrease generation of noise at the time of supplying the door hinge, and a configuration for loading and moving the door hinge is simplified, such that a work space may be secured, and improving work convenience.
US09305415B2
A banknote management system 1 includes a banknote handling apparatus 2 having stackers for stacking banknotes, the banknote handling apparatus sorting the banknotes based on sorting conditions set for the respective stackers, and sequentially stacking the sorted banknotes in the stackers corresponding to the sorting conditions; and a banknote management apparatus 3 managing the banknote handling apparatus. The system includes a DB registration specifying unit 32B specifying a stacker 11 a DB registration necessity of which is specified among the stackers; a banknote detailed information creating unit 37B creating banknote detailed information for recognizing a banknote that is stacked in the stacker a DB registration of which is set to be necessary; and a DB control unit 37D registering the banknote detailed information in a database 33. The system can minimize a memory capacity of the database and a volume of banknote detailed information to be registered in the database.
US09305414B2
A safe unlocking machine includes a currency container that may be moved into and out of a container unit. The currency container includes a coin inlet, a bill inlet, and a lock-incorporated shutter that opens and closes a tag. When the shutter is operated to open, RFID wireless verification is performed between an antenna located in the container unit and the tag of the currency container. When predetermined conditions including accomplishment of the RFID verification are satisfied, rotation of a receiver handle is permitted. When the receiver handle is rotated once, a safe main body of a safe, which is located in the safe unlocking machine, is solely moved rearward. The currency in the safe main body falls down due to its own weight and is stored in the currency container.
US09305407B1
A method for fleet management can be created using a vehicle maintenance tracker for at least one vehicle and performing a vehicle inspection on the at least one vehicle using an inspection device to identify services needed on the vehicle. The vehicle inspection can then be transferred to a mechanic for verification of services needed on the vehicle. The vehicle inspection can provide a verification of services needed to the vehicle maintenance tracker and generate at least one of: vehicle repair information prioritized by importance of services, a schedule for vehicle service prioritized by importance of services needed, and a vehicle return to service date based on a schedule for vehicle service prioritized by importance of services needed.
US09305406B2
The present application discloses systems and methods for managing assets. In one exemplary embodiment, a system for monitoring an asset is disclosed. The system comprises at least one asset monitoring device, at least one fuel control device, and a central server. The asset monitoring device is configured for use with the asset to collect asset data about the asset. The fuel control device is configured for use with a fuel source to collect fueling data about fueling of the asset. The fuel control device is configured to communicate with the asset monitoring device to receive the asset data from the asset monitoring device. The central server is configured to communicate with the fuel control device to receive the asset data and the fueling data from the fuel control device.
US09305399B2
An object display device includes an image capturing unit for acquiring an image in real space, an image feature extraction unit for extracting a predetermined feature about an image either in a plurality of feature regions detected from the image in real space or in the entire image in real space, an image processing unit for performing correction processing on an image of an object based on the predetermined feature about the image, and a display unit for displaying an overlaid image in which the image of the object subjected to correction processing is overlaid on the image in real space. With this configuration, the feature of the image in real space is appropriately reflected in the image of the object in the overlaid image.
US09305397B2
Systems and methods for a tessellation are described. These systems and methods may divide the domain into a plurality of portions, including a first portion. The systems and methods may also determine coordinates for vertices for a first set of shapes that reside within the first portion, wherein each shape of the first set of shapes includes at least one vertex on a first edge of the first portion. After determining coordinates for the vertices for the first set of shapes, the systems and methods may determine coordinates for vertices for a second set of shapes that reside within the first portion. Each shape of the second set of shapes shares at least one vertex with at least one shape of the first set of shapes and none of the shapes of the second set of shapes includes a vertex on the first edge of the first portion.
US09305394B2
Embodiments of the present invention are directed to methods and a system that allow for deterministic parallel low discrepancy sampling, which can be efficiently processed, and are effective in removing transitionary artifacts that occur in low-dimensional projections generated in low discrepancy sequences. Embodiments of the claimed subject matter further provide improvements upon the low-dimensional projections and thus the visual quality when using the Sobol' sequence for image synthesis.
US09305393B2
A synthetic acceleration shape bound primitives composing a 3-D scene, and is defined using a group of fundamental shapes arranged to bound the primitives, and for which intersection results for group members yield an ultimate intersection testing result for the synthetic shape, using a logical operator. For example, two or more spheres are used to bound an object so that each of the spheres is larger than a minimum necessary to bound the object, and a volume defined by an intersection between the shapes defines a smaller volume in which the object is bounded. A ray is found to potentially intersect the object only if it intersects both spheres. In another example, an element may be defined by a volumetric union of component elements. Indicators can determine how groups of shapes should be interpreted. Synthetic shapes can be treated as a single element in a graph or hierarchical arrangement of acceleration elements.
US09305391B2
The present disclosure provides a system and method for the development and manipulation of three-dimensional voxel-based models. The method includes accessing, by a processor of a computing device, a subdivision surfacing geometry (SubD) model and converting a portion of features of the SubD model to a voxel model. The method includes accessing a texture for application to the voxel model and combining the texture and the voxel model to create a textured voxel model. The method includes determining displacement maps determined based in part on a difference between a surface portion of the voxel model and a surface portion of the SubD model and applying the displacement maps to the surface portion of the SubD model to determine a second SubD model where the second SubD model is configured for manipulation while preserving a visual aesthetic and a geometric placement of the added texture.
US09305381B1
Methods for drawing content to a display are provided. In one aspect, a method includes receiving input indicating content to be drawn to a display, and providing a request to prepare the content for display to a first thread. The method also includes receiving, in response to the provided request, instructions for drawing the content to the display, and providing the instructions for drawing the content to the display to a second thread. The method further includes executing, by the second thread, the instructions for drawing the content to the display. Systems and machine-readable media are also provided.
US09305379B2
A method for processing an image of a series of images includes receiving first data representing a first previously reconstructed image and receiving second data representing a second image. A second image is reconstructed in accordance with the first data, the second data and a noise model. The noise model is a likelihood estimation. The second image is reconstructed in accordance with a penalty function. The penalty function is a roughness penalty function. The penalty function is updated by iteratively adjusting an image volume estimate. The penalty function is updated by iteratively adjusting a registration term. The penalty function is a prior image penalty function and the prior image penalty function and a registration term are jointly optimized. The penalty function is determined in accordance with a noise model. The function is a p-norm penalty function.
US09305374B2
An electronic device with a display displays a user interface on the display. The device determines a first set of content-display values for one or more content-display properties of first content that corresponds to a respective region of the display. The device determines a first set of control-appearance values for one or more control-appearance parameters based on the first set of content-display values. The device displays a control in the respective region of the display, where an appearance of the control is determined based on the first content and the first set of control-appearance values, and displaying the control includes applying a blur operation to the first content to generate first blurred content and overlaying a translucent colored layer over the first blurred content.
US09305370B2
Techniques are described for rendering objects formed by implicit surfaces using ray-tracing, where each implicit surface is defined by a surface equation. The techniques utilize presence of real-roots to determine which implicit surfaces are intersected by a ray. If all implicit surfaces classified as uncomplemented surfaces intersect the ray, and none of the implicit surfaces classified as completed surfaces intersect the ray, the techniques determine a maximum from among a set of real-root values of the surface equations for the uncomplemented surfaces to determine an intersection point of the ray. The techniques utilize the intersection point for further processing such as per-pixel color and depth processing.
US09305357B2
A novel technique for performing video matting, which is built upon a proposed image matting algorithm that is fully automatic is disclosed. The disclosed methods utilize a PCA-based shape model as a prior for guiding the matting process, so that manual interactions required by most existing image matting methods are unnecessary. By applying the image matting algorithm to these foreground windows, on a per frame basis, a fully automated video matting process is attainable. The process of aligning the shape model with the object is simultaneously optimized based on a quadratic cost function.
US09305356B2
A method of selecting image data representative of a subject from an image data set comprises determining regions of image data, wherein each region of image data consists of a respective plurality of connected voxels, and selecting at least one region as being representative of the subject based upon at least one of the size and shape of the region.
US09305348B2
A diagnosis imaging apparatus and an operation method thereof are provided. A diagnosis imaging apparatus includes: an image processing apparatus for detecting a first point and a second point on a heart wall of a valve of interest in a 3D volume data of a heart of a subject, rotating the 3D volume data to make a virtual line connecting the first point and the second point be parallel with a datum plane, and acquiring a 3D standard view of the valve of interest based on the rotated 3D volume data; and a display apparatus for displaying the 3D standard view.
US09305339B2
Multi-feature image haze removal is described. In one or more implementations, feature maps are extracted from a hazy image of a scene. The feature maps convey information about visual characteristics of the scene captured in the hazy image. Based on the feature maps, portions of light that are not scattered by the atmosphere and are captured to produce the hazy image are computed. Additionally, airlight of the hazy image is ascertained based on at least one of the feature maps. The calculated airlight represents constant light of the scene. Using the computed portions of light and the ascertained airlight, a dehazed image is generated from the hazy image.
US09305332B2
Input image information is received. Enhancement information is determined based on frequency characteristics of the input image information. The enhancement information is mixed with the input image information to generate an enhanced image.
US09305329B2
A first image at a first resolution is received, the first image having a first hole therein. Based on the first image, a second image is generated at a second resolution lower than the first resolution, the second image having a second hole therein corresponding to the first hole. In the second image, one or more second-image source patches for the second hole are identified. At least one first-image source patch in the first image is identified based on a location of the identified second-image source patch. The identified at least one first-image source patch are stored in memory. Fill content are identified in the at least one first-image source patch stored in the memory. The identified fill content are placed in the first hole.
US09305328B2
A method performed by software generates a render request record for a render request submitted by a user of an app and stores the render request record in a queue database. The render request includes a visualization to be rendered. The software selects the render request record from the queue database. Selection of the render request record is determined at least in part by a priority value that depends on an amount of time the user has spent using the app. The software generates a rendered image for the selected render request record, using render data. Then the software publishes a publishing element including the rendered image to a newsfeed stream displayed by a social networking site.
US09305327B2
An image processing apparatus and its control method receives a drawing command including a moving image drawing command and a graphics drawing command and performs drawing processing. A drawing command is received, and the moving image drawing command is separated from the graphics drawing command. A graphics drawing unit obtains the result of graphics drawing in accordance with the graphics drawing command. A moving image drawing unit generates moving image data processed in accordance with the moving image drawing command. A composition unit composes the result of graphics drawing by the graphics drawing unit with the moving image data generated by the moving image drawing unit.
US09305318B2
A method of forming unique, private, personal, virtual social networks on a social network system that includes a database storing data relating to corresponding user entities. The method includes: a first user entity sending an invitation to a second user entity, recording in the database the second user entity as a direct contact of the first user entity and determining that third user entities, directly connected to the second user entity, are indirect contacts. A unique, personal, social network formed from direct and indirect contacts is thereby created for each user entity. Each user entity is able to control privacy of its data with respect to other user entities depending on the connection factor to that other entity and/or that other entity's attributes.
US09305302B2
Weighting sentiment information includes capturing sentiment information of a post from an electronic source, categorizing the post into categories based on the sentiment information, and assigning a weight to the post based on an interest attribute.
US09305299B1
A system, method, and computer program product are provided for proactively identifying and addressing customer needs. In use, at least one customer need for at least one customer is predicted, based, at least in part, on information associated with the one or more detected customer care request triggering events, information associated with the one or more customer care interactions, and information associated with the one or more after-effects.
US09305293B2
Embodiments of the invention include systems, methods, and computer-program products for a clearing house for creating and directing readable indicia to/from merchants, users, and/or vendors. As such, merchants, users, and vendors may all be able to recognize, read, and complete transactions using a created universal readable indicia, irrespective of the entities associated with the transaction. The invention may create and provide a universal readable indicia that may be read and/or scanned by any of a user, merchant, or vendor. Subsequently, upon scanning, the system may recognize the appropriate vendor associated with the scan, based on information about the user or merchant derived from the scan. As such, the invention may be able to convert the universal readable indicia to one or more indicia accepted by a vendor that may complete the transaction with the user and/or merchant.
US09305290B2
Disclosed is an employee vacation scheduling system for enabling an employee to purchase vacation travel services on the basis of the availability of the paid leaves thereof. The vacation scheduling system comprises a database comprising a plurality of employees wherein, each employee is associated with the number of paid leaves the employee is entitled to. The scheduling system further comprises a store module for enabling an employee to purchase a vacation travel service that spans a predetermined number of vacation days, a date module for enabling the employee, in the process of purchasing the vacation travel service, to mark successive vacation dates for the utilization of the vacation travel service, and a payment module for enabling the employee to pay for the vacation travel service upon determining that the number of vacation days are lesser than or equivalent.
US09305288B2
Systems and methods are disclosed for wirelessly communicating electronic mail messages at a vehicle. A computer processor is in communication with a memory device having software for an e-mail service, and electronic mail account credentials enabling access to one or more electronic mail accounts. A transceiver is in communication with the computer processor, and is capable of pairing with one or more wireless communication devices (e.g. cellular phone, etc.) for wirelessly communicating data between the processor and electronic mail servers located remotely from the vehicle. The processor operates the transceiver to wirelessly access the one or more electronic mail accounts at the electronic mail server(s) to wirelessly send or receive electronic mail messages at the vehicle. The computer processor convert received electronic mail messages to speech signals for playback.
US09305287B2
Methods, systems and computer program products are provided for generating a feasibility score for a job search and for generating a suggestion for enhancing the score. In one method, one or more computing devices receive, over a network, a data object that is associated with a user who is engaged in a search for employment. The data object includes a résumé of the user and a requirement that is associated with the search. The computers calculate, based on the data object, a score that indicates a likelihood of receiving an offer for an employment position that satisfies the requirement. The computers generate a suggestion that identifies how the score may be increased. The computers send the suggestion over the network to a computing device of the user.
US09305285B2
Embodiments are directed to a heads-up display for improving efficiency for displaying information using a web browser. Content-of-interest may be determined in web documents based in part on content profiles corresponding to the web documents. The determined content-of-interest may be compared with other information stored separately from the web browser. Business Information associated with the determined content-of-interest may be determined based on the comparison of the other information and the content-of-interest. Plugin information for a plugin document may be generated based on the a portion of the business information and the at least a portion of content-of-interest. The generated plugin document may be displayed in the web browser. The web documents may be modified based on the business information that may correspond to the determined content-of-interest. And, the modified web documents may displayed in the web browser.
US09305282B2
An arrangement of goods, comprising: a plurality of units of an article, the units equipped with respective contactlessly readable tags; each of said tags comprising a respective memory configured to store a respective signature; the signatures stored in the memories of said tags appearing scrambled relative to one another when read by a reader. Also, a method, comprising: contactlessly reading a first signature from a first tag affixed to a first unit of an article; contactlessly reading a second signature from a second tag affixed to a second unit of the same article, the second signature appearing scrambled relative to the first signature; decrypting the first signature with a key to reveal (I) an identifier associated with the article and (II) a first scrambling code; and decrypting the second signature with the same key to reveal the same identifier and a second scrambling code different from the first scrambling code.
US09305279B1
Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on computer storage media, for ranking developers. One of the methods includes obtaining data representing a plurality of developer actions for a developer, obtaining a net violation baseline for the code base, wherein the net violation baseline represents a measure of violation introductions compared to violation removals by a typical high-productivity developer of the code base, obtaining a developer action baseline for the code base, the developer action baseline representing a number of developer actions for the typical high-productivity developer of the code base. A net violation value and a developer action value are computed for the developer. A score is computed for developer including comparing the sum of the net violation value and the net violation baseline to the sum of the developer action value and the developer action baseline. The developer is ranked relative to other developers by the score.
US09305278B2
An access server computing system scrapes a set of records maintained by a target computing system in a database which is only made accessible over the Internet with a limited protocol query and an access challenge. The access server accesses the target computing system through an Internet browser interface based on emulating a user query made through the limited protocol, including by automatically passing locator identifier fields to retrieve a corresponding set of record which are stored in the first database.
US09305273B2
A system may include a network device including a memory. The memory may store a first database including a plurality of records, wherein each record in the first database stores a telephone number (TN) and a status of the corresponding TN. the first database may stores information to indicate whether one of the records in the first database was updated. The memory may store a second database having a plurality of records. Each record in the second database may indicate a range of consecutive TNs from the first database having a same status. The system may include processors to run a first thread to update the one of the records in the first database. The processors may run a second thread to generate the second database from the first database in response to the stored information indicating that the one of the records in the first database was updated.
US09305238B2
Techniques for detecting patterns in one or more data or event streams. A pattern to be detected may be specified using a regular expression. Events received in a data stream are processed during runtime to detect occurrences of the specified pattern in the data stream. In one embodiment, a pattern type or class is determined for the specified pattern and pattern matching is performed using a technique selected based upon the type or class determined for the specified pattern.
US09305234B2
A key word detection device and a method for detecting a search key word from a target image in order to perform a search with a search engine on the internet, the key word detection device comprising: a processor configured to operate as a feature point detector configured to detect a feature point of a specific character string from the target image, the specific character string prompting a user to perform the search; a key word recognition unit configured to recognize a character string existing in surroundings of the feature point detected by the feature point detector as the search key word in the target image; and a storage for storing character information and data of the target image used by the processor.
US09305233B2
A computer-implemented method and apparatus for detecting an object of interest. An edge image is generated from an image of a scene. A sectioned structure comprising a plurality of sections is generated for use in analyzing the edge image. The edge image is analyzed using the sectioned structure to detect a presence of the object of interest in the edge image.
US09305221B2
An imaging unit is arranged in a motor vehicle. The imaging unit is designed for providing, as a function of an image acquired by it, a digital source image of a predefined image size. A first intermediate image of a predefined first intermediate image size is generated by reducing a resolution of the source image for the sake of reducing pixels. Furthermore, a second intermediate image of the predefined image size is generated such that it comprises the first intermediate image. The second intermediate image is analyzed by a predefined detector in order to examine whether an object of a predefined object category is situated in the second intermediate image, the detector being designed for analyzing a predefined image detail and for detecting an object of a predefined object category of a predefined object size range.
US09305212B2
An image acquisition system for processing and tracking mail pieces in a mailing system (2) of the type comprising at least one mail piece processing machine (4, 6, 8) comprising at least one accumulation device (14, 16) for producing mail pieces and generating electronic processing and tracking details for these mail pieces, at least one imaging device (10, 12) for acquiring images of the mail pieces, and a computer (24) coupled to the at least one imaging device and the at least one mail piece processing machine, the at least one imaging device acquiring the images of mail pieces for simultaneously providing both these processing and tracking details and a filling level of the at least one accumulation device.
US09305209B2
A biometric authentication apparatus includes a storage unit which stores first shape data representing a shape of biometric information of a registered user's hand with fingers at a first posture and second shape data representing a shape of biometric information of the hand with the fingers at a second posture; a posture specification unit which calculates an index representing a third posture of fingers of a user's hand in a biometric image; a biometric information extraction unit which generates third shape data representing a shape of biometric information of the user's hand in the biometric image; and a correction unit which obtains corrected shape data by correcting the first or the second shape data to cancel a shape difference of the biometric information due to a difference between the third posture and the first or the second posture based on the index for matching.
US09305204B2
A method and system to detect the microcalcifications (MC) in different type of images viz. X-ray images/mammograms/computer tomography with varied densities using nonlinear energy operator (NEO) is disclosed to favor precise detection of early breast cancer. Such Microcalcifications are associated with both high intensity and high frequency content. The same NEO output is useful to detect and remove the irrelevant curvilinear structures (CLS) thereby helps in reducing the false alarms in micro calcification detection technique. This is effective on different dataset (scanned film, mammograms with large spatial resolution such as CR and DR) of varied breast composition (viz. dense, fatty glandular, fatty), demonstrated quantitatively by Free-response receiver operating characteristic (FROC). Importantly, the method and apparatus of the invention can be used in conjunction with machine learning techniques viz. SVM to favor detection of incipient or small microcalcifications, thus benefiting radiologists in confirming detection of micro-calcifications in X-rays images/mammograms and reducing death rates.
US09305198B2
A data reading system, such as for reading optical codes being passed through a read zone, including one or more imagers, and at least one illumination module, all disposed in a reader housing, the illumination module in one configuration having a reflector housing comprised of a cone-shaped structure of generally rectangular cross-section, with a top inner surface and a bottom inner surface, wherein area of the cross-section of the cone-shaped structure increasing from a rear end to a front end, and an illumination source (such as a plurality of light emitting diodes) disposed at the rear end of the reflector housing and operative to generate illumination out through the reflector housing along an outgoing illumination path, the top inner surface of the reflector housing being a surface of high reflectivity relative to the bottom inner surface of the reflector housing which has a surface of relatively low reflectivity. Also disclosed are imager configurations for providing multiple fields of views of multiple imagers co-mounted on a common PCB.
US09305197B2
A method includes the following: (1) projecting a light pattern towards a target object; (2) detecting light returned from the target object through an imaging lens arrangement with an imaging sensor to capture a first image with changes in the position of the focus plane of the imaging lens arrangement; (3) processing the first image to determine an optimized position of the focus plane of the imaging lens arrangement; (4) detecting light returned from the target object with the imaging sensor to capture a second image when the position of the focus plane of the imaging lens arrangement is maintained at the optimized position; and (5) decoding a barcode in the second image.
US09305193B2
A contactless communication device is provided which includes a field strength detecting circuit configured to detect a strength of a field induced on an antenna; a card circuit configured to demodulate a signal received via the antenna during a reception interval of a card mode; a processing unit configured to process the demodulated signal; and a reader circuit configured to transmit data via the antenna during a transmission interval of the card mode, the data provided from the processing unit, wherein an output power of the reader circuit is adjusted according to the field strength detected.
US09305186B2
A network of storage units has a data path which is at least a portion of the network. The network also has a key storage unit and a gateway storage unit. If the key storage unit stores a key value, the key storage unit transmits a key signal to the gateway storage unit. If the gateway storage unit does not store a gateway value or the key signal is not transmitted to the gateway storage unit, the gateway storage unit does not insert a data path segment in the data path. If the gateway storage unit stores a gateway value and the key signal is transmitted to the gateway storage unit, the gateway storage unit inserts the data path segment.
US09305183B2
A processor capable of secure execution. The processor contains an execution unit and secure partition logic that secures a partition in memory. The processor also contains cryptographic logic coupled to the execution unit that encrypts and decrypts secure data and code.
US09305182B1
Managing distribution of sensitive data is disclosed. In one example, a request is sent to a control platform to add a virtual domain. A domain key associated with the virtual domain is received. A request that the credential be transmitted to the virtual domain is sent, along with the application credential which has been encrypted using the domain key. In another example, a request that one or more application credentials be pushed to a virtual domain is received from a configuration console. The virtual domain is notified that at least one action request associated with the virtual domain is available. A signed request is received from the virtual domain for the action request. The application credentials are transmitted to the virtual domain. In a third example, an application credential of a virtual domain is requested. A signed message including an encrypted application credential is received from the control platform.
US09305181B1
A network interface receives transaction information. A processor determines private information and public information from the received transaction information. The network interface communicates the private information to an obfuscation engine, and receives obfuscated private information. The processor then merges the obfuscated private information with the public information to create a temporary identifier, and then converts the temporary identifier into a transaction identifier. A printer then prints a portion of the public information and the transaction identifier on a transaction receipt.
US09305179B2
Systems and methods for reducing accuracy of web bugs are disclosed. In some implementations, a method includes, at a computing device, identifying an incoming electronic message addressed to an intended recipient. The incoming electronic message includes a plurality of content items provided by a content provider. The method also includes, before the intended recipient reviews the incoming electronic message, reducing accuracy of user activity tracking by the content provider, by: requesting on a modeled temporal basis, a download of a first media content item in the plurality of media content items. In some implementations, the first media content item is invisible to the intended recipient.
US09305169B2
A security auditing computer system efficiently evaluates and reports security exposures in a target Web site hosted on a remote Web server system. The auditing system includes a crawler subsystem that constructs a first list of Web page identifiers representing the target Web site. An auditing subsystem selectively retrieves and audits Web pages based on a second list, based on the first. Retrieval is sub-selected dependent on a determined uniqueness of Web page identifiers relative to the second list. Auditing is further sub-selected dependent on a determined uniqueness of structural identifiers computed for each retrieved Web page, including structural identifiers of Web page components contained within a Web page. The computed structural identifiers are stored in correspondence with Web page identifiers and Web page component identifiers in the second list. A reporting system produces reports of security exposures identified through the auditing of Web pages and Web page components.
US09305166B2
A method for detecting a timing channel in a hardware design includes synthesizing the hardware design to gate level. Gate level information flow tracing is applied to the gate level of the hardware design via a simulation to search for tainted flows. If a tainted flow is found, a limited number of traces are selected. An input on the limited number of traces is simulated to determine whether the traces are value preserving with respect to taint inputs, and to determine that a timing flow exists if the traces are value preserving with respect to the taint inputs.
US09305161B1
A password hardening system is arranged between one or more clients and a domain controller or other authentication entity. The password hardening system comprises a plurality of servers configured to store in a distributed manner respective shares of at least one of a hardened surrogate password and a corresponding user password. The password hardening system is configured to intercept a first set of one or more communications based at least in part on the user password and directed to an authentication entity external to the password hardening system, and to provide to the authentication entity in place of at least a portion of the intercepted first set of one or more communications a second set of one or more communications based at least in part on the hardened surrogate password. The password hardening system may be configured to serve as a proxy between an authenticating client and the authentication entity.
US09305160B2
A method for generating passwords at customized internals includes: storing a plurality of user profiles, each profile including data related to a user including a plurality of account data entries, each entry including a current password, password criteria, and a predetermined period of time set by the related user; identifying at least one user profile including one or more account data entries where the included predetermined period of time has expired; generating a new password for each of the one or more account data entries included in each of the at least one user profile using random password generation algorithms, each password being based on password criteria included in the respective account data entry; and updating the current password included in each of the one or more account data entries included in each of the at least one user profile based on the generated new password.
US09305157B2
A reading device reads ambiguous target elements of an authentication target printed on a medium. Each ambiguous target element has a number of different manners by which the ambiguous target element can be interpreted by the reading device. The authentication target as read by the reading device is compared against an authentication signature of the reading device. The authentication signature specifies for each ambiguous target element an expected manner by which the reading device interprets the ambiguous target element as one of the different manners by which the ambiguous target element can be interpreted. Where the authentication target as read by the reading device matches the authentication signature of the reading device, the reading device is signaled as having passed authentication.
US09305155B1
Methods, systems, and apparatus, including computer programs encoded on a computer storage medium, for receiving user input indicating a first user selection of a first form of biometric authentication from a plurality of forms of biometric authentication, providing a first interface for display on a user device, the first interface corresponding to the first form, receiving first biometric data, the first biometric data being provided using the first interface, and selectively enabling communication between the user device and a back-end system based on the first biometric data.
US09305150B2
Security is enhanced for a user of an electronic device by providing a method for managing user login behavior. When an entered password that is different from a defined password is received, the method includes identifying alternative characters for at least one character of the entered password based on a location of a key corresponding to the character of the entered password on a keyboard used to enter the password. When the alternative characters are identified, a variation of the entered password is generated by replacing a character of the entered password with an alternative character of the character. When information relating to the variation matches information relating to the defined password, the entered password is determined to be valid.
US09305148B2
Content is encoded with a watermark that associates it with a particular consumer. When presented for playback, the rendering equipment examines the watermark to confirm that the consumer with whom the content is associated, is also the consumer with whom the equipment is associated. If there is no watermark—or if the watermark is associated with a different consumer, then playback is refused. The equipment also desirably checks whether the content has a second watermark (or even a very feeble remnant thereof), indicating that the content has been derived from content earlier provided to a different consumer. If so, playback is again refused. Thus, this embodiment will refuse to play if there is no watermark; if there is one watermark not associated with the proprietor of the equipment; or if there are two or more watermarks.
US09305140B2
A system for assisting a subject to select a proper form of treatment. The system comprises: a monitoring section that remotely monitors a health status of the subject; an inference section that infers medical information about the subject based on information subject posted on social networks; a subject database that stores subject's information; and a symptom engine that stores symptoms of medical situations. The inference section applies the health status and the medical information against symptoms stored in the symptom engine to determine a proper form of treatment.
US09305130B2
A method for forming semiconductor layout patterns providing a pair of first layout patterns being symmetrical along an axial line, each of the first layout patterns comprising a first side proximal to the axial line and a second side far from the axial line; shifting a portion of the first layout patterns toward a direction opposite to the axial line to form at least a first shifted portion in each first layout pattern, and outputting the first layout patterns and the first shifted portions on a first mask.
US09305120B2
A first component and a second component of a sports board may be controlled to configure the sports board. The first component may be coupled with a plurality of layers of the sports board. The second component may also be coupled with the plurality of layers of the sports board.
US09305117B2
Metadata associated with at least one field defined in a user interface is identified. The metadata associated with the field defined in the user interface is processed to identify at least one characteristic of the field defined in the user interface. Based on the characteristic(s), a test string is generated for use as an input into the field defined in the user interface to perform validation on the field.
US09305111B1
Quantitative analysis is provided through the implementation of a graph that includes nodes having edges therebetween representing data dependencies between the nodes. The nodes include calculation objects such as programs, data, libraries, and/or other objects. The nodes provide for modular computation that provides for transparency, record-keeping, experimentation, and/or other functionalities.
US09305093B2
A touchscreen-based user interface that allows the user to perform information searching on a mobile information appliance, such as a tablet computer or smart phone. By moving one or two fingers in appropriate direction(s) across the touchscreen, a search may be specified. Moreover, by using the appropriate gestures, a search may be broadened or narrowed by specifying additional search terms. This may be performed iteratively to allow the user to discover information, at various times narrowing or broadening a search.
US09305083B2
The techniques described herein automatically generate high precision clusters and high recall clusters for a set of documents having an author with a same or similar name. The high precision clusters and the high recall clusters can then be used in a labeling process so that efficient and accurate author disambiguation is realized.
US09305076B1
In an automatic electronic discovery search tool, documents can be clustered into a cluster hierarchy according to a first clustering approach. Once a hierarchy tree is created, portions of the tree can be flattened for application of a second superior clustering approach. Clustered portions may be used in a document review tool or further filtered according to specified criteria. Clusters may be filtered or used in a document review tool.
US09305075B2
A mechanism by which rule attributes of varying types and numbers can be stored and searched in an efficient manner is provided by storing attribute values of each rule in a child table of a parent rule table. The child table is normalized and contains a foreign key pointing back to the parent rule table and has attribute-value pairs as table columns of the child table. Each rule is then represented by one row of the parent rule table and one or more corresponding rows of the child rule details table. A variable and unlimited number of attribute dimensions is supported among the rules, and search performance is improved through the use of database indexes on the rule details table attribute columns. Metadata representing the structure of the child rule details table will identify the data attributes for each dimension.
US09305069B2
A method for uploading an object into a distributed storage system is implemented at a computing device The computing device splits an object into one or more chunks and uploads the one or more chunks into the distributed storage system. For each uploaded chunk, the computing device receives a write token from the distributed storage system, inserts an entry into an extents table of the object for the chunk in accordance with the received write token and the chunk ID, chunk offset, and chunk size of the chunk, generates a digest of the extents table, the digest representing the one or more chunks that the client expects to be within the distributed storage system, and sends the digest of the extents table to the distributed storage system. The distributed storage system is configured to use the digest to determine whether it has each of the one or more client-expected chunks.
US09305067B2
A computer software implemented method for transforming a first extract transform load (ETL) job having at least some unload transform load (UTL) portions. The method includes the following steps: (i) decomposing the first ETL job into an intermediate set of one or more jobs; and (ii) for each job of the intermediate set, transforming the job into a transactionally equivalent job to yield a final set of one or more jobs. The decomposing is performed so that each job of the intermediate jobs set is a Simple UTL job. The transforming is performed so that each job of the final set includes no UTL portions.
US09305066B2
In an example embodiment, a demand signal management system is configured to coordinate data harmonization among a plurality of entities. The demand signal management system may obtain unharmonized data through third party entities. Global records based on internal master records and taxonomy information may be distributed to the entities. In some embodiments certain entities may have authority to create new global records. In other embodiments, some entities may have authority to approve proposed new global records. In still other embodiments, some entities may not have authority to create new global records. Unharmonzied data sent to the entities for harmonization in accordance with the global records. The entities may accept or reject the harmonization request. If accepted, the entity may return an updated global record, a proposed new global record, and/or a new global record depending on the unharmonized data, the global records and the entities' authority.
US09305061B2
A system that incorporates teachings of the present disclosure may include, for example network device having a controller to receive multiple streams of content for portions of a multimedia work, perform a high level analysis for features in each of the streams for the multimedia work, perform a specialized analysis on the portion having a detected general feature to generate a content analysis output, correlate the content analysis output with other content analysis of the multimedia work, and output a weighted content description based on the correlation function. Other embodiments are disclosed.
US09305059B1
According to one aspect, the subject matter described herein includes a method for dynamically selecting questions to be presented in a survey. The method includes providing for assignment of priorities to potential survey questions. The method further includes determining a selection probability for each question based on the assigned priorities. The method further includes storing questions in a database embodied in a non-transitory computer readable medium. The method further includes dynamically selecting, from the database and based on the selection probabilities, questions to be included in surveys to be presented to a plurality of individuals such that different individuals are presented with different sets of questions.
US09305049B2
A mechanism is provided for cross-allocated block repair in a mounted file system. A set of cross-allocated blocks are identified from a plurality of blocks within an inode of the mounted file system, based on a corresponding bit associated with each cross-allocated block in a duplicated block information bitmap being in a first identified state. The set of cross-allocated blocks are repaired using a user-defined repair process. Then one or more of the set of cross-allocated blocks are deallocated based on results of the user-defined repair process.
US09305042B1
A system, method, and computer readable medium for removing credit card numbers from a financial transaction record is provided. A temporary record containing only numeric characters is generated by parsing non-numeric characters from the financial transaction record. Numeric strings are then parsed from the temporary record and evaluated to determine if the parsed numeric strings potentially comprise a credit card number. Numeric strings that are evaluated as potentially comprising credit card numbers may then be further evaluated to determine if the numeric strings comprise valid credit card numbers. The original financial transaction record may then be searched for numeric strings evaluated as valid credit card numbers. Any string of consecutive characters that match a validated credit card number may then be replaced with white space characters or other innocuous characters in the transaction record.
US09305040B2
B-Tree data is serialized to existing data for all types of workloads by converting a B-Tree data structure into a format capable of being stored and resurrected while containing all data stored in the B-Tree data structure and information relating to the B-Tree data structure.
US09305039B2
Systems and methods for indexing data include formulating an objective function to index a dataset, a portion of the dataset including supervision information. A data property component of the objective function is determined, which utilizes a property of the dataset to group data of the dataset. A supervised component of the objective function is determined, which utilizes the supervision information to group data of the dataset. The objective function is optimized using a processor based upon the data property component and the supervised component to partition anode into a plurality of child nodes.
US09305038B2
Identifying significant media granulars may comprise partitioning a media document into one or more media granulars. A score may be assigned to each of the one or more media granulars. The one or more media granulars may be monitored to detect one or more user actions on the one or more media granular. The score associated with a respective one of the media granulars may be updated based on a number of user actions detected on the respective one of the media granulars. A media granular may be identified as being significant based on the score meeting a threshold.
US09305034B2
A system receives database tables from a plurality of computer systems. Each of the database tables is associated with a particular computer system. Each particular computer system is associated with a particular schema. The database tables are stored in a computer storage device according to the particular schema of the computer system with which each database table is associated. Database views are created and stored. Each of the views is associated with a particular schema. A configuration table according to the particular schemas of each of the computer systems is generated. The configuration table is displayed on a display device. A selection of one or more schemas is received from the display on the computer display device. The database view from one of the selected database schemas is used as a template to generate a view for all of the selected schemas.
US09305031B2
Two or more tuples to be processed by a processing element operating on one or more computer processors may be received by the processing element. The processing element may have a windowing operator performing a windowing operation to determine a first value at the conclusion of a windowing condition. It may be determined from one or more tuples received within the windowing condition whether a condition to end the windowing operation before the windowing condition concludes is met. In addition, the windowing operation may be ended before the windowing condition concludes when the condition to end the windowing operation is met.
US09305021B2
A map system for presenting Point of Interest (POI) information is provided with an interface module, a storage unit, and a processing module. The interface module is coupled to a display device and provides an operation interface for receiving a search query and a condition of time period. The storage unit stores a plurality of POIs data and verified data of the POIs each corresponding to a respective one of different time periods. The processing module filters the POIs and the verified data according to the search query and the condition of time period to generate an electronic map, and displays the electronic map to present the filtered POIs via the interface module and the display device.
US09305020B2
The present invention is directed to recording and providing media files based on a location. Such systems and methods maybe transacted by a client application or a processor in communication with one or more electronic devices. In accordance with some embodiments of the present invention, methods may include receiving from a first device: a media file; data comprising information identifying a location associated with the media file; storing the media file and data in a database; receiving from a second device information identifying a location of the second device; determining a geographic radius of the second device based upon user selection; determining if one or more media files stored in the database are associated with a location in the geographic radius of the second device; and sending the one or more media files to the second device.
US09305017B2
Aspects of the subject matter described herein relate database virtualization. In aspects, clusters of database servers may be located at various locations of the Internet. When a client seeks to access a logical database, the client may send a logical server and logical database name in a data structure. These names may be used to find a physical server(s) and database(s) that correspond to the logical database. Once the location is determined, a proxy component is used to intercept and/or forward communications between the client and the physical server(s) and database(s) corresponding to the logical database. Using this system, a client may access data from a logical database without knowing the physical address of the logical user database.
US09305011B2
An archival storage cluster of preferably symmetric nodes includes a data protection management system that periodically organizes the then-available nodes into one or more protection sets, with each set comprising a set of n nodes, where “n” refers to a configurable “data protection level” (DPL). At the time of its creation, a given protection set is closed in the sense that each then available node is a member of one, and only one, protection set. When an object is to be stored within the archive, the data protection management system stores the object in a given node of a given protection set and then constrains the distribution of copies of that object to other nodes within the given protection set. As a consequence, all DPL copies of an object are all stored within the same protection set, and only that protection set. This scheme significantly improves MTDL for the cluster as a whole, as the data can only be lost if multiple failures occur within nodes of a given protection set. This is far more unlikely than failures occurring across any random distribution of nodes within the cluster.
US09305005B2
Provided are a computer program product, system, and method for merging entries in a deduplication index. An index has chunk signatures calculated from chunks of data in the data objects in the storage, wherein each index entry includes at least one of the chunk signatures and a reference to the chunk of data from which the signature was calculated. Entries in the index are selected to merge and a merge operation is performed on the chunk signatures in the selected entries to generate a merged signature. An entry is added to the index including the merged signature and a reference to the chunks in the storage referenced in the merged selected entries. The index of the signatures is used in deduplication operations when adding data objects to the storage.
US09304998B2
The present invention extends to methods, systems, and computer program products for main-memory database checkpointing. Embodiments of the invention use a transaction log as an interface between online threads and a checkpoint subsystem. Using the transaction log as an interface reduces synchronization overhead between threads and the checkpoint subsystem. Transactions can be assigned to files and storage space can be reserved in a lock free manner to reduce overhead of checkpointing online transactions. Meta-data independent data files and delta files can be collapsed and merged to reduce storage overhead. Checkpoints can be updated incrementally such that changes made since the last checkpoint (and not all data) are flushed to disk. Checkpoint I/O is sequential, helping ensure higher performance of physical I/O layers. During recovery checkpoint files can be loaded into memory in parallel for multiple devices.
US09304995B2
A method includes generating data from workforce applications, at least one of the workforce applications including at least one of forecasting, scheduling, recording, and monitoring functionalities; and storing the data from the at least one of the workforce applications in a storage area network (SAN), the SAN being operable to connect the at least one of the workforce applications to computer storage devices. This may also include keeping recorded contacts in a long term storage device such as the SAN or an operational data store (ODS) and transparently searching in both the ODS and the SAN simultaneously. With a concept of moving data on to a file system SAN which is cheaper as compared to a database technology such as ODS, the method facilitates predictable performance from the ODS and easier manageability with constant cost from SAN.
US09304992B2
A story index of story elements is provided in which each story element is able to be referenced in a story by name and by language that does not include the name. The story index may also contain references to the same story elements in other associated stories, including other stories in a series or that are in a different type of media. An associated story presentation application program may enable a viewer to view the entries in the story index for a specified story element and to then view the specified story element at any of the referenced locations. The application may enable purchase or downloading of the associated stories.
US09304991B2
Method and apparatus for using monitoring intent to match business processes or monitoring templates
Methods and apparatus are provided for using monitoring intent to match business processes or monitoring templates. One or more business processes and monitoring templates are identified by obtaining at least one business process or monitoring template, wherein at least one of the obtained business process or monitoring template has an associated monitoring intent comprising one or more monitoring keywords; obtaining a user-specified monitoring intent from the user, the user-specified monitoring intent comprising one or more search keywords; assigning a score to at least one of the obtained business process or monitoring template, wherein the score is based on a matching of one or more of the monitoring keywords from the associated monitoring intent with the search keywords of the user-specified monitoring intent; and identifying the one or more of the plurality of business processes and the plurality of monitoring templates based on the assigned score. The business processes and monitoring templates each have a plurality of keywords and a weighted score is optionally assigned to each of the plurality of keywords. The assigned score is based, for example, on a weighted score of matching keywords. A ranked list is optionally generated.
US09304990B2
Methods and systems for translating a text into multiple languages performed by at least one software component executed by at least one processor, comprise: maintaining a translation repository having a plurality of entries associating different types of content with user-specified languages; monitoring the text received by a program to identify one or more types of content and a source language of the text; retrieving the user-specified languages from the translation repository associated with the identified types of content; and for each of the identified types of content, translating the content thereof from the source language to the corresponding user-specified language when the source language is different from the corresponding user-specified language.
US09304981B1
A method and system are provided for utilizing inter-application image overlays or virtual transparent overlays (VTOs) to communicate information between users and tools along the EDA tool chain in an EDA design flow. VTOs remain divorced from an underlying design file and are able to be manipulated by a plurality of different users in a plurality of different EDA applications or tools, all meant to operate in different stages of the design flow and perform different functions along the design path towards actual physical circuit realization and fabrication.
US09304979B2
Syndicated descriptions of web content are obtained from feeds. For each item of each feed, a link is followed to a content page, and it is determined whether the content page directly or indirectly points back to the feed. If so, the description of the item from the feed is stored as an authorized description with a canonical form of the link to the item. Subsequently, when an item of user-generated content that includes a link to web content is received, the link to the web content is canonicalized. Based on the canonicalized link, any stored authorized syndicated descriptions of the linked content is obtained. If more than one authorized syndicated description of an item of linked content is available, one is selected. Then, the item of user-generated content containing a link can be published with an authorized syndicated description of the linked content.
US09304976B1
Systems and techniques are disclosed for positioning, based on a position velocity measure, related media content within a media outlet such as a website, a blog, an aggregation page, an application, or the like. The related media content may be related to a media content and may link to the media content, be a derivative of the media content, summarize the media content, or the like. A location within a media outlet for a related media content may be determined and the related media content may be published accordingly. The location of a related media content may be modified from a first location to a second location. The size of a related media content may be increased and/or a related media content may be highlighted. Further, techniques are disclosed for publishing related media content within a zone from a plurality of zones associated with a media outlet.
US09304975B2
A method is disclosed for laying out a plurality of containers on a page to generate a document upon insertion of content in the containers. The containers each have edges whose position upon layout is independent of the dimensions of the content inserted in each container. An association is created between an edge of a first container and an edge of a second container that is parallel and opposed to the first edge which constrains the second edge to a relation to the first edge. The page may then be laid out using the containers such that the edge of the first container moves dependent on the dimensions of content inserted in the first and second containers.
US09304972B2
Systems for memory-based computing include combining multiple operations into a single lookup table and combining multiple memory-based operation requests into a single read request. Operation result values are read from a multi-operation lookup table that includes result values for a first operation above a diagonal of the lookup table and includes result values for a second operation below the diagonal. Numerical inputs are used as column and row addresses in the lookup table and the requested operation determines which input corresponds to the column address and which input corresponds to the row address. Multiple operations are combined into a single request by combining respective members from each operation into respective inputs an reading an operation result value from a lookup table to produce a combined result output. The combined result output is separated into a plurality of individual result outputs corresponding to the plurality of requests.
US09304969B2
The present charging rate of a battery is accurately calculated. The calculation mode of the present charging rate is switched to a current integration mode during operation of a generator motor while the mode is switched to a voltage reference mode at a predetermined switchover timing. In the current integration mode, charge current of the battery is integrated and added to the initial charging rate and an integrated discharge current value is subtracted from the initial charging rate of the battery to calculate the present charging rate. In the voltage reference mode, the present charging rate is calculated based on a predetermined map and detected voltage of the battery. After calculation of the present charging rate according to the voltage reference mode, the calculation mode is restored from the voltage reference mode to the current integration mode and the suspension of operating the generator motor is cancelled.
US09304964B2
A separable Transport Layer is described in the context of cache coherent multiple component micro-electronic systems. In one example, a packet is received from a source component, the packet containing a Protocol Layer. A Transport Layer is attached to the packet and the packet is sent across a component communications interface to a second component, the packet containing the Transport Layer and the Protocol Layer.
US09304963B2
Systems and methods self-organize a multifunctional power and energy control and management system by integrating multiple backplane based modules through module descriptions, the module descriptions including control logic and parameters associated with the modules. Dynamic data table structures may be configured based on information provides with the module descriptions and provide for improved data accessing, storing, and updating.
US09304957B2
An image processing method includes: dividing received data into a header and a body; and writing the data in at least one buffer through a direct memory access (DMA) transfer.
US09304951B1
Disclosed is a policy-based I/O dispatcher that intercepts I/O requests from several individual volumes made to a shared storage system (such as a RAID array) and manages these I/O requests so that no single volume monopolizes the I/O bandwidth and excludes the other volumes from timely completing their own I/O requests. Also disclosed are a plurality of attributes that may be assigned to each volume sharing a disk array to effectively manage the sharing of the disk array among the volumes. The I/O policy manager may handle I/O requests from several sources including volume-based iSCSI I/O requests as well as the file-share-based XFS I/O requests.
US09304945B2
A method for synchronizing parallel applications in a partitioned asymmetric multi-processing system having multiple independent levels of security is provided. Synchronized access to a shared data memory region is provided for a first application through a first instance of a para-virtualized user library linked against a first application in a first domain having a first security level. Synchronized access is provided to the shared data memory region for a second application in parallel with the first application through a second instance of the para-virtualized user library linked against the second application in the first domain. The second instance of the para-virtualized user library also accesses the synchronization structure. Access is prevented to the shared data memory region and the synchronization structure by other applications in one or more other domains having other levels of security per domain.
US09304943B2
A processor system according to the present invention includes a storage unit (10), a control information area (12) that stores an access prohibit flag (13) capable of switching from an allow side to a prohibit side, a main PEa that issues an access request to the storage unit (10) and a request for rewriting a copy register (32), a security PE that evaluates whether or not the request for rewriting the copy register (32) is valid, the copy register (32) that stores, when the access prohibit flag (13) is set to the allow side, a value corresponding to the allowance and, when the access prohibit flag (13) is set to the prohibit side, a value corresponding to an evaluation result by the security PE, and an access control circuit (21) that controls whether or not to allow access from the main PEa to the storage unit (10) based on an output value from the copy register (32).
US09304941B2
A method comprises receiving a plaintext message (m), encrypting the plaintext message and generating a cipher text (c) and authentication data (t), storing the cipher text in a user data portion of a data storage device, and storing the authentication data in a meta data portion of the data storage device.
US09304934B2
Register files for use in an out-of-order processor that have been divided into a plurality of sub-register files. The register files also have a plurality of buffers which are each associated with one of the sub-register files. Each buffer receives and stores write operations destined for the associated sub-register file which can be later issued to the sub-register file. Specifically, each clock cycle it is determined whether there is at least one write operation in the buffer that has not been issued to the associated sub-register file. If there is at least one write operation in the buffer that has not been issued to the associated sub-register file, one of the non-issued write operations is issued to the associated sub-register file. Each sub-register file may also have an arbitration logic unit which resolves conflicts between read and write operations that want to access the associated sub-register file in the same cycle by prioritizing read operations unless a conflicting write instruction has reached commit time.
US09304926B2
A coherent memory system includes a plurality of level 1 cache memories 6 connected via interconnect circuitry 18 to a level 2 cache memory 8. Coherency control circuitry 10 manages coherency between lines of data. Evict messages from the level 1 cache memories to the coherency control circuitry 10 are sent via the read address channel AR. Read messages are also sent via the read address channel AR. The read address channel AR is configured such that a read message may not be reordered relative to an evict message. The coherency control circuitry 10 is configured such that a read message will not be processed ahead of an evict message. The level 1 cache memories 6 do not track in-flight evict messages. No acknowledgement of an evict message is sent from the coherency control circuitry 10 back to the level 1 cache memory 6.
US09304923B2
A data processing systems employing a coherent memory system comprises multiple main cache memories. An inclusive snoop directory memory stores directory lines. Each directory line includes a directory tag and multiple snoop vectors. Each snoop vector relates to a span of memory addresses corresponding to the cache line size within the main cache memories.
US09304922B2
Methods and apparatus relating to an inter-queue anti-starvation mechanism with dynamic deadlock avoidance in a retry based pipeline are described. In one embodiment, logic may arbitrate between two queues based on various rules. The queues may store data including local or remote requests, data responses, non-data responses, external interrupts, etc. Other embodiments are also disclosed.
US09304918B2
A computer system, comprising: a server; and a storage system, the server including an operating system, the storage system including a storage control part, wherein the operating system is configured to: transmit a read request for first data to the storage system in a case of receiving the read request for the first data not stored in a server cache from an application; store the first data received from the storage system into the server cache, and wherein the storage control part is configured to: read the first data from the storage cache, transmit the read first data to the server, and invalidate the first data stored in the storage cache.
US09304913B2
A hybrid cache includes a static random access memory (SRAM) portion and a resistive random access memory portion. Cache lines of the hybrid cache are configured to include both SRAM macros and resistive random access memory macros. The hybrid cache is configured so that the SRAM macros are accessed before the resistive random memory macros in each cache access cycle. While SRAM macros are accessed, the slower resistive random access memory reach a data access ready state.
US09304912B1
System and methods are provided for building redundancy data of a source storage medium using a redundant-array-of-independent-disks (RAID) array, the RAID array including one or more target storage mediums, the source storage medium including multiple data areas. One or more invalid data areas on the source storage medium are identified. Identification information of the one or more invalid data areas is generated. Redundancy data for data areas on the source storage medium other than the one or more invalid data areas is built using the RAID array.
US09304911B2
A method of operating a semiconductor storage device is provided. A memory space of a buffer memory is allocated into a data area for storing user data and a map area for storing map data. The user data and the map data are read from a nonvolatile memory. A size of the user data to be stored in the data are compared with a size of the data area. The size of the data area and the size of the map area are adaptively varied according to the comparison result.
US09304901B2
System and methods for managing I/O write requests of host systems to physical storage. A storage subsystem includes a plurality of storage devices where each storage device is configured to provide data storage. At least a pair of redundant controllers is connected to the plurality of storage devices for executing the I/O write requests from the host systems. A received I/O write request is initially saved in a controller memory of one of the controllers and mirrored in controller memory of the other controller. In one embodiment, the I/O write request is transferred to a flash memory device for subsequent transfer to the storage devices. Once transferred to the flash memory device, the I/O write request may be flushed from the controller memories. The I/O write request may then be transferred to the storage devices from the flash memory device as a background operation.
US09304891B1
During a test-generation technique, a test session with web flows associated with a set of users and a browser is recorded. Then, the test session is modified to generalize the web flows to a larger set of users. For example, data may be converted into variables, requests may be added or removed, and/or delays may be inserted between requests. In addition, the test session may be filtered using one or more filters to remove: static content, images and/or types of requests. After the test session has been generalized, it can be incorporated into a load test that accurately simulates interactions with multiple users.
US09304889B1
In one aspect, a method includes monitoring a replication process, predicting performance based on the monitoring, receiving a suspend notification and determining whether to suspend the replication process or wait to suspend the replication process based on the performance predicted. In another aspect, an apparatus includes electronic hardware circuitry configured to monitor a replication process, predict performance based on the monitoring, receive a suspend notification and determine whether to suspend the replication process or wait to suspend the replication process based on the performance predicted. In a further aspect, an apparatus includes electronic hardware circuitry configured to: monitor a replication process, predict performance based on the monitoring, receive a suspend notification and determine whether to suspend the replication process or wait to suspend the replication process based on the performance predicted.
US09304888B2
Embodiments are directed to executing a workflow using a virtualized clock and to ensuring idempotency and correctness among workflow processes. In one scenario, a computer system a computer system determines that a workflow session has been initialized. The workflow session runs as a set of episodes, where each episode includes one or more pulses of work that are performed when triggered by an event. Each workflow session is processed according to a virtualized clock that keeps a virtual session time for the workflow session. The computer system receives an event that includes an indication of the time the event was generated, and then accesses the received event to determine which pulses of work are to be performed as part of a workflow session episode. The computer system then executes the determined pulses of work according to the virtual session time indicated by the virtualized clock.
US09304879B2
Movement of storage access is orchestrated between systems by dynamically reconfiguring zoning of a storage fabric. A failover system can detect a failure of a first initiator system that is assigned to a target storage system using a zone table of one or more network switches that are communicatively coupled to the target storage system. Further, the failover system can reassign the target storage system to a second initiator system using the zone table in response to a detection of the failure of the first initiator system, wherein the second initiator system is determined to be communicatively coupled to the one or more network switches. Furthermore, the failover system can initiate an access, via the one or more network switches based on the zone table, of the target storage system by the second initiator system.
US09304877B2
Embodiments of the present invention disclose a method, computer program product, and system for memory replication. In one embodiment, in accordance with the present invention, the computer implemented method includes the steps of executing a mobile agent on a server node, wherein the server node is within a cluster of server nodes connected via network communications, capturing a memory state of the server node during operation of the server node, wherein the memory state includes session information stored on computer memory of the server node, which is captured and stored by the mobile agent, monitoring the server node to determine whether the server node has failed, and responsive to determining that the server node has failed, migrating the mobile agent to an active server node within the cluster of server nodes, wherein the mobile agent carries the captured memory state.
US09304873B2
Embodiments include a recovery system, a computer-readable storage medium, and a method of recreating a state of a datacenter. The embodiments include a plurality of program modules that is executable by a processor to gather metadata from a first datacenter that includes at least one virtual machine (VM), wherein the metadata includes data representative of a virtual infrastructure of the first datacenter. The program modules are also executable by the processor to recreate a state of the first datacenter within a second datacenter using the metadata upon a determination that a failure occurred within the first datacenter, and to recreate the VM within the second datacenter.
US09304866B1
Avoiding encryption of certain blocks in a deduplication vault. In one example embodiment, a method of avoiding encryption of certain blocks during a backup of a source storage into a deduplication vault storage may include analyzing each allocated plain text block stored in a source storage at a point in time to determine if the allocated plain text block is already stored in the deduplication vault storage. If the allocated plain text block is not stored in the deduplication vault storage, the block may be encrypted and the encrypted block may be analyzed to determine if the encrypted block is already stored in the deduplication vault storage. If neither the allocated plain text block nor the encrypted block is already stored in the deduplication vault storage, the encrypted block may be stored in the deduplication vault storage.
US09304864B1
Capturing post-snapshot quiescence writes in an image backup. In one example embodiment, a method for capturing post-snapshot quiescence writes in an image backup may include taking a first snapshot of a source storage at a first point in time, identifying a first set of block positions of blocks that are allocated in the source storage at the first point in time, identifying a second set of block positions of blocks that are written to the first snapshot during post-snapshot quiescence of the first snapshot, resulting in a first quiesced snapshot, calculating a third set of block positions by performing a Boolean OR operation on the first set of block positions and the second set of block positions, and copying blocks in the third set of block positions from the first snapshot to a full image backup.
US09304858B2
A method begins by a dispersed storage (DS) processing module establishing data identifying criteria for searching data on a network, establishing data analyzing criteria for analyzing found data of the data on the network, and establishing distributed computing criteria. The method continues with the DS processing module distributing the data identifying criteria and the data analyzing criteria to a set of distributed storage and task (DST) units. The method continues with the DS processing module receiving a set of network data partial resultants from the set of DST units, wherein the set of DST units generates the set of network data partial results in accordance with the data identifying criteria to produce found data and analyzing the found data in accordance with the data analyzing criteria. The method continues with the DS processing module processing the set of network data partial resultants to produce a network data resultant.
US09304846B2
A vehicle computer system configured to communicate with a mobile device, comprising a wireless transceiver configured to communicate with the mobile device. The vehicle computer system also includes a processor in communication with the wireless transceiver and memory. The processor is configured to monitor activity occurring at the wireless transceiver, receive a message from the wireless transceiver that includes information related to one or more software states of the wireless transceiver, determine an error has occurred at the wireless transceiver, save the information related to the one or more software states of the wireless transceiver in the memory, and send the information related to the one or more software states.
US09304845B2
A sequence code verification system can be designed to include a data reader, a validity engine, and an error notifier. The data reader can read sequence codes from consecutive logical blocks. The validity engine can invalidate write operations in response to checking data validity by applying comparison operations to sequence codes and block offsets of batch write operations. The error notifier can notify a user of an error for each invalidated write operation batch. The system can validate data written to logical blocks on a storage subsystem adapted so that, during write operations, an additional sequence code is written to each logical block of data. The sequence code can remain constant for each write operation batch and the sequence code can be incremented for each new write operation batch.
US09304842B2
A control method comprising: a first step of detecting, by the server module, a failure in the first interface; a second step of executing, by the server module, given recovery processing when a failure is detected in the first interface; a third step of using, by the coupling module, the first end point to detect a failure in the first interface and output a failure notification; a fourth step of converting, by the coupling module, the failure notification into a notification of disconnection of the first interface, and transmitting the disconnection notification generated by the conversion to the storage module from the second end point; and a fifth step of disengaging, by the storage module, coupling to the server module when the disconnection notification is received from the coupling module.
US09304840B2
A system and method may generate executable block diagrams in which at least some of the blocks run in accordance with message-based execution semantics. A message may include an input data payload that does not change over time, and the message may persist for only a determined time interval during execution of block diagram. A message-based execution engine may control execution of message-based blocks in which a source block may generate a message at a particular point in time, the message may be sent to one or more destination blocks triggering execution of those blocks, and the message may be destroyed on or after a determined time interval. Other execution domains, such as a time-based or state-based execution domain, may be provided, and the system may implement a hybrid execution model.
US09304832B2
Application programming interface (API) hooks are injected into an application program executing at a client during run-time. Responsive to these hooks, data intended for encryption prior to transmission from the client is diverted, for example for content filtering, compression, etc., prior to being encrypted. In the case of encrypted data received at the client, the data is decrypted but before being passed to the application it is diverted, under control of the API hooks, for content filtering, decompression, etc.
US09304831B2
A scheduler in a process of a computer system detects an execution context that blocked from outside of the scheduler while in a critical region. The scheduler ensures that the execution context resumes execution on the processing resource of the scheduler on which the execution context blocked when the execution context becomes unblocked. The scheduler also prevents another execution context from entering a critical region on the processing resource prior to the blocked execution context becoming unblocked and exiting the critical region.
US09304829B2
Disclosed herein are techniques for managing operations. A distribution of operations across a plurality of execution environments is determined in order to achieve a performance objective. Another distribution of the operations is determined, if the status of the execution environments renders the distribution suboptimal or incapable of achieving the performance objective.
US09304827B2
The present solution provides increases in automation, scalability and efficiency for delivering technical support services to devices. Systems and methods of the present solution provide a hierarchy or layers of automated desktop services with remote technical support services, which may be automated. The present solution provides an on desktop automation support system that detects and automatically remediates problems on a device of the user. If the problem is not fixed or fixable via local automated remediation at the desktop, a centralized service may remotely deliver technical support services to the device in the form of automated support services delivered to the device or remote technical agents connecting remotely with the device. With the combination of local support automation, remote support automation, remote and onsite technicians, the centralized service may deliver a hierarchy or multi-layers of services to any device.
US09304826B2
A self-help application platform such as one hosting an interactive voice response (IVR) has a browser that executes application scripts to implement the self-help application. The execution of the application scripts is performed by utilizing various application resources, such as media conversions from text to speech (TTS) and speech to text (automatic speech recognition ASR) and other media servers. The platform is provided with a dynamic resource selection mechanism in which the application is executed with an updated optimum set of application resources distributed over different locations. The selection is based on the profiles of the browser, users, route, and quality of service. The selection is further modulated by the browser's previous experiences with the individual resources. The selection is made dynamically during the executing of the application script.
US09304821B2
In some examples, a distributed system may include a plurality of nodes with a file stored in a file system across the plurality of nodes. One of the nodes may receive a request for location data corresponding to a part of the file. For instance, the location data may be included in a mapping file, and the request may specify an offset of the mapping file. The mapping file may include locations of nodes storing parts of the file in the file system across the plurality of nodes, and the mapping file may have a plurality of parts corresponding to the parts of the file. In response to the request, the node may access the mapping file and send location data corresponding to the offset of the mapping file. The location data may indicate at least one of the nodes storing the part of the file.
US09304815B1
Detecting replica faults within a replica group and dynamically scheduling replica healing operations are described. Status metadata for one or more replica groups may be accessed. Based, at least in part, the status data a number of available replicas for at least one replica group may be determined to incompliant with a healthy state definition for the replica group. One or more healing operations to restore the number of available replicas for the at least one replica group to the respective healthy state definition may be dynamically scheduled. In some embodiments, one or more resource constraints for performing healing operations and one or more resource requirements for each of the one or more healing operations may be used to order the one or more healing operations.
US09304812B2
A microprocessor is configured to execute programs divided into discrete phases. A scheduler is provided for scheduling instructions. A plurality of resources are for executing instructions issued by the scheduler, wherein the scheduler is configured to schedule each phase of the program only after receiving an indication that execution of the preceding phase of the program has been completed. By splitting programs into multiple phases and providing a scheduler that is able to determine whether execution of a phase has been completed, each phase can be separately scheduled and the results of preceding phases can be used to inform the scheduling of subsequent phases. In one example, different numbers of threads and/or different numbers of data instances per thread may be processed for different phases of the same program.
US09304809B2
Disclosed are systems and methods for processing events in an event stream using a map-update application. The events may be embodied as a key-attribute pair. An event is processed by one or more instances implementing either a map or an update function. A map function receives an input event from the event stream and publishes one or more events to the event stream. An update function receives an event and updates a corresponding slate and publishes zero or more events. Systems and methods are also disclosed herein for implementing a map-update application in a multithreaded architecture and for handling overloading of a particular thread or node. Systems and methods for providing access to slates updated according to update operations are also disclosed.
US09304801B2
An efficient elastic enforcement layer (EEL) for realizing security policies is deployed in a cloud computing environment based on a split architecture framework. The split architecture network includes a controller coupled to switches. When the controller receives a packet originating from a source VM, it extracts an application identifier from the received packet that identifies an application running on the source VM. Based on the application identifier, the controller determines a chain of middlebox types. The controller further determines middlebox instances based on current availability of resources. The controller then adds a set of rules to the switches to cause the switches to forward the packet toward the destination VM via the middlebox instances.
US09304796B1
Technology for identifying virtual computing instance issues is described. An operating information report of a virtual computing instance may be parsed to obtain a diagnostic result. The diagnostic result may be compared against a data store of known computing instance issues to determine whether there is an issue for the virtual computing instance. The issue may be flagged when identified and provided for resolution.
US09304792B2
A computer system and a method for tracking information flow are provided. The computer system divides an information flow tracking task into two decoupled tasks executed by two procedures. The first procedure emulates execution of instructions and divides the instructions into code blocks according to an instruction executing sequence. The first procedure translates the instructions of the code blocks into information flow codes and transmits them to the second procedure. The first procedure further translates the instructions into dynamic emulation instructions and executes the dynamic emulation instructions to generate addressing results of the dynamic addressing instructions. The second procedure executes the information flow codes according to the addressing results to emulate the instructions of the code blocks. Moreover, the method also tries to reduce the amount of data transmission between the two procedures when the first procedure executes the emulation task. Therefore, the efficiency of tracking information flow is enhanced.
US09304783B2
Aspects of the present disclosure relate to methods of managing and delivering digital media content data. In certain embodiments, a management device in communication to a computing device via a universal serial bus (USB) connector is provided. The management device has a processor, a volatile memory and a non-volatile memory. The non-volatile memory includes a first partition storing a firmware and a second partition. When executed at the processor, the firmware emulates an emulated bootable storage device for the computing device at the USB connector. In response to an access instruction from the computing device to access data stored at an emulated address of the emulated bootable storage device, the management device converts the emulated address to a physical address of the second partition, and accesses the data at the physical address. The data includes digital media content data and a control module configured to play the content data.
US09304780B2
Methods for returning a computing system to a previous state are provided. In one aspect, a method includes loading a second system state of a second operating system partition, and receiving a request to return to a first system state of a first operating system partition while operating in a second system state of the second operating system partition. The method also includes loading the first system state of the first operating system partition. Systems and machine-readable media are also provided.
US09304776B2
A computer system may recognize a busy-wait loop in program instructions at compile time and/or may recognize busy-wait looping behavior during execution of program instructions. The system may recognize that an exit condition for a busy-wait loop is specified by a conditional branch type instruction in the program instructions. In response to identifying the loop and the conditional branch type instruction that specifies its exit condition, the system may influence or override a prediction made by a dynamic branch predictor, resulting in a prediction that the exit condition will be met and that the loop will be exited regardless of any observed branch behavior for the conditional branch type instruction. The looping instructions may implement waiting for an inter-thread communication event to occur or for a lock to become available. When the exit condition is met, the loop may be exited without incurring a misprediction delay.
US09304774B2
Apparatus and methods provide early access of instructions. A fetch queue is coupled to an instruction cache and configured to store a mix of processor instructions for a first processor and coprocessor instructions for a second processor. A coprocessor instruction selector is coupled to the fetch queue and configured to copy coprocessor instructions from the fetch queue. A queue is coupled to the coprocessor instruction selector and from which coprocessor instructions are accessed for execution before the coprocessor instruction is issued to the first processor. Execution of the copied coprocessor instruction is started in the coprocessor before the coprocessor instruction is issued to a processor. The execution of the copied coprocessor instruction is completed based on information received from the processor after the coprocessor instruction has been issued to the processor.
US09304766B2
Systems and methods for determining a character sequence digest. An example method may comprise: identifying, within a character sequence, one or more sections, wherein each section comprises a section header and one or more section bodies; performing the following operations for each identified section body: responsive to determining that the section body is not preceded by a section header, prepending a section header to the section body; calculating a section digest by applying a hash function to the section comprising the section header and the section body; and calculating a digest of the character sequence by applying a symmetric summing operation to one or more section digests.
US09304762B2
Disclosed is a method of automatically customizing a computer executable application, such as a test automation harness, based on currently installed modules. The functionality of the application can be split in multiple modules. At runtime, the application can automatically detect the presence or absence of a module. If a module is available, it can automatically be integrated with the application such that the functionality, such as language-level features and constructs, provided by the module is active and/or exposed. If the module is absent, the application can continue executing without the functionality provided by the module.
US09304754B2
Methods, systems, and techniques for automatically allocating and dynamically determining icons for placement on legacy task output as part of modernizing such tasks are provided. These enhanced modernization techniques may be used for many different applications to automatically provide graphical enhancement to legacy applications in ways heretofore not pragmatically possible because of the sheer volume of menus in typical enterprise scenarios running legacy applications. Example embodiments provide a Role-Based Modernization System (“RBMS”), which uses these enhanced modernization techniques to provide role-based modernization of menu-based legacy applications.
US09304752B2
A computer implemented method for deploying, in a distributed virtual environment, a multi-component software product is disclosed. The method may include requesting and receiving product installation parameters, which may include virtual machine IDs corresponding to subsets of the product installation parameters. The method may also include copying software product installation files and parameters onto a first virtual machine, halting the first virtual machine, cloning the first virtual machine to a second virtual machine and setting virtual machine IDs on the virtual machines. The method may also include starting the virtual machines and identifying, based on virtual machine IDs, subsets of the product installation parameters. The method may also include deploying, based on subsets of the product installation parameters, the software product by installing first and second components of the software product on the first and second virtual machines, respectively.
US09304746B2
A computerized method of creating a user model, comprising: 1) Providing one or more software component collections containing software components. Each of the software components is associated with a single attribute and has: a. An attribute generation engine for calculating an attribute data. b. An attribute repository which stores the attribute data. c. An output object which outputs the attribute data to another of the plurality of software components. d. A metadata field which holds an identifier relating to the respective software component. 2) Selecting by a developer, a subset of software components. 3) Defining by the developer, a plurality of data links mapping data flow among the members of the subset. 4) Generating a user model based on the subset and the data links. 5) Outputting the user model.
US09304734B2
Each of DAW processes and UI devices which are controllers of the DAW processes regularly sends a heartbeat signal including identification information of a music system which the DAW process or UI device belongs to, to a network by broadcast or multicast. The heart beat signal can be transmitted to the network using an Ethernet frame for UDP including the heartbeat signal in the data body, as a heartbeat packet. Based on the received heartbeat signal, it can be distinguished that the DAW process or UI device which sent the heartbeat signal is which of a device or music software process belonging to the relevant music system, a device or music software process belonging to another music system, and a device or music software process not belonging to any music system.
US09304727B2
A non-transitory computer-readable storage medium stores a printer driver. The printer driver causes the processor of a computing device to function as a printer driver core section and a print setup user interface section and causes these sections to perform the following processing. The processing includes: defining an area in a PrintTicket to create a first PrintTicket, by the printer driver core section; operating a display section of the computing device to display the print setup screen, and incorporating another PrintTicket into the area of the first PrintTicket to create a second PrintTicket, by the print setup user interface section, where the another PrintTicket includes a description of information about another print feature having been inputted on the print setup screen. The processing further includes converting the second PrintTicket into a third PrintTicket which can be interpreted by the print device, by the printer driver core section.
US09304719B1
Systems and methods are provided for dynamically splitting print jobs to reduce the time taken to start printing those jobs. One embodiment is a print server that includes an interface that receives a Portable Document Format (PDF) print job. The print server also includes a job controller that determines a size of the PDF print job, and estimates a delay to start marking a first page of the PDF print job. In response to determining that the delay exceeds a threshold, the job controller splits the PDF print job into segments by: generating a first PDF segment that has a delay to start marking the first page that is less than the threshold, and includes a PDF page tree; transmitting the first PDF segment to the printer; generating an additional PDF segment that includes an additional PDF page tree; and transmitting the additional PDF segment to the printer.
US09304716B2
A printer 11 can connect to a tablet device 10 that generates and transmits data using a browser function; has a communication unit 20b that receives data from the tablet device 10 on either a first logical communication channel K1 or a second logical communication channel K2 and processes the received data as required according to the communication channel; and has a print unit control unit 20a that prints based on data received by the communication unit 20b.
US09304709B2
A method of writing data to a range of logical blocks in a storage medium includes: receiving a command including a starting logical block address, a value indicating a range of logical block addresses to be written, and a logical block of data; storing the logical block in a first temporary storage; generating a logical page by duplicating the logical block a plurality of times corresponding to a number of logical blocks in a logical page and transporting the generated logical page to a second temporary storage and storing the generated logical page in the second temporary storage; writing the generated logical page from the second temporary storage into the storage medium beginning from the starting logical block address; and performing a read-modify-write operation if the first write operation does not begin on a logical page boundary or the last write operation does not end on a logical page boundary.
US09304696B2
Systems, methods, and computer program products for mirroring dual writeable storage arrays are provided. Various embodiments provide configurations including two or more mirrored storage arrays that are each capable of being written to by different hosts. When commands to write data to corresponding mirrored data blocks within the respective storage arrays are received from different hosts at substantially the same time, write priority for writing data to the mirrored data blocks is given to one of the storage arrays based on a predetermined criterion or multiple predetermined criteria.
US09304686B2
A data storage device is disclosed. In one embodiment, the data storage device comprises a flash memory and a controller. The flash memory comprises a plurality of blocks, wherein each block comprises a plurality of pages, and each page comprises a plurality of data trimming units which is a smallest unit for data modification. After a data trimming process has been performed on an address range of the flash memory, the controller determines a last page corresponding to an ending address of the address range, determines whether data values stored in the last page with addresses subsequent to the ending address are all equal to a specific data pattern, and sets the value of a trimming flag corresponding to the last page to be 1 when the data values stored in the last page with addresses subsequent to the ending address are all equal to the specific data pattern.
US09304684B2
A method and an apparatus for selecting media files are provided. In the present invention, three keys are used for selecting a plurality of media files, wherein one of the keys is used for rotating and selecting a presently displayed media file, one of the keys is used for directly selecting the presently displayed media file, and another key is used for skipping the presently displayed media file. Complete select functions can be executed to a plurality of media files stored in any path by using foregoing three keys. The selected media files are stored in another path as being selected without spending time in actions such as moving, copying, and deleting, etc. Thus, the media file select operation is greatly simplified.
US09304681B2
Software, firmware, and systems are described for identifying characters in a handwritten input received from a user on an input device, irrespective of an angle that the input is received at. In one implementation, the system establishes an anchor point and distances from the anchor point to reference support lines. A set of candidate characters is identified based on received handwritten input. The system estimates support lines for each of the candidate characters. The system ranks the candidate characters based on a total deviation measurement from the expectation for each candidate, where the expectation in part is based on the established distance from the established anchor point to reference support lines, and identifies a best-ranked candidate based at least in part on a smallest total deviation measurement.
US09304679B2
According to one embodiment, an electronic device includes a storage, a first display processor, an input module, and a second display processor. The storage is configured to store stroke information corresponding to a plurality of strokes. The first display processor is configured to display the plurality of strokes. The input module is configured to input a retrieve key for retrieval of the plurality of strokes. The second display processor is configured to display a enlarged or reduced display area including a stroke part, which is retrieved from the stroke information and corresponds to the retrieve key, and strokes other than the stroke part.
US09304678B2
A switching method for an electronic device having sensing regions is mentioned. The switching method is configured to detect signals received by the electronic device, so as to switch the states of the electronic device. The switching method comprises receiving a first signal at a first moment and receiving a second signal at a second moment, wherein the first signal is generated by touching a first sensing region and the second signal is generated by touching a second sensing region; measuring a triggering duration and determining whether the triggering duration is consistent with a predetermined duration, when the first signal and the second signal are inputted simultaneously; switching the electronic device from a first state to a second state, if the triggering duration is consistent with the predetermined duration; and maintaining the electronic device in the first state, if the triggering duration is not consistent with the predetermined duration.
US09304675B2
A portable electronic device for instant messaging is disclosed. One aspect of the invention involves a graphical user interface (GUI) on a portable electronic device with a touch screen display. The GUI has a set of messages exchanged between a user of the device and another person. The set of messages are displayed in a chronological order. In response to detecting a scrolling gesture comprising a substantially vertical movement of a user contact with the touch screen display, the display of messages are scrolled in accordance with a direction of the scrolling gesture. The detecting of the scrolling gesture is substantially independent of a horizontal position of the user contact with the touch screen display.
US09304673B2
Method and user interface for controlling an apparatus are provided. At least one dynamic bar is provided for displaying on a main screen of a graphical user interface for controlling the apparatus. Each dynamic bar is associated with respective one or more interfaces for applications and/or functions provided by the apparatus and each dynamic bar has a pop-up interface for providing at least one of preview information determined from information managed by the applications and/or functions and links to invoke said respective interfaces.
US09304670B2
A display device includes a display unit configured to display an image; a sensor unit configured to sense an input to the display device and to generate an input signal according to a sensed result; and a processor, wherein the processor is further configured to: provide a user interface for editing the displayed image, divide the image into a first area and a second area if a first input signal is detected, determine any one of the first area and the second area as a variable area having variable visibility if a second input signal is detected, switch the variable area to an invisible state and display an indicator indicating the invisible state of the variable area if a third input signal is detected, and switch the variable area in the invisible state to a visible state if a fourth input signal is detected.
US09304666B2
Supporting navigation on touch screens displaying elements organized in a fixed number of dimensions
An aspect of the present disclosure stores information related to the elements in the form of an array of objects. Each object contains information indicating the area covered by the object on the display. The index values used for accessing an element may be viewed as forming an N-tuple, with each value of the N-tuple representing the value of the corresponding dimension/index. A swipe is first mapped to a single one of the dimensions and an end position along the dimension. The value of the tuple corresponding to only the dimension is modified and the object corresponding to the tuple is accessed. The area information in the accessed object is examined to determine whether the end position of swipe falls in the display area covered by the element. The tuple value of only the dimension is modified in searching for the element that covers the end position.
US09304665B2
One or more messages may be selected and grouped and one or more group-level actions may be initiated for the group, such that the group-level action is performed on each message in the group. Each message in a group shares the at least one attribute value. A messaging user interface may comprise a listing of the set of messages and a message group display portion that displays one or more message groups and a group-level toolbar comprising a selectable indicator for each group-level action. A message, or messages, shown in a message list portion of the user interface may be selected from the message list based on similarity of the message(s) to previously selected messages, and the selected message(s) may be grouping based on shared attribute values. The messages belonging to a group may be modified in the same way via a single action taken on the group.
US09304658B2
Menu items are displayed on a screen, for example in the form of user-activatable on-screen buttons. A root menu is displayed, including a “more” button that allows the user to navigate to one or more sub-menus. Each menu can contain function buttons, menu buttons, or any combination thereof. Function buttons provide direct access to functions. Menu buttons provide access to sub-menus, which may be provided in a hierarchical arrangement. In some sub-menus, a menu title button replaces the “more” button and provides access to a previously displayed menu. The user can activate a displayed function button in any menu or sub-menu to perform an action associated with the function button. In one aspect, all menus are displayed in the same area of the screen. When a menu is to be displayed, it replaces the previously displayed menu.
US09304654B2
Methods and systems are provided for providing an improved three-dimensional graphical user interface. In one embodiment, the method generally comprises: receiving an input from an end user, and capturing computing output from at least one computer source in response to the received end-user input. The computing output can be presented as two or more objects within a three-dimensional virtual space displayed to the end user. In one embodiment, the method further comprises generating a timeline that includes an icon for each object presented within the virtual space. In another embodiment, the method further comprises providing a database for storing and categorizing data regarding each object presented within the virtual space.
US09304653B2
A method of creating a three-dimensional (3D) image based on user interaction, the method including receiving an input image; receiving a user input; segmenting an object, which is included in the input image, based on the received user input; editing an area of the segmented object; configuring a layer for the segmented object, based on the edited area; and creating a 3D image, based on the configured layer.
US09304650B2
A method for displaying of a touch cursor is provided. The method is adapted to an electronic apparatus having a touch display unit. The touch display unit has a display area. The method includes the following steps. At least one first dimension boundary and at least one second dimension boundary are defined in the display area. A cursor, which has a pointing area and a touchable area, is displayed. When a touch event occurs in the touchable area, the cursor is correspondingly moved according to a touch coordinate of the touch event. When a reference point of the cursor passes two of the at least one first dimension boundary or two of the at least one second dimension boundary, the cursor is rotated for adjusting a relative position of the pointing area and the touchable area.
US09304649B2
Embodiments of the present invention address deficiencies of the art in respect to hierarchical tree file browsers and provide a method, system and computer program product for selectably flattening a hierarchical tree object structure in a hierarchical tree object browser. In one embodiment of the invention, a method of flattening an object hierarchy in an object browser can be provided. The method can include selecting a node in an object hierarchy in an object browser and, responsive to selecting the node, displaying content for the selected node and content for at least one node below the selected node in the object browser.
US09304647B1
A system and method for user interface screen presentation prioritization is provided. The display of a plurality of panes may be determined based on either priorities of each pane received in messages or based on combined weightings of each pane based on a weighting provided by a user and a weighting provided by a content source. The display of the panes may relocate the panes and/or change the size of the panes based on changed priorities of each pane or based on changed combined weighting of each pane. The panes may comprise selectable items.
US09304635B2
A conductive film includes an elongated film base, a first conductive layer, a second conductive layer and a third conductive layer in this order. The elongated film base has a longitudinal direction and a width direction orthogonal to the longitudinal direction. The width direction dimension of the elongated film base is greater than or equal to 1 m. The first conductive layer is an indium-based oxide layer. The second conductive layer is a metal layer. The third conductive layer is an oxidized metal layer having a thickness of 1 nm to 15 nm formed by sputter deposition.
US09304623B2
A combination touch and transducer input system is provided, which facilitates user input into an electronic system with a finger and/or a transducer (e.g., a stylus). The system includes a transducer configured to generate an electric field, and a sensor including an array of electrodes and a controller. The transducer is configured to transmit digital data, such as pen pressure data and switch status data, to the sensor. The sensor controller operates both in a touch sensing mode and in a transducer sensing mode. During the touch sensing mode, the controller determines a position of a proximate object (e.g., a finger) by capacitively sensing the object with the array of electrodes. During the transducer sensing mode, the controller determines a position of the transducer based on a signal received by the array of electrodes from the transducer, and also receives and decodes the digital data encoded in the received signal.
US09304621B1
A computing device can enable and/or provide communication functionality based at least in part upon a type of pressure applied to the device by a user. In some embodiments, a device can attempt to determine a mood or disposition of the user based upon the way in which the user is gripping and/or squeezing the device, and can provide the user or another person with information about that user's current mood. Similarly, a user might be able to use certain motions or pressure applications at one or more locations on a device to cause certain communications to be sent, such as to send a specific message or convey a certain mood of the user. At least a portion of the computing device can have pressure-sensitive material or capability, in order to allow for input on the sides, back, or other appropriate locations on the device.
US09304619B2
A touch screen control system communicates with a host processing system (HPS). The touch screen control system includes a memory and control circuitry. The control circuitry operates a touch screen according to rules stored in the memory by: during a first time period and in response to detecting a first type of user input with a touch sensor of the touch screen, updating a display screen of the touch screen autonomously without requiring intervention from the HPS following the detection of the first type of user input; during the first time period and in response to detecting a second type of user input with the touch sensor, updating the display screen according to directions provided by the HPS; and during a second time period and in response to detecting the first type of user input with the touch sensor, updating the display screen according to directions provided by the HPS.
US09304615B2
A capacitive stylus pen is provided that inputs an indicated position to a tablet by capacitive coupling. The capacitive stylus pen includes a signal generating circuit that generates a signal having the same frequency as a frequency of a signal to be transmitted from an electrode, a transformer that boosts the generated signal and that includes a primary winding and a secondary winding, and an analog switch for controlling connection between a first end of the secondary winding and the electrode to an on-state or an off-state. The capacitive stylus pen further includes a power extracting circuit that extracts power to be supplied to the analog switch from an electromotive force induced in the secondary winding, and a capacitor coupled to a second end of the secondary winding to set the second end at a fixed potential in an alternating-current manner.
US09304601B2
A system, method, and computer-readable medium that facilitate software configuration of assistive computer devices by automatically assessing a user's capabilities through questions and tasks are provided. The analysis results of the user's capabilities are then available to assistive computer software applications which may subsequently update their interfaces accordingly. A mapping mechanism from an external input device into a target software application is facilitated for software applications that do not include assistive technology features.
US09304599B2
Projected input and output devices adapt to a desktop environment by sensing objects at the desktop environment and altering projected light in response to the sensed objects. For instance, projection of input and output devices is altered to limit illumination against and end user's hands or other objects disposed at a projection surface. End user hand positions and motions are detected to provide gesture support for adapting a projection work space, and configurations of projected devices are stored so that an end user can rapidly recreate a projected desktop. A projector scan adjusts to limit traces across inactive portions of the display surface and to increase traces at predetermined areas, such as video windows.
US09304597B2
Apparatus, computer-readable storage medium, and method associated with human computer interaction. In embodiments, a computing device may include a plurality of sensors, including a plurality of light sources and a camera, to create a three dimensional (3-D) interaction region within which to track individual finger positions of a user of the computing device. The light sources and the camera may be complementarily disposed for the camera to capture the finger or hand positions. The computing device may further include a 3-D interaction module configured to analyze the individual finger positions within the 3-D interaction region, the individual finger movements captured by the camera, to detect a gesture based on a result of the analysis, and to execute a user control action corresponding to the gesture detected. Other embodiments may be described and/or claimed.
US09304592B2
Systems and methods for electronic device control based on gestures are provided. A particular method includes sending a menu from a gesture controller to a display device. The menu includes selectable options to control at least one electronic device. The method includes detecting a first user gesture at the gesture controller in response to three dimensional (3D) image data obtained from a gesture camera. The method includes determining at least one command for one or more electronic devices at the gesture controller based on the first user gesture and based on the menu. The method also includes sending the at least one command from the gesture controller to the one or more electronic devices.
US09304591B2
An apparatus includes sensor circuitry configured to sense spatial phenomena; application circuitry configured to respond to sensation of a spatial phenomenon by the sensor circuitry where a pre-existing relationship exists between the spatial phenomenon and the response of the application circuitry; and regulation circuitry configured to regulate the response of the application circuitry to the spatial phenomenon based at least in part on sensation of a different spatial phenomenon by the sensor circuitry. Various other apparatuses, systems, methods, etc., are also disclosed.
US09304590B2
An electronic device that provides thermal feedback to a user is described. In particular, when the user provides a setting via tactile interaction with a surface of a user-interface device in the electronic device, a thermal mechanism in the electronic device establishes a temperature gradient on the surface based on the setting. For example, the thermal mechanism may include a heat source that increases a temperature of the portion of the user-interface device and/or a heat sink that decreases a temperature of another portion of the user-interface device. Moreover, the thermal mechanism may dynamically modify the temperature gradient based on the tactile interaction and an environmental condition (such as the temperature) in an external environment that includes the electronic device. Note that the tactile interaction with the user may occur with a physical control object (such as a knob) and/or with a virtual icon displayed on a multi-touch display.
US09304586B2
Various embodiments related to entering text into a computing device via eye-typing are disclosed. For example, one embodiment provides a method that includes receiving a data set including a plurality of gaze samples, each gaze sample including a gaze location and a corresponding point in time. The method further comprises processing the plurality of gaze samples to determine one or more likely terms represented by the data set.
US09304581B1
Storage systems include a plurality of enclosures interconnected to provide a network. Each enclosure includes a first power supply module, a redundant power supply module, a first electronics module, and a redundant electronics module in electrical communication with the first electronics module and providing redundant functionality of the first electronics module. Each of the modules of each enclosure is individually associated with a separate power profile dedicated to that module. The power profile of each given module includes one or more programmable power parameters that determine when to power down and power up that given module during operation of the storage system.
US09304575B2
Reducing power consumption in a touch screen. In some examples, a first level of touch accuracy can be determined, and a first portion of the touch screen can be operated in a first mode corresponding to the first level of touch accuracy. In some examples, a second level of touch accuracy can be determined, and a second portion of the touch screen can be operated in a second mode corresponding to the second level of touch accuracy. The first and/or second levels of touch accuracy can be determined based on an application running on a device including the touch screen and/or a user interface displayed on the touch screen. In some examples, in the first and/or second modes, the respective portions of the touch screen can transition between a touch sensing phase and a display phase at different transition frequencies and/or can sense touch at different ratios of touch sensors.
US09304571B2
A method and apparatus for power managed interrupt handling is disclosed. In one embodiment, a system includes one or more agents that may invoke an interrupt request. An interrupt controller is configured to receive and process the interrupt requests. When idle, the interrupt controller may be placed in a low power state. The system also includes an interrupt power control circuit coupled to receive interrupt request indications from each of the one or more agents that may invoke interrupts. The interrupt power control circuit is configured to assert a wakeup signal responsive to receiving an indication of an interrupt request from one of the agents. If the interrupt controller is in a low power state, it may exit the state and resume operation in an active state responsive to assertion of the wakeup signal.
US09304567B2
A power chip detecting device, applied in a server, includes a power chip, a power sequence control module, a base management controller, a GPIO module, and a signal detecting module. The power sequence control module sends an initial power enable signal to the power chip after the server is switched on, and the power sequence control module receives an initial power good signal from the power chip after the power chip receives the initial power enable signal. The signal detecting module sends a time abnormal result to the GPIO module after determining that time difference between sending out of the initial power enable signal and the initial power good signal is less than a reference value. The GPIO module sends the time abnormal result to the base management controller.
US09304566B2
Portable communication devices and methods for use in charging an electrically powered vehicle are disclosed. One example portable communication device includes a first input device configured to scan an optical machine-readable code associated with the charging station, a display device, and a processor coupled to the first input and display devices and configured to determine an identification number of a charging station based on an optical machine-readable code scanned by the first input device, to initiate communication with the charging station through at least one network, and to cause the display device to display a user interface, the user interface including content associated with the charging station.
US09304565B2
An information handling system power supply dynamically adapts thermal and power output protection constraints based upon thermal and power output conditions measured at the power supply. In the event of changing conditions at the information handling system, such as an increase in ambient temperature or an increase in power consumption, a power constraint adaptive module adjusts constraints at which the power supply will shut down in order to maintain power to an information handling system outside of a normal power and thermal constraint operating envelope for the power supply.
US09304561B2
The present disclosure is generally related to power management in a circuit on a circuit board of a processor. The circuit includes a first power connector coupled to a first power input rail. The circuit includes a second power connector and a second power input rail. The circuit includes a control module. The control module is configured to determine a power specification of the circuit board. The control module is configured to detect a power cable connected to the first control connector. The control module is configured to sense a voltage at the second power connector. The control module is configured to couple the second power input rail with the first power connector or the second power connector in response to the determined power specification of the circuit board and the sensed voltage at the second power connector.
US09304558B2
According to one embodiment, an electronic apparatus includes a first housing and a second housing. The first housing includes a first wall, a second wall opposite to the first wall, and a third wall between the first wall and the second wall. The third wall faces the second housing when the second housing is raised from the first housing. The third wall includes an outmost portion of the third wall in a direction from a fan toward the third wall, a first area obliquely extending between the outmost portion and the first wall and including a first opening, and the second area obliquely extending between the outmost portion and the second wall and including a second opening.
US09304555B2
The present disclosure is directed to a system and method for using magnetically coupled antennas to enhance receptivity and/or reading range of radio frequency (RF) transaction devices. In some implementations, a method for boosting RF signals includes wirelessly receiving an RF signal from a transaction terminal at a passive antenna. The passive antenna is magnetically coupled to the antenna of a transaction card. The transaction card is inserted in a mobile host device and configured to execute a payment application using user credentials in response to at least a transaction request and transmits at least one transaction response to the transaction terminal based, at least in part, on the executed transaction application and using the antenna either standalone or through the coupled antenna configuration. The RF signal is transmitted to the transaction card using the inductive coupling with the terminal.
US09304548B2
A docking station of an electronic device includes a casing having a bearing surface, a fool-proofing set, an elastic member, a connector and a linkage member. The fool-proofing set includes a protrusion protruding from or retracting back to the bearing surface and a stopper linking up with the protrusion. The elastic member is disposed in the casing and provides an elastic force so that the protrusion protrudes from the casing normally. The connector is able to operably protrude to a bearing space above the bearing surface or retracts back. When the protrusion protrudes from the bearing surface, the stopper stops at a moving path of the linkage member so that the connector is limited inside the casing. When the protrusion retracts back, the linkage member is not stopped by the stopper so that the connector is able to operably protrude to the bearing space to connect with the electronic device.
US09304545B2
A docking station connects through a docking port and docking cable with an information handling system to support communication between the information handling system and docking station peripherals. On initial interface, one data lane of the docking port establishes a temporary management interface, such as an I2C management bus, to configure the docking station. After configuration, a docking manager, virtual wireless access point and power block cooperate to assign data lanes of the docking port and wireless communication resources to information transfer and power transfer functions based upon processing and communication tasks performed at the information handling system.
US09304543B2
A computing device to couple with a second computing device. The computing device switches between a master mode and a slave mode based on whether the computing device is docked with the second computing device.
US09304542B2
A grip for holding a tablet computer in one hand while activating and using the device with the other hand comprises a stem connecting a base portion attached to the tablet and a top portion, with a central hole of appropriate size in the stem to accommodate a finger inserted through the grip. Opposing walls of the stem are biconcave in the plane perpendicular to the plane of the hole in the stem, defining a shape convenient for gripping between two fingers.
US09304537B2
The present invention relates to an organic light emitting diode device and a display apparatus corresponding thereto. The organic light emitting diode device comprises a plurality of pixels. Each pixel comprises an organic light emitting unit and a driving unit. The organic light emitting unit is disposed in a displaying region. The driving unit is disposed in a driving region. The driving region overlaps the displaying region and the driving region is smaller than the displaying region. According to the organic light emitting diode device and corresponding display apparatus of the present invention, it is easier to fulfill the organic light emitting diode device with narrow bezel.
US09304536B2
A processor-implemented method for implementing a shared counter architecture is provided. The method may include receiving, by a worker thread, an application request; recording, by a common timer thread, a shared timer value and acquiring, by the worker thread, the shared timer value. The method may further include recording, by the common timer thread, a shared calibration factor; acquiring, by the worker thread, a configuration value corresponding to the application request and generating, by the worker thread, a calibrated timeout interval for the application request based on the shared calibration factor, the shared timer value, and the configuration value. The method may further include registering, by the worker thread, the calibrated timeout interval for the application request on a current timeout list; determining, by the common timer thread, a timeout occurrence for the application request based on the registered calibrated timeout interval; and releasing resources based on the timeout occurrence.
US09304516B2
A flight control system and method for controlling the vertical flight path of an aircraft, the flight control system includes a stable decoupled model having a decoupled lateral equation of motion and a decoupled longitudinal equation of motion and a feedback command loop operably associated with the stable decoupled model. The feedback command loop includes a vertical flight path angle control law; an altitude control law; and a vertical speed control law.
US09304513B2
An object of the present invention is to provide a driving assistance device which it is easy to instinctively manipulate without causing a driver to feel a sense of discomfort. According to the driving assistance device according to the present invention, when it is instructed to perform automated driving using an automated driving switch and a destination has been set using a destination setting unit, an ECU generates a route for automated driving to the destination and starts the automated driving. When a destination has not been set using the destination setting unit and it is detected that the driver has travel continuation intention by a travel intention detection unit, the ECU generates a route for automated driving along the road and starts the automated driving. When a destination has not been set using the destination setting unit and it is detected that the driver does not have the travel continuation intention by the travel intention detection unit, the ECU generates a route for automated stopping and starts the automated driving. Therefore, since the automated driving automatically starts based on the intention of the driver, the driving assistance device is easy to instinctively manipulate without causing the driver to feel a sense of discomfort.
US09304509B2
Methods of monitoring pharmaceutical manufacturing processes are disclosed herein. The methods described herein provide an ability to control and monitor pharmaceutical manufacturing processes (for example, liquid mixing systems and water based systems) and can ensure data and product integrity and ultimately minimize overall manufacturing cost.
US09304508B2
A method associates a cell in the composite adaptive distance field (cADF) with a machining instruction that changes a type of the cell or a type of a distance field in the cell in forming a composite surface of the workpiece to produce at least part of an association, and associates the distance field in the cell with the machining instruction changing the type of the distance field in forming the composite surface of the workpiece to produce at least part of the association. In response to receiving a command to undo a simulation of the machining to the intermediate machining instruction, a subset of cells and a subset of distance fields forming the composite surface of the workpiece at a time of the simulation by the intermediate machining instruction are identified using the association and the intermediate representation of the workpiece is determined using the subset of cells and the subset of distance fields.
US09304507B2
A tool path display apparatus (20) includes a tool coordinate value calculation unit (22) that calculates tool commanded coordinate values and tool actual coordinate values, based on commanded value time series data of position commands for a plurality of axes, detected value time series data of position detected values for the plurality of axes, and the structure of a machine tool, an acceleration calculation unit (23) that calculates accelerations of a tip point of a tool using the tool commanded coordinate values and the tool actual coordinate values, and a display format selection unit (24) that selects display formats of the accelerations of the tool commanded coordinate values and the tool actual coordinate values.
US09304503B2
A numerical control device controls a machine tool that includes a turret to which a tool is attached, the turret being configured to move along an X-axis and rotate on an H-axis, and further includes a workpiece rotatable on a C-axis. There is no direct movement of the machine tool along a Y-axis that is orthogonal to the X-axis. The numerical control device includes an analyzer that analyzes a y-axis rapid-traverse command in a Y-axis interpolation mode; a C-axis interpolation processor that interpolates a C-axis rotation angle range in response to the analyzed Y-axis rapid-traverse command; and an X-axis interpolation processor that interpolates an X-axis position based on the interpolated C-axis rotation angle range, where the numerical control device rotates the C-axis movement at a constant velocity during the entire C-axis rotation angle range, and accelerates an X-axis velocity of the turret accordingly, to thereby perform an operation.
US09304491B2
Generally, this disclosure provides systems and methods for generating three dimensional holographic images on a transparent display screen with dynamic image control. The system may include a transparent display screen that includes an array of pixels; a driver circuit configured to control each of the pixels in the array of pixels such that the transparent display screen displays an interference fringe pattern, the interference fringe pattern associated with a hologram; and a coherent light source configured to illuminate the transparent display screen with coherent light, wherein transformation of the coherent light by the interference fringe pattern generates a three dimensional holographic image.
US09304485B1
There is provided in one embodiment a doctor blade alignment device for aligning a doctor blade in a toner hopper of a printer cartridge. The device has an alignment assembly portion with a doctor blade contact portion having at least two magnet elements and at least two blade adjustment elements. The device further has an adjustable setting blade attached to the alignment assembly portion and substantially coextensive in length with the alignment assembly portion. The device further has a base portion attached to the adjustable setting blade and substantially coextensive in length with the adjustable setting blade. The alignment assembly portion and the adjustable setting blade calibrate the doctor blade alignment device to obtain a doctor blade alignment setting for aligning a doctor blade in a toner hopper of a printer cartridge.
US09304479B1
In an image forming apparatus, a coating layer of each of a photoconductor drum and a collecting roller has been formed by a dipping method in which a base body of each of the photoconductor drum and the collecting roller is dipped in a liquid in a state where the base body is in a vertical attitude such that a first end of the base body faces down and a second end of the base body faces up. The collecting roller is supported in a state where the first end of the collecting roller base body and the second end of the drum base body face a same direction.
US09304463B2
According to the present disclosure, a fixing device includes a heating member, a rotatable pressure roller, and a metal pattern. The heating member includes a heating rotary body configured to be heated by a heating device. The pressure roller is pressed against an outer circumferential surface of the heating rotary body. The metal pattern is disposed facing the heating member so as to extend in a sheet width direction which is equal to an axial direction of the pressure roller, and the metal pattern is formed of a metal wire of which a resistance varies according to variations in temperature of the heating member.
US09304462B2
An image forming apparatus includes a first heating rotator and a first pressing rotator forming a fixing nip fixing a non-fixed toner image formed in an image forming portion onto a sheet, a second heating rotator and a second pressing rotator forming a heating nip heating the fixed toner image on the predetermined sheet that has passed through the fixing nip, a first rubbing member keeping a range of the first heating rotator contactable with the sheet at a predetermined surface roughness by rubbing a surface of the first heating rotator, and a second rubbing member keeping a range of the second heating rotator contactable with the sheet at a surface roughness smaller than the predetermined surface roughness by rubbing a surface of the second heating rotator.
US09304457B2
A fixing device includes a tubular body extending in a first direction, a heater disposed in an internal space of the tubular body, a frame supporting the tubular body and a plate-like member provided on the frame. The tubular body has an open end in the first direction. The heater includes a hollow tube extending in the first direction, a heat generating element disposed in a hollow space of the tube, a terminal fixed to the frame, and a pin connecting the heat generating element and the terminal. The frame has a first surface positioned to oppose the open end of the tubular body in the first direction. The plate-like member is positioned between the open end and the first surface in the first direction, the plate-like member being formed with a pin opening for permitting the pin to penetrate therethrough.
US09304452B2
A fixing device includes a fixing member, a pressuring member, a separating member and a reciprocating mechanism. The fixing member is arranged rotatably around a rotation axis. The fixing member includes a passing region and a non-passing region. Through the passing region, a recording medium passes. The non-passing region is arranged outside the passing region. The pressuring member is arranged rotatably and configured to come into pressure contact with the fixing member so as to form a fixing nip. The separating member includes a separating plate and a contact piece. The separating plate is configured to face the passing region with an interval and separate the recording medium passing through the fixing nip from the passing region. The contact piece is configured to come into contact with the non-passing region. The reciprocating mechanism is configured to reciprocate the separating member along a direction of the rotation axis.
US09304447B2
Image forming apparatus includes: main body casing having first and second side walls opposite to each other, and upper portion having opening; top cover swingably supported on the upper portion of the main body casing at a position near the second side wall and configured to openably close the opening; endless belt disposed below the top cover and having first end portion closer to the first side wall and second end portion closer to the second side wall; photoconductor drum disposed under the endless belt; development unit disposed under the photoconductor drum and configured to supply developer to the photoconductor drum; and fixing device disposed above the second end portion of the endless belt. The endless belt is configured to be swingable about axis of rotation provided near the second side wall such that the first end portion of the endless belt is swingable in an upper-lower direction.
US09304443B2
In an image forming apparatus, an agitator agitates the toner in a target agitation amount before the image forming portion forms the image. The target agitation amount represents an amount of actions of agitation imparted upon the toner by the agitator. A processor is configured to: obtain at least one of a degradation level of the toner, the image to be formed, a non-agitation time period during which the agitator has not agitated the toner; set the target agitation amount based on the at least one of the degradation level of the toner, the image to be formed, and the non-agitation time period; perform agitating the toner in the target agitation amount by the agitator; and control the image forming portion to form the image after the agitator agitates the toner in the target agitation amount.
US09304441B2
A developer accommodating container for accommodating a developer includes; an opening for permitting discharge of the developer; and a sealing member, mounted on the developer accommodating container, capable of exposing the opening by being moved. At least a part of the sealing member is formed of a material having compatibility with a material for forming the developer accommodating container and a material having incompatibility with the materiel for forming the developer accommodating container. Either one of the material having the compatibility and the material having the incompatibility is dispersed in the other one of the materials.
US09304437B2
An image forming apparatus includes an apparatus body, a drum unit which holds photosensitive drums in parallel, a developing cartridge which is detachably mounted in the drum unit, a translation member which is provided in the apparatus body to be movable linearly, a shaft which is provided on the tandem photosensitive drum unit for each developing cartridge; and a pivoting member which is rotatably supported by the shaft. The pivoting member includes an abutting portion which is provided on one side to abut the translation member, a pressing portion which is provided on the other side, and is configured to press a predetermined portion of the developing cartridge in a direction in which the developing roller is separated from the photosensitive drum; and a spring portion which applies a biasing force in a direction in which the pressing portion is separated from the predetermined portion.
US09304436B2
A developer container includes a container body and a movable wall. The container body includes a cylindrical internal space extending in a first direction and defined by an inner surface of the container body. The container body includes a developer discharge port. The movable wall includes an outer surface disposed in close contact with the inner surface of the container body, and a conveying surface defining a storage space configured to contain the developer. The movable wall moves to the developer discharge port in the first direction from one end side toward the other end side of the internal space, while conveying the developer in the storage space to the developer discharge port. The outer surface of the movable wall includes a discharge port sealing portion. When the movable wall is at the developer discharge port, the discharge port sealing portion covers the developer discharge port.
US09304435B2
Electronic systems, such as printing systems, often use components that have integral memory. The integral memory can be used to store information about the component. In some printing systems this memory includes a portion that stores a value indicative of a print yield. Disclosed is a method and system for allowing the memory to have data indicative of an increased print yield.
US09304429B2
A charging member includes an electro-conductive substrate and an electro-conductive resin layer. The electro-conductive resin layer contains a binder, a plurality of bowl-shaped resin particles, and a plurality of hollow particles. The charging member has a surface having recesses due to openings of the bowl-shaped resin particles and protrusions due to edges of the openings of the bowl-shaped resin particles, where the positional relationship between one bowl-shaped resin particle and the hollow particles lying in the vicinity of the bowl-shaped resin particle is that the number of the hollow particles being in the space under the bowl-shaped resin particle in a predetermined depth is at least four in average.
US09304422B2
It is intended to provide magnetic toner that produces a stable image density in long-term use and can prevent ghosting under conditions of low-temperature and low-humidity. The present invention provides magnetic toner including magnetic toner particles each containing a binder resin, a magnetic material and a releasing agent, and silica fine particles, wherein the silica fine particles include silica fine particles A and B, the silica fine particles A have a number-average particle size of 5-20 nm as primary particles, the silica fine particles B are produced by a sol-gel method, and have a number-average particle size of 40-200 nm as primary particles, an abundance ratio of secondary particles of the silica fine particles B is 5-40% by number, and a coverage ratio X1 of the surface of the magnetic toner particles with the silica fine particles determined by ESCA is 40.0-75.0% by area.
US09304414B2
A method for producing an electrophotographic photosensitive member having a charge transporting layer, the charge transporting layer being a surface layer, the method including drying a coat of a charge-transporting-layer coating liquid to form the charge transporting layer, wherein the charge-transporting-layer coating liquid contains components (α), (β), (γ) and (δ), and when the solubility of the component (α) in 100 g of the component (γ) is defined as X(g) and the solubility of the component (α) in 100 g of the component (δ) is defined as Y(g), solubility X and solubility Y satisfy a relationship of X>Y.
US09304406B2
A field facet mirror for an illumination optics of a projection exposure apparatus for EUV microlithography transmits a structure of an object arranged in an object field into an image field. The field facet mirror has a plurality of field facets with reflection surfaces. The arrangement of the field facets next to one another spans a base plane. Projections of the reflection surfaces of at least two of the field facets onto the base plane differ with respect to at least one of the following parameters: size, shape, orientation. A field facet mirror results which can ensure a uniform object field illumination with a simultaneously high EUV throughput.
US09304401B2
A radiation spot measurement system for a lithographic apparatus, the system having a target onto which a radiation system of the lithographic apparatus may project spots of radiation for a measurement process, the target having a measurement target. The system further includes a radiation detector to detect radiation from one of the spots, and a controller to receive information from the radiation detector and to determine the position of the spot of radiation relative to an intended position of the spot of radiation.
US09304398B2
The present invention is a developing treatment apparatus for performing development by supplying a developing solution to a substrate having a front surface coated with a positive resist or a negative resist and then subjected to exposure wherein a movable cup is raised to introduce one of scattering developing solutions for the positive and negative resists into an inner peripheral flow path of a cup and the movable cup is lowered to introduce the other of scattering developing solutions for the positive and negative resists into an outer peripheral flow path of the cup, and the developing solution introduced into the inner peripheral flow path and the developing solution introduced into the outer peripheral flow path are separately drained.
US09304396B2
Provided herein are multi-layer stacks for use in extreme ultraviolet lithography tailored to achieve optimum etch contrast to shrink features and smooth the edges of features while enabling use of an optical leveling sensor with little or reduced error. The multi-layer stacks may include an atomically smooth layer with an average local roughness of less than a monolayer, and one or more underlayers, which may be between a target layer to be patterned and a photoresist. Also provided are methods of depositing multi-layer stacks for use in extreme ultraviolet lithography.
US09304390B2
A system and process of an extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUVL) is disclosed. The system and process includes receiving a mask with two states, which have 180 degree phase difference to each other. These different states are assigned to adjacent main polygons and adjacent assist polygons of the mask. A nearly on-axis illumination (ONI) with partial coherence σ less than 0.3 is utilized to expose the mask to produce diffracted lights and non-diffracted lights. A majority portion of the non-diffracted lights and diffracted light with diffraction order higher than 1 are removed. Diffracted light having +1-st and −1-st diffracted order are collected and directed by a projection optics box (POB) to expose a target.
US09304380B2
The present invention provides a projection type display apparatus for displaying an image by which reduction of contrast is suppressed, including: a light source; a first lens array and a second lens array having a plurality of lens cell areas; a collecting lens; a display element; a projection lens; and a light shielding unit which light-shields the light fluxes from the first lens array to the second lens array, wherein the light shielding unit light-shields at least parts of all the lens cell areas except for the lens cell area in contact with an optical axis among a plurality of rectangular lens cell areas of the second lens array, and a light shielding area in the lens cell area in contact with the optical axis is smaller than that in any of the lens cell areas except for the lens cell area in contact with the optical axis.
US09304373B2
A terahertz wave generation element is provided, which includes: an optical waveguide including a core of electro-optic crystal; an optical coupler for extracting a terahertz wave generated from the optical waveguide when light propagates in the optical waveguide to a space; and a reflecting layer disposed on the opposite side to the optical coupler with respect to the core of the optical waveguide, so as to reflect the generated terahertz wave. According to the element, it is possible to provide a generation element that can generate a relatively high intensity terahertz wave efficiently by photoexcitation or generate a terahertz wave having a relatively narrow pulse width, so as to flexibly control waveform shaping of the generated terahertz wave.
US09304367B2
An electro-static discharge protection circuit for a liquid crystal display is disclosed. In response to positive electro-static charges being generated on the signal line, a thin film transistor with a gate electrode connected to the high level signal line is switched on, and the positive electro-static charges are discharged through the switched on thin film transistor. In addition, in response to negative electro-static charges being generated on the signal line, a thin film transistor with a gate electrode connected to the low level signal line is switched on, and the negative electro-static charges are discharged through the switched on thin film transistor.
US09304354B2
A light-emitting module includes: (a) a liquid-crystal module containing a pair of transparent substrates and a liquid-crystal layer disposed between the pair of transparent substrates; (b) a first light-emitting diode (LED) component disposed on a first side of the liquid-crystal module; (c) a first transparent cover plate over the first LED component such that the first LED component is sandwiched between the liquid-crystal module and the first transparent cover plate; and (d) a control circuit configured to control an on/off frequency of the liquid-crystal module and a light-emitting frequency of the first LED component in such a manner that the light emitted from the first LED component is synchronously shielded by the liquid-crystal module, wherein the light is emitted from a side opposite to the liquid-crystal module.
US09304351B2
A display device includes: a substrate which includes a plurality of pixel areas disposed in a matrix configuration; a pixel electrode positioned in each of the pixel areas; a roof layer positioned on the pixel electrode and spaced apart from the pixel electrode with a microcavity therebetween; injection holes respectively positioned at two edges of the microcavity; a support positioned at one edge of the microcavity and adjacent to one of the injection holes; an alignment layer positioned on an inner surface of the microcavity; and a liquid crystal layer positioned in the microcavity. The support is disposed at each of opposite edges of two microcavities which are adjacent to each other in a column direction.
US09304346B2
A display device includes: a first substrate and a second substrate which are located so that inner main surfaces thereof face each other; a liquid crystal layer located between the first substrate and the second substrate; a seal material located between the first substrate and the second substrate so as to surround the liquid crystal layer, the seal material bonding the first substrate and the second substrate to each other; an organic insulation film located in a seal formation area on the inner main surface of the second substrate, the organic insulation film having an opening section in the seal formation area; and an inorganic insulation film located to continue from an inside of the opening section to a surface of the organic insulation film through an inner wall surface of the opening section, the inorganic insulation film being directly covered with the seal material.
US09304344B2
Disclosed is a display device that includes a display panel, a guide frame configured to support the display panel, a plurality of fixers arranged between the display panel and the guide frame and include an accommodating part, a cover member inserted into the accommodating part of each fixer and configured to fix the display panel to the guide frame together with the plurality of fixers, and a pad disposed between the display panel and the guide frame and configured to prevent penetration of a foreign material.
US09304338B2
Electronic devices may include displays. A display may include a display unit that includes an array of display pixels and a backlight unit that provides backlight illumination for the display pixels. An automated alignment system may be used to align the display unit to the backlight unit. The alignment system may include a camera, a control unit, and computer-controlled positioners. The control unit may gather alignment feature location information from the display unit and the backlight unit using the camera. The control unit may determine a centroid of the backlight unit based on the alignment feature location information. The alignment feature location information may include the respective locations of openings in the backlight unit. The control unit may operate computer-controlled positioners to align the display unit with respect to the backlight unit using the centroid and to subsequently attach the display unit to the backlight unit.
US09304333B2
An electronically dimmable optical device, including, in sequence, an active absorbing polarizer; a first static reflective polarizer; an active polarization rotator; and a second static reflective polarizer; configured so that the reflectivity and/or transmissivity of the device can be controlled (increased or decreased) by application of a voltage across the active absorbing polarizer and/or the active polarization rotator. One or more polarization levels can be selected by controlling the voltage at the active absorptive polarizer such that setting the active absorptive polarizer to a selected polarization level determines the brightness of an image produced by the device.
US09304329B2
A multifocal diffractive lens comprises a multifocal diffractive structure coupled to a refractive component. The refractive component comprises at least one curved surface. The multifocal diffractive structure comprises a first plurality of substantially monofocal echellettes having a first optical power for near vision correction and a second plurality of substantially monofocal echellettes for far vision correction. The first plurality of substantially monofocal echellettes combined with the second plurality of substantially monofocal echellettes can provide a multifocal diffractive profile having decreased light scatter, chromatic aberration, and diffraction to non-viewing orders such that dysphotopsia is substantially inhibited. A third plurality of substantially monofocal echellettes having an intermediate optical power can be combined with the first plurality of substantially monofocal echellettes and the second plurality of substantially monofocal echellettes.
US09304325B2
The present invention provides a VCA-based lens driving device. By way of giving an improved OIS coil structure, a magnetic induction element used to sense movement of magnets atop which maybe cause from a user's hand shaking can be placed as far away from OIS coils as possible. The impact of the magnet field of the OIS coil on the magnetic induction element is thus reduced. In one embodiment, the OIS coil is down-sized to reduce the influence of the OIS coil on the magnetic induction element placed beside it. In another embodiment, the OIS coil has a one-sided indention and the magnetic induction element is placed below/or beside the indention of the OIS coil.
US09304324B2
A vertical axis shock and vibration isolator for a camera has first and second plates connected by linkages which allow the plates to move towards and away from each other, while keeping the plates parallel to each other. The second plate is suspended from the first plate on dampener assemblies having a spring and a fluid dampener. The isolator may be used in an under slung or an over slung position, without changing its isolation characteristics. When set up in an over slung position, the dampener assemblies may be inverted separately from the isolator so that the springs remain loaded in compression.
US09304323B2
A projection device may include at least one first laser device and one second laser device, which is arranged opposite the first laser device. A prism is arranged between the two laser devices, wherein a polarization-dependent mirror device is arranged in the prism in such a manner that the beam of the first laser device is reflected in a direction that extends opposite the direction in which the beam of the second laser device is reflected. The polarization of the beam of the second laser device is then rotated, and the beam is deflected back to the polarization-dependent mirror device. The beam of the second laser device now passes through the mirror device without reflection due to the change in the polarization of the beam of the second laser device, such that two superposed laser beams of different polarization are available at the output of the projection device.
US09304307B2
A light scanning microscope with an illumination module generates several illumination beams and moves them, in each case as a spot, in a predefined region of a sample to excite sample radiation. A detector module for confocal detection of the sample radiation excited by each spot includes a first detector, an imaging lens system, having an optical axis, for imaging the predefined region along an imaging beam path running from the sample as far as the first detector, and a rotatable diaphragm with several pinholes located in a pinhole plane. The diaphragm, upon rotation, may be located at least partially in the imaging beam path for confocal detection. A second detector may be arranged outside of the imaging beam path. A first beam splitter may be arranged in the imaging beam path between the sample and the diaphragm. The beam splitter deflects sample radiation onto the second detector.
US09304305B1
Plural image planes are illuminated through a single image-collecting objective system. The field of view or magnification (or both), is allocated dynamically among the plural planes. Preferably the planes include two detector planes—one corresponding to a wide field of view (FOV) and the other to a steerable narrow one. Allocation is performed by a beam splitter in combination with a steering mirror, or steering-mirror array, that steers both fields together. The splitter isolates radiation corresponding to the narrow FOV from radiation corresponding to the wide FOV. In method forms of the invention, an electrooptical observation system produces simultaneous plural images for a region of interest. The system displays simultaneous images having respective plural resolutions. In operation a first, relatively wider FOV continuously covers a region of interest; while the second is narrower and has finer resolution than the first.
US09304304B2
An image capturing lens assembly includes, in order from an object side to an image side, a first lens element, a second lens element, a third lens element and a fourth lens element. The first lens element with negative refractive power has an object-side surface being convex and an image-side surface being concave. The second lens element with positive refractive power has an object-side surface and an image-side surface being both convex. The third lens element with positive refractive power has an object-side surface being concave and an image-side surface being convex. The fourth lens element with positive refractive power has an object-side surface being convex, and an image-side surface being concave at a paraxial region and being convex at a peripheral region, wherein the surfaces of the fourth lens element are aspheric.
US09304303B2
A positive-negative-positive-positive-positive zoom lens changes magnification by moving each of a first group to a fourth group so as to alter the interval between each group. The third group comprises first and second lens components, at least one of which has an aspheric surface, and the first lens component is a positive-negative-positive cemented lens in sequence from the object side. The zoom lens satisfies the conditional expressions, 7<β2t/β2w<10, 5<β3t/β3w<12, 0.7<(β2t/β2w)/(β3t/β3w)<1.65) (where: β2t is the lateral magnification of the second group at the telephoto end; β2w is the lateral magnification of the second group at the wide end; β3t is the lateral magnification of the third group at the telephoto end; and β3w is the lateral magnification of the third group at the wide end).
US09304296B2
An imaging lens substantially consists of, in order from an object side, five lenses of a first lens that has a positive refractive power and has a meniscus shape which is concave toward an image side, a second lens that has a negative refractive power and has a meniscus shape which is concave toward the image side, a third lens that has a negative refractive power and is concave toward the object side, a fourth lens that has a positive refractive power and has a meniscus shape which is convex toward the image side, and a fifth lens that has a biconcave shape and has an aspheric shape which has at least one extreme point on an image side surface. Further, the imaging lens satisfies predetermined conditional expressions.
US09304294B2
An imaging lens includes plastic-made first, second, third, and fourth lens elements arranged in the given order from an object side to an imaging side. The first lens element has a positive focusing power and is biconvex. The second lens element has a negative focusing power, is biconcave, and has an abbe number not greater than 30. The third lens element has a positive focusing power and has a convex imaging-side surface facing toward the imaging side. The fourth lens element has an imaging-side surface formed with a concave area in a vicinity of an optical axis of the fourth lens element. The imaging lens further includes an aperture stop disposed between the first and second lens elements.
US09304289B2
An imaging lens includes first to fifth lens elements arranged from an object side to an image side in the given order. Through designs of surfaces of the lens elements and relevant optical parameters, a short system length of the imaging lens may be achieved while maintaining good optical performance.
US09304282B2
A focusing motor an enclosure includes: a lens barrel; a lower support; an iron sheet perpendicularly fixed to the lower support; a coil attached to an inner surface of the iron sheet; at least one pair of magnets arranged on an outer side of the barrel along an optic axis of the barrel and parallel to the coil, a magnetic pole of one magnet is opposite to that of an adjacent magnet; a first guide rail disposed on the outer side of the barrel; a second guide rail disposed on an inner side of the lower support and parallel to the first guide rail; and a pulley assembly located between the barrel and the lower support, and movable along the first and second guide rails.
US09304277B2
An enclosure for housing and fastening a length of optical cable, the optical cable having an outer sheath and a flexible strength member, includes a fixing element and a retention assembly, the fixing element being adapted for engaging a portion of the outer sheath and the retention assembly being adapted for fastening the flexible strength member. The fixing element and the retention assembly are independent from each other. The retention assembly includes a reel and a reel seat. The reel is adapted to receive at least one turn of the flexible strength member wound thereon and to be inserted without rotation into the reel seat. The reel seat is adapted for housing the reel. The reel seat is shaped at least partially mating the shape of the reel.
US09304274B2
A strain relief device and method are provided for use with an optical fiber cable of an optical communications system. The strain relief device comprises a plurality of metal wires, or rods, grouped into a bundle of parallel metal wires and a clamping mechanism for clamping first and second ends of the metal wires to an optical fiber cable. The clamped bundle of metal wires forms a spring having a spring constant that provides it with a desired stiffness and a desired flexibility.
US09304268B2
An optical interposer comprising: (a) a crystalline substrate having a top planar surface and a crystalline plane angle; (b) a groove defined in the top planar surface and extending from an edge of the substrate to a terminal end, the groove having side walls and a first facet at the terminal end, the facet having a first angle relative to the top planar surface, the first angle being about the crystalline plane angle, the first angle having a delta from 45°; (c) a reflective coating on the first facet; and (d) an optical conduit having an optical axis and an end face optically coupled with the first facet, the end face having a second angle with respect to the optical axis such that the angle of refraction at the end face compensates for the delta such that the end face and the first facet cooperate to bend light about 90°.
US09304265B2
Embodiments disclosed herein include fiber optic connectors employing a movable optical interface connected by optical fibers to a fiber optic cable, components and methods. In one embodiment, the movable optical interface moves between an extended position for cleaning by the user of the movable optical interface and a retracted position to optically connect the fiber optic connector to an optical device in a mechanically-secure manner. Because the fiber optic cable employs the movable optical interfaces, embodiments described herein involve one or more fiber protection features to prevent optical fiber attenuation and/or damage to the end portions of the optical fibers.
US09304263B2
A connector includes an insulating connector body having a contact hole formed in the connector body. A metal shell receives the connector body. An adapter in the contact hole supports a fiber optic terminus. A securing member is located on an exterior surface of the connector body and releasably attaches the adapter to the connector body such that the adapter and terminus can be conjointly and nondestructively inserted into the connector body and conjointly and nondestructively removed from the connector body.
US09304262B2
A fiber optic cable assembly includes a fiber optic cable and a fiber optic connector. The cable includes a jacket having an elongated transverse cross-sectional profile that defines a major axis and a minor axis. Strength components of the cable are anchored to the connector. The fiber optic connector includes a multi-fiber ferrule defining a major axis that is generally perpendicular to the major axis of the jacket and a minor axis that is generally perpendicular to the minor axis of the jacket. Certain types of connectors include a connector body defining a side opening that extends along a length of the connector body; a multi-fiber ferrule configured for lateral insertion into the connector body through the side opening; and a cover that mounts over the side opening after the multi-fiber ferrule has been inserted into the connector body through the side opening.
US09304259B1
A micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) mirror array can be constructed using sub-dies that each includes two or more MEMS mirrors. In some implementations, an optical cross-connect system includes a first MEMS mirror array that includes first mirror units. Each first mirror unit can include a first substrate and two or more first MEMS mirrors supported by the first substrate. Each first substrate can be independent from each other first substrate. The cross-connect system can include a second MEMS mirror array that includes second mirror units. Each second mirror unit can include a second substrate and two or more second MEMS mirrors supported by the second substrate. Each second substrate can be independent from each other second substrate.
US09304258B2
An optical fiber grating tracker includes a first stub, a second stub, an optical fiber grating, and a connection part. The connection part has a through hole. The first stub is inserted into one end of the through hole. The second stub is inserted into the other end of the through hole. An interval exists between the first stub and the second stub. The optical fiber grating is in the through hole and in the interval. A space in the through hole is filled with a waterproof material. The optical fiber grating tracker and the method for detecting an optical fiber line fault can detect an optical fiber fault from an optical fiber truck to the optical fiber grating tracker through an optical splitter, and meanwhile do not affect normal communication of an original optical communication network.
US09304247B2
Provided is a display device, which includes a light source, a light guide plate, a light conversion member, and a display panel. Light is incident to the light guide plate from the light source. The light conversion member is between the light source and the light guide plate. The display panel is on the light guide plate. The light guide plate includes a central region corresponding to an available display region of the display panel for displaying an image, an outer region around the central region, and a total reflection surface inclined from an optical axis of the light source, and disposed in the outer region.
US09304246B2
A composite light guide plate comprises a light guide plate and a prism structure adhering to the light guide plate. The light guide plate comprises a light emitting surface. A plurality of first microstructures is formed on the light emitting surface. The prism structure is adhered on the light emitting surface of the light guide plate. The prism structure comprises a first surface in contact with the light emitting surface. A plurality of second microstructures is formed on the first surface. Each second microstructure is corresponding to and in tight contact with one of the first microstructure. An apparatus and a method for manufacturing the composite light guide plate is also provided.
US09304240B2
A method for manufacturing phase retarder film includes steps of providing a substrate; forming an alignment layer on the substrate, the alignment layer having at least a first phase region, at least a second phase region and at least a third phase region, the third phase region being disposed between the first phase region and the second phase region, and a phase retardation of the third phase region being different from phase retardations of the first phase region and the second phase region. The phase retardation of the first phase region is different from the phase retardation of the second phase region.
US09304238B2
A polarizing plate, a fabrication method thereof, and a display device using the same are provided. The polarizing plate includes a polarizing element, a first adhesive layer formed on one surface of the polarizing element, a second adhesive layer formed on the other surface of the polarizing element, a protective film attached to an upper portion of the first adhesive layer, a bonding layer attached to a lower portion of the second adhesive layer, and a luminance enhancement film attached to the bonding layer.
US09304236B2
Disclosed is an optical member in the form of a film or a thin plate. The optical member contains near infrared absorbing particles comprising crystallites of an oxide containing at least Cu and P and having a number average aggregated particle size of at least 20 nm and at most 200 nm. Further, a near infrared cut filter, a solid-state imaging element, a lens for an imaging device and an imaging/display device are disclosed. They comprise a near infrared absorbing layer containing near infrared absorbing particles comprising crystallites of an oxide containing at least Cu and P and having a number average aggregated particle size of at least 20 nm and at most 200 nm.
US09304228B2
An object detection apparatus includes an incident optical system, which includes light source units and a combining unit combining light beams emitted from the light source units; a deflection unit including rotating reflection parts that deflect the light beams to scan and be irradiated on a predetermined range of an object; an imaging unit forming an image based on the light from the predetermined range of the object; and an optical detection unit detecting the object based on the light received via the imaging unit. Further the combining unit combines the light beams such that each of the combined light beams passes a single light path when projected onto a predetermined plane, and each of the light paths exists outside a region of the deflection unit when projected onto the first plane.
US09304224B2
A method for electromagnetic geophysical surveying according to one aspect of the invention includes disposing a plurality of electromagnetic receivers in a selected pattern above an area of the Earth's subsurface to be evaluated. An electromagnetic source is repeatedly actuated proximate the electromagnetic receivers. Signals generated by the receivers, indexed in time with respect to each actuation of the at least one electromagnetic energy source, are recorded. The recorded signals are processed to generate an image corresponding to at least one point in the subsurface. The processing includes stacking recordings from each receiver for a plurality of actuations of the sources and beam steering a response of the receivers such that the at least one point is equivalent to a focal point of a response of the plurality of receivers.
US09304218B2
A digital seismic sensor adapted to be connected, via a two-conductor line, to an acquisition device. The digital seismic sensor includes: a digital sensor; a local sampling clock providing a sampling frequency; a receiver for receiving command data coming from the acquisition device and synchronization information providing accurate timing information to enable seismic sensor synchronization; a compensator for compensating, as a function of the synchronization information, a drift of the local sampling clock; a transmitter for transmitting seismic data towards the acquisition device; a driver for driving the receiver and the transmitter, according to a half-duplex transmission protocol over the two-conductor line and using a transmission clock extracted from the received command data; a power receiver for receiving electrical power; and a coupler for coupling the command and synchronization information receiver, the transmitter and the power receiver to the two-conductor line.
US09304216B2
An apparatus includes an array of seismic sensor units that are adapted to acquire measurements in connection with a land surface-based seismic survey. Each seismic sensor unit includes a particle motion sensor and a rotation sensor.
US09304208B2
A method of controlling a mobile terminal, and which includes turning on, via a controller of the mobile terminal, a global positioning system (GPS) engine to measure a position of the mobile terminal and provide a position-related service using the position measured by the GPS engine; sensing, via a sensor of the mobile terminal, a movement characteristic of the mobile terminal; temporarily turning off the GPS engine when the sensed movement characteristic of the mobile terminal is below a predetermined threshold; and turning back on the GPS engine when then sense movement characteristic is greater than or equal to the predetermined threshold.
US09304198B1
The various technologies presented herein relate to the determination of and correction of heading error of platform. Knowledge of at least one of a maximum Doppler frequency or a minimum Doppler bandwidth pertaining to a plurality of radar echoes can be utilized to facilitate correction of the heading error. Heading error can occur as a result of component drift. In an ideal situation, a boresight direction of an antenna or the front of an aircraft will have associated therewith at least one of a maximum Doppler frequency or a minimum Doppler bandwidth. As the boresight direction of the antenna strays from a direction of travel at least one of the maximum Doppler frequency or a minimum Doppler bandwidth will shift away, either left or right, from the ideal situation.
US09304190B2
The invention relates to the remote measurement of the dielectric permittivity of dielectrics. A 3D microwave and a 3D optical range images of an interrogated scene are recorded at the same time moment. The images are digitized and overlapped. A space between the microwave and optical image is measured, and a dielectric permittivity of the space between these images is determined. If the dielectric permittivity is about 3, then hidden explosive materials or components of thereof are suspected. The invention makes it possible to remotely determine the dielectric permittivity of a moving, irregularly-shaped dielectric objects.
US09304189B2
This disclosure includes systems and methods for detecting radar signals by performing an initial spectral analysis to identify candidate radar signals and subsequently determining whether any candidate radar signals are false detections using a secondary analysis.
US09304187B2
The present invention relates to a method for estimating the positions of devices in direct communication with each other, to a method for estimating the structure of a network, and to apparatuses for supporting the methods. According to one embodiment of the present invention, the method for estimating the positions of devices in a wireless access system which supports direct D2D communication between the devices includes the steps of: obtaining information on distance estimation to an adjacent D2D device (for example, a second D2D device) by a D2D device having two reference points (for example, a first D2D device); and estimating the position of the D2D device by using the information on distance estimation and the position information on the two reference points, at which time the information on distance estimation can be obtained through direct D2D communication between the D2D device and the adjacent D2D device.
US09304186B2
A method and system for time-of-flight (ToF) positioning in an IEEE 802.11 network comprises a responder station to transmit samples of preambles as the preambles are received. The samples represent channel information. The preambles comprise extension high-throughput long training fields (HT-LTFs). An initiator station is arranged to perform a time-of-arrival calculation based at least in part on an analysis of the channel information.
US09304184B1
A method for increasing accuracy of geolocation based on timing measurements of RF signals. The method includes: (a) receiving at a user one or more RF signals transmitted over time, (b) correlating the received signals with a plurality of replica waveforms, (c) creating a first set of estimates of the time or arrivals of the signals at the user, (d) using the first set of estimates to create a plurality of models, wherein each model assumes that some of the measurements are affected by multipath or interference, (e) testing the models to estimate the likelihood of timing measurements for each model, and (f) determining the set of LOS measurements as one associated with a model having the largest likelihood.
US09304170B2
A modular heavy load battery test system is provided. The system includes a heavy load module and a battery tester. The heavy load module includes a housing, first and second lengths of high-resistivity, large-gauge wire arranged on respective upper and lower surfaces of a heat-resistant support plate, a switch and at least one cooling fan. The battery tester includes a housing, a microcontroller and a set of battery charging wires. The microcontroller selects the configuration of the first and second wires and provides the control signal to the heavy load module, while the switch selectively connects the first and second wires to the battery tester based upon the control signal.
US09304169B2
A method for processing a power source state and a terminal supporting the same, wherein the terminal includes a power source configured to supply a specific electric power; a charger IC configured to collect power source information transmitted from a charger to the power source; a gauge IC configured to collect charging information of the power source and to generate gauging information to display a fuel gauge indicating a charging state of the power source based on the power source information transmitted by the charger IC; a control unit configured to display the fuel gauge based on the gauging information transmitted by the gauge IC; and a display unit configured to display the fuel gauge.
US09304160B1
Aspects of the present disclosure describe an inspection apparatus which performs inspection on a smaller field of a wafer with structures for current collection. The defective via holes may be located based on the collected current. It is emphasized that this abstract is provided to comply with the rules requiring an abstract that will allow a searcher or other reader to quickly ascertain the subject matter of the technical disclosure. It is submitted with the understanding that it will not be used to interpret or limit the scope or meaning of the claims.
US09304158B2
A method for determining current return path integrity in an electric device with a plurality of signal lines and supply lines. A library with at least one reference signal pattern of a near end crosstalk signal on a defined signal line arising from an input signal on another defined signal line is provided, a predetermined signal to a selected signal line of the electric device is applied, the near end crosstalk signal on at least one further signal line of the electric device is detected, said near end crosstalk signal is compared with the corresponding reference signal pattern from the library, and if there is a deviation between the near end crosstalk signal and the corresponding reference signal pattern, an information that there is any defect in the electric device is displayed.
US09304153B2
In one embodiment, a method of verifying a component coupled to an output of a power supply includes measuring a frequency response from a control input of the power supply to the output of the power supply. The method also includes comparing the frequency response to a predetermined metric based on the measuring. The component is determined to be valid if the frequency response falls within the predetermined metric.
US09304152B2
A current monitoring circuit is disclosed. The current monitoring circuit includes a main transistor arrangement for connection in series with a load and a set of one or more measurement branches in parallel with the main transistor arrangement. Each measurement branch comprises a series resistor and switch for controlling the connection of the branch into circuit. A gate controller is provided for controlling the switching of the main transistor arrangement and branch switches and a sense amplifier is included for measuring a current through the load based on the current flowing through the main transistor arrangement or a branch.
US09304150B2
A current probe enabling measurement of current of a signal in a circuit includes a ferrite core defining a gap, a wire wrapped around the ferrite core and a magnetic field sensor. The wire is configured to receive the signal from the circuit, where the current of the signal flowing in the wire generates a magnetic field in the ferrite core. The magnetic field sensor is positioned in the gap of the ferrite core, the magnetic field generated in the ferrite core flowing through the magnetic field sensor, which produces a voltage proportional to an intensity of the magnetic field. The current is measured based on the voltage produced by the magnetic field sensor.
US09304140B2
A sample analyzer comprising: a sample dispenser for dispensing a sample into a reaction container; a sample transporter for sequentially transports a plurality of reaction containers along a transporting path; a processing station including a plurality of processing sections and a transferring section that transfers a reaction container between the sample transporter and the processing sections; and a controller is disclosed. The sample dispenser sequentially dispenses samples at intervals. The controller alternates the interval when problem occurred at any of the processing sections.
US09304139B2
An object of the present invention is to provide a method for analyzing hemoglobins which can accurately separate hemoglobins in a short time by liquid chromatography. The method for analyzing hemoglobins by liquid chromatography includes pretreating a sample with an oxidant and a binder for trivalent heme iron.
US09304132B2
A molecular delivery system including a plurality of nanowires (e.g., Si NWs), each of the nanowires having a surface layer formed of a silicon-containing material and a covalently bound linker (e.g., silane linker) attached to the surface layer, and optionally including a substrate to which the nanowires are adhered or a molecule to be delivered attached to the linker. Also disclosed is a method of delivering into a cell an exogenous molecule.
US09304129B2
Embodiments of the present invention are directed toward devices, systems, and method for conducting assays using sedimentation. In one example, a method includes layering a mixture on a density medium, subjecting sedimentation particles in the mixture to sedimentation forces to cause the sedimentation particles to move to a detection area through a density medium, and detecting a target analyte in a detection region of the sedimentation channel. In some examples, the sedimentation particles and labeling agent may have like charges to reduce non-specific binding of labeling agent and sedimentation particles. In some examples, the density medium is provided with a separation layer for stabilizing the assay during storage and operation. In some examples, the sedimentation channel may be provided with a generally flat sedimentation chamber for dispersing the particle pellet over a larger surface area.
US09304128B1
Embodiments of the present invention are directed toward devices, system and method for conducting toxin activity assay using sedimentation. The toxin activity assay may include generating complexes which bind to a plurality of beads in a fluid sample. The complexes may include a target toxin and a labeling agent, or may be generated due to presence of active target toxin and/or labeling agent designed to be incorporated into complexes responsive to the presence of target active toxin. The plurality of beads including the complexes may be transported through a density media, wherein the density media has a lower density than a density of the beads and higher than a density of the fluid sample, and wherein the transporting occurs, at least in part, by sedimentation. Signal may be detected from the labeling agents of the complexes.
US09304126B2
The invention relates to compounds of Formula I, wherein R1, R2, and R3 are defined in the specification, useful for the synthesis of novel conjugates and immunogens derived from quetiapine. The invention also relates to conjugates of a quetiapine hapten and a protein.
US09304124B2
A ligand design allows compact nanoparticle materials, such as quantum dots (QDs), with excellent colloidal stability over a wide range of pH and under high salt concentrations. Self-assembled biomolecular conjugates with QDs can be obtained which are stable in biological environments. Energy transfer with these ligands is maximized by minimizing distances between QDs/nanoparticles and donors/acceptors directly attached to the ligands or assembled on their surfaces.
US09304122B2
The present disclosure is related to a microfluidic flow analyzer for pathological detection. The microfluidic flow analyzer comprises plurality of buffer channels, sample channel, central flow channel, plurality of exciting optical channels and plurality of receiving optical channels. The plurality of exciting optical channels and the plurality of receiving optical channels are placed at predetermined angle to the central flow channel. The plurality of exciting optical channels excite cell in the sample solution flowing through the central flow channel. The cell being excited produces one or more optical signals. The one or more optical signals are received by the plurality of receiving optical channels. The microfluidic flow analyzer comprises plurality of detectors placed on each of the plurality of receiving optical channels for detecting one of the one or more optical signals. The detected optical signal is sent to a computing unit for pathological detection.
US09304121B2
Method, apparatus and arrangement according an exemplary embodiment of the present invention can be provided for generating an image of at least one portion of an anatomical structure. For example, the portion can have an area greater than about 1 mm2, and the image can have a resolution a transverse resolution that is below about 10 μm. For example, light can be scanned over such portion so as to generate first information which is related to the portion, where the light may be provided through a diffraction arrangement to generate a spectrally dispersed line. Method, apparatus and arrangement according to a further exemplary embodiment of the present invention can be provided for positioning a radiation or optical beam within an anatomical structure based on signals generated by scanning a portion of the structure using the same or a different beam.
US09304119B2
Systems and methods for testing an engine lubricant are provided. The system includes a heated block having at least one cavity therein, at least one test cylinder receiving the engine lubricant therein, and at least one heated test piston selectively disposable into the engine lubricant of the test cylinder whereby deposits are formable on the test piston. The test cylinder is positionable in the cavity of the heated block and heatable thereby. Taxi oils and/or gases may be added to facilitate testing.
US09304117B2
A gas processing device such as an aerosol exposure monitor is configured for acquiring chronic data, acute data, or both simultaneously, and may include a pump and a noise dampening device. The noise dampening device may include an elastomeric membrane between an inlet chamber and an outlet chamber. In another aspect, an aerosol exposure monitor may include an impactor, a collection filter, and a nephelometer that includes a sample chamber integrated with an aerosol flow path associated with the impactor and collection filter.
US09304116B2
An apparatus includes a portable housing and a plurality of separately operable microfluidic emitters disposed within the housing. Each microfluidic emitter h an inlet for receiving a liquid and an outlet for emitting a spray. Each microfluidic emitter is movable within the portable housing between a first position in which the outlet of that microfluidic emitter is fully retracted within the portable housing and a second position in which the outlet of that microfluidic emitter projects out of the portable housing. The portable housing with the multiple emitters is adapted to be detachably coupled to another housing portion. This housing portion includes a microfluidic substrate with a channel for transporting an eluent and an outlet aperture for emitting the eluent. The inlet of one of the emitters is detachably coupled to the outlet aperture of the microfluidic substrate.
US09304106B1
The invention provides a trapping ion mobility analyzer and methods for operating the ion mobility analyzer. The trapping ion mobility analyzer comprises an RF field for radially confining ions along an axis, a region with an axial electric DC field and a gas flow along the axis counteracting the electric DC field in the region, wherein the region either comprises a rising edge with an increasing axial electric DC field or a falling edge with a decreasing axial electric DC field and wherein the slope of the electric field strength along the axis is not constant at a substantial portion of the edge.
US09304096B2
A method of measuring a capacitance (C) of a sensor having a working electrode that is coated by an insulating layer and a ligand forming an affinity surface. The method involves the steps of bringing the electrode into contact with an analyte, supplying a constant first current (I1), and a constant second current (I2) of opposite direction to the first current (I1), and a constant third current (I3) of same direction as the first current (I1) during determined time periods to the sensor. Further the method includes sampling the potential (V) built up across the sensor, and calculating the capacitance of the sensor from the inclination (B, D, F, H) of a potential curve received in response to the current supply. A method used for detection of an interaction between a ligand and an analyte is also disclosed.
US09304087B2
A Raman spectroscopic apparatus analyzes a substance under analysis and includes a light source that emits light of a first wavelength, an optical device that adsorbs the substance under analysis and is irradiated with the light of the first wavelength, and an optical detector that receives light radiated from the optical device. The optical device includes a first structural member that generates charge transfer resonance in response to the light of the first wavelength and a second structural member that is less than or equal to 5 nm from the first structural member and generates surface plasmon resonance in response to the light of the first wavelength. The first structural member is made of a metal or a semiconductor, and the second structural member is made of a metal different from the material of the first structural member.
US09304082B2
An information acquiring apparatus that acquires information on a specimen by applying terahertz wave to the specimen through a plate-like member, the specimen being provided between a reflecting member having a reflecting surface and the plate-like member. The apparatus includes an applying unit that applies the terahertz wave to the specimen, a detecting unit that detects the terahertz wave reflected from the specimen, and an information acquiring unit that acquires the information on the specimen by using temporal waveforms acquired from a result of detection performed by the detecting unit, the information acquiring unit using at least a temporal waveform representing a portion of the terahertz wave that is reflected by an interface between the plate-like member and the specimen and a temporal waveform representing a portion of the terahertz wave that is reflected by an interface between the specimen and the reflecting surface of the reflecting member.
US09304080B2
Cavity enhanced absorption spectroscopy systems and methods for detecting trace gases using a resonance optical cavity, which contains a gas mixture to be analyzed, and a laser coupled to the cavity by optical feedback. The cavity has any of a variety of configurations with two or more mirrors, including for example a linear cavity, a v-shaped cavity and a ring optical cavity. The cavity will have multiple cavity resonant modes, or a comb of frequencies spaced apart, as determined by the parameters of the cavity, including the length of the cavity, as is well known. Systems and methods herein also allow for optimization of the cavity modes excited during a scan and/or the repetition rate.
US09304078B2
An electron gun abnormality detecting device for detecting an abnormality in first and second electron guns of a magnetic domain refining device for an electrical steel sheet includes: a magnetooptic element configured to contact with and separate from an inspection region set to include a boundary between a magnetic domain discontinuity generated by irradiation of a surface of the electrical steel sheet with an electron beam by the first electron gun and a magnetic domain discontinuity generated by irradiation thereof with an electron beam by the second electron gun, and configured to detect a steel sheet magnetic domain structure in the inspection region as an optical property; a light source configured to irradiate the magnetooptic element with linearly polarized light; and a detector configured to detect polarized light rotated by the steel sheet magnetic domain structure transferred to the magnetooptic element.
US09304077B2
Ghost reflections in a catadioptric scatterometer objective are excluded from an angle-resolved spectrum measurement by using a partial pupil for illumination and for the measurement excluding the area of the pupil plane that has been illuminated. Ghost reflections are reflected back into same point in the pupil plane. The ghost reflections do not interfere with the signal in the non-illuminated area of the pupil plane. An illumination system provides a beam of electromagnetic radiation to illuminate a first area in an illumination pupil plane of the objective. The objective is arranged as to illuminate the substrate with the beam of electromagnetic radiation. The illumination pupil plane is the back projected image of the pupil plane of the objective and is also imaged into the measurement pupil plane at the back focal plane of the objective, via auxiliary optics. A detector is configured to measure an angle resolved spectrum arising from the illumination of the substrate, in a measurement area of the measurement pupil plane of the objective excluding an area corresponding to the first area.
US09304066B2
A system for at least one of homogenization and lysis of a sample includes one or more walls forming an enclosed chamber having an inlet and a plurality of fluidic connections. A first fluidic network is coupled to at least one of the plurality of fluidic connections and a second fluidic network is coupled to at least one of the plurality of fluidic connections. The system further includes a rotary element within the chamber, and an actuator configured to rotate the rotary element. The first fluidic network is configured to introduce at least a sample into the chamber from at least one first reservoir. The second fluidic network is configured to expel at least the sample from the chamber to at least one second reservoir. The rotary element is rotated by the actuator about an axis extending along a length of the rotary element.
US09304058B2
Techniques for analyzing output modal content of optical fibers that support more than one spatial mode are disclosed. These techniques are based on spatially resolving interference between co-propagating modes and constructing a spatial beat pattern between the co-propagating modes. By doing so, these techniques provide information about the modes that propagate along the optical fiber.
US09304056B2
The invention relates in particular to a method of covering a duct for transporting or storing a fluid in a device for detecting a leak of the fluid, the device comprising a layer of insulating fibrous material arranged to surround the duct and a layer of conductive material that extends against the layer of insulating material, the conductive material being essentially constituted by fibers of carbon or graphite, wherein the layer of insulating material is secured to the wall of the duct by strapping ties around said layer.
US09304054B2
An apparatus for use in a wellbore having a housing having at least one chamber capable of receiving a fluid, a sealed annular volume, and a non-electronic pressure sensor disposed in the sealed annular volume. The non-electronic sensor includes a sealed, compressible container. Positioned within the sealed, compressible container are first and second magnets that are separated by a first distance when a fluid within the sealed annular volume is at a first pressure. When the fluid in the sealed annular volume is at a second pressure, the first and second magnets are separated by a second distance.
US09304053B2
Embodiments of a system that can detect leaks that occur in seals, and in one example, to seals found in a valve. In one embodiment, the system utilizes sensors that measure fluid properties of a sample volume proximate to the seal. The system can compare data from these measurements with data from a sample of a reference fluid (e.g., ambient air) to indicate the presence of working fluid in the sample volume. This result may indicate problems with the seal, e.g., degradation of the seal that is meant to prohibit the working fluid from migrating out of the valve.
US09304051B2
Systems, method and apparatuses of a building control sensor unit are disclosed. One apparatus includes a building control sensor unit that includes one or more sensors operative to sense an environmental condition of a structure, and a transceiver, wherein the transceiver includes an extended antenna, wherein the extended antenna includes a strand of memory metal. The apparatus further includes a controller, wherein the controller is operative to receive information from other building control sensor units or a central controller, and transmit information to the other building control sensor units or the central controller, wherein the building control sensor unit is configured such that when placed on or within a ceiling of the structure, the extended antenna extends into the structure.
US09304039B2
An integrated circuit for an imaging system is disclosed. In one aspect, an integrated circuit has an array of optical sensors, an array of optical filters integrated with the sensors and configured to pass a band of wavelengths onto one or more of the sensors, and read out circuitry to read out pixel values from the sensors to represent an image. Different ones of the optical filters are configured to have a different thickness, to pass different bands of wavelengths by means of interference, and to allow detection of a spectrum of wavelengths. The read out circuitry can enable multiple pixels under one optical filter to be read out in parallel. The thicknesses may vary non monotonically across the array. The read out, or later image processing, may involve selection or interpolation between wavelengths, to carry out spectral sampling or shifting, to compensate for thickness errors.
US09304033B2
Method for analyzing the condition of a machine having a slowly rotating part, includes: rotating a rotatable part at a rotational speed of less than 50 rpm; generating an analogue electric measurement signal dependent on mechanical vibrations emanating from rotation of a shaft using a sensor having mechanical characteristics causing it to resonate at a certain resonance frequency; sampling the analogue measurement signal at a sampling frequency to generate a digital measurement data sequence in response to the received analogue measurement data; digitally filtering the digital measurement data sequence to obtain a filtered measurement signal and achieve a signal having a bandwidth between an upper and a lower frequency which is lower than the certain resonance frequency and the upper frequency being higher than the certain resonance frequency; generating a digitally enveloped signal in response to the filtered measurement signal by digitally rectifying the filtered measurement signal, and by digital low pass filtering of the rectified filtered measurement signal to generate the digitally enveloped signal; performing a condition analysis function for analyzing the condition of the machine dependent on the digitally enveloped signal.
US09304032B2
A WIM (weigh-in-motion) sensor has an oblong hollow profile and includes two force-transmission plates arranged parallel to each other. A tube is arranged between the plates and is integrally formed with the plates and defines a hollow space. Two supports that are arranged opposite one another are formed inside the hollow space, each support extending away from a respective plate and between which a measuring element is received centrally in the tube under preload. The tube includes two tube segments designed to be mirror-symmetrical with respect to each other, which join the plates together and on the inside adjoin the hollow space. The wall thickness of each tube segment has a relatively thick region between at least two relatively thin regions.
US09304025B2
A measuring transducer comprises at least one measuring tube for carrying a flowing medium as well as a transducer housing mechanically coupled with the at least one measuring tube. The transducer housing includes: an inner shell forming a cavity accommodating the at least one measuring tube; and an outer cladding formed at least partially by means of yarn, namely cladding placed outside of the cavity and surrounding the inner shell.
US09304020B2
A device for maintaining and analyzing an aerodynamic probe of stagnation pressure type intended to be installed in an aircraft comprises a channel with a first end that is intended to penetrate into the probe, and an ejector fluidly coupled to the channel to create an air depression in said channel relative to the ambient pressure and a closed vessel recovering any particles sucked into the channel, the ejector and closed vessel being external to the probe when the channel is inserted into the probe. The ejector is coupled to a pressurized gas source and ejects gas in proximity to a second end of the channel opposite the first end to suction the air present in the channel and thereby create the air depression in said channel.
US09304012B2
Methods for dynamically varying label density and label placement on a map display used in mapping and/or navigation solutions. Label density and label placement on a map display are adjusted dynamically based on: a function class of a road being navigated, a function class of a road to be navigated following an upcoming maneuver, a distance to an upcoming maneuver, and/or a speed a device receiving mapping/navigation services is travelling.
US09304010B2
Methods, apparatuses, and computer program products are herein provided for providing broadband audio signal navigation instructions. A method may include determining a broadband audio signal associated with at least one navigation instruction. The method may further include causing the broadband audio signal to be provided to the user. The broadband audio signal may be a representation of an audio signal with components in all frequencies capable of being at least one of perceived or broadcast by a speaker. Corresponding apparatuses and computer program products are also provided.
US09304009B2
An approach is provided for determining a recommended passenger embarkation point to associate with a point of interest. An embarkation platform determines one or more candidate passenger embarkation points. The embarkation platform also processes contextual information associated with the one or more passenger embarkation points, the at least one passenger, the at least one vehicle, or a combination thereof to determine at least one recommended passenger embarkation point from among the one or more candidate passenger embarkation points. Information regarding the at least one recommended embarkation point is then caused to be presented.
US09304003B1
A computing device includes a location sensor system including sensor(s) configured to measure one or more parameters of a surrounding environment, a pose-tracking engine configured to determine a current pose of the computing device based on the one or more measured parameters of the surrounding environment, a graphing engine configured to access a traversability graph including a plurality of vertices each having a local coordinate system, a navigation engine configured to identify a nearby vertex of the traversability graph to the current pose, and configured to determine a path of traversable edges between the nearby vertex and a destination vertex of the traversability graph, and a display configured to visually present as an overlay to the environment a navigation visualization corresponding to the path.
US09304002B2
Representative implementations provide devices and techniques for observing the movement of one or more objects over a duration of time. Collected locational data of the objects is grouped according to a plurality of sliding time intervals having a variable length. The data is converted to one or more geometric representations, which are representative of object movement during a time interval. Movement patterns of the objects may be determined based on the properties of the geometric representations.
US09304000B2
A portable terminal executing an application program for realizing a predetermined function may not require a re-input operation of setting information and may reduce a restart time of the predetermined function by way of an in-vehicle apparatus. Specifically, the in-vehicle apparatus acquires and stores the setting information from the portable terminal. When a forced termination of the application program is detected, the in-vehicle apparatus transmits the setting information to the portable terminal after the application program is restarted by the portable terminal. The setting information from the in-vehicle apparatus enables the portable terminal to perform an auto-resetting process for redefining/resetting the setting information in order to resumes the application program.
US09303999B2
Methods and systems for determining estimation of motion of a device are provided. An example method includes receiving data from an inertial measurement unit (IMU) of a device and receiving images from a camera of the device for a sliding time window. The method also includes determining an IMU estimation of motion of the device based on the data from the IMU, and a camera estimation of motion of the device based on feature tracking in the images. The method includes, based on the IMU estimation and the camera estimation having a difference more than a threshold amount, determining one or more of a position or a velocity of the device for the sliding time window, and determining an overall estimation of motion of the device as supported by the data from the IMU and the position or velocity of the device.
US09303998B2
A guidance system for a mobile machine includes a location determining device for determining a location of the machine, a user interface and a controller. The controller is configured to receive location information from the location determining device, detect a path followed by the machine using the location information and, as the machine travels the path, receive waypoint information from a user via the user interface indicating a plurality of initial waypoints associated with the path. The controller is further configured to present the initial waypoints to the user, receive selected waypoint information from the user via the user interface indicating one or more of the initial waypoints as selected waypoints, and automatically guide the machine using the one or more selected waypoints.
US09303990B2
A laser beam generating device is provided for generating multiple mutually orthogonal light beams. The device includes a laser light generator that generates at least three output beams. A beamsplitter of the laser light generator has two incident surfaces orientated at forty-five degrees in relation to an optical axis. A first portion of a light from a light source is incident on a first of the two incident surfaces and output as a first output beam in a first direction orthogonal to the optical axis. A second portion of the light is incident on a second of the two incident surfaces and output as a second output beam in a second direction opposite the first direction. The light source is arranged in relation to the beamsplitter such that a third portion of the light bypasses the beamsplitter and forms a third output beam projected parallel to the optical axis.
US09303972B2
A position-measuring device includes a code carrier having a first graduation track and a second graduation track, the second graduation track being an incremental graduation track. A first detector system is configured to scan the graduation tracks so as to generate first position signals. A second detector system is configured to scan the second graduation track so as to generate second position signals. A first position-processing unit is configured to process the first position signals so as to yield a first absolute position value. A second position-processing unit is configured to process the second position signals so as to yield a second absolute position value. The first position-processing unit is configured to feed an absolute auxiliary position value to the second position-processing unit. The second position-processing unit is initializable with the absolute auxiliary position value.
US09303971B1
High aspect ratio positioning systems are disclosed herein. A high aspect ratio positioning system can be packaged in a thin package that can eliminate some bulky components typically associated with positioning systems such as pancake motors or other motors, geared resolvers, gear trains, and the like. Thus, the high aspect ratio positioning system can be used in applications where volume is limited, without sacrificing accuracy.
US09303965B1
A primer installation device provides consistent placement of a primer in an ammunition shell. The device includes a ram rod coupled to and positioned in a housing. An elevator is coupled to the housing. A position of the elevator is adjustable relative to the housing. The elevator is structured to comprise a conduit. A shell holder is coupled to the elevator. A loading pin is operationally coupled to the ram rod wherein operation of the ram rod extends the loading pin through the conduit in the elevator and through the shell holder such that the loading pin is configured for installing a primer into a shell positioned in the shell holder. Full extension of the loading pin is determined by physical obstruction of operation of the ram rod.
US09303963B1
A mechanical broadhead has an elongated body and a plurality of cutting blades pivotably mounted to the elongated body. The cutting blades, when in a folded position, nest in longitudinally extending slots in the elongated body, but assume an extended position when the broadhead enters a target.
US09303959B2
A stationary target shooting system includes a main body having a horizontal member, a vertical member, and a base. The horizontal member is coupled to a first end of the vertical member. The base is coupled to a second end of the vertical member. At least one paper target holder is disposed on the horizontal member. At least one non-paper target holder depends from the horizontal member. The stationary target shooting system is portable and can be easily broken down and reassembled for use on a variety of surfaces. The stationary target shooting system may be adapted for target shooting with both firearms and archery.
